The Untaught Syllabus. 14.
Quotes For Political Activists:
In Their Own Words: Dumbing Us Down Further: What Freedom Of The Press?


The quotes contained in this article are taken from two of my books: "The
Untaught Syllabus: 1917 And All That - In their Own Words: A Political History
Of The Cold War 1917-1983." which has also been serialised in British and
foreign journals; and "A Radical Book Of Enlightenment For The Common Man."
which is a compilation of over 1,700 radical political quotes in subject
categories.

Why place such a heavy emphasis on quotes?

Quotes have a veracity of their own, either somebody said something or they
didn't. And if enough people, with similar interests and motives and enough
power concentrated in their hands, say much the same thing, then it is more
likely that their interests will prevail.

I have found through tutoring, speaking engagements, publishing, debating and
general argument that it is more effective and revealing, especially to the
incredulous, that quotes, speaking for themselves without polemical intervention
from me - other than selection, editing and assembly - have an immediate impact
and influence on the credulity of the reader. And yes, it is extremely biased.
But when did idealistic academic or journalistic notions of being 'balanced' or
'unbiased' ever equate with veracity or reality?

I challenge those who preach a so-called 'balanced' view to come up with a
negation of what is being said.

I am happy for any of the compilation to be copied in whole or in part provided
that the full authorship of each quote is stated, and that authorship of the
compilation and any script is acknowledged; and that the work is used for the
purpose for which it is obviously intended - to inform and educate those
interested in the modern history of wars, peace, anti-racism, poverty,
imperialism, global trade and exploitation and the world debt crisis.



Dumbing Us Down Further: What Freedom Of The Press?



"Freedom of speech is the free choice of buying a newspaper for £15 million and
speaking to 35 million people or speaking to 25 people from a soap box in Hyde
Park."

(Tony Benn.)



"You cannot hope to bribe or twist
The honest British journalist.
Knowing what the chap will do
Unbribed, there's no occasion to."

(Humbert Wolfe "The Uncelestial City.")



"There's freedom to him that would read
There's freedom to him that would write.
There's none ever feared that the truth should be heard
Than they whom the truth would indict."

(Robert Burns.)



"I await the hour when a journalist can be driven from the press room for venal
practices, as a minister can be unfrocked, or a lawyer disbarred."

(US clergyman John Haynes Holmes.)



"The modern newspaper is one half ads and the other half lies between the ads."

(Anonymous.)



"There is no such thing, at this date of the world's history, in America, as an
independent press. You know it and I know it. The business of the Journalist is
to destroy truth; To lie outright; To pervert; To vilify; To fawn at the feet of
mammon, and to sell his country and his race for his daily bread. You know it
and I know it and what folly is this toasting an independent press? We are the
tools and vassals for rich men behind the scenes. We are the jumping jacks, they
pull the strings and we dance. Our talents, our possibilities and or lives are
all the property of other men. We are intellectual prostitutes."

(John Swinton, former Chief of Staff, The New York Times, 1953.)



"There is no such thing in America as an independent press... There is not one
of you who dare to write his honest opinions, and if you did you know beforehand
they would never appear in print... You know this and I know it... We are the
tools and vassals of rich men... they pull the strings and we dance. Our
talents... our lives are all the property of other men. We are intellectual
prostitutes."

(US newspaper editor John Swinton, 1883.)



"The vested interests - if we explain the situation by their influence - can
only get the public to act as they wish by manipulating public opinion, by
playing either upon the public's indifference, confusions, prejudices,
pugnacities or fears. And the only way in which the power of the interests can
be undermined and their manoeuvres defeated is by bringing home to the public
the danger of its indifference, the absurdity of its prejudices or the
hollowness of its fears; by showing that it is indifferent to danger where real
danger exists; frightened by dangers which are non-existent."

(Sir Norman Angell, English writer.)



"We are grateful to The Washington Post, The New York Times, Time Magazine and
other great publications whose directors have attended our meetings and
respected their promises of discretion for almost forty years. It would have
been impossible for us to develop our plan for the world if we had been subject
to the bright lights of publicity during those years. But, the work is now much
more sophisticated and prepared to march towards a world government. The
supranational sovereignty of an intellectual elite and world bankers is surely
preferable to the national auto-determination practiced in past centuries."

