Guide to Effective Protests: Dress Code

Which picture shows people who are more serious?

The title was going to be "making demonstrations more effective" until I realized my previous titles increasingly began with ING suffix words. This reminded me that the trend of statements with ING suffix starters seemed to pick up pace under Bush. He would make many speeches in front of a background that would be endlessly covered with written tidbits like "rebuilding American families", "increasing opportunities", "making heartland strong", etc.

News organizations caught this propaganda flu as well. Since adding the ING suffix creates an action noun and conveys that continuous action is happening, it could very well be that GOP came up with very effective, psychological, and viral informational tool. Instead of definitive statements conveying a beginning and end such as "The act of 2006 caused this" we got streams of meaningless and cerebrally confusing "financing our future" which just told that vague action is happening nonstop. Perfect for 24/7 cable and do nothing politicians since definitive statements with an end would invite thought. Bush excelled at psych ops.

When talking about increasing effectiveness of protests, it is good to remember that the gathering of demonstrators is primarily a psychological propaganda tool for various media and apathetic middle class sections of the public. During the Bush era, the early Iraq war protests numbered in the hundreds of thousands. These protests were dramatically ineffective and not just due to 3 major media conglomerates deciding to ignore them. These anti-war gatherings were utilizing shockingly outdated methods (if they were ever that effective to begin with considering cultural backlash in 1970s).

The participants thought that the sheer numbers of people would be enough to catch the media's eye. Many of the baby boomer organizers have been using the same tactics that seemed to be successful decades ago and for which the establishment and society at large had developed a serious immunity. It may have been shocking and eye catching to have colorfully dressed hyper individuals in large numbers in 1960s in one place. In 2003 however, the insistence than protesters find their own unique way of expressing discontent became counterproductive since MSM was able to use it as a weapon of ridicule when it wasn't ignoring. It was easy pickings to zoom in on the strangest looking hippy or funniest paper meche statue.

Anybody who was exposed to this silly groan inducing spectacle could not have come away psychologically impressed. The actual target audience, politically dominant elderly and middle aged voters in the western world (majority of them were not on the side of earlier protesters in 60s/70s) were exposed to the wrong psychological marketing strategy and completely counterproductive anti-war propaganda.

The organizers would complain that just getting everybody organized enough to show up was an accomplishment. If they faced such critical organizational issues they should have spent serious energy on creating a perception of organization that was lacking. This is easily accomplished with a general agreement on what to wear and what color theme the demonstration should be.

It may sound silly but one just has to look back at US suffrage movement and the various CIA engineered "color revolutions" in eastern Europe in recent years. The green "movement" in Iran for instance was comprised of multitudes of various groups and previously unaffiliated individuals yet it miraculously became transformed into a monolithic "movement" with a simple color emphasis.

The effect of 2003 protests would have been multiplied dramatically if everybody showed up in their most formal wear and decided on a singular color. All it takes is for organizers to send a simple message to those attending such as "whatever you do show up in work pants/work skirt and a white shirt and wear a cheap blue headband or scarf, etc". When a reporter takes a picture of 50,000 people each dressed individualistically, it looks as you'd expect, just a horde of disorganized people. However a picture of 50,000 all dressed in office cubicle formal wear that also has blue headbands and occasional blue flags would be visually and psychologically stunning. It would:

1) Prevent reporters (both MSM and amateur) from singling out the strangest looking costumes and pretty much force more wide crowd shots since shots of so many people wearing the same are better photography in general (think psych ops of crowd shots in 2003 Ukraine and 2009 Iran). More media coverage is guaranteed.

2) Create the illusion of organization and "movement" which in turn invites giving the whole coalition of diverse groups an umbrella nickname (even simple tea bags can do this much less blue headbands)

3) Most importantly the psychological effect on elderly people (who see a crowd of crisp well dressed people of all ages) would go further in achieving the aim of the event in the first place. Even if the demonstration gets a derogative nickname like "bluebaggers/bluetesters" etc it would still give power to "movement" by putting it under one category. People like to lump things into categories.

