Why are there a lot of conspiracy theory , these days ? Were they in pre-internet era too ?

[Spyce D]

This question is somewhat related to what @Chase asked here

Erectile Dysfunction - Seems like a lot of young guys have erection problems now. Older guys, did you have ED when younger?

Hey fellas, I've been wondering about this a while now. I just read orkie's latest LR, in which he lost his erection due to getting fatigued. This isn't about him, but rather a trend I have possibly noticed... not sure if it's real or just perception. It seems like there are a LOT of guys now...

www.skilledseducer.com

Now, i have already written about my internet addiction here

Internet addiction is fuelling my AA

It seems to me that this addiction of mine is making me hell lot of nervous in general . Like , i can't focus on any productive thing for long , restlessness , getting afraid of even small confrontation , getting punch in a gut feeling while approaching , having too much headache and whatnot...

www.skilledseducer.com

And I have been to that rabbit hole of how certain people are doing xyz to do abc Shady stuff and All about the rise of right wing groups / parties / governments in various parts of the world ( including mine ) .

I am way past those days as it was 6 years ago but what I had always seen from time to time at online Forums about xyz conspiracy theory .

You name the country and there are some special conspiracy theories making rounds . But , conspiracy theories of USA always dominate the scene .

So , As I already updated , I am nearing 3 month mark in my internet addiction recovery and life is so great ..... I don't really have any worry about what's happening in the news . And a lot of internet stuff seems bogus to me , now .

And that got me thinking about how when I didn't have much internet .... I never really cared about the SECRET GOVERNMENT STUFF . But , once I got hooked in it ..... I believed it to be reality .

And just are how some people on internet are addicted to porn since their adolescence ..... There are also some who have been addicted to conspiracy theories since their teenage .

Can it be that due to rise in internet ...... Some people started writing about theories which may or may not have been true but just like porn ..... They become favourite in certain circles .

And because of that some folks get depression and other mental illnes . See this.

https://www.reddit.com/r/nosurf/comments/y4vdny

Fuck . These things even used to give me stress and even I had E.D. and depressive nihilism but after going on detox . All these issues are solved .

And I would like to know if there were conspiracy theories pre - internet era or is it just our sensationalist era thing ?

 

[ulrich]

When I was kid, old ladies used to gather outside of church giving pamphlets and saying that DBZ and The Simpsons were satanic shows.
They said that kids may become addicts just for watching those shows.

Such thing motivated me to binge on The Simpsons, of course.
What a great childhood.

Anyway, yes. Things have been like that always.

History tells you about times where Greece was full of philosophers and the Bible mentions times were prophets were a common occurrence.
You can only imagine what some psychos could have done in those times without literacy being a common thing.

Have you ever had hallucinations caused by fever? Those can be crazy.
Now imagine a time when those could have interpreted as prophetic dreams.
Craaaazy.

Modern USA conspiracy theory have their own feeling… I think they are sophisticated enough to capture the interest of cultured (although not that cultured) people.
Compared to old prophecies, they are far more sophisticated and science sounding.

Craziness has always been around… if anything, it just evolved.

 

[MarioTheDom]

Most of the conspiracy theories spun out from the 80's - 90's thanks to a lot of declassified documents

And most of these theories have been there since ages - nothing new under the sun

PS: watch the why files on YT if you like them

 

[Chase]

I wonder how long this thread will last before we have to close it down!

Humans are good pattern recognizers, but poor systems thinkers, who tend to anthropomorphize the forces and patterns they detect.

For instance, throughout much of human history, humans have attributed the movement of the heavenly bodies, the vagaries of the oceans and rivers, the rains, and the seasons to anthropomorphized deities. Humans observe these forces, and they know these forces affect them, but because they cannot understand how the forces converge to have these effects they attribute their effects to conscious, willful behavior (in this case to spirits/deities).

The same thing happens with the effects of intergroup competition. The various nations, classes, races, religious groups, political parties, and various other kinds of groups and cliques really do compete with each other, sometimes subtlety, sometimes brutally, just because life competes with other life, and life will form alliances with more similar/related/aligned life to compete against more dissimilar / less closely related or less closely aligned life (cooperative group competition). At some levels member of different groups may cooperate as part of a larger overarching group, but at lower levels they may still be in competition (e.g., competition by cliques within the larger group).

