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artwork
Radicalizing society by hijacking culture through ignorance and lies - II
Media and culture
original story: Stalin was the original catfish
Continuing from the previous storypost:
https://www.theglassfiles.com/browse/images/33162/show
It's not until i saw this image that i realized i've been looking at a falsified photo of Joseph Stalin for at least 10 years now. Not that he wasn't a potentially charming looker, but we can also agree that the photo on the left, the doctored photo, makes him look more like a movie star than an aspiring communist strongman.
That is the key: take reality, and *improve* it by means of the latest technological advancements.
From the original post on reddit:
"Sometimes, photo doctoring meant going back to the past to change the historical record, as when Stalin ordered Leon Trotsky, once a leading figure in the Communist Party, eliminated from all photos. After Trotsky was exiled by Stalin for mounting a failed opposition to his leadership, the revolutionary was snipped, airbrushed and covered up in countless photographs. Sometimes, Stalin inserted himself in photos at key moments in history, or had photo technicians make him look taller or more handsome.
Stalin’s obsession with image manipulation didn’t stop with photos. As historian Jan Plamper notes, the omnipresent portraits of Stalin that were in every home and business were subject to maniacal oversight. The dictator commissioned an army of painters to create his official portraits, offering some artists massive amounts of money to paint him. Then, the official portrait was reproduced and retouched over and over until it met with Stalin’s liking."
[ this quote is from the article that led to the reddit post, 'How Photos Became a Weapon in Stalin’s Great Purge' by Erin Blakemore, link below ]
Stephen Glass, who invented "facts" in 41 articles he wrote as a superstar young journalist at the New Republic from 1995 to 1998, explains the method:
“I would tell a story, and there would be fact A, which maybe was true. And then there would be fact B, which was sort of partially true and partially fabricated. And there would be fact C which was more fabricated and almost not true. And there would be fact D, which was a complete whopper. And totally not true. And so people would be with me on these stories through fact A and through fact B. And so they would believe me to C. And then at D they were still believing me through the story.”
Stephen Glass was doing this before 'The Apprentice' television show ever aired (premiered in 2004), but you can recognize how powerful this method is, and how endemic it has become. To the extent that even the people telling the lies, seem to believe the lies to be the actual truth.
Exceptionally dangerous, the essence of 21st century extremist propaganda. If people are frazzled enough by the speed at which digital information is disseminated, and ignorant enough because the educational institutions haven't caught up to the cultural shift... you can make them believe anything you want.
~~~
~~~
Original image (same as document presented here):
https://www.reddit.com/media?url=https%3A%2F%2Fi.redd.it%2F7qz929wcv4681.jpg&captcha=1
Source materials:
https://www.history.com/articles/josef-stalin-great-purge-photo-retouching
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/stephen-glass-i-lied-for-esteem-07-05-2003/
https://www.theglassfiles.com/browse/images/33162/show
It's not until i saw this image that i realized i've been looking at a falsified photo of Joseph Stalin for at least 10 years now. Not that he wasn't a potentially charming looker, but we can also agree that the photo on the left, the doctored photo, makes him look more like a movie star than an aspiring communist strongman.
That is the key: take reality, and *improve* it by means of the latest technological advancements.
From the original post on reddit:
"Sometimes, photo doctoring meant going back to the past to change the historical record, as when Stalin ordered Leon Trotsky, once a leading figure in the Communist Party, eliminated from all photos. After Trotsky was exiled by Stalin for mounting a failed opposition to his leadership, the revolutionary was snipped, airbrushed and covered up in countless photographs. Sometimes, Stalin inserted himself in photos at key moments in history, or had photo technicians make him look taller or more handsome.
Stalin’s obsession with image manipulation didn’t stop with photos. As historian Jan Plamper notes, the omnipresent portraits of Stalin that were in every home and business were subject to maniacal oversight. The dictator commissioned an army of painters to create his official portraits, offering some artists massive amounts of money to paint him. Then, the official portrait was reproduced and retouched over and over until it met with Stalin’s liking."
[ this quote is from the article that led to the reddit post, 'How Photos Became a Weapon in Stalin’s Great Purge' by Erin Blakemore, link below ]
Stephen Glass, who invented "facts" in 41 articles he wrote as a superstar young journalist at the New Republic from 1995 to 1998, explains the method:
“I would tell a story, and there would be fact A, which maybe was true. And then there would be fact B, which was sort of partially true and partially fabricated. And there would be fact C which was more fabricated and almost not true. And there would be fact D, which was a complete whopper. And totally not true. And so people would be with me on these stories through fact A and through fact B. And so they would believe me to C. And then at D they were still believing me through the story.”
Stephen Glass was doing this before 'The Apprentice' television show ever aired (premiered in 2004), but you can recognize how powerful this method is, and how endemic it has become. To the extent that even the people telling the lies, seem to believe the lies to be the actual truth.
Exceptionally dangerous, the essence of 21st century extremist propaganda. If people are frazzled enough by the speed at which digital information is disseminated, and ignorant enough because the educational institutions haven't caught up to the cultural shift... you can make them believe anything you want.
~~~
~~~
Original image (same as document presented here):
https://www.reddit.com/media?url=https%3A%2F%2Fi.redd.it%2F7qz929wcv4681.jpg&captcha=1
Source materials:
https://www.history.com/articles/josef-stalin-great-purge-photo-retouching
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/stephen-glass-i-lied-for-esteem-07-05-2003/
Russia
20th and 21st centuries
Gonzo9000 ~~ u/theHAREST ~~ https://www.reddit.com/user/theHAREST/
https://www.reddit.com/r/HistoryMemes/comments/rilq5w/stalin_was_the_original_catfish/
This item is shared by Philip M Shearer
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the Community and the World.