Pretty sneaky sis! Want to be the winner every time? Here’s the formula:
- Describe and then embellish a potential threat to the status quo.The threat can be real or imaginary or somewhere in between, but it must cause fear and it must be a threat that an individual could not eliminate on his or her own. (“Out of Your Hands Entirely” or “Catastrophic Acts of God” are frequently used brands)
- Add off and on periods of heightened threat punctuated times of safety.
- Promise to make those brief stable periods the status quo and eliminate the threat. If you’ve done it right, you will find a populace willing to suppress their own self-interest and will unquestioningly do whatever it takes to carry out your plan…whatever it might be.
How can you argue against something that will reduce a threat to life and property? It is easy to use fear to control those who would otherwise oppose you. And if you’ve manufactured the fear, it’ll be even easier for you to ride to the rescue. I mean, no one wants to be the guy who said, “Calm down! Terrorists won’t attack again” just as the terrorists are striking again and we are caught unprepared. To appeal to people’s fear in order to eliminate opposition is SO 20th century, and SO manipulative and creepy.
An example right here in Cambria:
- Describe and then embellish a potential threat to the status quo. (Cambria catches fire. First one house, then another, and another, then the trees carry it to another, and so on. Cambria doesn’t have the water to battle fire.)
- Add off and on periods of heightened threat punctuated with brief safe times. (There’s a built-in period of reduced threat (in winter) and the start of each fire season is lionized every year. )
- Promise to make those brief stable periods the status quo and eliminate the threat. First, the storage in new Pine Knolls water tanks, now the Stuart street tanks and the pumps at the Rodeo Grounds, toss in a lot clearing ordinance and defensible space laws and Hallelujah!
Are you scared yet? Whenever someone is appealing to you fear (or other emotion) it activates your sense of self-preservation and your “emotional brain”. Your logical mind is suppressed and your thinking becomes more conservative. Drew Westin discusses his studies on this phenomenon at great length in his excellent book The Political Brain: The Role of Emotion in Deciding the Fate of the Nation
CCSD using Fear? According to the previous Board, this town has been in a state of emergency for decades. The District keeps us on constant vigilant watch, providing weekly measurements and comparison charts that show how desperate the situation is. There’s hardly a moment we aren’t reminded of our deficient water supply. How much storage do we need? The recently released Resource Management System report from the County actually removed the highest severity Level 3 for Cambria’s water system, since the Pine Knolls tanks are now in service. Chief Miller and his trained personnel likely have many game plans for many of the possible scenarios involving home fires in town. That seems like a defining task of his job. I have confidence that between CalFire and our local Fire Department, they will manage the water available to do their job in an emergency. More water would be nice. So would having our own helicopter with water bucket. But we aren’t without protection now.
Know the facts. Cambria is one of the most well-protected forested areas in this state. It’s a difficult environment to defend from fire. We maintain mutual aid agreements with Calfire and other nearby fire departments, have well-trained firefighters, and relatively new equipment. Are there deficiencies? Probably. But I feel confident we are well protected in case of emergency.
The new threat: Growth. With “enough” water storage for our emergency fire protection needs, look to see the formula applied to GROWTH and development more aggressively. (More on this next week.)
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