This is http://www.essayz.com/a9806271.htm Previous-Essay <== This-Essay ==> Following-Essay Click HERE on this line to find essays via Your-Key-Words. {Most frequent wordstarts of each essay will be put here.} ========================================================== %SECRET POLICE STATE AUTHORITARIAN CONTROL FEAR SIN+980627 %AMBIGUITY DOUBT UNCERTAINTY ARBITRARY CAPRICIOUS+980627 %PREJUDICE DUE PROCESS DECISION PRIORITY KNOWLEDGE+980627 %COLLUSIVE GAMES SELF DECEPTION DISHONESTY DIALOGUE 980627 Authoritarian systems of government, religion, education, business, tribes, families and traditions --- have often employed secret police to spy upon other members of the community --- and to report irregularities which may indicate less than full allegiance to the authoritarian system. Such was the case in Imperial Rome, Nazi Germany, Fascist Italy, Communist Russia and Communist China. Of course other examples could be indicated. The secret police state makes use of: 1. Dividing the members of the community into a loyal few who serve to intimidate the uncertain many. 2. Uncertainty to amplify fear, apprehension and anxiety -- through the use of minimal effort and minimal overt force, coercion and violence. 3. Tacit rules and regulations to minimize how much there is to rebel against; and to make it more difficult to plan strategies of rebellion. 4. Advantages granted to a chosen upper/middle-class members who are not part of the secret police---to pacify them and keep them from instigating any rebellion and/or keep them from joining in any rebellion instigated by others of less advantage. 5. Pretense that the authoritarian system is working to promote the communal and personal integrity of the community and its members --- when really it is trying to maintain control in ways which undermine both personal and communal integrity. 6. Collusive games of mutual self-deception through which the vast majority of the members of the community come to see the whole authoritarian system as being in their best interests --- relative to any other way in which the members of the community might inter-relate with each other. Many communities which do not have people working for pay in a secret police system --- nevertheless many people are involved in informal collusive "secret police" in that many of the most respected community leaders and their followers are playing collusive games of mutual self- deception in keeping with some, if not all, of the above means for maintaining control --- to the advantage of the most powerful and advantaged members of the community. Authoritarian systems of government, religion, education, business, tribes, families and traditions have often employed COLLUSIVE/INFORMAL SECRET POLICE to spy upon members of the community --- and to report irregularities which may indicate less than full allegiance to their authoritarian system. Such systems lead to personal and communal disintegration in many of the same ways as do OVERT AND FORMAL SECRET POLICE SYSTEMS. We will do well and be well when we can recognize, name, describe and talk openly and publicly about HOW the systems, formal and informal, engender both personal and communal disintegration. (c) 2005 by Paul A. Smith in (On Being Yourself, Whole and Healthy) ==========================================================