As far back as 1957 subliminal messages where being used to try to influence the behaviour of ordinary people. The most famous example, from that time, was the cinema experiment by James Vicary. Vicary prepared a film with the embedded subliminal messages "eat popcorn" and "buy coke". His findings stated that sales of both these products increased as a result of the subliminal stimuli. Even though this experiment has been discredited and has never been successfully duplicated the vast majority of people still believe in the effectiveness of subliminal programming.

William Dawson and other legislators, In Washington D.C., immediately launched a campaign get subliminal messages banned from television and radio broadcasts. Dawson sternly warned that if subliminal messages were used as a political propaganda tool the results could be frightening as they could be used to serve and maintain a form of totalitarian government.

Even though there was no real hard evidence to substantiate any of Dawson's claims the huge and overwhelming public outcry was enough to force the Government into action. At the time, as is still true today, the majority of scientists had well-founded reservations about the effectiveness of subliminal messages; most scientists just don't believe they work. So, even though scientific and governmental communities didn't believe subliminal to be effective the public wanted them banned!

This is the official reason behind the USA, British and Australian Governments decision to ban the use of subliminal advertising on television and radio? However, there is evidence to suggest that at around the same time scientists were completely dismissing the idea some other people, with a very different agenda, had found that by using subliminal messages they really could affect people's behaviour!

During the raging debate over the effectiveness of subliminal advertising and the outcry for them to be banned the interest of a very powerful covert group was sparked. A group that did not have to answer to the public and that had immense, almost inexhaustible, resources at their disposal. This group decided, at this time, to start a full investigation. It is well known that The CIA have always had a keen interest in the research of anything that can influence the human mind and their development of mind altering drugs and therapies is well documented. Therefore it should come as no surprise at all to find that they invested a lot of resources, manpower and money into studying the subject of subliminal messages as a form of covert persuasion.

In recently released classified documents, now available under The Freedom Of Information Act, we see just how deeply involved and thorough the CIA were in researching the effectiveness of subliminal messages as a means of brain-washing.

Under intense pressure from investigative journalists and Congressional Investigators, the CIA were forced to release a wide variety of documents which included some previous year's copies of their internal journal "Studies in Intelligence". In a 1958 journal CIA investigators reported their initial findings into subliminal persuasion in a report frighteningly titled "The Operational Potential of Subliminal Perception".

In the excellent book by Martin A. Lee, a former agent with the CIA who remains unnamed tells of the CIA's commitment to investigate whether or not subliminal messages could be used to influence the outcome of a political campaign. They were especially interested in using of subliminals in this way on television and radio.

In a January 17th 1958 declassified document, the CIA stated that it might be possible to include a subliminal message such as ‘Obey' in their subliminal projection and added that subliminal messages had achieved some success in commercial advertisements!

No-one can be sure if the CIA ever concluded their investigations into subliminal technology, if it continues to this day or if they found any other startling information that is, as yet, unavailable to us. However, the use of subliminal messages as an effective self-improvement tool cannot be denied and their uses are growing every year. So, there must be something in it. Perhaps now you may think about giving one a go?

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