Fox News has been caught flashing up a subliminal image of presidential candidate John McCain during its TV intro sequence in what appears to be a deliberate, criminal, and underhanded propaganda ploy.
Blink and you'll miss it, but the image of a smiling John McCain and his wife Cindy is sure to register in your subconscious as it flashes up behind the logo of Fox 5 News, a Fox News affiliate.
Watch the clip.
Neo-Cons are obviously denying reality again by claiming the image is accidental, but this isn't a "bleed image" from a roll of Kodak, it's state of the art digital editing. It is impossible for an image to be placed there unless its done deliberately.
"I think you people are getting ahead of yourselves," claims one debunker, "the fox guy working the computer prolly just got lazy and used a clip from a previous show, calm down. There are such things as lazy people."
If he merely used a clip from a previous show then why on earth does the McCain image flash up for only a matter of milliseconds? If the image was inserted for a genuine reason then why would it appear for less time than the conscious mind could register it?
The story following the intro is not about John McCain, so that excuse is out of the window too. Again - the image flashes up too quickly to be recognized consciously.
The fact that Fox News is engaging in this stunt may be unsurprising to some, but the most disturbing aspect of using subliminal advertising is that it has been proven successful.
James Vicary's infamous 1957 claim that he could get New Jersey movie-goers to buy more popcorn and drink coca-cola by flashing the words "Drink Coca-Cola" and "Hungry? Eat popcorn" for 1/3000 of a second at five-second intervals during a film is the subject of much controversy. Vicary asserted that sales of popcorn and Coke in that New Jersey theater increased 57.8 percent and 18.1 percent respectively, but the accuracy of the results has long been disputed.
However, a 2006 New Scientist investigation concluded that "Researchers have shown that if the conditions are right, subliminal advertising to promote a brand can be made to work."
23-millisecond subliminal messages for "Lipton Ice" resulted in 80% of subjects choosing Lipton Ice Tea over other drinks brands in an experiment conducted by Johan Karremans at the University of Nijmegen in the Netherlands.
An investigation needs to be conducted into how the image appeared during the Fox News intro sequence and if a deliberate motivation to engage in mass public deception is found, authorities should consider revoking Fox 5's broadcast license or at least handing out a gargantuan fine.
The use of subliminal advertising in the UK, Australia and the US is a criminal offense.
It is the mandate of the FCC to clamp down on such an egregious attempt to sway public opinion by means of subliminal psychological influence, especially when the brand being pushed is not merely a soft drink, but a presidential candidate. If evidence comes to light that it was deliberate, then serious questions need to be asked.
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