"Brainwashing of my Dad" (film)

I’ve heard of this film and was only mildly interested, but given the chatter on left/right, conservative/liberal and the conversation about not being civil in tongue, I’d like to propose this advertising blurb as an example of brainwashing about brainwashing. It came in my e-mail—I get a lot of unsolicited advertising since I have blogs and review books.

“Right-wing cable news and "conservative" talk radio attract older Americans like graying moths to an angry flame. But why would someone who was either apolitical or a Democrat in younger days become addicted to conservative talk shows in their twilight years? Filmmaker Jen Senko wondered how her WWII veteran and Kennedy Democrat father had been transformed into a Fox News Fanatic, suddenly and inexplicably railing against minorities, homosexuals, poor people, and Democrats. Using her dad as an entertaining example, Senko pulls back the curtain to expose the tools and tricks of the wizards behind the right-wing media revolution. And in discovering what happened to him, Senko reveals the all-too-chilling bigger picture of what’s happening behind-the-scenes to influence our national discourse.”

Note the use of hot button inflammatory words and memes (I’ve marked in yellow). Right wing is always a pejorative, and the scare quotes are around the word conservative to warn you that even that isn’t a truthful term. Even the term talk radio is code for fanaticism since there has been no successful talk radio on the left. (The crazies on talk radio are usually the listeners, not the hosts.)  Addicted is always a negative term. Pulling back the curtain is a Wizard of Oz reference—a bumbling shyster who uses tricks. There is no right-wing media revolution except in the sense that the media is no longer the play ground exclusively one party or philosophy, which controlled it even before Walter Cronkite, and there is one channel on cable that is always called right wing, Fox News. The only one, because all broadcast and all other cable are liberal. But note the positive allusions to solid, good old, warm fuzzy Democrat ideas like WWII veteran and Kennedy Democrat, even father. Chilling bigger picture—must be a conspiracy so stay tuned and buy a ticket so she can recover her investment (seems to be an evil capitalist). See how Fox News is linked, without any evidence, to speaking out against minorities, homosexuals and the poor. I’ve watched Fox for years, and have only seen a keen reliance on celebrities, the wealthy, and well spoken Congress members of both parties. Fox has far more minorities and women in front of the camera than the other cable stations. It also carries the usually silly stuff in the morning like recipes and exercise.

This may be one of the most biased blurbs about bias that I've seen in. . . , well, since the last thing the left wrote about how the right wing news treats Hillary.  The author/writer/director never considers that the left may have brainwashed her! All the people she interviews about language and media are academics--all from the left.

Trailer for film