Brain Wash
An excellent Paper 1 example by Thao Mai
" Guess what? The Nazis didn't lose the war after all. They won it and flourished. They took over the world...This took a long, long time, but when it was all over, everyone in the world was one hundred percent Aryan, and they were all very, very happy. Naturally the textbooks used in the schools no longer mentioned any race but Aryan or any language but German or any religion but Hitlerism...After a few generations of that, no one could have pit anything different into the textbooks...because they didn't know any thing deferent. But one day two young students were conversing at the University of New Heidelberg in Tokyo....Kurt said, " I'll tell you, Hans. There is something that's troubling me- and troubling me deeply"... "it is this" Kurt said. " I cant shake the crazy feeling that there is some small thing that we are being lied to about" (Ishmael, 27). If one day Kurt can get out of that Hitlerism planet, he will find out what he has been lied about; Based on my own story, I can guarantee this. In past seventeen years living in Vietnam, lot of things in society did not make sense but I had no ideas what I had been lied about. One day, an airplane took me thousands miles away to America where I have enough critical distance to realize that my brain has been "washed" pretty well.
In the past seventeen years living in Vietnam and studied about our country, I was taught Vietnam is the most wonderful and has a perfect political system . "We have a brave and heroic country with a fair political system which had been set up to serve Vietnamese", my mind shaped to see society this way. Thousand of years being colony of Chinese, five hundred years colony of France, then colony of Japan and America ," we has small size of both lands and body, though we had never lost a war," my history teacher taught me, " it is the most obvious evidence to be proud of." Besides, this slogan is everywhere "serving Vietnamese is mission of the government." Each years, the government spent billion dollars each year in propaganda the law "citizens have right to vote". Beware of capitalism may be formed, government must control everything, prices, salary, schools, factories, transportations, communication service... Being middle agent to keep balance between the rich and the poor is the main roles of the government. Moreover, the national phrase "Independent- freedom- happiness" was everywhere to remind me how our society presence. Still in my memory, "all citizens are equal", citizens have freedom to speed and freedom to choice religion" was the first law that I was taught. All the resources from books TV, newspapers, magazines, and teachers...admired our political system. I was proud to be next generation of Vietnamese who are socialist, equality, freedom, ethical, hard working and brave.
Until I arrive America, my basic knowledge, belief and pride is crashed so hard like a glass bottle falls on a hard ground. An American came to me and ask "your country is communist, right?" I frown "No, we are Socialist Republic." I have never heard about the word "Communist" before. I go online to find a proven; Surprisingly I find out that I has been fool. When I was in my country, my teacher never told us that we swiped out Champa and robbed their land around 1472. They said America was an invader after French but did not mention that America was the Southern benefactor. September 2rd, 1945 was not a national independent day but it was the day the southern lost the war. There were terrible pictures, songs, poems what it had never saw, heard or read before, about those black days after 1945. From the youngest child into the oldest senior whoever still wanted to follow Cong Hoa was killed cruelly: the Communist, we were, buried our people alive. Kids were forced to picked gun and kill their brothers, sisters. Thousands of Vietnamese bodies were buried in Pacific Ocean on their way to cross the ocean. There was lot of people and businesses which were took away because the government need more fund. Now, there were still so many debunk Vietnamese society that I have never seen before. "Vote", somebody wrote it is a luxury play which replays every years because the new leader is selected before citizens voted for them. Receiving brides are so popular that people accepted them as a policy. Many people who live on country side are put in prison because they want to switch their religion into Christian. When I was young, my dad slapped hand my hand and make me promise that I would never repeat this sentence again " I don't believe Ho Chi Minh is that much perfect" as long as I still living in Vietnam. For sure, he was not a big fan of Ho Chi Minh but I could not know what was wrong.
What if I didn't have the opportunity to go to America, what if I grown old in Vietnam, I will never know the truth. All the books, poems and songs about Cong Hoa was burn along with their author. All the radio channels and TV news are selected by the Government. My government even writes textbooks and resource for education system. No one dared to speak up the truth. Every evidences hit on my brain said "this is the truth, believe, live with it." I don't even doubt that I am being lied, therefore I don't even mind to find a critical distance. Only when I moved to American or any other country so I have the opportunities to build up the critical distance; in another words, I watch my country under another point of view. Come back with the story in Ishmael, can Kurt find his critical distance while the whole world belong to Aryan?
We are, human, who write up a story of our society and we got stuck inside. Daniel Quinn is right to define " a culture is a people enacting a story." " A story" can be rewrite. The lies survive after generation and generation; it will be assume to be the truth. Because the truth always be accepted, no one want to bring them out and dissect them again. We don't want to be pressure; we lived without wondering "how things came to be this way." How does it affect me after we know the truth? Nothing, I am upset and disappointed for couples days then it gone; History could not change. However, because a story can be rewrite, we write up a better future; where kids desire to learn the truth.