Brainwashing, streetfighting and the DNC

I did my thesis on “Brainwashing, attitude change and its relation to advertising”. It was controversial among my peers (“what do you mean advertising is not brainwashing?”), among the tribunal members (“what do you mean it is attitudes and not ‘motivation’ that is important?”) and among my coworkers, who believed that the key to coming up with great creative was to sit and write headlines until one “clicked” and were opposed to this “intellectual crap” invading the sanctum of the creative department.
 
My greatest discovery was the entire theory of Cognitive Dissonance.
 
From Wikipedia: In psychology, cognitive dissonance is the mental stress or discomfort experienced by an individual who holds two or more contradictory beliefs, ideas, or values at the same time; performs an action that is contradictory to one or more beliefs, ideas, or values; or is confronted by new information that conflicts with existing beliefs, ideas, or values.
 
Leon Festinger's theory of cognitive dissonance focuses on how humans strive for internal consistency. An individual who experiences inconsistency (dissonance) tends to become psychologically uncomfortable, and is motivated to try to reduce this dissonance—as well as actively avoid situations and information likely to increase it.
 
Reducing Cognitive Dissonance is key.
 
Cognitive dissonance theory is founded on the assumption that individuals seek consistency between their expectations and their reality. Because of this, people engage in a process called dissonance reduction to bring their cognitions and actions in line with one another. This creation of uniformity allows for a lessening of psychological tension and distress.
 
According to Festinger, dissonance reduction can be achieved in four ways.[1] In an example case where a person has adopted the attitude that they will no longer eat high fat food, but eats a high-fat doughnut, the four methods of reduction are:

• Change behavior or cognition ("I will not eat any more of this doughnut")
• Justify behavior or cognition by changing the conflicting cognition ("I'm allowed to cheat every once in a while")
• Justify behavior or cognition by adding new cognitions ("I'll spend 30 extra minutes at the gym to work this off")
• Ignore or deny any information that conflicts with existing beliefs ("This doughnut is not high in fat")

 
Leon & The Donald
 
One of the most frustrating aspects when speaking with Trump fans is the way that they ignore, rationalize or completely turn around events and actions that would sink other presidential candidates.
 
The press is full examples, but imagine what would happen if any “normal” candidate had a nude wife pictures all over the internet, five kids from three wives, refused to release his tax returns, invited Russia to spy on us, called 11 million Mexicans rapists and drug dealers, called a war-hero Republican ex-presidential candidate a failure because he was captured, called a judge useless because of his Mexican descend, had over 3,500 lawsuits and insulted the parents of a soldier who just died in an American war.
 
When other Republican leaders (e.g., Mitt Romney) attack Trump, their messages fall flat. When traditional media (e.g., The New York Times) attack Trump, their messages also fall flat. Those sources have no credibility whatsoever among Trump followers.
 
So, depending on the person you are talking with and the specific event or action addressed you can see each of the four actions described above in practice.
 
The Trojan Horse Approach.
 
There is only one way to deal with the thick defensive shields that most Trump followers have built around these dissonances. The Trojan Horse approach: present a message that is totally accepted initially and passes through the psychological filters, delivers such a contradictory ending that it forces the viewer to move his point of view (it can be done and it is described in the theory itself) and then destroy the original position so that there is no “going back”.
 
Finally, the message has to be delivered with the language and imagery that resonates with the target person, not some corporate or agency generic “persona”, so individualization and customization are basic.
 
For example…

• A testimonial from a Mexican family thanking Trump for providing jobs for the entire family, allowing them to live in a decent house, then the camera pulling back and revealing that the Mexican family was in Mexico, where Trump exported jobs.
• A testimonial from the hiring manager of what is obviously a low-paying company thanking Donald for creating so many entry-level job positions, but the second part of the spot revealing that the entry-level employee was a small business who went bankrupt because Trump did not pay his bills.
• A testimonial from an obviously young white middle-American kid dressed in a military uniform thanking Donald for setting up such a great role model. While he speaks, he is doing some menial task (washing dishes…) and serving some obviously wounded or disabled African American kids. “Yep” he says “one thing Donald taught me… let some other guy die for YOUR country”.
• A “documentary” showing several billionaires telling Trump “no escaping Donald, you’ve got to take one for the team, so, go out, run for president, make Americans work for five bucks again, don’t worry, we’ll take care of you” while patting him in the back and sending him down the escalator for that first conference.
• A closing for all of them with the line: “Trump, yeah, he’s got your back, buddy”, showing a target on a white older guy’s back.
• Always calling Trump “Donald”, minimizing him.

 
The mechanism in all of these pieces is similar:

• The message needs to go through the person’s psychological filters and the easiest solution for doing that is to present imagery that is accepted by the target as being part of “Make America Great Again” (jobs, young kids going to war)
• It then delivers a macabre or negative twist at the end: helping foreign families abroad, my (white) kid is a coward, someone like me is totally broke and broken, this is really a billionaire’s conspiracy.
• The message then destroys the original position (Trump never created jobs here, Trump bankrupted companies here, Trump mocked fallen soldiers here…) so there is no going back.

 
Streetfighting 101 – Relentlessly painful.
 
There are two rules to streetfighting: First, hit and hit and hit continuously, do not give the other person the chance to react and second, make sure that the other person can’t get up.
 
If I were consulting for the DNC I would make sure to have –literally—hundreds of pieces, from :30 and :60 commercials, to longer videos, a YouTube Channel, Facebook, Twitter, other blogs… everything lined up and then I would unleash barrage after barrage of these messages continuously.
 
I would not worry about targeting. Another of the key findings of Dissonance theory is that people tend to be exposed to the kind of messaging that reduces tension, that is, the one that they agree with. So, for example, are you worried about jobs… you will tend to watch the ads about jobs while excluding, say, the ones about the military.
 
In unleashing a barrage, you also make sure of two things:

1. You will reach just about everyone in the Trump camp with at least half a dozen messages that will penetrate the psychological shields and deliver a Trojan Horse.
2. You will not give the Trump camp enough time to respond to all of them. And, if they do, they will not have the resources to both, mount a retaliatory campaign AND respond to each attack line.

 
Why ads ridiculing Trump will probably not work.
 
Let’s say that (for some unknown reason) you are an avid follower of the Futbol Club Barcelona. If I started ridiculing them after a loss, your reaction would be either to become angry and defensive (well… they lost because of this, because of that…) or completely tune it out. Why? Because in ridiculing them, I’m also ridiculing you.
 
If I wanted you to change positions on the FCB, an easier way would be to find out a chink in the armor, something that you think was pretty bad (perhaps a player, perhaps something that the trainer did) and then join forces with you to ridicule THAT. In doing so, it is “you” and “I” together ridiculing a third party.
 
In real life, you would not ridicule Trump for having a 3rd and much younger wife. You’d find common ground with some of the more conservative voters who might agree that Trump is being dumb because a younger “Russian” would only marry him for his money (whether that is true or not and whether she is “Russian” or not)
 
In summary:

• Most anti-Trump messages are falling on deaf ears among its intended audience: voters
• The Theory of Cognitive Dissonance explains why this is happening very well and gives us several possible ways to counter-act the psychological shields that are currently preventing these messages from happening
• Key factor: Messages that work like Trojan Horses: are accepted by the user initially, then deliver a total contradiction and destroy the original position.
• Two other key factors:
  • Multitude of messages – increase self selection and odds that the targeted voter will read a few of them
  • A continuous barrage of messages – do not allow for a counter-reaction

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Yeah, baby, Trump's got your back!