Anyone who swears to “tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth” is promising not to commit lies of commission (making ”bald-faced lies”), lies of omissions (leaving out critical facts), or lies of influence (making deceptive statements designed to influence the listener’s judgments regarding truthfulness rather than providing a truthful response). Fact-checking services can be useful for identifying lies of commission but are less likely to identify lies of omission and lies of influence—we’ll help you learn to recognize those forms of deception.
Spy the lie, by former CIA agents Houston, Floyd, and Carcinero, provides some useful examples of deceptive answers people provide when they don’t want to tell the truth. Here are some examples, illustrated by recent answers to human rights questions that officials seem reluctant to answer honestly:
1.
A response that fails to answer the question—for example:
Question:
“Are children still being separated from their parents at the U.S. border?”
Deceptive
answer: “Our goal is always to
reunify children and teenagers with a relative or appropriate sponsor.”
2. Minimizing the level of concern warranted by an issue—for example,
Question: “What about all the negative reports concerning how the migrant children are being treated?”
Deceptive answer: “With
regard to family residential centers, the best way to describe them is more
like a summer camp.”
3. Going into attack mode—for example:
Question: Can you account for
the missing migrant children?
Deceptive answer: Unfortunately, some who ostensibly care about these children refuse to address why they are here: the loopholes in our immigration system. (emphasis added)
Your assignment: Watch for these forms of deception when viewing responses to challenging questions, while keeping in mind that honest people sometimes show one of these “symptoms of deception” without necessarily being liars. It’s the pattern, the repetition of deceptive statements, you want to watch out for.
“Man is born free, but he is
everywhere in chains.”
— Jean Jacques Rousseau (28 Jun 1712 – 2 Jul 1778), Social Contract, 1762
I.
Authoritarian Control, Dominance, Rule: Course of Human History
Fictional accounts of compelling
dystopian societies, including, Brave New World, 1984, The Handmaiden’s
Tale, Fahrenheit 451, The Matrix, and scores of apocalyptic movies,
are proving prescient.
Once confined to popular reading,
entertainment, and college seminars, fictional accounts of dystopian societies
have assumed a frightening reality as government, military, corporate, and
private sectors impose oppressive surveillance strategies, methods, techniques,
and tactics on citizens. These impositions are destroying the last semblances
of legal and moral individual “privacy,” freedoms, civil rights, and USA
Constitution First and Fourth Amendment rights, especially those guaranteed by
the Bill of Rights. 2
Citizen fears for personal safety
and security are encouraged and promoted by media collaborators with
governments, military, and corporate beneficiaries of violence and war; a
pervasive sense of peril, danger, and jeopardy is now normal. This sense of
fear both sanctions and authorizes authoritarian national security sectors to
impose egregious abuses of citizen rights and privileges with oppressive and
punitive measures.
Playing upon Western nations fears
of being overrun by invasions, occupations, and exploitations by
international migrants, especially from Islamic, Sub-Saharan African, and
Central American nations, citizens in many European countries have elected
right-wing populist governments determined to implement draconian immigration and
refugee policies, limiting or blocking immigration to selective groups and
conditions.
USA President Donald Trump announced
all “illegal” resident immigrants will be expelled form the USA beginning June
24, 2019, under the auspices of the United States Immigration and Customs
Enforcement (ICE) by the Department of Homeland Security. President Trump
considers illegal immigrants to be a threat to national security as sources of
violence, crime, disease, and competing cultural traditions.
A convincing xenophobia has found
its way into minds and hearts of citizens and officials resulting in the
emergence of widespread of “hate” cultures and outbursts of gun violence. “Our
nation is under attack by dangerous foes seeking our demise and collapse!” This
is the thematic cry of those seeking more power, control, and domination of
citizen masses, an appeal to fear and heroic nationalism.
Condemnation of violations of
citizen privacy and rights, guaranteed in the Fourth Amendment of the USA
Constitution, is drawing urgent attention from legal and NGO sources, with
little legal consequence. Government, police, military, and corporate and
private agencies are supporting numerous laws and regulations legitimizing
pervasive surveillance, monitoring, and storage of citizen information for
potential prosecution.
Control, Domination, Rule of
Citizens: An “Old” Policy and Practice
“Experience has shown that even
under the best forms of government, those entrusted with power have in time,
and by slow operations, perverted it into tyranny.”
— Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826), Preamble to a Bill for the More General
Diffusion of Knowledge, Fall 1778, Papers 2: 526-527.
