Empezó el frío, edredón de invierno en la cama, a partir de este objeto tan simple recordé una de las peores excusas que le di a un tipo en mi vida*:

“No, no puedo ir a tomar un café, tengo que bajar el edredón de la parte de arriba del placard”


* Modestia a parte, estimo que debe ser una de las peores excusas de todos los tiempos.

Esta es una transcripción para que seguir la película sea un poco más fácil.

Old School Narrator: The 1940´s have been a decade of medical breakthroughs and developments in medicine and psychiatry. Scientists have developed a new technology to cure mentally ill adults with the use of electroshocks, the minds of sick patients are being wiped clean giving them a fresh start on this blank slate physician imprint a new healthy personality!

Naomi Klein: Re making people, shocking them into obedience. This is a story about that powerful idea. In the 1950´s it got the attention of the CIA, the agency funded a series of experiments out of them was produced a secret handbook on how to break down. The key was to use shock to reduce adults into a child-like state.

The following narration is excerpted from the CIA´s 1963 and 1983 interogation manuals.

Narrator: It´s a fundamental hypothesis of this handbook that these techniques are in escence methods of inducing regression on the personality. There is an interval which may be extremely brief of suspended animation a kind of psychological shock or paralysis. Experienced interrogators recognise this effect when it appears and know that at this moment the source is far more open to suggestion, far likelier to comply than he was just before he experienced the shock.

Naomi Klein: But these techniques not only work on individuals, they can work on whole societies- A collective drama, a war, a coup, a natural disaster, a terrorist attack puts us all in a state of shock. And in the aftermath, like the prisoner in the interrogation chamber, we too become child-like, we´re inclined to follow leaders who claim to protect us. One person who understood this phenomenon early on was the most famous economist of our era, Milton Friedman. Friedman believed in a radical vision of society in which profit and the market would drive every aspect of life: from schools to health care, even the army. He called for abolishing all trade protections, deregulating all prices and eviscerating government services. These ideas have always been tremendously unpopular, and understandably so, they cause waves of unemployment, send prices soaring and make life more precaurious for millions. Unable to advance their agenda democratically, Friedman and his disciples were drawn to the power of shock.

Narrator: The subject should be rudely awakened and immediatly blindfolded and handcuffed, when arrested at this time most subjects experience intense feelings of shock, insecurity and posychological stress. The idea is to preven the subject from relaxing and recovering from shock.

Naomi Klein: Firedman understood that just as prisoners are softened up for interrogation by the shock of their capture, massive disasters could serve for soften us up for his radical free market crusade. He adviced politicians that immediately after a crisis they should push through all the painful policies at once before people could regain their footing. He called this method "Economic Shock Treatment", I call it "The Shock Doctrine". Take a second look at the iconic events of our era and behind many you will find its logic at work. This is the secret history of the Free Market, it wasn´t born in Freedom and Democracy, it was born in Shock.

"Only a crisis actual or perceived produces real change" Milton Friedman

Narrator: Isolation, both physical and psychological must be maintained from the moment of aprehension. The capacity for resistance is diminished by disorientation. Prisoners should maintain silence at all times, they should never be allowed to speak to each other.

Naomi Klein: There is one other thing I´ve learned from my study of states of shock, shock wears off. It is by definition a temporary state and the best way to stay oriented, to resist shock is to know what is happening to you and why.

"Information is shock resistance. Arm yourself"

Naomi Klein estuvo en una conferencia el día 25 de abril en la Feria del Libro y presentó su libro "The Shock Doctrine" sus explicaciones fueron muy reveladoras, y aunque Nelson Castro no hizo ninguna pregunta "jugada" estuvo bastante bien. Hay algunas cosas más en YouTube sobre el libro, entre ellas una entrevista con John Cusack en la que hablan de forma bastante informal sobre las ideas del libro que es muy recomendable.