Torturer's Lobby

Contrary to many people, I find the story of Pablo Escobar quite entertaining. It shows that no matter where you go, authority truly has no... authority. Police here in the U.S. do not need to go through too much extensive examinations or training to become a cop... and when they do, they are still human. People, including police, will sometimes give in to bribes, gifts, or any other type of payment in exchange for relinquishing their power and "letting things slide". Escobar had such a powerful grip on Colombia that he was able to spend his "sentence" in a luxury home that they called "prison"... seems so far from America's three hots and a cot, doesn't it?

Info-mercials... HA!

Chapter 3 on unSpun, “Tall Coffees and Assault Weapons”, only reiterates my beliefs that infomercials are not only hilarious, but absolute propaganda. This chapter tells how corporations that market a product will carefully choose their words in order to make the most impact on the consumers who view the advertisments. Do we really think that “Oxi-Clean” can erase a year-old grape juice stain, or does it work because they use it on freshly spilled liquid on TV? This is eye candy… has anyone noticed that companies will depict the users of the old or competitor product as miserable or angry, and usually in black and white… while those using the marketed product don shiny smiles and vibrant colors? Coincidence… more like propaganda.

Don't Fall into the Trap

If I learned anything from unSpun, it is the fact that the media will stop at nothing to gain your attention and lure you into a belief. The trick is… not falling for it. Propaganda is meant to attract the feeble-minded consumer, and does a pretty good job of it. If we stand our ground and don’t fall into a trap. By not getting wrapped up in the ideas that the media attempts to shove down our throats, we can remain to think and act for ourselves instead of adopting what they want us to think and do.

Green Team

Toxic Sludge presents environmental awareness in Chapter 9. I really can’t believe that some people think that there is nothing wrong with the way the world today treats the environment and the dangers presented by its deterioration. Once again, the key is filtering through the propaganda to attain the facts. Obviously, our environment is in danger and those who claim differently have no factual premise to their argument, and probably rely 100% on propaganda.

How to be Sure

Chapter 8 of unSpun, “How to Be Sure”, deals with the fact that facts can easily not be factual (repetitive?). I agree with this—how do we know that a fact is true, or that a primary source is more credible than a secondary one? The media thrives off of this and lures us in with propaganda because we might not “know any better”. The public falls into the ignorant category because they sometimes refuse to dig through the propaganda and find the true facts. It is much easier to believe exactly what we hear, and not question the media’s display of the “facts”. We can only know for sure by researching for ourselves.

Facts Can Save Your Life

I agree totally with the ideas in Chapter 5 of unSpun, "Facts Can Save Your Life". Consumerism is full of propaganda and misleading information. When you buy or sign up for something, it is extremely imperative to know the in's and out's of the details; in other words , it is important to read the fine print. One example of this is "free" magazine subscriptions. While a certain amount of issues may be free, it is nearly impossible to cancel your subscription, and you end end getting charged full price. I also agree with the "Grey Goose effect". I personally know people who will spend nearly double the amount of money to get a name-brand product. In actuality, the is little difference in quality. If the consumer takes time to research the facts of what they are purchasing, the chance of being swindled or tricked into an unwanted product or obligation decreases immensely.

UFO Cults

This reading kind of taught me a lot about the relationship between companies and their consumers. Corporations know that most of the people that buy their products do not truly research what they are spending their hard-earned money on. Therefore, they are able to throw false information in advertisements by tweaking small parts of the script. A couple key tactics that companies use are comparison to competitors (most of the time, there is no difference in rival brands) and breakthroughs (anything new or improved). Busy consumers will jump on the ban wagon if they are misled to believe the product at hand is exponentially better than the next one -- cost won't matter if they believe they are buying "the best" merchandise.