Thank you so much for stopping by my website. I hope you will find something here to interest you. So let me introduce myself. I am a novelist, a civil and mechanical engineer, a Vietnam-era Air Force veteran, a Catholic by faith. Politically I am a centrist who subscribes to neither party, although I like […]
The Call-Out Culture versus the Help-Out Culture Part 1
So what might validation rackets like the Klan teach us today? I would like to think the Ku Klux Klan was just an aberration, but I doubt it. Too much profit is made in monetizing misery. The far-right and far-left have no incentive to change their game. We’ve been conditioned to believe the great divide […]
Monetizing Misery – Part 2 On Validation Rackets
In my previous post, I wrote about how the Ku Klux Klan of the 1920s was a wildly successful multi-level marketing Ponzi scheme that monetized fears held by many native-born Americans. Today I’ll talk about the third item that jumped out of my research. The Ku Klux Klan was a validation racket for those who […]
Monetizing Misery – Part 1 The Anaheim Ku Klux Klan in 1924
So now we’ve familiarized ourselves with three tactics used by people in authority to overpower those around them, including: Milgramming, the abuse of authority to change good people into bad people. Gaslighting, the abuse of authority to make smart people think they are crazy, and Dunning-Krugering the abuse of authority to transfer confidence and power […]
The Dunning-Kruger Trap
In Act V Scene I of As You Like It, the court jester, Touchstone, lectures William, a countryman and minor character, “The fool doth think he is wise, but the wise man knows himself to be a fool.” Four centuries later, in 1999, two American social psychologists, David Alan Dunning, and Justin Kruger decided to […]
On Milgramming and Gaslighting
While we’re on the topic of Milgramming, we need to mention gaslighting. Both are tools corrupt authoritarians use to manipulate us. They are two tools in the same toolbox, but not the same. Here’s the difference: Milgramming is the abuse of authority to change good people into bad people. Gaslighting is the abuse of authority […]
The Milgramming of America – Part 2
I’d like to write more on the topic of the Milgramming of America. To remind you, Milgramming is the abuse of authority to change good people into bad people. In the previous blog, I summarized the Milgram Experiment. Today I’d like to talk about the 1971 Stanford Prison Experiment. For an overview you can go […]
The Milgramming of America – Part 1
In case you haven’t noticed, America is being Milgrammed. And what is Milgramming? I was hoping you might ask. In brief, Milgramming is the abuse of authority to change good people into bad people. This might occur when one joins or swears allegiance to any number of authority figures, be they gang leaders, organized criminals, […]