Search - Cold War Era Dangers On The Home Front on DVD

A Different Era And Way Of Thinking

Bart | Montpellier, France | 11/14/2006

(5 out of 5 stars)

"When the governement is threatened, often its first choice is not to confront its enemies, but, rather, to scare its own people and get them to be on their side so that they can do whatever it is they need to do should war occur.

You can see that in this day and age when our governement used paranoia after the World Trade Center attack to convince people that Iraq was a serious and current threat to our survival.

This allowed the government to get permission and public support for a war that the people might otherwise have shied away from.

These DVDs demonstrate that this method and attitude of propoganda is nothing new.

At the end of World War II government officials were terrified that the next war would be with the Soviet Union or that communists might try to take over our government from the inside.

They knew they could not let this happen, but since the Soviet Union was not doing anythin to justify war, they were worried that the people would not let them commit troops to the cause if they felt they had to.

The result was a desire to "educate" the population about the dangers of both the Soviet Union and communinism. They figured that if people understood the threat they could generate more public support.

So, they made a series of films to be shown before movies and in schools to demonstrate why the people should fear communism and the soviet union.

When you watch these films you can see how seriously the government took the soviet threat. What's a shame is how often they exagerated the threat and went out of their way to make communists seem much worse than they were.

That's what makes these DVDs so valuable. Becuase they give you a crash course in the history of what the government will do to protect itself and stir up public passions.

They serve as an excellent cautionary tale and have allowed me to view what our current officials say with a more understanding eye.

This should be required viewing for anyone who really wants to understand how our system works."

A Different Type Of DVD

Deacon | America | 04/26/2006

(5 out of 5 stars)

"This is not your typical documentary DVD. I was expecting something that would give me a lot of commentary on the vintage footage - like most of the films you find out there.

This DVD on the other hand goes in the other direction - with surprisingly positive results.

The footage is presented as is - you get clip after clip of propoganda films the way they were shown in the 50s and 60s and the editors leave it up to you to draw your own conclusions.

The entire thing made me think of the way that America has really changed a lot in 40 or 50 years and taught me a good deal about just how paranoid we used to be.

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