(David Rockefeller, Trilateral Commission, June, 1991.)



"In March, 1915, the J.P. Morgan interests, the steel, shipbuilding, and powder
interest, and their subsidiary organizations, got together 12 men high up in the
newspaper world and employed them to select the most influential newspapers in
the United States and sufficient number of them to control generally the policy
of the daily press... They found it was only necessary to purchase the control
of 25 of the greatest papers. An agreement was reached; the policy of the papers
was bought, to be paid for by the month; an editor was furnished for each paper
to properly supervise and edit information regarding the questions of
preparedness, militarism, financial policies, and other things of national and
international nature considered vital to the interests of the purchasers."

(U.S. Congressman Oscar Callaway, 1917.)



"Our independent American press, with its untrammelled freedom to twist and
misrepresent the news, is one of the barriers in the way of the American people
achieving their freedom."

(US criminal lawyer Clarence Darrow.)



"Our principal enemy, the principal enemy of any healthy development of the
German spirit and of the German people today, is the press! The press, at the
stage of its evolution which it has now reached, is the true enemy of the
people, an enemy all the more dangerous by reason of its many disguises...

Daily new lies; lies by means of pure fact alone, lies by means of invented
facts, lies by means of facts distorted into their opposites - such were the
weapons with which we were fought! And to cap the climax of this shameful
business the newspapers in most cases even refused to print a correction...

If a man makes money by publishing a newspaper, by poisoning the wells of
information, by feeding the people a daily spiritual death, he is the greatest
criminal I can conceive...

With my soul full of sadness, I do not hesitate to say that unless a complete
transformation of our press can be accomplished, if this newspaper pestilence
shall continue for fifty years more, the intelligence of our people will be
destroyed."

(German socialist Ferdinand Lassalle, speech to Union of German Workers, 1863.
Lassalle was imprisoned twice for sedition for making this speech.)



"The setting up of a new, invisible and all powerful government in this country,
within the last twenty years, in open violation of fundamental and statutory
law, could not have been accomplished under the steady fire of a free and
independent press...

Except for the subserviency of most of the metropolitan newspapers, the great
corporate interests would never have ventured upon the impudent, lawless
consolidation of business, for the suppression of competition, the control of
production, markets and prices.

Except for this monstrous crime, 65 per cent of all the wealth of this country
would not now be centralised in the hands of 2 per cent of all the people...

When the Morgan and Rockefeller interests harmonised to consummate the great
wrong, they well understood that they could not achieve their purpose against a
hostile press. Hence they "took over" the newspapers.

This does not necessarily mean the ownership of all newspapers. The perfection
of the modern combination is little less than a Fine Art. Here again control is
better than outright ownership. And control can be achieve through that
community of interests, that independence of investment and credits which ties
the publisher up to the banks, the advertisers, and special interests."

(US reformist politician Robert LaFollette Sr, Fooling the People as a Fine Art,
Follette's Magazine, April 1918.)



"The real value of freedom is not to the minority that wants to talk, but to the
majority, that does not want to listen."

(US educator Zechariah Chafee Jr.)



"The press plays a very significant role in maintaining and strengthening and
justifying racism at all levels of society, providing a cover for racist
activity."

(The Runnymede Trust, London, 1989.)



"It is impossible for ideas to compete in the market place if no forum for
their presentation is provided or available."

(Thomas Mann.)



"If people really knew, the war would be stopped tomorrow. But of course they
don't know, and can't know."

(British Prime Minister Lloyd George, during the First World War.)



"One of the main reasons for the general weakness of the British Press appears
to be the readiness of journalists to conspire in the massacre of their own
work."

(British writer David Hare. The Guardian, August 15 1981.)



"Well, we've heard two points of view for and against capital punishment, and
probably the truth lies somewhere between the two extremes."

(Presenter of Any Questions, BBC Radio.)



"The narrowness of the British media, our primary source of information, is a
national disgrace. The damage runs deep.

