A big takeaway from breaking down scifi’s influence on the psyop war is that we seem to have settled for “good enough” instead of striving for excellence. And let’s be real, “good enough” is usually just a fancy way of saying “meh, it’ll do.”
But what’s the psyop war? How does scifi influence it? That’s the mission of Annalee Newitz’s new project “Stories Are Weapons: Psychological Warfare and the American Mind.” To give us a look back at how we got into this heightened state of war and how we might be able to escape it. Half ‘Manufacturing Consent,’ half ‘Future Shock,’ Stories Are Weapons makes a strong case for two conclusions.
- A quiet psyop war is being perpetrated against the American public
- It’s holding us back from truly innovative and life-changing discoveries.
Okay, cool. An interesting thing about Stories Are Weapons is that it’s not just about scientific breakthroughs, but also about how we communicate and educate others about these topics. We’ve become so obsessed with making everything easily digestible and palatable for the masses that we’ve resorted to dumbing things down to the point where they lose their meaning and significance.
And the worst part is, we’re doing it all in the name of making everyone happy. But here’s the thing, you can’t please everyone. And in the process, we’re sacrificing the pursuit of real knowledge and understanding. That’s how the psyop war is being lost – we’re aware of the influence and the scifi aspects, but most people don’t seem to care.
I’m with Stories Are Weapons. We deserve better than this. We deserve a society that values critical thinking and pushes the boundaries of what is possible. We deserve a culture that embraces complexity and celebrates curiosity.
How do you combat scifi’s influence on the psyop war? It’s pretty simple: quit settling for mediocrity and start demanding excellence. Let’s challenge ourselves and those around us to think bigger and dream bolder. Because when it comes to science and technology, “good enough” will never be good enough.