Control, domination, and rule of
citizen thought, behavior, and identity by authorities and ruling classes is
the story of human history; it is the logical outcome when States, Nations,
Empires, and Colonial Rulers, especially dictatorships, assume disproportional
power.
Protests and rebellions are quelled
by a variety of oppressive measures, including arrests, imprisonment, torture,
as well as murder, beatings, and crowd control tactics. Assassinations and
disappearance of rebel leaders is common, as desperate authorities oppress
contention.
While inspirational stories of
citizen uprisings protesting control, domination, and rule, including the
French and American Revolutions, are celebrated each year as sacred holidays,
the harsh reality emerging is “omnipresent-mass surveillance.” Past
glories are diminished in the presence of new oppressions.
Never before in history have the
vast means of citizen control, domination, and rule been as total and complete
as they are now because of the uses and abuses of technology. Romantic notions
of citizen heroes leading uprisings against abusive and corrupt governments and
authorities are the stuff of past myths. Mass government surveillance and
monitoring of citizens and groups has destroyed individual and group privacy
and rights. Oppressive conformity, homogenization, and subjugation are now
accepted goals for authorities claiming national security needs.
Tragically, continued use of effective media and propaganda has resulted in citizen concurrence and acceptance of oppression and violation of Constitutional rights and privileges. A tragic paradox! “Yes, oppress and control me; I need your protection in a dangerous world.” (“Escape From Freedom. . . . . .”)
Control, Domination, Rule . . .
Governance is needed! This reality
cannot be contested! Contestations of abuses of power,
however, omnipresent in the government-congressional-corporate-military-educational
complex is required and essential. As elections approach, why are no candidates
willing to risk the tolls of exposing the situation? Where are calls and
accusations of encroaching oppression,
A challenge for citizens is the
reality “society” often hides, distorts, and represses concerns for freedom.
Openness, transparency, participation is required in a democracy. Past
presidential candidates have won on a platform of these admirable goals, only
to find upon election, they succumb to shadow powers, and conform to
traditional agendas using war and violence to achieve unwarranted goals. Who
controls the leaders? Hidden governments?
In the USA, most citizens never
imagined government would “betray” citizens given the protections of the USA
Constitution. Today, however, surveys indicate less than 10% of USA citizens
trust the government, and often see the government as biased in favor of
special interests via lobbyists.
“Secret State” and “Shadow State”
groups of powerful and positioned individuals assumed power and control,
betraying their oaths and loyalty in favor of personal agendas keeping them in
power. Much of the “Secret State” individuals are ensconced in Justice
Department offices and agencies (i.e., CIA, FBI, DHS, NSA). Crimes and abuses
of these groups continue to unfold daily revealing a tragic story of
corruption, collusion, and crime.
When societal institutions breakdown
and collapse under pressures of corruption, cronyism, special interests, and
inadequate funding, citizens are bereft of resources for protection and
security. In an open and democratic society, transparency, social
responsibility, and voting are keys to citizen awareness and empowerment. What
happens, however, when these too are lost to political interests?
Tragically, many “secret state”
societies around the world have already destroyed or denied citizen rights,
enabling groups with special interests and concerns to exist and to exact their
toll. Under these circumstances, citizen wellbeing and welfare yield to special
interests and the advancement of control in favor of mega-groups pursuing their
own interests. Citizens are no longer players, and when they attempt to
act against control, they are promptly subdued as enemies of the State.
Citizens look to government to
protect them, but corrupt governments are too closely linked and connected to
secret and known “power” groups, to offer citizen protection. In the process,
citizens lose trust in governments and societal institutions; this raises the
threshold for both protests and repression.
Within this context of institution collapse, and the rise of special interest and concerns, citizens become identified with certain groups at the cost of a society’s democratic identity and membership. They seek the comfort and security of identity with fringe elements offering simple solutions and identification of obvious enemies among minorities, immigrants, and radical revolution members. Heroes, calling for change, become victims.
Footnote 1:
The term “omnipresent surveillance” is taken from John W. Whitehead’s recent article, “The Omnipresent Surveillance State: Orwell’s 1984 Is No longer Fiction.” Information Clearing House. June 11, 2019. See also Rutherford Institute, Virginia, USA.
Anthony J. Marsella, Ph.D., a member of the TRANSCEND Network for Peace
Development Environment, is a past president of Psychologists for
Social Responsibility, Emeritus Professor of psychology at the University of
Hawaii’s Manoa Campus in Honolulu, Hawaii, and past director of the World
Health Organization Psychiatric Research.
