Fantastic Planet has a worthwhile post about an article on MSN. It’s about a study conducted ostensibly by the University of Connecticut, the message of which is essentially, “Young people don’t care about freedoms protected by the First Amendment.”

FP makes a really great point:

Why all the surprise? *Of course* they don’t understand freedom of speech– they have a limited vocabulary, confined to Britney and American Idol. They have to walk through metal detectors on their way into school every morning. It’s some big shock that kids raised in a restrictive security-state-of-being don’t comprehend or care about guarantees of free speech?

But I want to look at this from another angle for a second. Yes, it means putting on my conspiracy hat once more, but I know a lot of you love that. And for those that don’t, let’s just call it a thought experiment. A thought experiment in what? Social engineering. Manipulating and manufacturing public opinion.

Let’s just break this article down into pieces and look at what it’s doing and how for a moment, shall we? First paragraph:

The way many high school students see it, government censorship of newspapers may not be a bad thing, and flag burning is hardly protected free speech.

To me, this already smells like trouble. You know how they say that formula for journalistic writing is an inverted triangle? You tell your whole story in the first line, then it narrows down to details.

What’s our story so far? Our story is about “high school students,” or rather young people. Young people are what we worship in this culture. Don’t believe me? Turn the tv or the radio on for 30 seconds. Young people also convey a sense of “innocence” or “purity.” What else does our story consist of? It consists of two declarative statements. One of which is “Government restricting freedoms isn’t definitely bad.” And the next is “Some of our freedoms are questionable anyway.” What do you get when you combine those two statements with our precious young people? You get a snot-nosed piece of shit teen celebrity saying:

“Like, um, you know… the government can do whatever it wants! Who cares?! Learning makes my head hurt. SPRING BREAK!! WHOO!!

Or, maybe Britney Spears said it better already, when was this, a year or two ago? Anyway:

Honestly, I think we should just trust our President in every decision that he makes and we should just support that. You know? And, um, be faithful in what happens.

Kids say the darndest things! What’ll these youngsters think up next? On to the next paragraph of this “news item”:

It turns out the First Amendment is a second-rate issue to many of those nearing their own adult independence, according to a study of high school attitudes released Monday.

“Those nearing their own adult independence” - what does that mean? This paragraph is intended to inform you that there is a “sea change” going on. That the next generation who are about to become full-fledged adults have a whole new way of looking at things that the rest of us are all stodgy ‘n stuff about. So watch out, cause they’re gonna be voting age soon!

After that, it starts getting into more specific details. It talks about how 1 in 3 kids thinks the First Amendment goes “too far” and that only half think newspapers should be allowed to publish what they want without government approval.

Then finally, in the fifth paragraph, well below the page fold, and underneath the ad (far past the point most people have stopped reading), there is a quote from somebody in the Knight Foundation (who footed the $1 million bill for the study) about how “dangerous” the attitudes of these kids is. But before you sit there feeling all vindicated, I’d have to ask the question of what’s the dillyo with this Knight Foundation? Who works there? Who started it? What else do they fund? What kind of other activities and organizations are they hooked into? Are they running this study as part of a campaign for somebody else? Where did this million dollars really come from? Why did this survey cost so much money? How were the schools and students chosen to participate in this? Why did this foundation choose the University of Connecticut as a conduit for the research? Does this university receive government contracts, especially military?

We could go on and on like this. Maybe they are all on the up-and-up, but for me, those questions need to be asked and answered before I applaud them for their “heroic efforts” to uphold freedom in America. This is exactly the reason that media literacy is virtually non-existent in this country. Because it involves following all kinds of complex trails of information, and nobody is going to do that when they can just sit at their computer in their boxer shorts and say, “Well, if the kids don’t like the amendment, then I don’t either. Now, how bout ordering some of this herbal viagra I keep hearing about?”

A couple paragraphs later:

The results reflected indifference, with almost three in four students saying they took the First Amendment for granted or didn’t know how they felt about it. It was also clear that many students do not understand what is protected by the bedrock of the Bill of Rights.

Three in four students said flag burning is illegal. It’s not. About half the students said the government can restrict any indecent material on the Internet. It can’t.

That’s great news, because nobody will miss it when it’s gone. And a few paragraphs later:

The partners in the project, including organizations of newspaper editors and radio and television news directors, share a clear advocacy for First Amendment issues.

