Comment by somenameforme

> western governments are also in the war of information and minds. if they wouldnt wage it, we'd already have lost.

Tangential, but this I strongly disagree with. The reason the US, and West more broadly, has been gradually, and now rapidly, losing this 'war' since the end of WW2 is precisely because we started waging it. And more generally the reason we started waging it is because we started behaving in an increasingly amoral fashion.

Consider that US had absolutely no intelligence agency whatsoever until 1942. And the CIA did not exist before 1947. Then within 15 years they're proposing engaging in terrorist acts against Americans on American soil so we can blame it on another country and get involved in a war. [1] And that proposal was only stopped by a President who would then shortly thereafter be assassinated by a "deluded gunman." [2] For context on that snippet if you're unaware, Bush Sr was the former head of the CIA.

From there it's shockingly just been a rapidly downhill slide. When you pretend to hold the moral high ground while acting fundamentally immoral, it leaves people far more jaded, and noncompliant, when they eventually 'wake up' to what's happening than if you just dropped the pretext and leveled with people.

[1] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Northwoods

[2] - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jOkTtpzoulc