Note from Kathie MM: It’s easy these days to see moral disengagement operating everywhere—those corrupt and vicious ways of thinking and arguing that allow individuals to abandon moral principles and behave inhumanely to fellow human beings. What victories the wielders of moral disengagement have seized—persuading people to feel good about doing harm, virtuous about participating in killing and torture, justified in behaving inhumanely to other human beings.
One of the principal ways of morally disengaging from moral principles like the Golden Rule is dehumanizing your chosen enemies—as described in earlier posts (see here and here ) and as illustrated in Christine Barie’s cartoon on Monday March 26, 2019.
In today’s cartoon, Christine reminds us that just as history is filled with examples of powerful leaders who manipulate fear and promote hatred in and for the oppressed and vulnerable members of society, history and herstory are also full of brave individuals who recognize the common humanity of all. These men and women, who empathize and connect with fellow humans scorned and mistreated by society’s power structures, are models of moral engagement, inspiring us to embrace “the other.”
“The sanctuary movement is only the latest sign that at heart we are a gracious people who care deeply about each other and a world of others.”
These days we are witnessing the bitter vituperation of an ignorant president who continues to sow fear and suspicion, who has accused Mexico of sending across our border rapists and drug dealers whom he plans to keep out by constructing an impenetrable wall.
This fearmongering has not gone unnoticed or unchallenged. Across the nation hundreds of communities large and small have declared themselves to be “sanctuary cities.” While no one seems certain as to what that implies, at a minimum it is an indication that when the reds come to seize someone the government has decided to deport, the transfer will be resisted.
In addition, churches all across the nation are now willing to open their buildings to those who are no longer safe from the threat of deportation. According to The Los Angeles Times, these congregations now number in the hundreds.
Historically, churches have been safe havens where fugitives could seek temporary protection. In Anglo-Saxon England, churches and churchyards generally provided 40 days of immunity, and neither the sheriff nor the army would enter them to seize the supposed outlaw. But gradually the right of sanctuary was eroded. In 1486, sanctuary for the crime of treason was disallowed, and sanctuary for most other crimes was severely restricted by Henry VIII. This right was later abolished.
In the 1980s many US churches provided sanctuary for political refugees from Central America. A member of our community was convicted of participating in a religious body that offered refuge during those troubling years.
“If this drive toward fascism is what it means to make America great again, then greatness has been badly defined.”
When President Trump declared that we should prioritize Christian refugees, and followed it with a prohibition against anyone coming here from several Muslim countries, a blanket of fear descended on every mosque and Muslim community. There’s a Muslim religious school a few blocks from where I live. Concerned about their children’s safety after Trump signed the ban, parents were hesitant to send them to class lest they be harassed on the way. When a threatening letter was sent to the school, a nearby Christian congregation dispatched volunteers every morning when the children were due to arrive and every afternoon when they were to return home, to make sure they were OK.
When President Trump suggested the possibility of assembling a Muslim registry in this country, scores of Christians said they’d go to the registration sites and declare themselves Muslims.
This state of affairs does not reflect the America I love and to which my grandfather, Peter Bayer, came from Germany after World War I. The United States has now become an enclave for frightened people who are controlled to the extent they internalize Trump’s hateful rhetoric. Thankfully, there are enough good people around who accept as fellow citizens those who are different — even if they do not personally know them.
The sanctuary movement is only the latest sign that at heart we are a gracious people who care deeply about each other and a world of others — added to the list that includes the underground railroad, the end of slavery and segregation, the civil rights revolution, care of the elderly through Social Security and Medicare, women’s suffrage, gay rights, WIC (the program for women, infants and children) and the effort to guarantee health insurance to every American.
We must not be ruled by fear or kept in line by how this administration defines the “outsiders” we are supposed to hate. If this drive toward fascism is what it means to make America great again, then greatness has been badly defined. It is not greatness to which Trump is pointing us, but a narrow sectarian nationalism that may end the greatest experiment in democracy the world has ever known.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 License. This article was originally published on Common Dreams, Friday, March 31, 2017, by BillMoyers.com
Charles Bayer is a somewhat retired theological professor and congregational pastor who writes regularly for The Senior Correspondent. He lives in Claremont, California, where he is still involved in writing a newspaper column and a variety of other jobs, boards and activities.