Right, because everybody knows that corporate media doesn’t censor itself voluntarily on behalf of its owners, advertisers, and a whole food chain of accomplices. Removal of First Amendment protection would like not change corporate media at all. But what would it change? Freedom of religion, assembly and the right to petitition the government. Somehow not a single one of these has been mentioned anywhere in this article. HMMMM…. You know what this means? This is an attempt to make you think that “freedom of speech” is the only thing at stake here. And since that’s not always “cool” according to teenagers, we can maybe do away with it, or at least limit it. But that means we won’t be able to gather en masse and storm the tsar’s palace anymore, because it will be illegal to go outside unless you’re on your way to the salt mines.

Oh, I also forgot this gem of a paragraph:

When asked whether people should be allowed to express unpopular views, 97 percent of teachers and 99 percent of school principals said yes. Only 83 percent of students did.

Wait a second, let me check my First Amendment here…. unpopular views? It doesn’t fucking say anything about unpopular views. This is totally irrelevant. Actually, not true. This is a classic “straw man argument” in which you deliberately misrepresent your opponents views in order to cripple his attacks.

But there is another hidden message in this paragraph, one about power dynamics. Did you spot it? They set up a hierarchy. The didn’t just ask students. They also asked teachers. And who else did they ask? Principals. Is it just a coincidence that the figure at the top of this power-pyramid is also the most classically virtuous? Are we supposed to get the message that those highest in the chain of command have only our best interests at heart? In other words, should we: “just trust our President in every decision that he makes?”

Then they go into talking about how students who are exposed to and allowed to engage in media activities in their school embrace the First Amendment rights blah blah blah. So these are the ones who are either A) marked for death, or B) need to be herded in and brainwashed into thinking that the media actually says anything or is free anyway. And then the truth finally comes out what this is all really about:

About nine in 10 principals said it is important for all students to learn some journalism skills, but most administrators say a lack of money limits their media offerings.

So this is actually about school funding? Is that the trick? Was this all just an elaborate ploy to get money for schools? Oh wait, but don’t schools just put out mindless worker bees for the hive anyway?

See, this is the problem with conspiracy theory: that it makes you read into everything like you’re on your all-time worst pot freak out.

Did my girlfriend just look at him? What the fuck? Are they sleeping together? Oh my god, is everybody laughing at me? Oh my god, everybody’s fucking laughing at me, because they’re fucking sleeping together and everybody knows it except me. Oh my god, I’m the biggest fucking idiot. Oh my god, did that dude just brush up against my hand? Was that an accident? Is he gonna try to touch my butt later? Oh my god, what’s that floating in my beer? Is that a bug? How many of those have I swallowed? Jesus Christ!

“To fight the empire is to be infected by its derangement,” as Philip K. Dick said. I guess the thing you gotta figure out is just to make sure you don’t have a “bad trip” when you take a trek into conspiracy land. You gotta figure out cool weird shit that’s gonna either allay your fears (ie, that there is some kind of cool elaborate counter-conspiracy underground at work), or empower you and other people somehow, or make you realize that it’s all a bullshit game and this is just a ride that we can get off whenever we want. Like that Bill Hicks quote, which I feel deserves repeating now as a sort of purge to that deep foray into enemy territory:

The world is like a ride in an amusement park. And when you choose to go on it,
you think it’s real because that’s how powerful our minds are. And the ride goes up and down and round and round. It has thrills and chills and it’s very brightly colored and it’s very loud and it’s fun, for a while. Some people have been on the ride for a long time and they begin to question, is this real, or is this just a ride? And other people have remembered, and they come back to us, they say,
“hey - don’t worry, don’t be afraid, ever, because, this is just a ride…”

And we… kill those people.

Ha ha! “Shut him up. We have a lot invested in this ride. Shut him up. Look at my furrows of worry. Look at my big bank account and my family. This just has to be real.”

Just a ride.

But we always kill those good guys who try and tell us that, you ever notice that?
And let the demons run amok. But it doesn’t matter because: It’s just a ride, and we can change it anytime we want. It’s only a choice. No effort, no work, no job, no savings and money. A choice, right now, between fear and love. The eyes of fear want you to put bigger locks on your doors, buy guns, close yourself off. The eyes of love, instead, see all of us as one.