On Sunday, April 9, I attended a screening of the documentary, The Brainwashing of My Dad, at Webster University. The film, by Jen Senko, explores the transformation of her father, Frank Senko, from a progressive Kennedy Democrat into a hate-filled, ranting Rush Limbaugh “Ditto Head” and his eventual escape from the cult of right-wing media.
As film making, the documentary is neither smoothly constructed nor particularly artful. The segments featuring Senko’s father and those featuring relatives of other individuals whose family members have been “brainwashed” are not especially compelling. What is compelling is the research Senko has done into the roots of the right-wing media phenomena and the tools it uses to propagandize Americans and to destroy legitimate news media.
Jen Senko first began to notice a change in her father when they moved and his job required a lengthy daily commute, during which he listened to Rush Limbaugh. Fox News was just beginning to emerge and soon her father was addicted to right-wing news. He even began sleeping in another room separate from his wife so that he could binge on Fox News long into the night.
The documentary details the roots of plans that began 40 years ago to shift America to the right through manipulation of media and news. When Roger Ailes worked in the Nixon administration he first drew up plans for right-wing media. Jurist Lewis Powell, who went on to be appointed to the Supreme Court by Richard Nixon, also outlined a broad plan to use propaganda techniques to support right-wing causes.
Senko brings together a number of impressive political and media critics including Noam Chomsky, Reese Schonfeld (CNN), Jeff Cohen (media critic), David Brock (Nixon alumnus, founder of Media Matters and author of Confessions of a Right-Wing Hit Man), Claire Connor (former John Bircher and author of Wrapped In The Flag), Matthew Saccaro (writer for Salon and author of I Was A Teenage Fox News Robot) and Republican political consultant Frank Luntz.
Claire Connor was raised in right-wing Republicanism and was a young John Bircher. She traces the beginnings of the right-wing media to the Goldwater era and Goldwater’s redefinition of American conservatism and the acceptance of any means to advance right wing ideology.
Political consultant John Luntz, explains how he helped take the nondescript, uncontroversial estate tax and turn it into a “death tax.” Lutz explains how he does research for keywords that frighten people the most and how Fox News anchors are prompted in the use of fear, alarm, shouting, and hand gestures to subliminally connect with their viewers.
The documentary reveals that Rush Limbaugh and Fox News are the primary news source for Supreme Court Justices Clarence Thomas. (These were also the prime news source for former Justice Antonin Scalia.) Media critic Jeff Cohen says,“Imagine that you’re a Supreme Court justice deciding on things like war and peace, civil liberties, gay marriage, and your window into the world is Rush Limbaugh’s three-hour monologue.”
The film also explores the neurology of brainwashing and propaganda, such as the addictiveness of alarm and fear, and how repetitive messages transform the brain.
Frank Senko eventually escapes from right-wing propaganda, but only through the happy accidents of a radio broken during a move, a television that failed, and the efforts of his wife.
The Brainwashing of My Dad serves as a caution, a history and as a resource for methods to derailing the right-wing propaganda machine.
The film can be found on Amazon (https://www.amazon.com/Brainwashing-My-Dad-Matthew-Modine/dp/B01C6AFDM6) and is available for $3.99 or for free to Amazon Prime members. It can also be found on Netflix and at http://www.thebrainwashingofmydad.com. The official trailer is below.
It makes for informative, if somewhat scary, viewing.
Submitted by Michael Pfeifer, WCD Member
I saw this film too. If ever there was an application of Marshall McLuhan’s iconic phrase The Medium Is The Message it is with this cult-like brainwashing strategy described in the film by what we once called “the lunatic fringe” but now is mainstream media sponsored by power and control mad republicans.
Thanks for your review.
I first started following this when I got one of my first ebooks, The Republican Noise Machine: Right-Wing Media and How It Corrupts Democracy (2004) by David Brock … the noise has now become deafening to the point of driving ‘Americans’ (whomever they are) crazy …
This film, the extensive literature on the subject, and they history of our own experience establishes that a great deal of very detailed planning has gone into pushing an ultra-nationalist, right wing ideology in America. The individuals outlining and executing the strategy for ultra-rightists are highly intelligent, skilled professionals. This is not some haphazard operation. The ultra-right plans continue to unfold and they are still several steps ahead of efforts to preserve democracy, much less plans to expand progressive ideas. There is much work to do and it will be a long, hard, multi-generational slog.