Signs That You Are Being Brainwashed (Without Even Realizing It)
Hear the term brainwashing and you might think of government agents ‘turning’ unwilling spies against their own countries, or cult leaders using mind control to manipulate their followers.
You might even go so far as to think of the term brainwashing in relation to propaganda spread during the First and Second World Wars, in order to influence vast amounts of people.
But what exactly is brainwashing and should we confine it to the past?
What is brainwashing?
The term brainwashing was first coined in the 1950’s during the Korean War. It was used to explain how totalitarian regimes were able to completely indoctrinate American soldiers through a process of torture and propaganda.
Brainwashing is the theory that a person’s core beliefs, ideas, affiliations and values can be replaced, so much so that they have no autonomy over themselves and cannot think critically or independently.
Who is likely to be brainwashed?
In the book and film ‘The Manchurian Candidate’, a successful senator is captured by Korean soldiers during the war and brainwashed into becoming a sleeper agent for them, with the intent of assassinating the presidential candidate.
The film shows that even an intelligent and powerful man can be brainwashed, but in truth, the opposite is more likely.
It is generally people that are vulnerable in some way and are, therefore, susceptible to a different way of thinking that are more likely to become brainwashed.
This could include people that have:
- Lost their loved one through divorce or death.
- Been made redundant or sacked from their job.
- Been forced to live on the streets (especially young people).
- Are suffering from an illness they cannot accept.
How can you be brainwashed?
The person who is trying to brainwash you will want to know everything about you in order to manipulate your beliefs. They will want to find out what your strengths are, your weaknesses, who you trust, who is important to you and who you listen to for advice.
They will then start the process of brainwashing you which typically take five steps:
- Isolation
- Attacks on self-esteem
- Us vs. Them
- Blind obedience
- Testing
Isolation:
The first step towards brainwashing begins with isolation because having friends and family around you is dangerous to them. The last thing a brainwasher wants is for someone with a different opinion to theirs questioning what you are now being asked to believe. The isolation could start in the form of not allowing access to family or friends or constantly checking where someone is and who they are with.
Attacks on self-esteem:
A person who wants to brainwash another can only do so if their victim is in a vulnerable state and has low self-confidence. A broken person is much easier to rebuild with the brainwasher’s beliefs.
The brainwasher, therefore, needs to break down the victim’s self-esteem. This could be through sleep deprivation, verbal or physical abuse, embarrassment or intimidation. A brainwasher will start to control everything about the victim’s life, from food, the time they sleep to even using the bathroom.
Us vs. Them:
In order to break a person down and reshape them in a different image, an alternative way of living must be introduced that is far more attractive than their present one. This is usually achieved by the victim only mixing with other people who have been brainwashed and will, therefore, praise the new regime. Or it could be that everyone wears a kind of uniform, have a set diet or other rigid rules that encourage a group dynamic.
There is evidence to suggest that humans are, by nature, tribal and want to be part of a group, the brainwasher needs to convince their victim that they lead the elite group that everyone wants to be in. A victim might also be given a new name, as in the case of kidnapped Patty Hearst, later called Tania by her captors, who eventually, after being brainwashed, sided with her kidnappers.
Blind obedience:
The end goal for a brainwasher is blind obedience, where the victim follows orders without question. This is usually achieved by positively rewarding the person when they please the brainwasher and negative punishing them when they do not.
Chanting a phrase over and over again is also a good way of controlling a person. Not only is repeating the same phrase over and over is a way of calming the brain, but studies have shown that the ‘analytical’ and the ‘repetitive’ parts of the brain are not interchangeable. This means we can only do one or the other, so how better to stop those doubting thoughts by chanting.
Testing:
A brainwasher can never think that his or her work is done, as there are always scenarios where the victim could start to regain their own autonomy and start thinking for themselves again. Testing their victims not only shows that they are still brainwashed, it allows the brainwashers to see just how much control they still have over their victims.
Tests could include committing a criminal act, such as robbing a store or burglarizing a home.
Brainwashing is not just the stuff of fiction or the past, it is real and present in many forms of today’s society.
