136 replies to this topic

[Yuli Ban]

http://www.pbs.org/n...-photos-france/

http://ww1centenary....irst-world-war/

http://www.firstworl...gins/causes.htm

 

You can say that it really began on June 28th, 1914 and escalated from there, but we're almost at that time. Only a handful people remember the world as it was being torn by the Great War. 

I hope we never have another Great War. The fact our species has had 2 world wars (technically it's had as many as two dozen, but that's another story) resulting in such massive global casualties is a shame. Perhaps inevitable for a species in the throes of first developing mass-scale technology, but shameful nonetheless.

[Glory of the quasars]

What have we learned? Heh. It's not about learning. As long as there will be scarcity and human greed, war will never end, period. 

Good thread, anyway, it's always good to remember.

[Mashallah]

Absolutely nothing.

[Maximus]

Nothing at all. If it weren't for MAD, WW3 would already have happened and probably multiple other World Wars too. 

[Mike the average]

We have only just begun to start learning thanks to the internet. Before that, like the majority I believed any old propaganda because there was no way to check anything. That's why I have more trust in the young than any other generation.

[Mashallah]

2Mike(writing from my phone, so I can't quote):
You're delusional if you think that propaganda is less efficient now. It rather to be seems the opposite for the majority of the population and that somewhat scares me.

[Mike the average]

delusional?

okay maybe you could tell us how to verify a media story before the internet came out

oh thats right....you weren't born yet...

[Mashallah]

Reasoning, "kitchen talks" (which were extremely popular in USSR) and outside contacts. Yes, the internet does give the POSSIBILITY to verify information, but the majority ignores that possibility and only believes in data that reaffirms their point of view, dismissing everything else as lies. And that is a problem.

[Mike the average]

'POSSIBILITY to verify'

 

Yeah I think its time to actually get out of the kitchen Bzflater, haha you could make an excuse for anything

 

This is the information age mate, only going to get bigger.

[Mashallah]

'POSSIBILITY to verify'

 

Yeah I think its time to actually get out of the kitchen Bzflater, haha you could make an excuse for anything

 

This is the information age mate, only going to get bigger.

 

The problem with internet is that it gives everyone an echo chamber and most people decide to remain in their echo chambers, only reaffirming their views. They also think like you that it's the information age and that it's therefore impossible to fool them, making them even more susceptible to propaganda and even easier to fool.

Internet's availability of information is a double-edged sword.

[Mike the average]

I don't think you get it,

 

before the net, you couldn't verify anything

 

all you had was other rival papers and media owned by the same bunch of billionaire media tycoons and an old set of encyclopedia britannicas if you were rich....

 

you have no idea how bullshit it was, I was ready to pick up a gun as a teen and go fight as an American Ally against you guys, Palestine, you name it....

 

You have no idea,

 

why do you think US 'accidentally' used to blow up Al Jazeera now and then, so no one could hear news from anyone else.

[Mashallah]

I don't think you get it,

 

before the net, you couldn't verify anything

 

all you had was other rival papers and media owned by the same bunch of billionaire media tycoons and an old set of encyclopedia britannicas if you were rich....

 

you have no idea how bullshit it was, I was ready to pick up a gun as a teen and go fight as an American Ally against you guys, Palestine, you name it....

 

You have no idea

 

Before the net, many people trusted the media less. Internet gives the illusion of the impossibility to deceive, which increases the susceptibility to deception.

As I said earlier, it's a double-edged sword.

[Mike the average]

If that's the case why was the media the first to hate the internet in the 90s

 

Always passing it off condescendingly as

 

'kids on the internet these days', Fox news the worst offender

[Mashallah]

If that's the case why was the media the first to hate the internet in the 90s

 

Always passing it off condescendingly as

 

'kids on the internet these days', Fox news the worst offender

 

It took time to adapt. Now there are many new forms of propaganda from astroturfing to viral propaganda videos.

[Mike the average]

Not even close to how bad it was pre internet

 

before the internet, propaganda was the news,

 

you didn't pick and choose.

[Yuli Ban]

I have to agree with Mike the average here. While people will gravitate towards what reaffirms their views, that's really natural. We've always done that. And anyone who is "well rounded" on the news is either "a brain-dead liberal commie" or "a fascist nazi."

 

But before the Internet, it really was as one-sided as it could possibly go. This is why I say that we're closer to Brave New World than Nineteen Eighty-Four.

 

 

1984— one or a few groups own all information, and no one even thinks to question it.

 

Brave New World— So much information that you choose one and run with it in the face of logic.

[MarcZ]

Biggest lesson from the First World War: don't enter into stupid alliances. 

 

Second biggest lesson from the First World War: war is not glorious.

 

Third biggest lesson from the First World War: when you defeat your enemy you should try to be as charitable as possible to them as opposed to a dick, because then bad things happen.

[Ryan94]

Crush the enemy completely. To leave it wounded is to leave it with the opportunity and time for revenge.

[Yuli Ban]

Crush the enemy completely. To leave it wounded is to leave it with the opportunity and time for revenge.

That's how we got in the Second World War.

You see, the reason France didn't have a Hitler after Napoleon was defeated was because the world leaders knew that crushing someone completely and humiliating them would never lead to good things...
A hundred years later, France of all nations, completely overlooked that.

[Yuli Ban]

First World War centenary: how the events of August 2 1914 unfolded

Britain went to war on August 4 1914. In the second part of a four-day series, we document the dramatic events leading up to the declaration of war as they happened, hour-by-hour