Even if you believe there are groups sufficiently powerful to purposely induce collective hysteria (it’s actually mathematically impossible), those that fell into it are themselves culpable for having done so.
The Academic and Medical 'professionals' acquitted themselves disgracefully, for the most part. You'd maybe expect all that education to inoculate a mind against the allure of Totalitarianism. Apparently, it doesn't. I might even speculate the reverse, that the educated mind provides the richest soil.
Why? Is there a video on that? Seems to me that money can buy near-unlimited outreach. If Pfizer, Gates, whoever; drop big bags of money off at all of major media, media will say just about anything. Then there's at LEAST 10% of the population stupid enough to digest and regurgitate almost literally anything and another ~70% of the population is willing to farm out all their critical thinking skills to their favorite "expert".
When the media drums beat loud enough on an issue, ~80% of the population keeps their mouths shut and they fall in line; their understanding of their cultural zeitgeist is formed by media and the 10% of idiots . If all of media and 10% of the population is going nuts, and dissent is quashed, then it's just a downward spiral from there and I think the criteria for "hysteria" has been met. And all it took to get going was big bags of money, and a morally aimless society.
I'm not sold on Gates and WEF's influence, but I don't understand your confidence that you can objectively demonstrate they were not able to puppeteer civilization into hysteria.
"Even if you believe there are groups sufficiently powerful to purposely induce collective hysteria (it’s actually mathematically impossible), those that fell into it are themselves culpable for having done so."
How many do you actually believe are in the collective hysteria? It's not the majority or you'd see a lot more solo masked drivers. I'd estimate 70-80% are in the go along to get along crowd. There are some hysterics but they are led by others. A good example would be the events that occurred at Oberlin a couple of years back. A few of the administrators and maybe professors and activist students helped drive hysteria in a small minority of the student population - probably 5% but those were vocal. The rest mostly kept their heads down for fear of them being put on the chopping block. Sure there were no masks etc but this bit is reminiscent of covid:
So to reframe the question: How does an institution take kids like that, and, by precept and example, teach them to rush to judgment, ignore evidence, disdain the legal system, and demonize neighbors who are different?
To say this is mathematically impossible is quite a stretch as we see this type of hysteria repeatedly (Evergreen may be another example) though not on such a large scale as covid. There are often a few in the driver's wheel, whether they are caught up in the hysteria themselves or actually have an agenda.
Mathematically impossible to reliably engineer collective hysteria. Now, there are loads of them that happen in more minor levels, but these are exactly what crowds end up doing, often with folks trying to whip up folks to follow their idea, but that doesn’t mean they were trying to induce a collective hysteria at all. As for the percentage that just keep their heads down, I don’t know.
I don't think anyone is suggesting that the collective hysteria was engineered. Fear was pushed on the public however by certain groups. Did they know it would lead to hysteria? Likely not but then it's not the first time that fear triggers hysteria. Consider the nuclear attack false alarm in Hawaii in 2018 where people were put into a state of hysteria. My understanding is a similar event happened with Orson Welles and his broadcast of the War of the Worlds where some believed he was broadcasting the news.
Creating an environment of fear where people were willing to upend their lives to avoid a virus was the intention. That was done via media all of which blared 24/7 fear porn. Look into the nudge units of UK which certainly did not arise out of hysteria. There are people who know how to manipulate the masses. If that were not the case, propaganda would never even be a word.
The nudge units themselves arose as part of the hysteria — after the inception of collective hysteria. *Weeks* after. They (the psychologists) had drunk the KoolAid, and were fully on board to righteously nudge the populace toward “safety.”
Sorry but most people are not part of the collective hysteria but just go along to get along.
The nudge unit were there early on but it may not have been called as such. In fact, the UK had more behavioral psychologists than any other class of expert. Note that before Boris went into the hospital, the UK had already paid a huge sum of money to an advertising company (the same one who was behind the babies being thrown out of incubators is my understanding) while they were telling the public that the British were going to take it on the chin. Messaging of taking it on the chin would not have needed the type of advertising budge the government had already doled out so no there was messaging to the public and behind the scenes the gathering of media and psychological experts to nudge the public.
