Political parties and power groups already know that hatred and disinformation are strategies with which they have a lot to gain when it comes to capturing votes. They have been using them in their campaigns for some time. It is proven that hate displaces rational thought, brings out the most emotional and reinforces the associated content, explain Virginia Martín, professor of Journalism at the University of Valladolid, and Sergio Arce García, researcher in Digital Communication and Social Networks at UNIR, in an article published Monday in . And they clarify that there is no need for forceful attacks, but rather a continuous trickle of medium and low-intensity hate messages through social networks is enough so that they are needed not only between the ideologically closest population, but also between voters from other parties, who end up normalizing these contents and society as a whole is more manipulable.
Now language anthropologist Marcel Danesi has shed light on why these messages are so effective and penetrating and how the brain is programmed to believe lies and conspiracy theories when the right language is used. Danesi has just published a paper in which he shows how language influences people’s cognition and belief mechanisms and how depending on the words used, neural circuits can be activated to establish beliefs without going through the cognitive reasoning centers. According to his research – collected in Politics, lies and conspiracy theories (Taylor
“Language is both a tool and a weapon, and when it is used as a weapon, the mind is negatively affected and activates circuits that are deeply embedded in it, such as that of beliefs,” explains Danesi by email. He details that this mechanism is normally coordinated with reason and compression, but “a master word manipulator can break this coordination, bring to the surface negative beliefs and through which constantly activate the feelings” of the receiver. .
And after analyzing the speeches of dictators such as Mussolini, Stalin, Putin and Hitler and prominent hate groups, Danesi is clear about the “linguistic hook” used to instill and spread hatred towards others : the dehumanizing metaphors. Words such as “pests”, “reptiles” or “parasites” were used by the Nazi regime to compare foreign or minority people to animals. And the same thing white supremacist groups did in the US and populist and far-right political movements do now to create hatred towards foreigners or towards those who escape the pattern they defend.
“Metaphor is one of the main paths to the mind’s belief system because it has the ability to connect domains of meaning that are normally kept separate and that, when mixed, create their own truth,” argues the professor of semiotics and linguistic anthropology from the University of Toronto (Canada). And he offers an example: “If someone is labeled a parasite, the brain begins to see that person metamorphosing into an insect in the imagination; if this metaphor is constantly repeated, we begin to make little distinction between this type of person and the insect, because the two concepts merge into a unit of thought and rarely manage to disconnect with words and arguments”.
Danesi admits he doesn’t know why this happens, but he does know that metaphors have the power to activate buried false belief systems in the mind, which tap into existing circuits in the brain that link important images and ideas without bypassing higher cognitive reasoning centers , causing thoughts to focus on certain things while ignoring others, “which often leads to anger and hatred against specific individuals or groups”.
The anthropologist explains that, in addition, the more these circuits are activated, the more neural connections are established “until it becomes almost impossible to turn them off”. That’s why once people start believing lies, they are unlikely to change their minds even if they are presented with evidence that contradicts their beliefs. “Once we’ve bitten the master liar’s linguistic hook, anything that supports his views, no matter how false, will be seen as evidence of the truth and the false beliefs are further reinforced.” he says
And the same thing happens with conspiracy theories: once immersed in this invented narrative there is almost no way out, because the events of the world are interpreted in accordance with this last one and as “proof” that it is truth He adds that, in addition, people manipulated by lies will reject news that does not confirm their beliefs or will interpret it as evidence that some entity is conspiring to dissuade them from “the truth”.
Neuroscientists explain that this has a lot to do with how the brain works. Beatriz Fagundo, PhD in cognitive neuroscience, explains that “it is very difficult for the brain – it spends a lot of energy – to create a learning, a pattern of neuron activation, and once it has been created by the guard to be able to recover it, from so that when he receives information that goes in line with what he has already learned, it is easier for him, and that is why he has a tendency to believe and take for granted what fits with what he knows”.
