How The American Empire Brought Us To The Brink
To Avert Disaster, We Must De-Colonise Our Minds
In centuries past, an imperial force would arrive at your shores with its gunboats or army, and establish control using overwhelming military power. This is what ‘yielding a stick’ looks like.
The ‘carrot’ came in the form of divide and conquer, where the empire armed a subset of your elite to the teeth, enabling them to control the rest of your population. This power came with one condition: The new ‘rulers’ had to swear loyalty to their imperial masters. And with that, the minority ruling class gained dizzying wealth while helping the empire pillage the people’s resources.
Sometimes the empire found multiple hostile tribes. In this case, they would play the groups against the other by offering military and economic support, either to the group they favoured more, or to both parties to keep them weak. Meanwhile, the imperial power would continue extracting resources, and then use that wealth to further expand their empire. This was the method used by the European powers until the 20th century.
Meanwhile, across the Atlantic Ocean, the United States of America had been busy nation-building in the New World, confiscating the natives of all the land and pushing every last European power out of the Western hemisphere.
This newly-independent British colony had found itself sitting on a geopolitical goldmine. Its enormous landmass was buffered on both sides by expansive oceans, giving it unprecedented security against invaders. Beneath its vast and fertile land lay almost every imaginable resource. To top it off, it had a sprawling navigable river system, making transportation of goods and farming easy and cheap.
Having everything it needed and then some, America happily bid its time in isolation, watching the European empires bicker and fight, while it picked off island nations to its west such as Hawaii and Guam. This state of affairs held until the World Wars, where the budding Axis empires of Germany and Japan threatened to tip the balance of power.
With its heartland safely tucked away, America rapidly built up a formidable navy and went into battle. All the European nations were crushed in the carnage. Japan, lacking natural resources, had to establish its vulnerable empire over the sea. America, backed by a secure home base, a massive population, an influx of productive migrants and limitless resources, outmuscled Japan in the Pacific, with the two nuclear bombs over Hiroshima and Nagasaki providing the exclamation points.
It was an extraordinary moment in human history. America stood as the sole naval power with an invulnerable heartland. The industrial age had ripened, and the dawn of the technological and media age had arrived. This gave the Americans a golden opportunity to rewrite the rules of colonialism. From the ashes of the old empires, neo-imperialism emerged, where control was enforced not just from the barrel of a gun, but through the human mind.
One Empire To Rule Them All
It was no coincidence that decolonisation happened in the fallout of the World Wars — everyone had to make way for the new superpower on the block. America had the Western hemisphere in its pocket, the most powerful industrial base on the planet, and a military and navy light years ahead of the rest. This invulnerability allowed it to project power all over the globe in new and innovative ways.
After the Europeans, Japanese and Ottomans lost control of their overseas territories, only two superpowers remained, with America and the USSR converging in war-ravaged Berlin. It was here that an imperial line was drawn — the ‘Iron Curtain’.
The USSR was a land empire, directly controlling vast swathes of eastern Europe and Asia. Yet it had only two tools in its arsenal: Socialism, and the sword. America was far more dynamic, able to offer its subjects not only military security, but also a model for unlimited economic growth, as well as dazzling cultural marvels such as Hollywood, and irresistible brand experiences like Coca-Cola and McDonald’s.
With globalisation breaking down all walls and barriers, the Soviets found themselves needing to build walls just to keep their people from leaving. Meanwhile, America’s ‘containment’ military strategy kept a steady pressure against Soviet expansion plans. The liberal capitalist juggernaut that was the USA hypnotised not only the Western sphere, but also the populations within the USSR, who demanded liberalisation. Eventually, the Soviets could no longer withstand the pressure. The Iron Wall collapsed, and with it, the Soviet Union, leaving one empire to rule them all.
Empire Re-Imagined
The world can be a dreary place without sunny new horizons. What separates us from animals is our insatiable desire to transcend our reality; to conceptualise new frontiers and seek out new experiences of being.
In looking to build its Utopia, the USSR sacrificed the spiritual realm on the altar of socialism. Religion had been an ideal solution for man’s restless nature, offering salvation and transcendence in the one God. The Soviet ban on religion aimed to take that away, and pushed the people closer to despair.
