The War on Young Minds.
Frans Vandenbosch 方腾波 03.03.2025
The Theft of Innocence
The phrase “stolen children” typically evokes images of physical abduction; a horrific crime that dominates headlines and ignites public outrage. Campaigns like Pam Palmater ‘s Justice for Our Stolen Children, which spotlight the violent deaths of Indigenous youths such as Colten Boushie and Tina Fontaine, rightly demand accountability for these visceral tragedies.[i] Yet this visceral image of literal theft pales before a far more insidious and pervasive crime: the systematic capture of young minds.
Across the West, a shadow campaign is underway to sever children from their families — not through brute force, but through ideological indoctrination. Under the guise of “progress”, (actually political correctness, woke, genderideology, …) an alliance of corporate oligarchs, tech monopolies, and captured institutions has weaponised education, media, and algorithms to brainwash an entire generation into slavish conformity with their agendas. These architects of cultural hegemony — unelected, unaccountable, and unrestrained — have engineered a silent coup.
They exploit children’s malleability to implant corporate-aligned ideologies, eroding familial bonds, critical thought, and moral autonomy. While physical kidnapping shocks the conscience, this psychological theft is dismissed as “activism” or “innovation”. But make no mistake: the scale is catastrophic. An entire generation has been alienated from its heritage, its values, and its future — all to serve the interests of a parasitic elite. The theft of bodies is a horror; the theft of souls is an existential crime.
The Theft of Minds: How Big Tech Has Captured Our Children
Matt Feeney [ii] exposes the unchecked power of technology, particularly through smartphones, as a tool of corporate control, prioritising profit over human flourishing. He condemns the intellectual and cultural complacency that has allowed Silicon Valley to dictate the parameters of thought, behaviour, and social interaction. Feeney’s argument is a call to arms, demanding collective resistance against Big Tech’s insidious influence.
- The supposed “emancipatory” potential of technology is an illusion. Rather than liberating individuals, digital platforms exploit human psychology to foster dependency and erode autonomy.
- Structural resistance is essential. Communities must reject Big Tech’s addictive design and predatory network effects through collective agreements and social constraints.
- The preservation of human agency requires reclaiming attention, deep thought, and meaningful human connections from the grip of technology’s dehumanising power.
Feeney warns that technology companies invest billions to ensure their devices and applications are as addictive as possible, deliberately cultivating a state of chronic distraction. This systematic erosion of cognitive independence, he argues, demands nothing less than constant vigilance. Parents, educators, and society at large must recognise this assault on attention and autonomy for what it is—a fundamental threat. The battle against Silicon Valley’s dystopian profit machine is not merely cultural but existential.
The NGO Complex: Instruments of American Narrative Warfare
Glenn Diesen [iii] exposes the role of USAID and American-funded NGOs in advancing US geopolitical hegemony under the guise of “democracy promotion.” Far from being neutral humanitarian actors, these organisations function as covert instruments of hybrid warfare—manipulating media, financing regime change operations, and enforcing ideological conformity. Diesen traces their role in orchestrating the 2014 Ukrainian coup and their ongoing function in shaping propaganda and political destabilisation across the globe.
Narrative Control & the Machinery of Censorship
American NGOs, including the Integrity Initiative, systematically manufacture “consensus” by marginalising dissent. Critics of NATO’s expansionist agenda or US militarism are smeared as “pro-Russian,” subjected to public denunciation, academic censorship, and state-backed personal attacks. Diesen himself has been targeted by Norwegian government-funded NGOs in a campaign of reputational destruction.
The Erosion of Free Speech
American media monopolies, in concert with state-backed NGOs, suppress debate by wielding moralistic rhetoric as a weapon. Advocacy for peace is deliberately equated with capitulation, while dissenters are branded as foreign agents. This carefully engineered system of censorship serves to perpetuate endless conflict, ensuring that war remains a lucrative enterprise for the ruling elite.
Democracy in Name, Tyranny in Practice
Diesen exposes the American censorship apparatus as an instrument of imperial control. Under the pretext of defending “democracy” and “human rights,” these NGOs operate as enforcers of ideological orthodoxy, silencing opposition and manufacturing public consent for war. His personal experience underscores the dangers of challenging dominant geopolitical narratives in an era where censorship is no longer overt but outsourced. The only way forward, he argues, is to expose these mechanisms, resist the imposition of ideological conformity, and demand genuine diplomatic solutions before manufactured consensus leads the world into yet another catastrophic conflict.