There are things you can do to stop yourself from being brainwashed:
- Don’t believe all that you read
- Don’t believe the hype
- Don’t buy into fear or scare tactics
- Watch for someone’s agenda
- Look out for subliminal messages
- Follow your own path
- Do your own research
- Listen to your own intuition
- Don’t follow the crowd
- Don’t be afraid to be different.
If you suspect someone you know has been brainwashed, get them away from their brainwasher, put them in touch with a professional and support them through the process.
Someone who has been brainwashed can recover, as research and past studies have shown that brainwashing is a temporary condition at best and leaves no lasting damage on a person’s psyche.
References:
See more here: learning-mind.com
Header image: Smithsonian Magazine
Bold emphasis added
Editor’s note: Brainwashing has been going on for several decades in relation to human-caused climate change, and is now being ramped up with fearmongering about the Covid ‘pandemic’.
Please Donate Below To Support Our Ongoing Work To Defend The Scientific Method
PRINCIPIA SCIENTIFIC INTERNATIONAL, legally registered in the UK as a company 
incorporated for charitable purposes. Head Office: 27 Old Gloucester Street, London WC1N 3AX.
Trackback from your site.
Ogmios
| #
I recommend viewing Bonhoeffer’s Theory of Stupidity, it can be found on BitChute, for his experiences of dealing with mass indoctrination. My personal view it is less stupidity and more an exposure of the number of people who have a serf mentality.
Both are pejorative terms but historically this has proved to be a successful life strategy. Since the time of the ancient Greeks (and before) the most persecuted have been intellectuals and free thinkers, the same will apply today. Unfortunately for the new serf class that life strategy has never before had to encounter gene therapy treatments and is doomed to fail much like shoaling fish were successful before the advent of modern fishing methods.
Reply
ЯΞ√ΩLUT↑☼N
| #
Explains everything about today’s hard Left and the Marxism they employ. The cure is 3 words: “Let’s Go Brandon“.
Reply
Eric the Red
| #
The five steps of brainwashing sound remarkably like what happens to university students. When they attend for the first time, they’re plunged into a new situation where they are essentially isolated from their previous environment of home, family, and friends. At that point they’re ripe for the plucking by leftist propagandists disguised as professors. When they graduate, the result is hordes of newly-minted woke warriors who descend on society like locusts to do even further damage.
Reply
Cecille
| #
So true. That was me as a 16 year old college freshman. I was total prey.
Reply
Squidly
| #
They must be upset because it didn’t work on me. I guess that’s one virtue of being such a rebel. I did what I wanted, when I wanted, how I wanted and I didn’t much care for what the authoritarians had to say. I am pretty much the same way today.
Reply
Jerry Krause
| #
Hi Squidly, Ogmios, Cecille and other PSI Readers not of like mind,
PSI Readers of like mind do not be need to be reminded of what
Cecille wrote.
Squidly wrote: “They must be upset because it didn’t work on me. I guess that’s one virtue of being such a rebel.” Sqyidly, I ask you, what have you done as a rebel beside not accepting what some authorities are trying to force you to do by “brainwashing” you. From the beginning of time there has been a war going on between GOOD an EVIL.
The USA of today was founded by Euopeans whose freedoms were being denied the authorities of their nations. And it does matter whether these freedom involved religion, employment, economics, etc. And these founders fought a war to win the freedom not to pay taxes to an European King. But to form a more perfect GOVERNMENT these freedom fighters had to compromise the principle of freedom. For this government allowed SLAVERY and it really does not matter who the slaves might be. So to correct this Absolute Mistake, the citizens of the USA fought a CIVIL WAR over the Principle of Freedom. Seldom considered is that after the was a winner of this CIVIL WAR there still existed the USA even though everybody did not agree about many things.
But an observed fact is that ever since its founding there have been people of other nations who have wanted to leave their country and families to come here to live and WORK!!! And we know that people of USA have fought wars against EVIL people who wanted to control the people in other countries’ to make these people of other countries their SLAVES!!!
Have a good day, Jerry
Reply