Yet it was not only in the East where disillusionment could be found — the Western Christian church was also weakened by modernity. After Nietzsche famously declared that ‘God is Dead’, and a near-apocalyptic war filled with unimaginable horrors had left many wondering if perhaps God were in fact dead, American-led capitalism promised to fill the void with a form of ‘pseudo-spirituality’ through consumption, which would lead a disenchanted secular West into the 21st century.
Along with promising a solution for man’s spiritual thirst, hyper-charged capitalism created increasing wealth inequality. Socialism offered a ‘fair’ alternative through economic equality, looking to stamp out envy and privilege. America, on the other hand, aimed to weaponise envy and privilege by exporting its ‘American Dream’ of social mobility and rags-to-riches success. We learnt a lot about human nature from witnessing which of these two models won the day.
The foundation for the US neo-empire was a combination of hard and soft power. First, the US made the dollar the world’s reserve currency, with America’s economic might offering a rock-solid foundation for global investment. While this created stability and confidence for everyone under ‘Pax Americana’, it also made them vulnerable to the ‘carrot’ being turned into a ‘stick’ in the form of sanctions. Second, rather than directly colonising countries like the empires of old, the US created ‘footholds’ in the form of hundreds of military bases, while its navy roamed the four oceans to tighten control.
This imperial foundation then allowed the US to go about establishing a soft power empire unlike anything the world had ever seen. With televisions quickly filling every home in the West, and cinemas in every city, the empire had a direct line into the imaginations of its subjects, allowing American companies to ‘engineer’ minds in ways that would have made even Joseph Goebbels burn with envy.
A Time Of Excess
The horrors of the World Wars created a collective hunger for stability and security. So the war generation pushed down its trauma, rolled up its sleeves, and got to work rebuilding the economy. The resulting post-war boom produced two forms of abundance: Consumer products, and babies. By the 1960s, this ‘baby boomer’ generation had come of age.
The 60s were a time of rapid change. The economic and baby boom had produced a ‘psychic excess’. Without hardships to deal with, the baby boomers moved up the hierarchy of needs, and began to seek out spiritual actualisation. Yoga. Psychedelics. Eastern spirituality. Music. Promiscuity. Their curiosity knew no limits.
The boomers also emerged at a time of heightened conflict. America followed up its carpet bombing of Korea in the 50s with an even more barbarous campaign against Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos. Emboldened by a surging economy, horrified by the empire’s aggression overseas, and frustrated by their traditional and stubbornly-conforming elders, the baby boomers rebelled, culminating in the counterculture revolution. Women’s liberation, the civil rights movement, anti-war protests and the sexual revolution erupted, putting the empire’s elites on notice. The baby boomers’ message was clear: Power lay with the people.
As is always the case in history, the elites responded, then adapted. The counterculture revolution was brought to a halt with the assassinations of figures like Martin Luther King Jr., Malcolm X and John F. Kennedy.
In the fallout of the chaos, the problem was clear: America was a land with more resources than it knew what to do with, and whose production supply had far outstripped demand. Yet it still needed to expand its economy to help fuel its burgeoning empire.
The solution had been under the empire’s nose the whole time. From chaos came opportunity. The baby boomers’ psychological excess and deep yearning for self-realisation, brought on after the contraction of world war, was ripe for the picking. The counterculture movement would be appropriated into capitalism, with the baby boomers’ lust for spiritual self-realisation channelled into the consumer market and media world.
Colonising Our Unconscious
In Nazi Germany, propaganda had been used to brainwash the population for war. In a peace-time American empire, mind control became a way to supercharge the economy through exploiting psychology — and the weapon of choice was the brand.
At first, brands were intended as a mark of quality for products with a specific purpose. Baking powder. Breakfast cereal. Canned tomatoes. The buyer associated a brand with something they needed, using it to quickly identify the product which worked best for them.
Yet after the 60s, demand needed to match an overabundant supply, and a rebellious baby boomer generation needed to be tamed. Building on the landmark work of Sigmund Freud, figures such as Ernest Dichter saw the potential of objects to become ‘psychic extensions’ of the human being. American advertising companies then set about attracting potential consumers by tapping into their unconscious desires and yearnings, and exploiting their insecurities.
Many of us were made to feel ugly, incompetent or unimportant in early life. The benevolent brands promised solutions to all of these hang-ups and more via the use of imagery and symbolism which conveyed a utopian way of life filled with happiness, beauty and security, utilising billboards, magazine ads and TV ads to spread their magic spell.
