The politics of fear the power of nightmares.

I was watching the GOP debates and the amount of times, the candidates were talking about keeping America safe was quite prominent for most of the candidates. Instead of offering a bright vision of the future, they were promising to defend you from nightmare visions of the future. As ideological politics has waned in the 21st century. Politicians have found a new role for themselves by offering to defend you from apocalyptic visions of the future. What we are seeing is a rise in the politics of fear. Fear is one of humans basic mechanisms for human compliance. How can politicians keep us safe. It seems, it's either by more war or restrictions in our freedoms whether that be gun ownership for some or Internet freedoms for others. Their solutions are always planning to restrict our liberties in one way or another.

Surely it should be the role of politicians to offer us hope of a better tomorrow competing ideas to see who has the best ideological route to that better tomorrow not promising to keep us safe from a worse tomorrow

I've copied the first episode of the documentary the power of nightmares, that goes into how politics has changed its vision, even going so far as to create and exaggerate threats to keep their roles as important to our needs. a brief synopsis for those who can't watch YouTube.

The Power of Nightmares: The Rise of the Politics of Fear is a BBC television documentary series by Adam Curtis. It mainly consists of archive footage, with Curtis narrating. The series was originally broadcast in the United Kingdom in 2004.[1] It has subsequently been aired in multiple countries and shown at various film festivals, including the 2005 Cannes Film Festival.

en.m.wikipedia.org...

a reply to: woodwardjnr

Thanks for putting that up, its a good time to for people to watch that video because it puts the entire war on terror and its recent history in context.

well done thanks

There is nothing to fear but fear itself.

a reply to: woodwardjnr

They're taking a chapter right out of W. Bush's playbook. Back then it got a lot of people on board to support the Iraq war, why not use the same game plan to gain votes? After seeing how Trump's message of banning Muslim's from the U.S. gained support, these candidates are now jumping on the band wagon. Fear is a driving factor that makes people ignore rational thinking.

a reply to: woodwardjnr

Terrible isn't it. Schools closed because of terror alerts, imminent threats to 'our shores'.

Indoctrinating the young.

In 10 years it's going to be a horrible planet.

a reply to: and14263 even growing up during the Cold War and Irish terrorism, never felt as apocalyptic as a GOP keep America safe message

You might as well also link Curtis' other docs as they too paint an even clearer picture of reality and how we got here.

The Century of the Self - how propaganda and neoliberalism has propagated a society of "me me me" and its repercussions.

Bitter Lake - how and why the west supports Saudi Arabia, and its implications thus far, stretching all the way to Afghanistan/ Iraq.

The Living Dead - how historical (dead) figures have been used to direct policy and ideology.

Curtis makes some incredible films. The Power of Nightmares was probably the best documentary I've ever seen on BBC. Part 3 especially was interesting.

Bitter Lake was also good, visually very trippy and disjointed, it's a bit like watching a dream but with a coherent narrative running through it, very cleverly put together.

a reply to: MagnaCarta2015 bitter lake is fascinating about the Quincy agreement and the effect ofAmerica the uk and Saudi Arabia relationship and what's now going on in Syria. They have helped me understand these conflicts and the intricacies behind them a lot more.