Brainwashing the Story of Men Who Defied It

By Edward Hunter

The new word brainwashing entered our minds and diction aries in a phenomenally short time. This sinister political expression had never been seen in print anywhere until a few years ago. About the only times it was ever heard in conversation was inside a tight, intimate circle of trusted relatives or reliable friends in Red China during the short honeymoon period of communism. The few exceptions were when a Red indoctrinator would lose his temper and shout out, You need a brainwashing. The reason the word was picked up so quickly was that it was not just a clever synonym for something already known, but described a strategy that had yet no name. A vacuum in language existed: no word tied together the various tactics that make up the process by which the communists expected to create their new Soviet man. The word came out of the sufferings of the Chinese people. Put under a terrifying combination of subtle and crude men tal and physical pressures and tortures, they detected a pat tern and called it brainwashing. The Reds wanted people to believe that it could be amply described by some familiar expression such as education, public relations, persuasion or by some misleading term like mind reform and re-educa tion. None of these could define it because it was much, much more than any one of them alone. The Chinese knew they hadn't just been educated or persuaded; something much more dire than that had been perpetrated on them, similar in many peculiar ways to a medical treatment.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Forgotten Books
• Release date: Nov 6, 2017

Edward Hunter

Born in New York, Edward Hunter spent a great amount of years living in Asia. It was in beautiful Thailand that he first began to put his love for Asian art into writing. He had a weekly column in the Bangkok Post entitled, “Antique Hunter,” as well as columns in Living Magazine, and was used as an authority by various media from around the world. When he returned to the United States in the mid 1980’s, he decided to switch careers and entered the intriguing world of high end retail. He worked for Sulka, Loro Piana and now works in Tailored Clothing at the Bergdorf Goodman Men’s store, located on Fifth Avenue in New York City. He is proud to be a founding member of BG 100, an organization created by Bergdorf Goodman to acknowledge the achievements of the top 100 selling associates. He will quickly tell you that it is service to the client that makes a salesperson’s reputation. Yet, by creating his card words, he has altered the value of his business card so far that, after the very first sale, a client almost always remembers to ask for “the poet”, “the philosopher”, “the salesperson who writes on the back of his cards”, or just “Hunter”. Four ways to selling success instead of the traditional one. Or as one of his many clients once said “it’s like receiving an American Fortune Card, not unlike eating at a Chinese restaurant and receiving a Chinese Fortune Cookie!”