Most of the intergroup competition happening between the various groups happens at a level below “willful, conscious agency.” Instead it is semi-conscious or unconscious, with opposing groups arriving at opposing stances that bring them into conflict. Some members within every group will be more or even very conscious of their group’s adversarial relationships with other groups and may consciously champion them, willfully seeking to drive their group forward, but most are not. These lone conscious, willful combatants may have larger influence, but they’re rarely key figures and are often marginalized because people don’t like (or may feel socially sanctioned not) to admit they are fighting with other groups.

What happens is people notice these forces against them coming from rival groups, and just like with the sun god and river spirit they anthropomorphize it: “There are secret back room meetings where members of the other group plot everything out in excruciating detail, leading us to the suffering we now face!”

People then get very attached to these conspiracy theories, which they themselves use as a means of intergroup competition, and will defend them heavily because they serve as a rallying point for “the troops.”

At a meta level, both the intergroup competition itself that gets characterized as “a conspiracy” and the construction and use of the conspiracy theory itself are forms of intergroup competition. You will notice the main antagonists of a conspiracy theory are always some certain group of people, demarcated by class, race, nationality, etc. Likewise, the people pushing the conspiracy are always some certain other group of people, demarcated by class, race, nationality, etc.

Then you get the really weird ones, where people can tell they are being affected by some force, but cannot identify it. Then instead of conspiracy theories revolving around an actual rival group of people, you get conspiracies about secret aliens or deities or whatnot.

Again that goes back to the basic human condition: good at pattern recognition / recognition of forces, bad at systems thinking, prone to anthropomorphizing everything and attributing willful intelligence to observed behavior.

In a way the conspiracy theorist’s world is actually a much safer, reassuring, saner one than the one where the conspiracy theories all blow away:

A world where no one truly has his hand on the wheel, where highly conscious, willful people are an extreme minority, and even their reach is limited, where most leaders are little more conscious than their followers, and almost all action is dictated by the semi-conscious instincts of herds of variously cooperating or competing human animals.

Chase

 

[Spyce D]

Modern USA conspiracy theory have their own feeling… I think they are sophisticated enough to capture the interest of cultured (although not that cultured) people.
Compared to old prophecies, they are far more sophisticated and science sounding.

Yeah , That's true . Because of Aliens , Mark Lizardberg , Alien Musk etc. Like , I have some Indian youtube videos trying to show Illuminati in Bollywood but I have never seen any American talking about Gandhi conspiracy theory . (I won't go into much details about that to keep it civil).

Most of the conspiracy theories spun out from the 80's - 90's thanks to a lot of declassified documents

And most of these theories have been there since ages - nothing new under the sun

PS: watch the why files on YT if you like them

Well , I used to watch Alex Jones back in 2017 and I was qround 18 at that time . Talk about emotional damage.

I wonder how long this thread will last before we have to close it down!

If it seems like going out of hand ... the mods can lock the thread.

@Chase

You just wrote a research paper , brother . It actually took me a while to read it because English is my fourth language .
Basically it's something to ponder .

Spyce

 

[ulrich]

Yeah , That's true . Because of Aliens , Mark Lizardberg , Alien Musk etc. Like , I have some Indian youtube videos trying to show Illuminati in Bollywood but I have never seen any American talking about Gandhi conspiracy theory . (I won't go into much details about that to keep it civil).

Well… if you compare that with a god of Thunder clashing his hammer to make it rain or demons walking the streets of your town at a specific night of the year… yeah, Mark Lizardberg sounds more plausible.

I bet the imaginarium in India is less sophisticated than the one in USA.

Here in Mexico, when the Corona started, some people started fires in hospitals because “they were injecting the virus to healthy people” and “the virus was a ruse to remove the knee fluids from unexpected patients”.
Yeah, that sounds stupid… yet some people believed it.

 

[Will_V]

Something I've often thought about is how the rapid advance of technology, and the way it leaves people feeling out of control of things, contributes to a host of psychological issues including paranoia. The level of complexity of fields such as automation and AI, medicine, biology, and even stuff like social engineering is just bewildering to the layperson. All these things influence more or less their reality, but they cannot really grasp them except to know that they are advancing very fast and that somehow life doesn't seem all that improved on a day to day level.