This ‘branding process’ worked subliminally by imbuing a dead logo with life by invoking emotion through storytelling. As a result, a brand came to signify not only a practical need being met, but a deeper yearning being gratified.
Coca-Cola used Santa Claus to associate its brand with the joy of Christmas. Even beyond December, Coke ads often conveyed moments of bliss through imagery of a beautiful or youthful person ‘sipping a refreshing coke’ on the beach. McDonalds, through Happy Meals, Ronald McDonald and in-house birthday parties, came to be synonymous with the jubilation of childhood.
Victoria’s Secret, invoking images of divinity in the form of lingerie-clad ‘angels’ catwalking down the runway, later bestowed women with a capacity to transcend their human blemishes and flaws. To become ‘divinely beautiful with a sexy edge’, you only needed to purchase a set of their lingerie.
The malignancy of this mind control knew no limits. Edward Bernays, the nephew of Freud and ‘father of propaganda’, is credited with promoting female smoking by branding cigarettes as feminist ‘Torches of Freedom’. He achieved this by appropriating the women’s liberation movement while using vivid imagery of confident women ‘lighting up’.
After the success of the ‘Torches of Freedom’ campaign, smoking grew to be viewed as feminine. Advertising executive Leo Burnett had the perfect solution, creating the ‘Marlboro Man’. This rugged cowboy in picturesque wild terrain spurred fantasies of power and ‘masculinity’ in men — if they purchased a packet. The campaign proved to be an immediate hit, convincing legions of males worldwide to start smoking while cancer rates shot up.
All of this laid the groundwork for what would come next, as mythology and identity would be combined to rewrite our entire social order.
Colonising Our Humanity
Throughout human history, mythology has been used to give shape to man’s archaic origins. These stories reveal a rich microcosm of repeating characters, dramas and tragedies which seem to always dominate human existence.
Carl Jung popularised the idea that this world still exists in our unconscious mind. He argued that mythological stories not only remind us of our origins, they also help us to channel the ‘psychic and energetic’ power we hold within.
Most modern hero stories, such as those in the Marvel Universe, are based on mythological figures. Within these stories are archetypes, which represent our various energetic ‘forms’. The Warrior, for example, fights on behalf of those they love. The Magician sees behind the ‘veil’ of reality, and can use this understanding to improve the world. The Great Mother holds the power to create and nurture life. There are hundreds of these fascinating figures in mythology.
Jung also argued that archetypes reside within all of us as energetic blueprints, being activated when the situation demands. Humans respond powerfully to archetypes when they see them. If someone is being attacked on the street, for example, the appearance of the Warrior who comes to assist sends tingles through us. When we feel overwhelmed and stressed, the warm embrace of someone channelling the Great Mother instantly calms our nervous system.
The empire’s corporations were quick to grasp the power of mythology to sway the consumer’s passion. In a world without adventure, where humans sat in office cubicles for eight hours a day, Nike provided a doorway into a ‘warrior’ culture through its imagery of fitness success. It even co-opted the name of the mythological Greek ‘goddess of victory’.
In an increasingly-globalised world of nomads, travellers and urban dwellers, Starbucks offered a familiar ‘third place’ between home and work, carefully curated to replicate a feeling of home, where the Great Mother’s warmth was there to embrace the consumer. The truth, however, was staring everyone in the face: The Starbucks logo was the Siren, whose seductive song coming through the speakers lulled unsuspecting victims and left them ‘shipwrecked’, disoriented in a ‘nowhere’ space which was neither here nor there.
By co-opting mythology in its products and media, the empire’s corporations held our imaginations hostage for profit. In a secular world detached from its religious and spiritual roots, only the next exciting product, movie or show was where we could truly feel alive. The only caveat was that, to maintain the feeling, you had to keep consuming.
This treadmill of self-realisation through consumption continued throughout the 80s and 90s, buoyed by a cultural burst from Japan, until the personal computer and internet emerged. It is here that the empire’s corporations saw an opportunity to provide more than mere temporary spiritual gratification through objects — they could bring the consumer directly into their pseudo-spiritual world once and for all.
