We should keep in mind that modern times are characterized by a good manipulation, especially when it comes to historical consciousness, mainly Poles.
Here are six basic meanings of the concept of manipulation:
- concealing real political goals in the form of others that are easier to accept;
- the production of certain desirable attitudes and choices among citizens, especially the electorate, leading to the approval of emergency measures taken by the government;
- creating images of reality designed to hide the actual state;
- creating images of their own leaders and parties and discrediting the leaders and opposing parties;
- using the language for manipulation and persuasion;
- manipulations occurring in the interpretation and establishment of a law favorable for political purposes.
All the aforementioned meanings of political manipulation are currently used in the so-called the process of building new historical consciousness, and history has become an area of political struggle. Propaganda works effectively in a society that is not capable to critical thinking, listening to the power elite that uses public media for this purpose and sponsors private media that are friendly to its own political goals. In addition, through the Internet and various forms of social media activity, there is a process of democratizing propaganda. Almost anyone can make an anonymous entry, denunciation, fake new in which content is created that triggers psychological mechanisms of anger, envy and exclusion. In the context of these considerations, it is worth recalling the concept of post-truth, which made an extraordinary career, and in Great Britain it received the title of the year in 2016. The concept of post-truth is not treated as a lie that contradicts facts, but rather as a strategy that gives the truth an insignificant meaning (passing the truth and the tendency to lie becomes common social behaviors). Knowledge as a set of facts and cause-and-effect relations that describe and explain the world has ceased to play a key role. Expert knowledge is also losing in importance, you can call your own professors to comment on reality, according to the instructions and needs of politicians. People create their own colloquial knowledge, mediated mainly by the media, including the social media for the young generation, which consists of a collection of comfortable views, preferences and opinions confirming their perception of the world and values. It is worth recalling that the philosophical discourse opposes the classical concept of Aristotle's truth, according to which the criterion of truth is the conformity of a sentence (thought) with the reality of the so-called non-classical concepts, among which we find the concept of universal consent. According to this, the truth is the one that most of people recognize as truth.
Today, some people learn about reality from the Internet, so they look for social evidence in the virtual world.
Among the typical behaviors of toxic people are mentioned: imposing and abusing power, subordinating to the weaker one; feeding on the uncertainty of interaction partners, which allows them to be manipulated; the need for an auditorium, focus on displaying yourself as the most important person with all the advantages; marginalizing others and controlling the environment; using submissiveness, driving feelings of guilt and uncertainty; establishing own rules and rules of the game in social relations; using language to disorganize and disorientate interaction partners; megalomania leading to treating ourselves as a point of reference, as a measure of good and evil, oracle of good and truth. Toxic politicians instil in society an eternal trauma and emotional extermination, and under the mask of care and common sense they enslave interaction partners (politicians of their party, people, electorate) and prepare them for boundless faith in the correctness and effectiveness of their own actions.
The question is why people remain loyal to toxic leaders, despite the abuse of their power, also in situations of direct loss or damage suffered by the leader.
The following characteristics-properties are to be considered basic in the characteristics of toxic politicians:
▶ Hostile attitude to the world, people, countries, nations, European institutions, suspiciousness, lack of confidence, pointing to enemies and obsessive hunting of enemies, acceptance of aggression in social and political life.
▶ Applying the dichotomous division of the world and people; the bipolar valuation based on the oppositions is particularly prominent: we - them, our - foreign, real Poles - untrue Poles, real patriots - opposition, Catholics – Islamists.
▶ Management of fear and anger. Appealing to fear and launching social fears, and then pointing out that only this authority knows how to deal with the threat. The mechanism is to indicate which values are at risk (safety, family, health) and to indicate who is the carrier of the threat, eg refugees, Muslims.
▶ References to content considered as populist (without awareness of definitional, typological and historical differences), and especially the use of the terms "people" and "sovereign" on behalf of which and for which the government rules. In the meaning of these concepts, the connotations with the good of the nation, ethnic solidarity, linguistic, cultural and religious identity are emphasized against the liberal elite.
▶ Building political capital on prejudices, ethnocentrism, stereotypes, resentments, xenophobia, anti-Semitism, and Islamophobia.
▶ Subordination of the law to the current power elite and political decision-makers: politicians play a dominant role as a factor influencing the state of relations between law and citizens. They control the process of creating law and its functioning, the law does not protect citizens, it represents the interests of the authorities, such as the dispute over the Constitutional Tribunal.
▶ Exposition and distribution of content contrary to the truth: using disinformation, disrespect for facts, the use of lies, the domination of post-truth in the description of reality.
▶ Disputes over history: building a new historical consciousness based on the principle of valorisation of Poles as the best and bravest nation; establishing institutions whose task is to defend a good image of the nation; a new interpretation of history; creating historical narratives consistent with the historical policy project.
▶ Dislike for experts and opposition intellectual elites. Discrediting experts guided by objective data and facts. Defense against experts revealing "uncomfortable truths". Setting up own experts who create accepted post-truths.