It is as if the very notion of the journalist as a teller of truths unpalatable
to ruling elites, as whistle-blower in the public interest, has been fatally
eroded. This is in part the result of the 'communications revolution' or 'total
television', in which vast amounts of repetitive information are confined to a
narrow spectrum of 'thinkable thought'. And the vocabulary of state and vested
interest manipulation is elevated above that of free journalism."

(Australian journalist in Britain John Pilger. )



"A litterateur is not a confectioner, not a dealer in cosmetics, not an
entertainer... He is just like an ordinary reporter. What would you say if a
newspaper reporter, because of his fastidiousness or from a wish to give
pleasure to his readers, were to describe only honest mayors, high-minded
ladies, and virtuous railroad contractors?"

"To a chemist nothing on earth is unclean. A writer must be as objective as a
chemist."

(Anton Chekov.)



"We do not need a censorship of the press. We have a censorship of the press."

(G.K.Chesterton.)



"Propaganda must not serve the truth, especially not insofar as it might bring
out something favourable for the opponent."

(Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf.)



"It is enough for me to send for Lorenz and inform him of my point of view and I
know that next day all the German newspapers will broadcast my ideas. I'm proud
to think that with such collaborators at my side, I can make a complete
about-face without anyone's moving a muscle. That's a thing that's possible in
no country but ours."

(Adolf Hitler.) (Rauschning "The Voice of Destruction: Hitler Speaks.")



"Through clever and constant application of propaganda, people can be made to
see paradise as hell, and also the other way round, to consider the most
wretched sort of life as paradise."

(Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf.)



"Not every item of news should be published: rather must those who control news
policies endeavour to make every item of news serve a certain purpose."

(Goebbels, diary, March 14 1943.)



"It then proved necessary to bring about a gradual psychological transformation
in the German people and explain to them by steps that there were some things
which could not be attained by peaceful means and had to be imposed with the use
of force. For that it was necessary not to propagate force as such, but it was
necessary to present to the German people certain foreign political events in
such a manner that the inner voice of the people itself would begin to cry out
for the use of force. This means to present certain events in such a manner that
in the minds of the broad masses of the people the conviction would emerge quite
automatically and gradually: If this cannot be done in a peaceful way, then it
must be done by force."

(Adolf Hitler, address to 400 members of the press, Munich, Nov 10 1938.)



"The need to project to the outside, needs, fears, frustrations and unsolved
conflicts, the causes of which are not recognised, and to find a scapegoat... is
being systematically guided here... wherever someone makes a speech with the
content that communism is bad and the West is threatened we are informed about
it in detail."

("Information oder Herrschen die Souffleure?" Hamburg 1965.)



"The decent way to influence opinion is by convincing people. But not everybody
is ready to be convinced. The path of conviction is a long one. The easier
method is to manipulate opinion with the innumerable technical means, the
functioning of which one can study and thus guide by careful sociological
analysis... The soft exertion of power, the unnoticeable which does not make the
person being influenced realise that he is not reacting to his free will, is
much more effective, if one only understands its manipulation properly."

(West German philosopher Karl-Friedrich von Weizacker, "Only Consciousness Can
Master the Future." De Welt, Hamburg, May 10 1965.)



"It is therefore one of the most important tasks of responsible state leadership
or a vigilant group of allies to make the people immune to the influence of the
opponent in its own sphere of power. Every disruption of the self-confidence and
the power of resistance must be prevented. This undoubtedly includes also as a
partial field the elimination of those who as the fifth column are working in
the ranks of their own society and order in favour of the opponent."

(Nation Europa, Coburg, March 3 1963.)



"It was always a good tactic to make the enemy responsible, in the eyes of
public opinion in Germany and abroad, for the future course of events. This
strengthened one's own morale and weakened that of the enemy. An operation such
as the one Germany was planning would be very bloody... Therefore, one must
convince public opinion that everything had first been done to avoid this
horror."

(Adolf Hitler.)



