The 10 most used mass manipulation strategies

This author described several ways in which it is possible to influence large collectives.

In 2002, the French writer Sylvain Timsit published a decalogue of the strategies that are most frequently used by the media and political elites to manipulate the masses.

It is a list that has been attributed by a press error to Noam Chomsky, philosopher, linguist and politician who has also described how through entertainment, the mass media achieve the reproduction of certain media achieve the reproduction of certain relations of domination.

Sylvain Timsit's strategies of public manipulation.

Timsit's list has become very popular because it describes in a concrete way ten situations in which surely all of us could identify ourselves. We will now describe Sylvain Timsit's Sylvain Timsit's strategies of manipulation of public opinion and society.

1. Encouraging distraction

Distraction is a cognitive process that consists of paying attention to some stimuli and not to others involuntarily and for different reasons, among which are the interest generated by these stimuli and the intensity or attractiveness of these stimuli..

It is a process that can easily be used as a strategy to divert attention from political or economic conflicts. It is generally done by means of encouraging information overload, or when such information contains a strong emotional charge.

For example, when newscasts devote entire days to reporting tragic events and minimize the time devoted to reporting problematic political events. This type of distraction fosters a lack of interest in acquiring in-depth knowledge and in discussing the long-term repercussions of political decisions.

2. Create the problems as well as the solutions

The author explains this method by means of the formula: problem-reaction-solution, and explains that a situation can be explained with the full intention of causing a specific reaction to a specific policy decision. with the full intention of causing a specific reaction to a specific public, so that this public demands a specific solution.The author explains this method by means of the formula: problem-reaction-solution, and explains that a situation can be explained with the intention of causing a specific reaction to a specific public, so that this public demands measures and decisions to solve the situation.

For example, when political powers remain indifferent to the increase of violence in a city, and then deploy police laws that affect freedom and not only decrease violence. The same is true when an economic crisis is defined as a necessary evil that can only be countered by cutting public services.

3. Appeal to gradualism

This refers to applying changes that are important gradually, so that public and political reactions are equally gradual and easier to contain.

Sylvain Timsit gives as an example the neo-liberal socio-economic policies which began in the 1980s, and which have had a gradual impact without their negative consequences opening the way to a truly massive revolution.

4. Deferring and putting off until tomorrow

Many of the measures taken by governments are not popular among the population, so that one of the most used and effective strategies is to make people think that the measure is painful and that it will not be taken until tomorrow. to make people think that such a measure is painful but necessary, and that it is necessary to agree on it inand that it is necessary to agree on it now, although its effects will be felt years later.

In this way, we become accustomed to the process of change and even to its negative consequences, and since it is not an issue that affects us immediately, we can more easily become aware of the possible risks.

As an example, Sylvain Timsit mentions the transition to the euro, which was proposed in 1994-1995, but was not implemented until 2001, or the international agreements that the USA imposed in Latin America in 2001, but which would be in force by 2005.

4. Infantilizing the interlocutor

Another frequently used strategy is to position the public as a group of naïve people. as a group of naïve people incapable of taking responsibility for themselves or of making critical and responsible decisions.or to make critical and responsible decisions.

By positioning viewers in this way, the media and political powers make it easier for the public to effectively identify with that position and end up accepting the imposed measures and even support them with conviction.

5. Appeal more to emotions than to reflection.

This refers to sending messages that have a direct impact on the emotional and sensitive register of the public, so that through fear, compassion, hope, illusion, among other emotions or sensations, it is easier to implant ideals of success, or behavioral norms, and of how interpersonal relationships should be.

6. To recognize the other as ignorant and mediocre.

This strategy is reflected, for example, in the significant differences between the quality of education and the resources allocated to it according to the socioeconomic and political class to which it is directed.

This means that the use of technologies is reserved for a few, which in turn hinders large-scale social organization. This in turn makes large-scale social organization difficult, It also leads some populations to recognize themselves as simply victims, without the possibility of being active.without the possibility of being active.

7. Promoting complacency in mediocrity

It is a matter of reinforcing the feeling of success and satisfaction with the situation in which we find ourselves, even if it is a situation of mediocrity. satisfaction with the situation in which we find ourselves, even if it is a precarious or unjust situationIt is about reinforcing the feeling of success and satisfaction with the situation in which we find ourselves, even if it is a precarious or unfair situation, which causes us not to develop critical thinking about that situation or even to justify it.

8. Reinforcing self-blame

At the other extreme is to make people think that the situation we are in is our fault, that is, to make the individual believe that he is responsible for his own misfortune (that he thinks he is not very intelligent or that he makes little effort; instead of recognizing that there is a social system that tends to injustice).

Thus organization and the exercise of resistance or revolt are thus avoidedWe tend to self-evaluate and blame ourselves, which in turn generates passivity and favors the appearance of other complications such as depressive or anxious states.

10. Know people better than they know themselves.

Timsit proposes that the advances made by science in the understanding of human beings, whether in the areas of psychology, biology or neuroscience, have achieved greater knowledge about our functioning; however, they have not generated a process of self-knowledge at the individual level, with the result that the elites continue to be the holders of wisdom and control over others.