I watched a speech with Peter Thiel one time where he mentioned that science fiction movies these days are almost entirely dystopian, and since I started paying attention I noticed it everywhere. I used to read a lot of golden era scifi, and it was often incredibly optimistic, sometimes to the point of naivete. But all this is gone - modern scifi writers like Peter Hamilton always converge on some kind of cyberpunk world of rebellion against some powerful oppressor. And that's generally the most optimistic stuff out there.

Of note is that the difference in optimism is very much centered around two things: technology and government. Back in the 60s and 70s people believed that utopias were possible and that technology would help us transcend into a sort of enlightened state. This had backpedalled hard, and now both technology and government will combine to do us harm in the form of either malevolent AI or a combination of malevolent AI and malevolent government.

Given that the reality of the advancement of technology seems to be mostly positive thus far, or at least isn't obviously 'bad', I've come to this conclusion that the paranoia is a result of unease rooted in an inability to grasp the complexities of the world we live in, therefore making it hard to predict and plan for the future, and making conspiracy theories more attractive as a way to clear the fog and give substance to the sense of unease.

 

[Zoro]

I used to read a lot of golden era scifi,

Got some recommendations?

 

[Karea Ricardus D.]

Honestly, the conspiracy theories have gotten out of hand. Now even all these top politicians are into conspiracy theories and talking about the New World Order.

https://newtube.app/TonyHeller/IQWcdey

 

[Will_V]

Got some recommendations?

Really depends what you like. My favorite is probably Arthur Clarke though it might be a bit abstract depending on your taste. Robert Heinlein wrote a lot of good old scifi hero stories. Isaac Asimov stuff is great for thinking about how civilization might change far into the future, though his characters are a bit pat. James Blish is another author I really enjoy, wrote a lot of the old Star Trek series and some great novels, the Night Shapes (fantasy) is a worth checking out.

One story that had an impact on me when I was very young was The Humanoids by Jack Williamson, it was one of those stories that for whatever reason took a week or two to shake off and I'll never forget.

There are a lot of assorted scifi books I've read that I really enjoyed, the best thing to do is go and find an antique book store and look up the scifi section, it will be full of them. Golden era scifi is a mixed bag, some authors are not that good writers but the idea is really interesting, others are good but the idea is nothing new.

If you have more specific interests pm me (so we don't derail) and I'll try to recommend something.

 

[Kent]

Michael Parenti offers an interesting take on the conspiracy phenomenon:​

“Almost as an article of faith, some individuals believe that conspiracies are either kooky fantasies or unimportant aberrations. To be sure, wacko conspiracy theories do exist. There are people who believe that the United States has been invaded by a secret United Nations army equipped with black helicopters, or that the country is secretly controlled by Jews or gays or feminists or black nationalists or communists or extraterrestrial aliens. But it does not logically follow that all conspiracies are imaginary.

Conspiracy is a legitimate concept in law: the collusion of two or more people pursuing illegal means to effect some illegal or immoral end. People go to jail for committing conspiratorial acts. Conspiracies are a matter of public record, and some are of real political significance. The Watergate break-in was a conspiracy, as was the Watergate cover-up, which led to Nixon’s downfall. Iran-contra was a conspiracy of immense scope, much of it still uncovered. The savings and loan scandal was described by the Justice Department as “a thousand conspiracies of fraud, theft, and bribery,” the greatest financial crime in history.

Often the term “conspiracy” is applied dismissively whenever one suggests that people who occupy positions of political and economic power are consciously dedicated to advancing their elite interests. Even when they openly profess their designs, there are those who deny that intent is involved. In 1994, the officers of the Federal Reserve announced they would pursue monetary policies designed to maintain a high level of unemployment in order to safeguard against “overheating” the economy. Like any creditor class, they preferred a deflationary course. When an acquaintance of mine mentioned this to friends, he was greeted skeptically, “Do you think the Fed bankers are deliberately trying to keep people unemployed?” In fact, not only did he think it, it was announced on the financial pages of the press. Still, his friends assumed he was imagining a conspiracy because he ascribed self-interested collusion to powerful people.

