JonRappoport March 4 2014
Every civilization and every generation has their defining voices.
The voice does two things. It tells the story of the times; and it injects the telltale emotions, moods, and attitudes of that story.
The public swallows the tale with all its lies and omissions, and accepts the way in which the whole act is spooled out by the sound of the narrative voice.
The tone of the story creates a trance.
Different societies are vulnerable to different styles of story-telling.
Americans on this side of the Atlantic, listening to the radio speeches of Hitler delivered with staccato militant force, thought the German people were clearly crazy to go along.
It never occurred to the Americans, glued to their radios listening to President Roosevelt, that many Germans would think the sing-song pseudo-British style of the aristocratic FDR was a transparent joke.
“I’ll take my hypnosis on rye with mustard.” “I’ll have mine on a bun with mayo.”
It’s assumed that, because Hitler and Mussolini were cementing their control through mass arrests and overt shows of force, they could get away with vocal displays of shouting and intimidation. Otherwise, the people would have turned away from them in disgust.
That’s not the whole picture, by any means. Large numbers of people in Germany and Italy responded enthusiastically to the voices of Hitler and Mussolini.
The trance they entered, as a result, wasn’t a passive narcosis. It was a kind of hysteria that demanded action.
If, down the road, America is put under an openly declared state of martial law, with all the bells and whistles attached, elite television anchors, like Brian Williams and Scott Pelley, will tell that story—not as Mussolini would—but as our anchors always do; in measured, “responsible, objective” tones. It will be “grave and sober.” The voices will suggest a dollop of alarm, but…everything is under control.