Life In The Garden
As American neo-imperialism spread throughout the world, bombarding it with endless advertisements and a flood of media, the world gradually began outsourcing its desires and emotional needs to brands as well as media figures and celebrities. From Happy Days’ the ‘Fonz’, to the lovable team from ‘Mash’, all the way to ‘Walter White’ today, America and the world developed one-way emotional bonds with fictional characters. For those who felt isolated and lonely in a fragmented modern world, TV shows such as ‘Friends’ and ‘How I Met Your Mother’ provided quirky and relatable characters to fill the void.
The more people identified with the empire’s brand and media offerings, however, the less they were gratifying their emotional needs from within themselves or other people in their community. The family experience of sitting captivated around the television, barely communicating with each other, was a normal state of affairs in the empire, which led to an inner poverty; a spiritual emptying of the soul. To help distract from and numb the pain of this internal barrenness, the empire provided even more ‘exciting’ branded products, and an ever-greater stream of movies, TV shows and other media experiences.
This has only become turbo-charged in the 21st century, with smartphones replacing the television screen, and streaming services replacing the TV channel. Our relationship to technology has become vastly more intimate. We communicate with our devices through voice and touch, and we have more media and products than we can even fathom.
Apple has gone a step further, now allowing us to direct our devices with the movement of our eyes. This deepening of device intimacy comes on the back of the exploitation of our dopamine circuits, where software is purposely programmed to offer intermittent ‘rewards’ like a slot machine, turning us into addicted ‘dopamine fiends’ in the process.
The consequence of this decades-long colonisation of our humanity is a globalised world of people alienated from themselves and each other. The main way we relate to others in our community now is through the empire. The town square is gone. We communicate heavily through messaging apps and social media. Shopping malls are where we might meet, yet surrounded by bright advertisements and products to buy.
Even our very identity is shaped by brands, with products, celebrities and consumer choices becoming extensions of our personality. Are you a Belieber or a Swiftie? PC or Mac? The brand on your clothes helps set you apart as an ‘individual’ while merging you into a collective brand identity. Brands have grown so much power that we have become their human billboards, allowing them to ‘brand’ us like cattle as we walk around with their logos on our clothes.
Even God himself has been co-opted by the neo-empire. Who needs prayer when the omnipotent Google has all the answers? The all-powerful AI is rapidly taking over our creative functions. Our capacity to ponder, problem-solve and innovate is gradually being outsourced. We ‘Google’ before we bother to think.
This ever-deeper codependent relationship we have with technology is leading to an emptying of our soul, making us more and more apathetic towards the outer world. Such is life in ‘the garden’ of Western decadence, where apathy keeps us in here, while we grow less and less concerned with the jungle out there.
The Nightmare Within Western Utopia
We now live in a society forged out of the ruins of the counterculture revolution. Like fish in water, we assume ‘this is how it has always been’. Meanwhile, the irresistible pull of herd mentality drags us forward while we remain hypnotised by an illusory realm of comfort, transcendence and abundance.
The images on our screens and the messages coming through our media aim to convince us that the future is bright. Beaming influencers peddle the next exciting product. Comedy skits and choreographed dances flood our social media feed. Entertainment will always be there to comfort us. Every problem has a solution. All of our desires can be fulfilled. Self-realisation is just beyond the horizon.
And yet, we witness that same world, the American-led West, inflicting death, destruction and poverty over and over again. Right now America is actively creating hell on Earth in Palestine and Lebanon. Through the work of brave journalists on the ground, the ‘jungle’ has penetrated our garden via social media. We witness apocalyptic images of destroyed buildings as far as the eye can see. Body parts, decapitated children and blood-stained corpses lay in front of wailing Palestinian mothers. The dead eyes of pale, lifeless babies stare back at us. This has been enough to jolt some into action. Yet the power of the garden is immense, continuing to drag the majority deeper inside its dopamine-filled, oceanic world of apathy.
For many in the West, these two conflicting realities are major sources of cognitive dissonance. Many deal with the resulting discomfort by compartmentalising, denying or arguing the situation away. How long can we keep this up? How much death, barbarism and destruction can we keep sweeping under that $49 rug on special? For how long can we continue concealing the dark reality with Kylie-Jenner-branded makeup?
Leaving The Garden For The Jungle
The garden promises comfort, joy, identity and belonging. To dare to venture out of it exposes us to a sense of anxiety, insecurity, emptiness and alienation. Through all of its ‘privileged’ offerings, the empire succeeded in numbing and subjugating us.