Doing something as simple and seemingly trivial as coordinating color and asking everybody to wear a white shirt automatically starts a process of integration where common themes and slogans are developed. It may be asking too much to also coordinate 3 simple phrases such as "Telling to End Afghanistan War" to utilize propaganda of repetition as a voice of the crowd. It may also be asking too much to have everybody at a protest shut up and walk in solemn silence for a mile to create a psychological sense of gravity in onlookers. It may definitely be too much to replicate the simple parade formation walking that suffragettes showed.

But when people feel seriously enough about something to gather in a large crowd (knowing that the crowd itself is a marketing tool) then they should also take the next step to demonstrate their seriousness instead of treating the event like a giant Halloween party, music festival, or socializing opportunity. Until common tricks to multiply message are used, American protesters will not show they are serious no matter how they feel on the inside. Then again, in today's climate next time there are that many people in the streets the catchy nickname they'd get may be pitchforkers.

Military-Industrial Complex Reform

Since defense industry is the backbone of US economy and employs millions of people, it needs to be transformed into an engine of productive national renewal rather than be sharply and rapidly slashed




The military-industrial complex has been the biggest real sector of the American economy since World War 2. The total amount of money poured into defense (and defense related expenditures which wouldn't otherwise exist) is now over 1 trillion dollars annually. Utilizing this proper counting of expenditures (rather than official breakdown that shows defense as just 1/4 of the total budget), the federal government spends 1/3 to almost 1/2 of all money it gets on defense (one may argue that it is even more when costs of years of counter-insurgency warfare are added but let's look at the basics for now).

Millions of Americans get their paychecks either directly or indirectly from the government in this manner. As such, making rapid sharp cuts in the defense budget (under either ideological or budget balancing pretext) would greatly exacerbate dangers to social stability and American domestic national security. Even modest cuts in defense will throw hundreds of thousands of additional citizens out of work and push the current real level of unemployment (20% or 1 out of 5 Americans without a job) to being worse than during the Great Depression. Possibility of serious social eruption with real violence is increased if this final solid industrial pillar of US economy is touched. Even with rather overpriced weaponry, US is still the biggest weapons dealer on the planet. In addition to quantitatively unmatched weapons exports to satellite nations and ideological allies, the government's military purchases is the last thing keeping remaining top notch American factories from being shut down.

Obama administration seems to realize this as has every president for the past 50 years. He prudently extended the GI Bill to send Iraq and Afghanistan occupation veterans to college. It is safer to have Iraqi war vets drinking liquor in college than sitting unemployed, armed, and boiling with personal or political resentment in an economically depressed town or city. Obama and Gates also mostly cut weapons systems so far that are in their research and development phase rather than full production phase. Blue collar workers are still showing up to make mortars, helicopter replacement parts, Humvees, etc.

Although the corporate path to globalization has already destroyed most of the productive industrial capacity in America, the military related factories remain to churn out a wide variety of complex products in large quantities. These assembly lines (and the advanced machinery and managerial systems experts required by them) will be the last thing the Obama administration touches. That is the reason Obama has focused more on health care to reduce long term costs.

It was always inevitable that mechanization in time will reduce total global amount of human workers and constantly increase levels of total unemployment on an international level. It is against this backdrop that the federal government has to work to decide on what to save money on. Here is a fascinating letter to the president and a call to action from 1960s (highly recommended) by scientists warning of mechanization and its consequences. Some quotes are in order:

"Present excessive levels of unemployment would be multiplied several times if military and space expenditures did not continue to absorb ten per cent of the gross national product (i.e., the total goods and services produced). Some six to eight million people are employed as a direct result of purchases for space and military activities. At least an equal number hold their jobs as an indirect result of military or space expenditures. In recent years, the military and space budgets have absorbed a rising proportion of national production and formed a strong support for the economy."