The Role of the American Public: A Nation of Willing Accomplices
Yet, blame cannot be placed solely on the tech giants, the oligarchs, and the media manipulators. Perhaps the greater indictment should fall upon the American populace itself—a society so complacent, so malleable, that it willingly submits to this digital serfdom and ideological subjugation. If the American public is willing to be herded, conditioned, and exploited by the very forces it claims to despise, then no amount of external resistance will suffice. A nation of sheep cannot feign outrage when it is led to slaughter.
The same principle applies to the political system. It is not merely the elites, the think tanks, or the intelligence agencies that maintain this machinery of deception—it is also the electorate itself. A populace conditioned to accept fabricated narratives, to mistake censorship for protection, and to outsource its own critical thinking to state-approved “experts” cannot feign ignorance of its complicity.
As Chen Weihua [iv] aptly put it, “The fact that Trump was elected by the American people means that the voters should also take the blame. The Biden voters too. Today, US election is very much about the lesser of two evils. Decent people cannot survive the primaries.” The American electorate, time and again, selects leaders who perpetuate this system—leaders who preside over regime change operations abroad while crushing dissent at home. If a nation allows itself to be ruled by illusion, then its servitude is ultimately self-inflicted.
The Theft of a Generation
What we are witnessing is not merely a crisis of politics, media, or technology, but an unprecedented crime: the theft of an entire generation. This is not just about corporate greed or ideological manipulation—it is about the systematic dismantling of critical thought, the engineered stupidity of youth, and the destruction of cultural continuity. Our children are not being educated; they are being programmed. Schools no longer cultivate knowledge but impose dogma. Universities no longer foster debate but demand obedience. The minds of the young have been hijacked, their capacity for independent reasoning crippled, their moral compasses distorted beyond recognition.
The scale of this crime is incalculable. A society that abandons its intellectual heritage, erodes its traditions, and surrenders its children to the dictates of unelected corporate overlords cannot survive. This is the real theft: the slow-motion abduction of an entire civilisation’s future. And the greatest tragedy? Those who should be resisting are the very ones who enable it. Parents look on helplessly as their children are brainwashed. Educators become enforcers of ideological conformity. Politicians serve as obedient functionaries of a parasitic elite.
We stand at a crossroads. Either we recognise this theft for what it is: a deliberate, calculated assault on the very fabric of civilisation—or we resign ourselves to decline. The choice is ours. But if we do not act now, if we do not reclaim our children, our culture, and our future, then the verdict of history will be merciless.
[i] Pam Palmater Justice for Our Stolen Children 23.08.2018 https://pampalmater.com/2018/08/justice-for-our-stolen-children-camp/
[ii] Matt Feeney, “Big Tech Has Stolen Our Children,” UnHerd, 02/03/2024, https://unherd.com/2024/03/big-tech-has-stolen-our-children/
[iii] Glenn Diesen, “USAID and NGOs for Narrative Control and War,” Substack, 10/02/2025, https://glenndiesen.substack.com/p/usaid-and-ngos-for-narrative-control
[iv] Chen Weihua, ChinaDaily Brussels correspondent in a WeChat message to the author, 10/02/2025
Thank you for reading! We’d love to hear your thoughts. Please share your comments here below and join the conversation with our community!
This is a most profound exposition Frans.
This really encapsulated it: “If a nation allows itself to be ruled by illusion, then its servitude is ultimately self-inflicted.”
You and Cynthia are the only people I know who have identified this most essential crisis facing civilization and for the right reasons.
For those who do ring the alarm bells about this intentional dumbing down of the youth, I find that they tend to become anti technology Luddites and anarchists (and ironically this still victims of the systems indoctrination program) who cannot fathom a world where wisdom and personal agency play a role in ensuring that technology and government are used well.
A piece tackling a vital issue of our time and of all times.
A civilization doesn’t have a future if its specific and original version of the classical/aristocratic/timeless education (having a spine, brains and cojones integrated) is not appropriately transmitted.
For example, in the case of China, her particular version of the classical/aristocratic/timeless education is called the Four Books & the Five Classics. There are many other works for study and practice including techno-scientific training but the Four Books & the Five Classics are the foundation of the Chinese civilization.
It’s at the center not only of civilization survival but of its full development going through a complete epistemological growth for all .
What is missing on a very practical level ?
In a few words : open-minded role models capable of rejuvenating the classical texts of a given civilization and fully transmitting them but also integrating them with the much needed techno-scientific training too.
The Humanities & and techno-scientific training are the 2 wings of the same bird soaring high.
Kwan Lee.