A Fly in the Ointment
In the late summer of 2006, I was having lunch at an extended family function. People were talking about various issues in the news. Out of curiosity, I asked a relative if he thought a freak named John Mark Karr, who was being imported from southeast Asia, had killed a little girl named JonBenet Ramsey? My relative was a retired FBI agent, as was his father. After controlling his laughter, he said no, Karr had not killed anyone.
He explained to me that at times, the media is used to distract the public's attention from something else that they should actually be paying attention to. Such distraction always involve something that creates a strong, automatic emotional response. My next question was if this was something the Bush-Cheney administration was engaged in? The answer was no, that while they sometimes hired outside groups for assisting in perception management, this was a specialty of groups that function no matter who is in office. They may be tasked with coming up with emotional keys such as "yellow cake" and "mushroom clouds" for an administration, they are as capable of manipulating a simpleton like George W. Bush as an average American.
Yet, sometimes a cigar is just a cigar, to be blunt.
The case of Gabby Petito is tragic. Her family is devastated. The boy friend's family is also suffering, though his parents' refusal to talk with investigators has not shed them in a sympathetic light. Her murder will cause pain in her community. That should not happen to any person, though it continues to happen all too often. The Petito case has no doubt brought up painful memories of similar cases for many of us. For but one example -- and I could list a half-dozen -- a good friend who I had a mad crush on in 9th grade went to visit her mother in Florida. She was murdered by a freak with a chain saw. I can still clearly see her beautiful face in my mind's eye as I write this.
While a single, isolated tragic case sometimes make the national news, it rarely gets the amount of coverage as the Petito, Ramsey, or Elizabeth Smart cases. One could conclude that this is intentional. The target audience is obviously those who identify innocence with white, blonds, cute females. This causes some negative responses, not always expressed, by those who are aware that white, blonds, cute females are not the exclusive victims of "going missing." Intentional or not, the media can create divisions within groups that should be united by such violence against women.
Watching various news reporting on Gabby's case -- including an internet site from a station in the community she lived with her boyfriend in -- it is evident that emotions tend to block out rational thinking. Viewers were texting questions that suggest they had zero understanding of how investigations work, much less the Constitution. A crowd of citizens gathered on the murderer's parents' lawn, and while public gatherings are also covered in the Constitution, there are obvious potential problems when a group of grasshoppers can turn into a mob of lucusts. This phenomenon only takes place when emotion trumps rational thought.
I've been discussing this topic on an internet forum, with members of a group that excludes Trump supporters. It is similar in some ways to the unstable behaviors of Trump supporters. I've outlined it in the contexts of individual versus group psychology, with overlaps in a sociological view of societies under the stress and anxiety of change -- including social decay. Many people respond on an emotional level,, and believe whatever gets those emotions sparking in their brain. And that is mechanical functioning.
It is not putting the parts of the brain that evolved to make us potentially a fully conscious human being. I do not use that term in the way that "woke" -- while potentially a good concept, can be a shallow fad -- is currently used and abused. I mean conscious, rational, organized thinking, the type that accepts that others have wants and needs. The type that recognizes the distinction between Gabby's social media posts, and the police footage. The type that identifies the seemingly never-ending numbers of teens and young ladies who go "missing" as unacceptable. And that, by no coincidence, is the type of thinking that identifies the actions of the Trump cult as unacceptable, too.
Fear is never overcome by more fear. Anxiety is not dealt with successfully with more anxiety. Frustration is not curbed by more frustration. Hatreds are not cured by way of more hate. An unconscious mind cannot become conscious unconsciously.
Rather than allowing the Petito case to serve as a national distraction, we should use it as a model of how emtions are manipulated on a large scale. It is not that different than the way in which those who practice perception management -- be it lies about incubator babies on concrete floors, yellow cake and mushroom clouds, or how the 2020 elections were stolen -- have manipulated the 40% of the unconscious American public.
= new reply since forum marked as read
Just getting there are we? 
thanks for furthering my education.
I had a neighborhood girlfriend murdered back in the 80's, white girl. Of course the media wasn't in full swing back then so only local coverage. Never found her killer.
Manufactured news is what drives advertising dollars. Sensationalism has also been the true seller of news. It's just now being driven by corporations who don't really want us to be cognizant of our thoughts, only our emotions which you pointed out so elegantly.
Thanks again