At a World Affairs Council meeting in San Francisco, I remarked to a participant that U.S. leaders were pushing hard for the reinstatement of capitalism in the former communist countries. He said, “Do you really think they carry it to that level of conscious intent?” I pointed out it was not a conjecture on my part. They have repeatedly announced their commitment to seeing that “free-market reforms” are introduced in Eastern Europe. Their economic aid is channeled almost exclusively into the private sector. The same policy holds for the monies intended for other countries. Thus, as of the end of 1995, “more than $4.5 million U.S. aid to Haiti has been put on hold because the Aristide government has failed to make progress on a program to privatize state-owned companies” (New York Times 11/25/95).

Those who suffer from conspiracy phobia are fond of saying: “Do you actually think there’s a group of people sitting around in a room plotting things?” For some reason that image is assumed to be so patently absurd as to invite only disclaimers. But where else would people of power get together – on park benches or carousels? Indeed, they meet in rooms: corporate boardrooms, Pentagon command rooms, at the Bohemian Grove, in the choice dining rooms at the best restaurants, resorts, hotels, and estates, in the many conference rooms at the White House, the NSA, the CIA, or wherever. And, yes, they consciously plot – though they call it “planning” and “strategizing” – and they do so in great secrecy, often resisting all efforts at public disclosure. No one confabulates and plans more than political and corporate elites and their hired specialists. To make the world safe for those who own it, politically active elements of the owning class have created a national security state that expends billions of dollars and enlists the efforts of vast numbers of people.”​

― Michael Parenti

 

[Conquistador]

Michael Parenti offers an interesting take on the conspiracy phenomenon:​

“Almost as an article of faith, some individuals believe that conspiracies are either kooky fantasies or unimportant aberrations. To be sure, wacko conspiracy theories do exist. There are people who believe that the United States has been invaded by a secret United Nations army equipped with black helicopters, or that the country is secretly controlled by Jews or gays or feminists or black nationalists or communists or extraterrestrial aliens. But it does not logically follow that all conspiracies are imaginary.​

​

Conspiracy is a legitimate concept in law: the collusion of two or more people pursuing illegal means to effect some illegal or immoral end. People go to jail for committing conspiratorial acts. Conspiracies are a matter of public record, and some are of real political significance. The Watergate break-in was a conspiracy, as was the Watergate cover-up, which led to Nixon’s downfall. Iran-contra was a conspiracy of immense scope, much of it still uncovered. The savings and loan scandal was described by the Justice Department as “a thousand conspiracies of fraud, theft, and bribery,” the greatest financial crime in history.​

​

Often the term “conspiracy” is applied dismissively whenever one suggests that people who occupy positions of political and economic power are consciously dedicated to advancing their elite interests. Even when they openly profess their designs, there are those who deny that intent is involved. In 1994, the officers of the Federal Reserve announced they would pursue monetary policies designed to maintain a high level of unemployment in order to safeguard against “overheating” the economy. Like any creditor class, they preferred a deflationary course. When an acquaintance of mine mentioned this to friends, he was greeted skeptically, “Do you think the Fed bankers are deliberately trying to keep people unemployed?” In fact, not only did he think it, it was announced on the financial pages of the press. Still, his friends assumed he was imagining a conspiracy because he ascribed self-interested collusion to powerful people.​

​

At a World Affairs Council meeting in San Francisco, I remarked to a participant that U.S. leaders were pushing hard for the reinstatement of capitalism in the former communist countries. He said, “Do you really think they carry it to that level of conscious intent?” I pointed out it was not a conjecture on my part. They have repeatedly announced their commitment to seeing that “free-market reforms” are introduced in Eastern Europe. Their economic aid is channeled almost exclusively into the private sector. The same policy holds for the monies intended for other countries. Thus, as of the end of 1995, “more than $4.5 million U.S. aid to Haiti has been put on hold because the Aristide government has failed to make progress on a program to privatize state-owned companies” (New York Times 11/25/95).​

​

Those who suffer from conspiracy phobia are fond of saying: “Do you actually think there’s a group of people sitting around in a room plotting things?” For some reason that image is assumed to be so patently absurd as to invite only disclaimers. But where else would people of power get together – on park benches or carousels? Indeed, they meet in rooms: corporate boardrooms, Pentagon command rooms, at the Bohemian Grove, in the choice dining rooms at the best restaurants, resorts, hotels, and estates, in the many conference rooms at the White House, the NSA, the CIA, or wherever. And, yes, they consciously plot – though they call it “planning” and “strategizing” – and they do so in great secrecy, often resisting all efforts at public disclosure. No one confabulates and plans more than political and corporate elites and their hired specialists. To make the world safe for those who own it, politically active elements of the owning class have created a national security state that expends billions of dollars and enlists the efforts of vast numbers of people.”​

― Michael Parenti

Ever read any John Le Carré novels?