Aaron Bushnell demonstrated the most extreme form of defiance after he set himself on fire. “You can’t have me,” he yelled at the empire.
In Gaza, we witness unspeakable horror, suffering and grief. Yet in the Palestinian people we also find an unshakeable faith in God, and a zealous urge to love and protect each other as apocalyptic destruction rains down on them every single hour, day-in day-out. In Gaza, they have each other, and they have God. They are free.
We are not.
Even in the face of an active genocide, apathy and privilege are winning the day. People cannot seem to give up their dependency on the empire. To speak up, to give up the perks of Western decadence risks you being cast as the ‘other’ and losing your ‘privileged’ position.
Just like with Vietnam during the counterculture revolution, a vicious and horrendous war is being waged by the empire. Instead of the napalm of Vietnam, we now witness the 2-tonne bombing of civilians and barbarous cruelty being proudly broadcast on TikTok by the Zionists, while the empire cheers them on.
Enabling this to continue is our lack of ‘psychic excess’ which the baby boomers possessed, and which we continue to sacrifice on the altar of media and consumerism. The empire learnt its lesson, and this time it was prepared. They got us good. The anti-genocide student protests which began in the US were but a whisper compared to the battle cry of the counterculture revolution. Can we find our way out of this dystopian garden? Can we reclaim our mind, willpower and humanity? Can we rediscover our battle cry?
The Purging Process
Through taking you on a journey into the roots of neo-imperialism, I aimed to provide you with the most powerful revolutionary weapon anyone can yield: Awareness. To be awakened to the problem is to loosen its grip.
Many of us will continue in our state of apathy, unable to immediately break out of years of conditioning. Yet when you know, you cannot unknow.
With awareness, that empowered voice in the back of our minds will grow louder. Gradually but surely, we will begin making different decisions. We may become more tolerant of boredom, and the urgency to fill the emptiness with consumption will grow weaker.
As our humanity returns to us, our priorities may shift. We start eating better and thinking less. Other people’s faces cease to be abstractions, and we notice the life and soul in their eyes. Our curiosity about the world will return. Our care for the welfare of others will find its way back to us. We might put our screens away and take a walk in nature, and simply enjoy using our senses. We may enjoy being truly present in the current moment. In some alternate future, we may find life holds more value to us than the piece of plastic in our pockets.
Ask yourself:
What am I consuming, and what is it doing to my mind, body and soul?
Why am I really consuming this food, product or media? Do I get true value from it, or am I buying into a seductive narrative or story which preys on my desires and insecurities?
What meaning or value does this add to my life?
How much of what I consume is poisoning me? For example, this might be sugar-filled and processed food or drink, but can also be a song with provocative yet empty lyrics.
Who am I empowering with my cash, attention and loyalty, and what is their agenda? Become aware of the corporations behind the bright-coloured logos and imagery.
And most importantly: How do the brands and media I consume reflect the core emotional needs which I have long neglected? Belonging, identity, power, joy, importance, self-realisation and transcendence — is it the responsibility of the corporations to give you these, or yours? What real-world actions can you take to fill your core needs? Consult your inner Self, and use your imagination.
Brands and media figures are dead entities made alive by us. Once we withdraw our energy from them, they cease to have power. When you come to see through the illusion, you find the brand and media world to be soul-destroying. Boycott them now for the love of yourself, and continue boycotting them for the love of humanity.
Face the doubt and cognitive dissonance within yourself. The resulting discomfort is what will lead you out of the garden. Only through confronting the challenges of the jungle can we find the freedom to act rightly. Only by entering the jungle that is reality can we carve out new, humane gardens, and invite those we love to contribute to them.
A Spiritual Revolution
Who am I? every human asks themselves.
Those with a fractured sense of Self often develop mental illness. The act of dissociating, or ‘checking out’ from the world, creates gaps in memory which make self-understanding much like trying to read a book with missing pages. Not knowing how you feel or why you are feeling that way is like a story with a confusing plot.
The empire has filled every physical and virtual space with advertising imagery and media, and used it to bombard our consciousness, inducing dissociation by design. Our emotions are constantly being manipulated, with every commercial break, visual ad, song and show we consume.