"The problems posed by the cybernation revolution are part of a new era in the history of all mankind but they are first being faced by the people of the U.S. The way Americans cope with cybernation will influence the course of this phenomenon everywhere. This country is the stage on which the machines-and-man drama will first be played for the world to witness"

"* Surplus capacity and unemployment have thus co-existed at excessive levels over the last six years.

* The underlying cause of excessive unemployment is the fact that the capability of machines is rising more rapidly than the capacity of many human beings to keep pace.

* A permanent impoverished and jobless class is established in the midst of potential abundance."

It has been 40 years since the warnings of this report and 40 years of the government disregarding all recommendations within it (as well as very similar observations and recommendations made by Zbigniew Brzezinski in 1970). Since the government has not made a thrust towards utilizing its industrial base (when it still had it) to move into post-scarcity socioeconomics, what remains to be done is make sure the remaining factories keep running. That means reform of the military-industrial complex rather than massive cuts in it. People working for the defense sector can slowly be put to use nation building right here at home.

It is well understood that the defense sector is bloated and corrupt (Lockheed-Martin for instance makes sure to have offices, factories, and people employed in over 40 states to influence congressmen across the board). However, gutting this 60 year old industrial behemoth will not only increase danger from former soldiers stirring trouble but will also create a bit of a brain drain as defense related scientists go abroad. Considering that the funding for exotic weapons Research and Development has increased under Obama, perhaps the government is aware of this and does not want an American repeat of Soviet scientists selling flowers on a sidewalk for a living until finding work in China.

Most importantly, the same factories making advanced fighter jets, tanks, and communications systems can be retooled to serve national renewal just as car factories were retooled to make tanks during WW2. The recent fires in California for example, could not be brought under control because of inadequate amount of firetrucks (some of them 40 years old) and military-industrial complex facilities can be utilized to stamp out fire trucks and other equipment of tangible material use. Under this cover, the government can continue funding the defense associated industries while actually diverting substantial amounts of money to improving social welfare and quality of life. This would be the equivalent to making cuts in defense that are absolutely necessary while being politically doable (since right now major cuts are impossible in any event due to congressmen needing Lockheed corporate money as well as blue collar political support working on Lockheed owned assets).

The way things stand now once the dollar default occurs, military industrial complex will be rapidly reduced anyway. Since it is a lot more real and tangible than the now deflating financial sector, its demise will bring a lot more societal misery than can be imagined. That is why it must be reformed to be more than an advanced killing machine. A good way to go about it would be to:

1) Increase the number and scope of collaborative projects with European aerospace and military counterparts when it comes to weaponry. This way, the burdens of developing next generation platforms can be shared while keeping American scientists employed within NATO space. Just like Indians and Russians are now jointly working on supersonic BrahMos missiles, there is no reason why Europeans and Americans need to engage on separate jet, ship, helicopter, and missile research.

2) Use executive authority to make surviving car and airplane factories collaborate with cutting edge military production facilities. Since German style state capitalism is coming to United States in the near future anyway, it will not be a big jump from ordering car companies around to mandating collaborative production of 21st century civilian vehicles, planes, communication tools, etc. Even national health care problem can be rapidly solved if the coverage given to soldiers is expanded to provide for all Americans.

3) Declare a national emergency as a pretext (war on dingy infrastructure to beat the Chinese or some silly marketing phrase like that) for using the military assets in socially productive and creative ways. This is an unfortunate tactic but seems to work the best in this society rather than direct appeals to compassion and data. An American government that says "hey lets use our soldiers and our space assets to put up these broadband towers all over the country so everybody has faster Internet than Japanese do" would have much greater success than one that follows recent example of Finnish government by saying  "all people have a right to the fastest Internet possible".

4) Of course who can forget about the 700 military bases US has around the world to maintain dollar dominance as a reserve currency. As the dollar declines, so should the number of American bases overseas.

Not using the military industrial complex as a vital tool of reform with the biggest potential (while first reforming the tool itself and taking enough control of it) would leave the federal government with few other options.