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Two Plus Torture Makes Five: Difference between revisions
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[[File:Madred Picard 5306.jpg|link=Star Trek: The Next Generation|frame|[[Armor-Piercing Question|"I asked how many lights you see."]] [[Memetic Mutation|"There are four lights."]] [[Blatant Lies|"I don't understand how you can be so mistaken."]]]]
{{quote|''Nazi theory indeed specifically denies that such a thing as "the truth" exists... The implied objective of this line of thought is a nightmare world in which the [[Evil Overlord|Leader]], or some ruling clique, controls not only the future but ''the past''. If the Leader says of such and such an event, "It never happened" -- well, it never happened. If he says that two and two are five -- well, two and two are five.''
|'''[[George Orwell]]''', "Looking Back on the Spanish War," [[Older Than They Think|four years before]] ''[[Nineteen Eighty-Four]]''}}
Most often used as a torture trope, probably influenced by the famous scene from ''[[Nineteen Eighty-Four]]'', the villain has the hero in his clutches, but the hero Simply... Won't... ''Crack''. Sometimes the villain has to do more, i.e., he has to make the hero's mind break. This means making the hero [[The Treachery of Images|see things that aren't there]] or being forced to acknowledge [[Blatant Lies|things that are contradictory]] [[Logic Bomb|or illogical]], sometimes through using [[Cold-Blooded Torture]] or [[Mind Rape]].
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{{examples}}
== Comic Books ==
* Lampshaded/spoofed in ''[[The Invisibles]]'' when Sir Miles is using the drug ''Key 17'' to mess with King Mob's mind. He causes King Mob to see, among other things, five fingers where there are four. The illustration is subtly creepy.
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== Real Life ==
* One reason for the [[Blatant Lies]] in the pronouncements of repressive regimes (like North Korea's recent{{when}} statement that their country is one of the happiest places on Earth) is that citizens wind up repeating them (to avoid being accused of disloyalty) even though they know the statements are untrue. This makes the citizens psychologically ''complicit'' in the regime's lies, and less likely to resist. That's the theory, anyway.
* Joseph Goebbels: "The principle and which is quite true in itself and that in the [[Big Lie|big lie]] there is always a certain force of credibility; because the broad masses of a nation are always more easily corrupted in the deeper strata of their emotional nature than consciously or voluntarily." In short: "The bigger the lie, the more it will be believed."
** In Germany's case the torture was economic collapse and Hitler was the one to say 2+2=5.
* The form of emotional abuse known as [[Gaslighting]].
* Not torture, but a similar concept: a common trick in hypnosis shows is to convince the person under hypnosis that a number (say, 8) doesn't exist, leading to confusion when the person is then asked to count his or her fingers and invariably winds up at eleven, despite knowing that there should only be ten fingers.
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