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Moreover, paintings like the temptation of saint anthony, or buddha facing mara, provide a portrayal of the human mind struggling to be consistent in the face of extreme distraction.

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And what I am asking is , but isn't that too a story that one is immersed in by authoritarian indoctrination? The idea that you must resist 'temptation' and sit in 'contemplation' or else 'Hell' for ever and ever, or 'Karma' for many lifetimes.

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I think you are off base with these examples, although manipulation is and has been afoot in many areas to greater and lesser degrees. To achieve the level of manipulation you describe a KGB would have had to exist that was 100 times as powerful than it is today.

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redgreenvines said:

left to one's own devices, we are all our own worst KGB's, and have to be our own St. Anthony too.

transforming everything into conspiracies is just more MARA

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Mara (Sanskrit: māra; Chinese: 天魔; pinyin: Tiānmó; Tibetan Wylie: bdud; Khmer: មារ; Burmese: မာရ်နတ်; Thai: มาร; Sinhalese: මාරයා), in Buddhism, is the demon that tempted Gautama Buddha by trying to seduce him with the vision of beautiful women who, in various legends, are often said to be Mara's daughters.[1] In Buddhist cosmology, Mara is associated with death, rebirth, and desire.[2] Nyanaponika Thera has described Mara as "the personification of the forces antagonistic to enlightenment."[3]

Etymology
The word "Māra" comes from the Proto-Indo-European root *mer meaning to die.[4] The Sanskrit form of the verbal root is √mṛ. It takes a present indicative form mṛyate and a causative form mārayati (with strengthening of the root vowel from ṛ to ār). Māra is a verbal noun from the causative root and means 'causing death' or 'killing'.[4] It is related to other words for death from the same root, such as: maraṇa and mṛtyu. The latter is a name for death personified and is sometimes identified with Yama. ff

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fabricate (v.) Look up fabricate at Dictionary.com
    mid-15c., "to fashion, make, build," from Latin fabricatus, past participle of fabricare "to make, construct, fashion, build," from fabrica (see fabric). In bad sense of "tell a lie (etc.)," it is recorded by 1779. Related: Fabricated; fabricating.

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All the same, those that profit from the dust of our bones do not have sufficient attention span to be so involved in controlling our thoughts (they don't even control their own thoughts in general).

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“The conscious and intelligent manipulation of the organized habits and opinions of the masses is an important element in democratic society. Those who manipulate this unseen mechanism of society constitute an invisible government which is the true ruling power of our country. ...We are governed, our minds are molded, our tastes formed, our ideas suggested, largely by men we have never heard of. This is a logical result of the way in which our democratic society is organized. Vast numbers of human beings must cooperate in this manner if they are to live together as a smoothly functioning society. ...In almost every act of our daily lives, whether in the sphere of politics or business, in our social conduct or our ethical thinking, we are dominated by the relatively small number of persons...who understand the mental processes and social patterns of the masses. It is they who pull the wires which control the public mind.”
― Edward L. Bernays, Propaganda

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Our thoughts are largely not in our own control but are herded to the extent that we do not herd our own selves (i.e. a jumble of thoughts are loosely corralled through the day from morning to night through every step of the day).

so sure, someone is profiting more than us, more than you, but this is not proof of an invasion of lizard people.  I'm am just pointing out that working through mental junk is not trivial and blaming one class (or race) or another for your own muddled thoughts is not fair.

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clock_of_omens said:

We may be natural story tellers, but we aren't naturally good story tellers. It takes skill to tell a good story with any artistic merit. Your dream story with your brother, e.g., is trite.

Other than that, what is your point? We experience life in a narrative fashion. We speak of life events as narratives. Of course people are going to use false narratives to mislead. This isn't really new information.

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