by David Risselada, America Outloud:
This past Sunday, I had the opportunity to be a guest on America Out Loud’s weekend news magazine, Viewpoint This Sunday. We discussed the idea that Americans are being manipulated to go along to get along and that a mass brainwashing of sorts has taken place. The best example of this is COVID-19 and the mask mandates that seemed to have people in a state of hypnosis. Even to this day, you see people wearing masks even if alone while driving their cars.
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That is the power fear holds over some people. It is a very controlling emotion, one that is thoroughly taken advantage of by those seeking to guide our behaviors in their desired directions. The fear of COVID-19 and the effective fear messaging behind it pushed people to comply with mask and vaccine mandates despite so much contradictory information concerning the virus. While COVID may seem like a thing of the past, the United States faces the distinct possibility that we will have to endure another situation where the government exercises top-down control in the face of a viral threat.
This spring, the World Health Organization will be holding final votes on the Global Pandemic Treaty, which allegedly gives the W.H.O. the authority to dictate health-related policies in the face of another pandemic. Will Americans be able to resist? Not if they don’t shut off their television and start studying they won’t.
“If we are to survive as free men, we must face up to the problem of politically inspired mental coercion, with all its ramifications.” (Meerloo, 1961, p. 7)
I believe if all Americans understood what I am about to share with you, there would be no chance that the government would be able to push another COVID-19 scenario on us. While many people will view this as being in the realm of conspiracy theory, it is all published information available to anyone who seeks it out.
If the World Health Organization were to impose global policies in the face of another pandemic, they would have the data obtained from the previous few years on what it took to get people to comply with mask and vaccine mandates. They would look at what messages and techniques were effective in getting people to march in lockstep with COVID-19 interventions, as well as any impediments to compliance so that they may be overcome. What if I told you they already had a pretty good idea that the majority of people would comply based on previous studies?
Well, in 2014, a study was published in the Singapore Medical Journal examining the Health Belief Model of Behavioral Change (see Chapter 3) and how it was useful in implementing mask mandates in the face of a respiratory infection. What is the Health Belief Model of Behavioral Change? I am glad you asked.
It is a theoretical model used to predict health-related behaviors based on the individual’s perceptions of the threat. What are the perceived levels of susceptibility? What is the perceived severity? What are the perceived benefits of compliance? What are the perceived barriers, and what must be done to overcome them? This study found that perceived susceptibility to the disease and the perceived severity of the disease were the most important factors in gaining compliance.
Why is the word perceived used so often? People are less likely to comply if they do not feel like they are in danger. One thing this study highlighted was the effectiveness of government and media collaboration. In fact, in Japan, it was found that heightened levels of compliance were gained when members of the media were shown on television donning face masks themselves. Didn’t we see this during COVID? Mass media campaigns depicting politicians and media members wearing face masks? Later, during the pandemic, videos surfaced of these same politicians taking their masks off and laughing as if to mock us after the filming of their propaganda campaign was over.
“Pressure from the media, in the form of impactful advertising campaigns (e.g., by mask manufacturers) and the appearance of news reporters donning facemasks on national television during epidemics, has been shown to contribute to the high levels of adherence to mask-wearing in Japan.” (Sim SW, Moey KS, Tan NC, 2014)
Another interesting finding was that social acceptance was a huge factor in gaining compliance. Wearing facemasks in Japan has become a normal practice because the perception is that healthy people wearing masks is a respectful behavior towards others. Moral, caring people wear masks because they are concerned about the health of those in their community. This is certainly something we saw taking shape during Covid. People who were not complying were demonized and shamed in the hopes they could be pushed into complying.
“Social acceptance was another key factor in increasing or decreasing the rate of compliance. In Japan, a street survey showed that most Japanese agreed that healthy individuals are being ‘respectful’ towards one’s health in a positive way by wearing facemasks. Hence, mask-wearing had not only become a normalized practice, but a desirable one.” (Sim SW, Moey KS, Tan NC, 2014)
This is where things start to get interesting. To truly understand the Health Belief Model of Behavioral Change, you have to understand B.F. Skinner’s operant conditioning and his beliefs concerning human beings. He writes in Science and Human Behavior that Darwin put man in his rightful place, and any study of behavior must be done from the perspective that free will is non-existent. The idea that man can choose his behavior prevents any predictable conclusions and allows for too many unpredictable variables. This is interesting because when looking at the Health Belief Model you find that it doesn’t take a person’s attitudes and personal beliefs into account when trying to predict behavior. Operant conditioning is based on the idea that man’s behavior is controlled strictly by the environment, and Skinner notes that if the environment can be controlled, so too can behavior. In Beyond Freedom and Dignity, he wrote the following –
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