- Project Proposal - 08-31-03 Fear is the greatest tool in which to control

people, because it forces them to control themselves. Whatever they have

been told will keep them safe, they will do. They might even give up basic

liberties in the process just feel more "secure" over a fear, be it rational or

irrational. More repressive countries like Saudi Arabia, Turkey, China, Brazil,

etc…keep their societies under control by making them fear direct punishment

if they do not follow the government's orders. Countries like Israel, Great

Britain, and ours use the fear of "others" threatening to take us over if we

don't follow our government's policies. Both methods are effective, but they

also have their weaknesses. People living under more repressive regimes know

exactly who their enemy is and once the people can gather enough opposition,

they can overthrow the government. In our situation the government is

"protecting" us so we do not want to lessen it's power. The only way we can

free ourselves from their control is to realize how they are controlling us and

this is what I want to focus on in my project. This work will be a satire on the

Department of Homeland Security that deals directly with their vague warnings

and scare tactics. My main goal is to expose the propaganda used by our

government and by doing so, neutralize it. I will do this by posting several

signs in strategic places all over the school (examples on next page). These

signs will bring out many different reactions from all that see it. Administrators

and custodians will question if they are real or not and will not know if they

should take them down. This uncertainty would mean that they could see our

government putting up such ridiculous signs. Students and others who think

they are real warnings might deface them or call the school board to complain.

People who know that it is an art/sociology project will hopefully compare my

mock signs to the actual propaganda being force fed to the public and be

more aware of tactics like these in the future. There are many other responses

that this work will elicit and hopefully all of them will end in reflection and

discussion on this serious issue. If we are scared, we are complacent and in

the end controlled. We don't have to break these chains; we just have to take

them off, because we put them on.