"Only by continually emphasising the German desire for peace and peaceful
intentions was I able to obtain freedom for the German people step by step and
to provide them with the armaments always required as a prerequisite for the
next step... It then proved necessary to bring about a gradual transformation in
the German people and explain to them by steps that there were some things which
could not be attained by peaceful means and had to be imposed by the use of
force. For that it was necessary to present to the German people certain foreign
political events in such a light that the inner voice of the people itself would
begin to cry out for the use of force."

(Adolf Hitler, in a speech Nov 10 1938.)



"Since the end of the war it was obvious to me that the German reader in no case
wanted one thing, that is, to think. And I adapted my papers to it."

(West German media king Axel Springer, Sonntagsblatt, Hamburg July 5 1955.)



"The decision in the struggle for the heart of Europe and thus for the destiny
of mankind is made in editor's offices, radio and television studios."

(West German neo-nazi organ Nation Europa.)



"Those fellows in the CIA don't just report on wars and the like, they go out
and make their own... They spend billions of dollars on stirring up trouble so
they'll have something to report on... It's become a government all of its own
and all secret. They don't have to account to anybody."

(Harry Truman, quoted by Merle Miller in "Plain Speaking.")



"President Reagan and his news handlers have been making, shaping and faking
news. This is an administration that has thought as much about news management,
and practised as much disinformation as any in peacetime history. The milestones
of its progress _ yellow rain, the El Salvador White Paper of 1961, the Pope
plot, KAL 007, Sandinista gun running, stretch through the years."

(The Wall Street Journal.) ()



"Two years after the war ended, major Hollywood film studios received
instructions to make anti-Soviet films, films directed against America's wartime
ally. Large sums of money were allocated for this purpose and several scripts
were commissioned."

(Berthold Brecht.)



"Foreign propaganda must be employed as an instrument of war - a judicious
mixture of rumour and deception, with truth as bait, to foster disunity and
confusion... In point of fact propaganda is the arrow of initial penetration in
preparing the people of a territory where invasion may be contemplated. It is
the first step; then fifth column work; then militarised raiders or 'commandos',
then finally the invading divisions."

(General William Donovan, Director of OSS (forerunner of CIA),in the early
1940s.) ()



"Let the working classes of Britain listen to nothing that might be presented
before them to draw their attention from the subject and they will accomplish
their own salvation and that of the world. Arise men of Britain, and take your
stand! Rally round the standard of Liberty, or forever lay prostrate under the
iron heel of you land and money-mongering taskmasters."

(George Loveless "The Victims of Whiggery.")



"All great events have been distorted, most if the important causes concealed,
some of the principal characters never appear, and all who figure are so
misunderstood and misrepresented that the result is a complete mystification. If
the history of England be ever written by one who has the knowledge and the
courage, the world would be astounded."

(Disraeli.)



"In this capture of the mind by our industrialised autocracy as the means to
economic and social subjugation, the most powerful instrument of all is the
modern industrialised Press. Through it our economic Prussianism can control the
nation's mind, form its opinions, direct its passions, determine its
judgements."

(Sir Allen Lane. The Press and Organisation of Society. 1933.)



"With politics let loose among those peoples, we may have a wave of disorder and
wholesale Communism set going all over those parts of Europe."

(South African Prime Minister Jan Smuts.) ()



"From the outset I realised that in researching the subject I would have to
carve through an ice cream mountain of public relations. I searched in vain
through books about the corporations and their histories to find any reference
to questionable activities in World War II. It was clear that the authors of
those volumes, granted the cooperation of the businesses concerned, predictably
backed off from disclosing anything that would be revealing."

(American historian Charles Higham.)



"Very often whole chunks of history are ignored. Most pupils in Britain do not
learn anything about the history, social development or lives of those who live
in socialist or 'neutral' countries. History curricula are generally limited to
the establishment's version of the British Empire, particularly its wars with
other empires, Spain, France and Germany, and the history of the USA. It would
difficult to find an average pupil who had any idea of a small fraction of, say,
the Nordic countries, the Balkans, or indeed of Asia. A few school children are
told there was a revolution in Russia which overthrew the Tsar, but they are not
given any information about the causes, effects or subsequent developments."

(Denis and Cynthia Roberts "How to Secure Peace in Europe.")



