>>This is a linguistic matter. In my language, there's a very distinctive difference between perfected and imperfected (aka continuous) verbs. The perfected verbs describe a one-time or a finished action; the continuous describe a process or a lasting action. Example: "I studied the matter" can be said "prouèio sam predmet" and "prouèavao sam predmet". The meaning of the first is "I have done the study of the matter", while the meaning of the other is "I have studied the matter for a [unspecified] time".
>
>I believe we call that the "present Perfect tense".
>
>I walked. - past tense
>I am walking - present perfect tense
>I will walk - future tense
>
>But English wasn't one of my enjoyable classes in school so I could be way off. <g>

You are.

It's not the tense, it's the state of the process described of the verb - was it performed for a while (as in "ispirali su im mozak" - "their brains were brainwashed for a while") or was the process completed ("isprali su im mozak" - "their brains were [completely] brainwashed"). This one inserted syllable makes all the difference in the meaning.

>>The difference in this matter here is that when I said "brainwashed", I wish I could have used the imperfected form of the verb, but, alas, there's no such thing in English. So, let's rephrase it: "been exposed to brainwashing". I hope this phrase does it justice, not implying any specific length of time.
>>
>>So they are "brainwashed" because they were exposed to it.
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>No kidding. So, you are a duck or a fish because you were exposed to water then? <g>

Au contraire, my dear Watson. Translated into the terms of your sentence, you may have been duckized or fishized by being exposed to water, but that doesn't mean you're [completely] duckized nor fishized, even though you were both duckized and fishized [for a while]. So in English it's "no you are not done even though you have been done". That's one blind spot of English, compared with Slavic languages.

>I think you have a very small opinion on the ability of others to think for themselves.

No, see above. But most reli..
No, I'm not getting there with you again.

> Is this what communism or socialism taught?

They surely tried in pure Stalinist countries. Yugoslavia had self-management, a soft version of it, which was (now I'm seeing that) so anti-leadership and so anti-patriarchal, because it basically told any group of people "you don't need a leader, pick one representative among yourselves for the outside world, get organized internally and shift gears as you go". That part of teaching worked fine. They tried to teach us that Party was always right, and other stuff which didn't really work, and they were also aware of it so they didn't push it too far.

> Or perhaps you're use of the english needs a boost?

I'm a use of English needs a burst.

>> There are ways to brace oneself against it - in my case, it was the lucky circumstance of multiple attempts from many sides, which exposed their methods and their agendae. There are other ways as well.
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>Everyone should think and check the facts.

And their definitions of what is a fact.