There are many mysterious forces and energies that drive human decision making. One of these energies is called ‘Allostasis’, the power, energy, motivation and drive for self-preservation. This is the energy and drive of sustaining life and the self.

This stands in stark contrast to the nonsense Bradley Curve that supposes humans have a ‘natural instinct’ for harm.

Once you believe this lie, you can then be rescued by DuPont.

The Bradley Curve was made up by DuPont to sell the nonsense of zero but the opposite is what is true. Humans have a natural instinct for safety, not for harm. We see the same in Homeostasis.

 This is just one of the many lies this organisation has been peddling for years (https://safetyrisk.net/dark-waters-the-true-story-of-dupont-and-zero/). The idea that DuPont are a premier safety company is pure myth. The evidence portrays the opposite.

The affirmation of myth is usually anchored to the constant repetition of a non-truth until it is made mythically true. The N@ zis did this for years and were very effective. You can read more about how this works here: Semiotics With a Conscience.  This is the basis of all propaganda including, safety propaganda.

All Propaganda is made effective by:

• Creating a myth (usually the opposite of what is true)
• Affirming the myth with semiotics
• Repeating slogans that affirm the myth
• Using half-truths that people want to believe
• Discrediting reality as in opposition to the myth
• Anchoring emotional triggers to beliefs and slogans
• Setting up the myths in binary opposition to the truth
• Claiming there is only the truth of the myth
• In creating doubt it then becomes best to go with the myth (Merchants of Doubt https://youtu.be/hqiCLuOtXts?si=ECp4B_7XZRPMCfBT)
• Giving the myth ideological power
• Making the myth political
• Anchoring religious power to the myth
• Closing off rational dialogue
• Further, read here: How Propaganda Works  or
• And here: The formation of mens attitudes

Another power and energy of being human is the drive for patterning, this is called ‘Apophenia’.

Humans look for patterns and links between things so they can gain a sense of control over their environment. This is how humans often construct links between things and find cause between events with Fundamental Attribution Error (https://safetyrisk.net/risk-safety-and-fundamental-attribution-error/). This is how Safety often finds cause where there is none.

Apophenia also drives people unconsciously to find links to substantiate a belief. All belief systems affirm belief through networks of belief rather than a single activity or idea.

We see this networking of beliefs often in a religious context where belief or faith in one thing is affirmed and amplified by a multitude of inter-linking things with numerous other beliefs. Often irrational beliefs are affirmed by a network of beliefs as each affirms the other. The series of beliefs is made strong by this network of beliefs and affirmed by numbers of believers who claim truth is decided by numbers of followers.

We see this network of beliefs in safety with the belief in zero.

All of the following are linked together and empower each other in safety, yet none are true:

• Zero – Even the fact that zero is infinity doesn’t dampen the ideology of zero (https://www.humandymensions.com/product/zero-the-great-safety-delusion/), the Quest of Safety is for infinity. Propaganda is rarely defeated by evidence.
• Bradley curve – Concocted on the nonsense of original sin that, humans have a ‘natural instinct’ for harm.
• Dominos – Thanks to Heinrich (1931), the goon of safety we have the first of several affirming semiotics that affirm the myth of zero.
• Swiss cheese – Reason’s silly model that matches nothing in real life, affirms the domino myth and linear causality thereby, giving a trajectory to elimination and zero.
• Zero vision – There is no vision in this ideology but by association the myth is manufactured that innovation, creativity and improvement is achieved by the myth. The opposite is the case.
• Pyramids – Bird and Heinrich again, the fairy tale masters, affirm the myth of safety as metrics and the myth of incident ratio to causality.
• Risk Matrix – Another semiotic used to concoct the idea that risk can be reduced to zero.
• 0 – multiply, add, subtract or divide anything by zero and nothing changes. Mathematically, everything about zero contradicts itself
• Slogans – These are the rhythmic poetics of nothing but are essential to propaganda. The two most popular are:
  • AAAP – All accidents are preventable (but buy insurance)
  • SiaCYM – Safety is a choice you make so, unsafety is a choice you make. The ultimate in the myth that harm is a matter of ‘free will’.
• The spirit of zero – The Apocalyptic, Pentecostal, miracles movie is the ultimate in propaganda and delusion. Everything about this movie is religious and emotional in affirming belief.
• ‘We believe’ – The great religious dogma of the 2017 Global Safety Congress.
• Cardinal Rules – The language of making something ‘god given’, more religious myth to affirm the absolute.

We see in all this network of beliefs and myth, the self-connecting and interconnecting beliefs that convince people to believe zero. Even so, none of this belief occurs at the grassroots. Our Zero survey (https://safetyrisk.net/update-on-zero-survey-just-believe/) shows that 85% of all safety people in the workplace don’t believe in zero (https://safetyrisk.net/update-on-zero-survey-just-believe/).

So, who does believe in zero?

Well, the sponsors of zero are as follows: Safework Australia, Safework NSW, Forgeworks, AIHS, Sentis and ICAM Australia etc., These are the organisations that affirm the propaganda of zero and make the myth of Zero real (https://safetyrisk.net/the-sponsors-of-zero-are/) when it is not! These are the organisations with no intelligence about risk and binary opposition. These are the groups that have no idea about how unethical zero is.

With all this collective mythology and delusion, it’s no wonder that the improvement in safety is zero. No wonder Safety spends all of its time counting the number of times it doesn’t achieve its goal. No wonder all these groups anchor their definition of safety to metrics. Just look at their discourse, it’s always about numbers.

If you want to learn about the nature of myth and culture and how propaganda interrupts reality, you can study here: https://cllr.com.au/product/mythology-and-risk-module-25/

In this study module we deconstruct the myths and networks of myths in safety and how to tackle risk in a real way that is positive, constructive and affirms the reality of risk.