"Contrary to the belief of most people, Americans are the most misinformed
people in the world. The unceasing daily flow of half-truths, distortions,
slanted news stories, and downright lies from the big-business controlled press
and radio does not enlighten. It serves only to confuse and befuddle; foments
unreasoning hysteria; spreads baseless prejudices.

The existence of such a system of mis-information makes America fertile ground
for home-bred fascism and home-grown totalitarianism.

Until America develops an educational system that teaches citizens to spot the
phony columnists and commentators, and not to parrot the propaganda they read
and hear, the people cannot be truly educated. Without the light of truth, wise
and proper decisions are impossible. The shame of America is that Americans,
despite all their technological marvels, know more things that are not true than
any other people on earth."

(Thomas Ogilvie, Editor, Jersey Times Feb 26 1949.) ( )



"Theoretically the press is free... In practice the media are dependent on
money, on power... The mass media are... firmly in the hands of those who rule,
who manage them directly or indirectly...

But Not only the politicians rule. The rich do so by disposing of the labour
power of the masses. They also try to form an opinion which is favourable to
their interests... They also make use of the media to convince people that party
interests are also those of the masses...

Within the ruling class the proprietors have the advantage over the politicians
for the latter only have the mandate of the masses who depend economically on
the proprietors. Private property in the mass media provides an additional
abundance of power of disposal over things and people but over the apparatuses
which are indispensable for the information of the masses."

("De Chance der Massenmedien." Die Neue Gesellschaft, Bielefeld, 1966.)



"The effective operation of a democratic political system usually requires some
measure of apathy and non-involvement in the part of some individuals and
groups."

("The Crisis of Democracy." The Trilateral Commission, 1977.)



"The minority, the ruling class at present, has the schools and press, usually
the Church as well, under its thumb. This enable it to organise and sway the
emotions of the masses, and to make its tool of them."

(Albert Einstein.)



"The pressure of public opinion is like the pressure of the atmosphere; you
can't see it - but, all the same, it is sixteen pounds to the square inch."

(US poet James Russell Lowell.)



"Josef Goebbels as the historic records show has fooled many people. After all,
that was his job and few would dispute his almost complete mastery of it. What
is surprising indeed, however, is that it still shows evidence in the pages of
The Times thirty odd years later. Writing from experience I do not think that at
that late time of the war Goebbels managed to fool many German soldiers in
Russia on the Katyn issue... German soldiers knew about the shot in the back of
the head all right... we German soldiers also knew very well that the Polish
officers were dispatched by none other than our own."

(Ex German soldier Henry Metelmann, in a letter to The Times, Feb 27 1971.)



"The daily press... which in a moment spreads inventions over the whole world,
fabricates more myths... in a day than could have formerly been done in a
century."

(Karl Marx.)



"I believe that few people aside from myself have any idea of the tremendous,
the almost invincible power and force of the daily press. I am one of those who
believe that at least in America the press rules the country; it rules its
politics, its religion, its social practice...

The publisher who has succeeded... is necessarily a capitalist...

The press of this country is now and always has been so thoroughly dominated by
the wealthy few of the country that it cannot be depended upon to give the great
mass of the people that correct information concerning political, economical,
and social subjects which it is necessary that the mass of the people shall
have, in order that they shall vote and in all ways act in the best way to
protect themselves from the brutal force and chicanery of the ruling and
employing class. I have sought to give these people all the information which
will strengthen them in their unequal contest with their masters."

(US newspaper boss Edward Scripps.)



"The cloak-and-dagger operations of America's Central Intelligence Agency are
only a small part of its total activities. Most of its $2,000 million budget and
80,000 personnel are devoted to the systematic collection of information -
minute personal details about tens of thousands of politicians and political
organisations in every country in the world including Britain. And this data,
stored in the world's largest filing system at the CIA headquarters at Langley,
Virginia, is used not only to aid Washington's policy makers, but in active
political intervention overseas - shaping the policies of political parties,
making and unmaking their leaders, boosting one internal faction against
another, and often establishing rival breakaway parties when other tactics
fail."

(Richard Fletcher "How the CIA Took the Teeth Out of British Socialism." In
Philip Agee and Louis Wolf (eds) "Dirty Work: The CIA in Western Europe.")