Constantly dissociated and emotionally dysregulated, we become folly for the empire. To top it all off, the very story of who we are, which is dictated to us by the corporations, is constantly changing to ensure we keep buying, putting us in a state of perpetual identity freefall.
The resulting pain in our hearts is compounded by a desire for wholeness that is never satisfied. With globalisation and capitalism rotting away our spaces of belonging, we find solace in brand identity and media figures. We find ourselves rabidly consuming just to reinforce who we are. If we stop for even a second, this identity begins to fall apart. Maybe it’s time we let it.
A spiritual revolution is needed.
What happens when we let ourselves fall? Rather than seeking transcendence and self-realisation through the illusory world of social media, television and brand affiliation, we can instead venture into our own soul. Through practising mindfulness and embodiment in the moment, we can become ‘Self’ sustained, allowing us to step off the treadmill of modernity.
It begins with a deep breath, and taking a moment to feel your body. When was the last time you relaxed into yourself? The empire relies on us being in a constant state of tension. Letting go makes us powerful, since we are no longer shaped from outside by pre-meditated corporate design, but spontaneously by our divine potential within.
The media and brands we gravitate towards represent the lack we feel in our soul. By looking at the ‘pantheon of gods’ which rule over our globalised world, such as fictional characters, celebrities and brands, we can gain a better understanding of what we long for. Unravelling these stories untangles us from bondage.
This manufactured ‘wealth’ of pleasure and reward has gripped our psyche and emptied our soul. We remain loyal to brands and media because we fear our inner poverty. By returning within, we re-populate our soul with the wealth of our True Self.
The King archetype, which heavily influenced Marvel’s Iron Man, represents the calm, responsible, and decisive leader who sacrifices himself for his people to ensure their prosperity. Tony Stark’s inner struggle to put aside the playboy and become the king everyone needed him to be, is what made him so compelling. How many of us left the cinema and set about channelling our own King or Queen energy, and how many simply logged into Disney+ to mindlessly binge the next phase of the Marvel Universe?
Why do we worship appropriated mythological gods like those provided by the Marvel Universe? Is capitalist-driven neo-paganism the way forward? What benefit do we get from coughing up our hard-earned dollars just to get a temporary fix of meaning and power? What about seeking out these archetypes within ourselves, and then giving them shape in the context of our lives? How about ‘going to battle’ against the corrupting of our world as Ares the god of war might? Can we not channel the infinite wisdom of Athena to carve out a better society, like the early Athenians did, naming their great city after the goddess of wisdom?
We seem to have forgotten during the Marvel craze that the gods of old were not intended to be an economic commodity. Mythology was created to remind us of our potential, not pull us further away from it. Mythology is intended to direct our awareness inwards so we can transform, not upwards to a bright screen to cheer while remaining unchanged.
Within us lies unfathomable power and richness — our ancestral heritage, our unique personalities, our God-given willpower and creativity. By stepping off the treadmill of consumer capitalism and media addiction, we may at first be forced to contend with an inner child left neglected for decades. Yet cultivating a relationship with this needy, moody part of us eventually reveals our rawest power — that of the divine child.
It is in our divine core where we discover our intellectual curiosity, allowing us to see the world with nuance and openness. Personal courage flows from this core, steeling us to face our innermost demons and pain. Social courageallows us to defy the herd and accept being cast as ‘different’. Spiritual curiosity lies with all of us, inviting us to acquire self-knowledge and truth, no matter how painful. Our divine core allows us to create new pathways for others to walk on, which can lead to a more humane world.
It’s time to become re-enchanted with the world on our own terms. But first, we need to allow ourselves to become disenchanted by the garden. The empire aims to lull us even deeper into its illusory embrace, providing us with augmented reality and more content than we can choose. Perhaps it’s time we snap out of the hypnosis, or rather neurosis, which has gripped the planet since the counterculture revolution, and begin a personal revolution instead.
Even apathy, the state of feeling nothing, is an emotion. By freeing our libido from the empire, we honour our counterculture ancestors and inherit their curiosity, lust for life, and brazen courage. What beautiful craziness ensues in the wake of our emancipation depends on how many of us can undertake this spiritual journey. When we reach a critical mass, grassroots communities can be carved out again, with each person deeply connected to their creative potential, overflowing with self-love and personal power, ready to offer it to the world.
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