9mo ago

Declassified CIA Guide to Sabotaging Fascism Is Suddenly Viral

www.404media.co

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A declassified World War II-era government guide to “simple sabotage” is currently one of the most popular open source books on the internet. The book, called “Simple Sabotage Field Manual,” was declassified in 2008 by the CIA and “describes ways to train normal people to be purposefully annoying telephone operators, dysfunctional train conductors, befuddling middle managers, blundering factory workers, unruly movie theater patrons, and so on. In other words, teaching people to do their jobs badly.”
Turns out I've been fighting fascism all along.
- “Make ‘speeches.’ Talk as frequently as possible and at great length. Illustrate your ‘points’ by long anecdotes and accounts of personal experiences. Never hesitate to make a few appropriate ‘patriotic’ comments.”
  “Bring up irrelevant issues as frequently as possible.”
  “Haggle over precise wordings of communications, minutes, resolutions.”
  Dam, I didn’t know I was a freedom fighter
It is impossible to say why this book is currently going viral at this moment in time and why it may feel particularly relevant to a workforce of millions of people who have suddenly been asked to agree to be “loyal” and work under the quasi leadership of the world’s richest man, have been asked to take a buyout that may or may not exist... [continued in article]
Truely, it's impossible to know
Hold conferences when there is more critical work to be done.
Insist on doing everything through ‘channels.’ Never permit short-cuts to be taken in order to expedite decisions.
“Make ‘speeches.’ Talk as frequently as possible and at great length. Illustrate your ‘points’ by long anecdotes and accounts of personal experiences. Never hesitate to make a few appropriate ‘patriotic’ comments.”
That reminds me of something. Standup, Kaban, Retrospective! It's Agile!
- Ah, it's all starting to make sense now. But why would people do such things, when Agile is absolutely not a cult?!
- Hold up, my company has been doing this shit for years…years!!!
It does make sense. As much as I hate it, Fascism loathes bureaucracy as a concept because it doesn't automatically grant them power to do whatever they want.
More Teams meetings. Got it!
Hey it's the handbook Trump is following. Except he uses it for fascism.
“Hoisted by our own petard!”
Called it.
What’s the secret to taking a nap? I close my eyes and doze off and wake up immediately. Still tired.
Apropos of nothing
I used to belong to a cult. On my way out I tried a fair number of these. It was kinda fun.

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