Fear - Jan Theuninck, 2001

The existential fear of the contemporary human being

                                                   http://viewonbuddhism.org/fear.html

https://beeld.be/kunstenaars/jan-theuninck

http://viewonbuddhism.org/buddhismus-deutsch/g-furcht-angst.htm

Popularized by the American sociologist Barry Glassner, culture of fear (or climate of fear) is the concept that people may incite fear in the general public to achieve political or workplace goals through emotional bias.

A largely unrelated concept in sociology is the "fear culture" on the Guilt-Shame-Fear spectrum of cultures



 la politique de la peur est une expression qui désigne la politique d'un gouvernement qui utiliserait la peur de la population pour faire adopter des mesures réduisant les libertés individuelles


Freedom from fear is listed as a fundamental human right according to The Universal Declaration of Human Rights :

Aldous Huxley in 1958 : people in fear are very easy to control

https://www.nexusnewsfeed.com/article/geopolitics/aldous-huxley-in-1958-pharmacology-and-propaganda-will-make-the-masses-love-their-slavery

https://www.contrepoints.org/2020/05/13/371283-la-peur-et-la-mort-pour-faire-accepter-la-surveillance-de-masse

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Creating "Fear" is a Psyop for Submission:Creating or amplifying fear can function as a psychological operation (psyop) to induce submission, compliance, or distraction, as argued by sociologists and authors like Barry Glassner and Aldous Huxley. This isn't always conspiratorial but often emerges from media, political, or economic incentives.

• Barry Glassner: In his book The Culture of Fear: Why Americans Are Afraid of the Wrong Things (1999, updated 2018), Glassner contends that fears are systematically manufactured by media, politicians, corporations, and advocacy groups to manipulate public behavior. Examples include hyped scares over crime rates (when they're falling), road rage, or rare diseases, which divert attention from systemic issues like poverty or inequality. This "fearmongering" sells products (e.g., security systems), boosts ratings, wins votes, and enforces social control by keeping people submissive and focused on phantom threats rather than real power structures. Glassner calls it a "peddling of fear" that exploits vulnerability for profit and authority.
• Aldous Huxley: Huxley explored control mechanisms in Brave New World (1932) and Brave New World Revisited (1958), emphasizing pleasure and distraction over overt fear (contrasting Orwell's 1984, which relies on terror). However, he acknowledged fear's role: "Love casts out fear; but conversely fear casts out love... Fear also casts out intelligence, casts out goodness." In totalitarian systems, fear (of punishment or exclusion) combines with engineered happiness to ensure submission—people self-censor or conform out of dread of losing comforts. Huxley warned of "dictatorships without tears," where subtle psyops like propaganda induce voluntary servitude. Linking to Glassner, both highlight how elites use fear (or its absence via distraction) as a tool for mass control.

In modern terms, this aligns with "fear propaganda" in politics, where governments amplify threats (e.g., terrorism, pandemics) to justify surveillance or restrictions.

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Freedom from fear remains a recognized human right, enshrined in international law since the mid-20th century. It originated in U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt's 1941 "Four Freedoms" speech, which outlined freedom from fear as a global ideal meaning "a worldwide reduction of armaments" so no nation lives under threat of aggression. This influenced the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR, 1948), where the preamble aspires to "freedom of speech and belief and freedom from fear and want" as the highest aspiration for humanity. It's not a standalone article but underpins rights like security of person (Article 3), freedom from torture (Article 5), and peaceful assembly (Article 20).

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