If you happen to live in a dangerous neighborhood, and/or you believe in ghosts, the word dark is likely to influence you more deeply that it does me.
I also recognized soon after Trump’s GOP convention speech that Clinton’s campaign had evidently coached its surrogates to simultaneously use the word dark to pre-suade voters to see Trump as scary. What I saw was weapons-grade persuasion technique. Those of you who are untrained in the techniques of persuasion probably heard the word dark and it automatically started the fear subroutine in your brains, as Clinton’s team planned. Keep in mind that 42% of Americans believe in ghosts, according to a Harris Poll. Another survey found that 57% of Americans – and 72% of African-Americans in particular – literally believe in Satan. And Satan likes to hide in the dark. With the ghosts.
If you ask Clinton supporters what scares them about Trump, they will say things about his temperament. It will sound quite rational. But rational thought is almost entirely an illusion. What is actually happening is that Trump reminds you of something scary (in the dark) and confirmation bias fills in the “evidence” where there is none.
As a trained hypnotist, and a student of persuasion, I see the world through a persuasion filter. My viewfinder shows me confirmation bias, whereas many people are seeing Trump as an irrational conflation of ghosts, devils, and bogeymen that hide in the dark. Team Clinton created that persuasion trap. I recognized the technique. Some of you did too. Most of the world did not.
I’m From New York
You know how Trump is always saying inappropriate and violent-sounding things? Most people see that type of language as offensive and even dangerous. The exception is people who grew up in New York. We see it as “talking.”
After college, when I moved from upstate New York to California, I had to relearn how to talk. My New York style offended nearly everyone. Let me give you an example of how a Californian talks compared to a New Yorker.
Californian: It looks like it might rain today.
New Yorker: Oh, shit. Fucking rain. I need that like I need a goddamned bullet in my head.
See the difference?
When Trump talks about roughing-up protesters, or shooting someone on 5th Avenue, people from New York don’t raise an eyebrow. But Californians start wondering how to have that guy involuntarily committed to some sort of facility that can fix whatever is wrong with him.