"Everything is quiet. There is no trouble here. There will be no war. I wish to
return."

(William Randolph Hearst's correspondent Remington sent to Havana. 1890.)



"Please remain. You furnish the pictures and I'll furnish the war."

(William Randolph Hearst, in reply to his correspondent Remington in Havana.
1890.)



"The freedom of the press throughout the world where the capitalists rule, is
the freedom to buy up newspapers, the freedom to buy writers, to buy and
manufacture public opinion in the interests of the capitalists."

(Lenin 1921.)



"When we lose our individual independence in the corporateness of a mass
movement, we find a new freedom - freedom to hate, bully, lie, torture, murder
and betray without shame and remorse. Herein undoubtedly lies part of the
attractiveness of a mass movement...

All social disturbances and upheavals have their roots in crises of individual
self-esteem, and the great endeavour in which the masses most readily unite is
basically a search for pride...

Thus blind faith is to a considerable extent a substitute for the lost faith in
ourselves; insatiable desire a substitute for hope; accumulation a substitute
for growth; fervent hustling a substitute for purposeful action, and pride a
substitute for unattainable self-respect."

(Eric Hoffer, US longshoreman.)



"The stage, art, literature, the cinema, the press and advertisement posters,
all must have the stains of pollution removed and be placed in the service of a
national and cultural idea."

(Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf.)



"We are drowning in information and starving for knowledge."

(Rutherford Roger.)



"An ounce of image is worth a pound of performance."

(Canadian writer and educationalist Laurence J. Peter, 1919-1990.)



What kind of world is it - Huxleyan or Orwellian?

"What Huxley teaches is that... spiritual devastation is more likely to come
from an enemy with a smiling face than from one (Orwellian) whose countenance
exudes suspicion and hate... Big Brother does not watch us, by his choice. We
watch him, by ours. There is no need for wardens or gates or Ministries of
Truth. When a population becomes distracted by trivia, when cultural life is
redefined as a perpetual round of entertainments, when serious public
conversation becomes a form of baby-talk, when in short, a people become an
audience and their public business a vaudeville act, then a nation finds itself
at risk; culture-death is a clear possibility."

(Neil Postman in "Amusing Ourselves To Death.")





British school and college history, economics, sociology and business studies
syllabus teaching and books do not contain any of this information.

All the material and information I have presented here is readily available to
historians, writers, journalists, teachers, educators and syllabus publishers.
Although I have spent many hundreds of hours gathering it all together, I did
not have to look very far to find any of it.

When as a trainee history lecturer, it was suggested I take the class on a trip
to the Tower of London and then set them an essay on what life was like for a
soldier in King Charles' Army centuries ago. Very useful knowledge that! A
sociology of the past perhaps? But certainly not history in its most important
sense; unless history is to mean anything old or 'interesting' that you can do
in evening classes, like antiques, flower arranging or basket weaving. When
instead I taught real history, learning from the past in order to change the
future, the collective life-experience of humanity, I was got rid of. The head
of the history department complained that the students had remarked that I made
them think; which the head of history had probably never done in a lifetime of
teaching. I ended up washing and cleaning and emptying human surgical waste in a
hospital.

Unless teachers learn to be brave and intellectually honest (difficult when they
have a mortgage and bills to pay), future historical, social and economic
education and popular 'knowledge' will also not refer to the US or British
history and continuing complicity in global plunder, exploitation, domination
and control, wars of aggrandisement and acquisition, causing the deaths and
devastation of the homes and lands of millions of people - the thousands of
children under the age of two who will die tonight through simple lack of food,
clean water, medicine and education - the untold millions of unnecessary deaths
among the overwhelming majority of humanity on this incredibly rich and abundant
and ultimately sustainable earth.



Quotes from Brian Mitchell. Evolution.



Responses and criticisms welcomed. Reply to my personal e-mail if you prefer. My
replies to criticisms will be posted.







"The most remarkable thing about the world is that you can understand it."
(Einstein.)
"There are no such things as strangers; only friends who have never met."
(Anon.)




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