Our Research
We hope that you can use both the podcast we have created and the research we have done to help guide your thought process of forming a foundation to discuss illusion in a concrete manner.
In The Podcast
Chinese Censorship
The Mark
- Tienanmen Square Massacre
- Called “The June 4th Incident” to cover up the death count
- Tried to cover it up but couldn’t because of the massive amount of footage
- Blocked “The June 4th Incident” and Tienanmen Square Massacre
- Originally just had a message stating “According to relevant laws, regulations and policies, search results for the blocked keyword cannot be displayed.”
- Citizens used code-words to get around it like “535 (May 35th) instead of June the 4th.
- Government reacts to keywords by attempting a new way to approach censorship
- Redirected to different Tienanmen Square incident in 1976 one where citizens gathered to try to protest removal of mourning decorations for popular Communist leader
- Hailed as event showing support for Communist party
- Changed “laws & regulations” message to “no results found” message so it looked like no one was talking about it/ isn’t important important enough to talk about
- Pots w/ material corresponding to that date
- Redirected to different Tienanmen Square incident in 1976 one where citizens gathered to try to protest removal of mourning decorations for popular Communist leader
- Censorship is used to trick Chinese citizens they’re free when they really aren’t
- Instead of being a China that's uncensored as people think, it's more like a China more cleverly censored
- Media dedicates large portion of resources toward political propaganda & promoting personality cult of Kim Jong-un w/ Kim Il-sung and Kim Jong-il
- Radios & TVs preset to only receive government frequencies & sealed w/ a label prevent tampering
- Serious Criminal offence to manipulate sets & receive radio/ TV broadcasts from outside North Korea
- Uses different TV systems than South Korea, so impossible to view broadcasts across border
- Could use short-wave radios to broadcast news, but against law to possess such radios
- Allegedly confiscated & resold by corrupted secret police agents.
- Despite extremely strict regulations & excessive punishments, North Koreans have increasing access to news & other media outside state controlled media authorized by government because police officers are known to smuggle western news and media to citizens as well as bypassing the criminal justice system for people who are caught.
- Good things happen to good people and bad things happen to bad people.
- It is basically karma in a sense (Karma is the belief that doing good things in one’s current life will result in better things happening in the next life)
- It is widely studied since Melvin J Lerner worked on the belief in the 60s.
- It is what makes people blame the victim as seen in media.
- People use it so they can believe that there is a reason for everything that happens.
- Use it so they don't have to cope with the randomness of real life.
- People use strategies to eliminate threats to this “just world” belief.
- Rational: acceptance of the reality of injustice, trying to prevent injustice/ provide restitution, accepting own limitations
- Irrational: Denial, withdrawal, reinterpretation of event
- Ghost Armies
- US & Brits created fake tanks, bases, runways/ planes, etc.
- Prevented Germans from bombing every base bc they would bomb the “ghost” bases.
- Freaked out the French/ US Allies because they thought the US army was bigger than it actually was.
- Used inflatable tanks that 4 people could lift to convince other countries that our soldiers has super strength (Captain America’s origin).
- Faking the Germans with camel dung bombs
- Germans would drive tanks over camel dung as good luck.
- The Brits would make small mines that looked like camel dung, so the German tanks would roll over them and explode.
- Germans started to only roll over dung that was rolled over before, so the Brits made the fake-dung bombs look like they were already rolled over
The Mark
- The post WWI German currency
- Dropped the Gold Standard to pay the debt they owed back quicker
- Printed massive amounts of money, making it's value plummet
- Related Economics Info: The greater of a supply, the less something is in demand and the less value it has.
- Became worthless, plunging the average German into complete poverty
- Marks quickly became unusable and Germany had to switch to a new currency
- Spoiler Alert: It didn't fix the fact that most Germans were now in extreme poverty and barely producing anything.
Didn't Make The Cut
Stuff that didn't make the cut of our podcast
Using Photoshop To Bypass The Great Firewall
- Students have mostly reacted to China's new approach to censorship by physically manipulating photos of the events in order to create the illusion they aren't discussing or posting about a censored matter, and when they are discovered, the pages the pages the Chinese Government has to show "No Results Found" to are comical. This image below caused mass censoring of search terms like "duck", "yellow" and "bath" for weeks.
World War One
North Korean Internet
Continuation On The Flexible Value Of Money
- People expected it to be over in a few weeks
- Soldiers didn’t expect to actually have people fire back at them (did they not understand how fighting in wars work??)
- Underestimated human element of war/ forgot it was two sided
- People thought that their side was the superior side w/ superior weapons/ tactics
- While similar things have happened at most every war in the past, this war was the brutalest example the world had ever seen.
North Korean Internet
- Despite what North Korea claims, only some high-level officials allowed access to global internet
- Some universities have small # of strictly monitored computers
- Other citizens may only get access to country’s own intrenet (Kwangmyong)
- A series of internal state run websites showcase how North Korea both "invented" the entire internet and "keeps it safe" from outsiders.
- Foreigners and smugglers access internet using a 3G phone network that leaks into North Korea from South Korea, China and Russia
- Substitute “intranet”
- Restricted to certain elite grade schools, select research institutions, universities, factories, & privileged individuals
- Not available in homes since none are given computers by the state
- Filtered by Korea Computer Center
- Ensures only “acceptable” information can be accessed through network
Continuation On The Flexible Value Of Money
- Value of the Russian Rubble plummets as the economy can't balance itself without expensive oil.
- Greek debt