 

[Dash of Englishness]

Earlier in the year I ended up getting into a sort of argument with some conspiracy theorists, and boy do I still remember it. Unfortunately I was out numbered 3 to 1! They unloaded quite a lot of nonsense, and I was quite annoyed with myself for leaving them bullshit so much. It was basically as case of "if you can't refute my point right here and now that means that it has to be true. In the end I just had to walk away while one of them was still talking to me. Any time one of them said something true, it was a fact that was taken out of context to back up a false argument. What was interesting was that when one of them would bring up some mad theory that the others wouldn't have heard of (they hadn't secretly agreed on everything before they bumped into me), the others would just stay silent even rather than asking questions themselves. I think they enjoyed the look of confusion on my face too much to be bothered disagreeing with each other in front of me. The argument had nothing to do with learning, and everything to do with power. At one point I was asked a question by the leader that I answered correctly, but he didn't know that he was asking the question in the wrong way, and he tried to play off my confusion as if I was bullshitting, but he had got it wrong the whole time. Really annoys me! Here's just some of what they said:

Fossil fuels apparently don't come from fossils, and that oil shouldn't be called a fossil fuel. One guy said that no fossils have been found at the depth oil is found at. I explained what I'd learned in school about how oil is formed from plants as well as bones and he then proceeded to say that up until 1920 people in school were being taught that the Earth was flat. The other told me that all of what I learned in school was bullshit.

One of them claimed that the Russian ambassador to the U.S was shot live on TV in Turkey (think he said in the 1970s) by a U.S CIA agent who was pretending to be a Turkish cop. Anyone ever hear of anything like that? He thinks the U.S is fighting this proxy war in Ukraine with the hopes of invading Russia to get nickel, as well as other minerals. He also claimed that in 2016 in Ukraine, that there was ethnic cleansing of Russians, and that the New York Times actually had an article on this.

The Titanic came up in all of this. One of them claimed it was sank deliberately due to them realising that the steel in it was of poor quality. Apparently a large number of high profile people mysteriously cancelled their trip to America before the ship set sail. I should have pointed out that the ship's architect was in fact on board and went down with it.

They went on about how one of the videos that Vladamir Zelensky was in - during his time as an actor, where is doing some dance or whatever - was faked... and that it is possible to see some of the green screen above his shoulder. I kind of thought "well if that is true, then so what?". But they were acting as if that's somehow prove that he's a bad person.

They also claimed that China owns all the ports in Australia, and that if the Chinese wanted to, they could control Australia, or something like that.

They denied climate change and claimed that grapes were grown in Britain 2,000 years ago, and that it was hotter during Roman Empire than it is today. One of them said that the sea level is the exact same as 100 years ago, and that it only appears to chance due to movement of tectonic plates. Later on this same guy started talking about water displacement due to ships... basically implying that if there's any increase in sea levels that it's due to all the ships displacing water. So even if I was able to prove him wrong about tectonic plates giving the illusion of rising sea levels, he'd have this other phoney argument to refer to.

Something came up about Cuban cigars and the Cuban missile crisis, and that their biggest buying is American politicians. Forget the details.

There was also reference to why George Bush kept reading 'My Pet Goat' in the school classroom when the Twin Towers were hit, and why didn't he do anything.

There was something in there about Hunter Biden's laptop!

Oh, and something about Bill Gates and how he's the biggest funder of the WHO, and that he also now owns most of the land in the U.S.

And these are only the ones that I remember!

