The Century of the Self: Episode 4

The Century of the Self
by Adam Curtis

The evening begins with a social hour and optional pot luck supper at 6:00 pm,
followed by the film at 7:30 pm, followed by a discussion at the end of the film.

Episide 4: 8 People Sipping Wine in Kettering

Episode Four of this extraordinary intellectual masterpiece by Adam Curtis explains how politicians on the left, in both Britain and America, turned to the techniques developed by business to read and fulfill the inner desires of the self. Both New Labour, under Tony Blair, and the Democrats, led by Bill Clinton, used the focus group, which had been invented by psychoanalysts, in order to regain power. They set out to mold their policies to people's inner desires and feelings just as capitalism had learnt to do with products. Out of this grew a new culture of public relations and marketing in politics, business and journalism. One of its stars in Britain was Matthew Freud who followed in the footsteps of his relation, Edward Bernays, the inventor of public relations in the 1920s. The politicians believed they were creating a new and better form of democracy, one that truly responded to the inner feelings of individual. But what they did not realize was that the aim of those who had originally created these techniques had not to liberate people but to develop a new way of controlling them.

Wheelchair accessible around the corner at 411 28th Street

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