The Academic and Medical 'professionals' acquitted themselves disgracefully, for the most part. You'd maybe expect all that education to inoculate a mind against the allure of Totalitarianism. Apparently, it doesn't. I might even speculate the reverse, that the educated mind provides the richest soil.
Re: "it’s actually mathematically impossible"
Why? Is there a video on that? Seems to me that money can buy near-unlimited outreach. If Pfizer, Gates, whoever; drop big bags of money off at all of major media, media will say just about anything. Then there's at LEAST 10% of the population stupid enough to digest and regurgitate almost literally anything and another ~70% of the population is willing to farm out all their critical thinking skills to their favorite "expert".
When the media drums beat loud enough on an issue, ~80% of the population keeps their mouths shut and they fall in line; their understanding of their cultural zeitgeist is formed by media and the 10% of idiots . If all of media and 10% of the population is going nuts, and dissent is quashed, then it's just a downward spiral from there and I think the criteria for "hysteria" has been met. And all it took to get going was big bags of money, and a morally aimless society.
I'm not sold on Gates and WEF's influence, but I don't understand your confidence that you can objectively demonstrate they were not able to puppeteer civilization into hysteria.
"Even if you believe there are groups sufficiently powerful to purposely induce collective hysteria (it’s actually mathematically impossible), those that fell into it are themselves culpable for having done so."
How many do you actually believe are in the collective hysteria? It's not the majority or you'd see a lot more solo masked drivers. I'd estimate 70-80% are in the go along to get along crowd. There are some hysterics but they are led by others. A good example would be the events that occurred at Oberlin a couple of years back. A few of the administrators and maybe professors and activist students helped drive hysteria in a small minority of the student population - probably 5% but those were vocal. The rest mostly kept their heads down for fear of them being put on the chopping block. Sure there were no masks etc but this bit is reminiscent of covid:
So to reframe the question: How does an institution take kids like that, and, by precept and example, teach them to rush to judgment, ignore evidence, disdain the legal system, and demonize neighbors who are different?
https://www.commentary.org/articles/abraham-socher/o-oberlin-my-oberlin/
To say this is mathematically impossible is quite a stretch as we see this type of hysteria repeatedly (Evergreen may be another example) though not on such a large scale as covid. There are often a few in the driver's wheel, whether they are caught up in the hysteria themselves or actually have an agenda.
Mathematically impossible to reliably engineer collective hysteria. Now, there are loads of them that happen in more minor levels, but these are exactly what crowds end up doing, often with folks trying to whip up folks to follow their idea, but that doesn’t mean they were trying to induce a collective hysteria at all. As for the percentage that just keep their heads down, I don’t know.
I don't think anyone is suggesting that the collective hysteria was engineered. Fear was pushed on the public however by certain groups. Did they know it would lead to hysteria? Likely not but then it's not the first time that fear triggers hysteria. Consider the nuclear attack false alarm in Hawaii in 2018 where people were put into a state of hysteria. My understanding is a similar event happened with Orson Welles and his broadcast of the War of the Worlds where some believed he was broadcasting the news.
Creating an environment of fear where people were willing to upend their lives to avoid a virus was the intention. That was done via media all of which blared 24/7 fear porn. Look into the nudge units of UK which certainly did not arise out of hysteria. There are people who know how to manipulate the masses. If that were not the case, propaganda would never even be a word.
The nudge units themselves arose as part of the hysteria — after the inception of collective hysteria. *Weeks* after. They (the psychologists) had drunk the KoolAid, and were fully on board to righteously nudge the populace toward “safety.”
Sorry but most people are not part of the collective hysteria but just go along to get along.
The nudge unit were there early on but it may not have been called as such. In fact, the UK had more behavioral psychologists than any other class of expert. Note that before Boris went into the hospital, the UK had already paid a huge sum of money to an advertising company (the same one who was behind the babies being thrown out of incubators is my understanding) while they were telling the public that the British were going to take it on the chin. Messaging of taking it on the chin would not have needed the type of advertising budge the government had already doled out so no there was messaging to the public and behind the scenes the gathering of media and psychological experts to nudge the public.