 

[Spyce D]

Earlier in the year I ended up getting into a sort of argument with some conspiracy theorists, and boy do I still remember it. Unfortunately I was out numbered 3 to 1! They unloaded quite a lot of nonsense, and I was quite annoyed with myself for leaving them bullshit so much. It was basically as case of "if you can't refute my point right here and now that means that it has to be true. In the end I just had to walk away while one of them was still talking to me. Any time one of them said something true, it was a fact that was taken out of context to back up a false argument. What was interesting was that when one of them would bring up some mad theory that the others wouldn't have heard of (they hadn't secretly agreed on everything before they bumped into me), the others would just stay silent even rather than asking questions themselves. I think they enjoyed the look of confusion on my face too much to be bothered disagreeing with each other in front of me. The argument had nothing to do with learning, and everything to do with power. At one point I was asked a question by the leader that I answered correctly, but he didn't know that he was asking the question in the wrong way, and he tried to play off my confusion as if I was bullshitting, but he had got it wrong the whole time. Really annoys me! Here's just some of what they said:

Fossil fuels apparently don't come from fossils, and that oil shouldn't be called a fossil fuel. One guy said that no fossils have been found at the depth oil is found at. I explained what I'd learned in school about how oil is formed from plants as well as bones and he then proceeded to say that up until 1920 people in school were being taught that the Earth was flat. The other told me that all of what I learned in school was bullshit.

One of them claimed that the Russian ambassador to the U.S was shot live on TV in Turkey (think he said in the 1970s) by a U.S CIA agent who was pretending to be a Turkish cop. Anyone ever hear of anything like that? He thinks the U.S is fighting this proxy war in Ukraine with the hopes of invading Russia to get nickel, as well as other minerals. He also claimed that in 2016 in Ukraine, that there was ethnic cleansing of Russians, and that the New York Times actually had an article on this.

The Titanic came up in all of this. One of them claimed it was sank deliberately due to them realising that the steel in it was of poor quality. Apparently a large number of high profile people mysteriously cancelled their trip to America before the ship set sail. I should have pointed out that the ship's architect was in fact on board and went down with it.

They went on about how one of the videos that Vladamir Zelensky was in - during his time as an actor, where is doing some dance or whatever - was faked... and that it is possible to see some of the green screen above his shoulder. I kind of thought "well if that is true, then so what?". But they were acting as if that's somehow prove that he's a bad person.

They also claimed that China owns all the ports in Australia, and that if the Chinese wanted to, they could control Australia, or something like that.

They denied climate change and claimed that grapes were grown in Britain 2,000 years ago, and that it was hotter during Roman Empire than it is today. One of them said that the sea level is the exact same as 100 years ago, and that it only appears to chance due to movement of tectonic plates. Later on this same guy started talking about water displacement due to ships... basically implying that if there's any increase in sea levels that it's due to all the ships displacing water. So even if I was able to prove him wrong about tectonic plates giving the illusion of rising sea levels, he'd have this other phoney argument to refer to.

Something came up about Cuban cigars and the Cuban missile crisis, and that their biggest buying is American politicians. Forget the details.

There was also reference to why George Bush kept reading 'My Pet Goat' in the school classroom when the Twin Towers were hit, and why didn't he do anything.

There was something in there about Hunter Biden's laptop!

Oh, and something about Bill Gates and how he's the biggest funder of the WHO, and that he also now owns most of the land in the U.S.

And these are only the ones that I remember!

Haha nice.


Rich people , government , other people, race , whatnot will always be the villians in conspiracy theories .

That's why I have stopped watching YouTube altogether ( with some exceptions here and there)

Cuz there is always some retarded video recommendations .

 

[Karea Ricardus D.]

"Merry Christmas... and a Happy New World Order, unless we fight to retain our human rights and dignity instead."

"All I want for Christmas is the Death of the New World Order."

both quotes by Chris Langan, most intelligent man in the world, today on his substack:

Chris Langan's Ultimate Reality

Clarity in a Time of Great Deception. Click to read Chris Langan's Ultimate Reality, a Substack publication with tens of thousands of subscribers.

chrislangan.substack.com

 

[Bo Diddley]

Prediction: by mid-2024 only the biggest squares, binary thinkers and NPC's will be chastising the conspiracy theorists. Coincidence Theorists, your days are numbered. Better tighten those blinders before the cognitive dissonance encroaches too far.