MEME Busting - The Art Of Cultural Truth In Narrative

by Edmund Jenks | May 12, 2011 at 04:23 pm

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MEME Busting - The Art Of Cultural Truth In Narrative

In the biological world, genes carry hereditary information, whereas, in the human communications world, MEMES carry cultural information.

If one were to rely on only getting their information from the news narratives we receive from large media broadcast and political organizations, we run the risk of living live through the lens of a distorted cultural truth versus a narrative focused on facts.

Take, for example, the MEME of "Mission Accomplished" and how it is being used to translate success and/or failure in our cultural landscape.

This excerpted and edited from Declaration Entertainment -

FIREWALL: Memebusters! The Osama Bin Laden Edition
By Bill Whittle

We used to have an immune system -- called the "press" -- that caught errors. Now the "press" generates most of the falsehoods themselves.

Memes are cultural beliefs that were not taught in school or in religion but that take on a life of their own because large numbers of people have emotional reasons for wanting them to be true …
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My joy about hearing about the death of Osama bin Laden lasted for about 20 seconds until I turned on the TV to see Andrea Mitchell crowing about how this really was "Mission Accomplished," not the premature "Mission Accomplished" that Cowboy George Bush claimed during his speech on that aircraft carrier, which happened, coincidentally, eight years earlier to the day …
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Only George Bush didn't claim "Mission Accomplished." In fact he said just the opposite.

So, where did this meme come from?

Well, the press made it up out of whole cloth. They not only distorted, they actually reversed everything that George Bush said on the deck of that aircraft carrier …
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Now that day on the carrier, President Bush didn't say "Mission Accomplished," but he did say this:

"The advance of freedom is the surest strategy to undermine the appeal of terror in the world … Where freedom takes hold, hatred gives way to hope … When freedom takes hold, men and women turn to the peaceful pursuit of a better life … American values and American interests lead in the same direction: We stand for human liberty."
[Reference Here]

Where does all of this leave our current administration, the 44th Presidency of the United States? It is left to try and dismantle the good work previous generations had put in place in the name of Liberty with the allies in the United States press ... while reaping some of the benefits. UBL is dead, and is still dead, because of the larger strategy the 43rd Presidency had the foresight to put into play. Iraqi's can vote and express their human liberty our military and its strategy left behind.

The uprisings in Egypt, Yemen, Syria, and even Libya are actions that have been brought about because people can see what one country, with a similar demographic can do. The biggest problem with these developments lay in the fact there remains the risk that the desires of the people in the streets will be hijacked through jihad control freaks and, of course, the MEME agenda of the press ... led by Al Jazeera, and aided by our own administration through the lack of strategy used by the 44th Presidency!

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Karen Hatter

at 17:07 on May 12th, 2011

In addition to standing in front of a banner that proclaimed 'Mission Accomplished', on the deck of the aircraft carrier the USS Abraham Lincoln in May of 2003, as text from President George W. Bush's speech indicates, it sure sounded like he was claiming success:

In this battle, we have fought for the cause of liberty, and for the peace of the world. Our nation and our coalition are proud of this accomplishment — yet it is you, the members of the United States military, who achieved it. Your courage — your willingness to face danger for your country and for each other — made this day possible. Because of you, our nation is more secure. Because of you, the tyrant has fallen, and Iraq is free.

Operation Iraqi Freedom was carried out with a combination of precision, and speed, and boldness the enemy did not expect, and the world had not seen before. From distant bases or ships at sea, we sent planes and missiles that could destroy an enemy division, or strike a single bunker. Marines and soldiers charged to Baghdad across 350 miles of hostile ground, in one of the swiftest advances of heavy arms in history. You have shown the world the skill and the might of the American Armed Forces.

It would seem President Bush must share some of the blame for any misunderstanding regarding his proclamation of 'Mission Accomplished'.

Edmund Jenks

at 17:35 on May 12th, 2011

In the video, the source for the banner is described ... placed there by the ship's staff.

What was accomplished was the toppling of the fourth largest standing army in the world ... and that, the Commander-In-Chief had every right to claim success. The establishment of several elections without corruption is another success the 43rd Presidency can claim as a success.

In international relations as it relates to the spread of liberty, what strategy has the 44th Presidency employed?

I'm still looking and I do not see one other than pure reaction and the washing of hands as-soon-as-possible.

Albert Milliron

at 23:51 on May 12th, 2011

Thanks. In seconds we have fact checkers and oppositional research via New Media types. The world now knows how nonfactual the old media is and always was. The UBL story was a prime example, they printed details of the raid, spoon fed by the White House without any verification of facts or second sourcing and had to retract almost the entire first story...

From UBL resisted and had a weapon, to he didn't resist and was killed without a weapon. First report is he had wives as human shields, to one of his wives threw herself in front of the Seals and was shot in the leg. To they destroyed the downed helicopter to ... some of a secret copter was left partially in tact....

In the days I was in the media, we knew information was sketchy at best in the early minutes, we reflected that with generalized statements in our headlines.. knowing that as details came in we would be more and more specific .... thus one of the reasons for the reverse pyramid stye of writing..

I was an announcer not a writer.. thankfully someone who knew what they were doing handled all of that..

Folks are now seeing that man behind that curtain.. he is just a man and not a very good wizard

Edmund Jenks

at 05:06 on May 13th, 2011

Funny that, Albert ... the reference about the wizard behind the curtain ... once one begins to understand HIS motivation, one begins to realize that the only lever HE knows how to pull is the one that remains in place between HIS legs.

With all of the calls by the White House of "shared sacrifice" should be shouldered by all, while the insulting, over the top music and poetry parties on Wednesday nights continue to pile up ... one can really get tired of watching our nation get jerked around in this way.

HE's just a man alright ... a man with a very large problem that translates to most of us living here in the United States knowing we are experiencing Carter's Second Term in this 44th Presidency.