“It is a capital mistake to theorize before one has data. Insensibly, one begins to twist facts to suit theories, instead of theories to suit facts.”
Misinformation and disinformation are the mortal enemies of any free press. Inaccuracy in reporting is just as deadly as flat-out lying. Unfortunately, too many have infiltrated and hijacked the alternative media to such a degree that sensationalism has become the driving mainstay, and not any sincere attempt at discovering the truth.
Since realizing this, I was then struck by the idea that the Internet had become a kind of fairground for people who labeled themselves as somehow being anti-Establishment. John Martinson once described his metaphor, known as the Carnival of Distractions, thusly:
“On the one side of the lot, we have the radio host that convinces people that they can win by playing at his game. But, like his obvious connection to the very criminal enterprise he professes to fight, he has it rigged in their favor. Despite the disgust and warnings issued from those who can see the mathematically obvious, people keep stepping right up to pay their money and take their chances.
“On the other side of the grounds, we have the fortune-teller, who will feed you a little fear, with your personal prophecy, as she knows best what people want. Even if the fair should last all week, and her predicted misery doesn’t happen, we can expect that many people will give her nonsense another generous investment on their trip back to the fairgrounds; that is, if they haven’t spent all their money with the radio host, or whomever he’s promoting.
“Off to the palm reader’s left, we see the House of Horrors, which offers to scare you out of your wits, if you just remain seated and abide by the rules. And it’s true! If you see something from their controlled vantage point, it can look quite sinister.
“Finally, we have the Ferris Wheel, with people going ‘round and ‘round, no solutions, no foreseeable way off, just the same old ‘round and ‘round that people line up in droves to get on.”
A good friend of mine respectfully disagreed with Martinson about one, relatively minor, detail about the Carnival. He didn’t think it possessed a Ferris Wheel, necessarily, but something more akin to a carousel. This carousel, unlike a Ferris Wheel, does not cycle between aerial and ground-level views, but it is constantly stuck on only one level of perception. Further, it typically portrays carnivorous animals running within an inescapable circle. I find this to be a more apt description of what Martinson was getting at with his Ferris Wheel imagery – opportunistic carnivores accomplishing nothing at all.
I think the reasoning for this is quite cogent. A carousel has animal statues that you sit on, and during the ride, they go up and down, around and around, finishing exactly where they started from. Carnivores are viscous meat eaters who scavenge the land for anything they can feed off of; they are more deadly whenever they roam in packs, and are not known for their productiveness. Similar to how the American Cancer Society obstructs the development of possible cures, the Carousel of Carnivores does the exact same thing with anything effective, because entertainment is their goal, not any sort of real substantive accomplishments.
Charlie Veitch recently described the emerging sectarian nature of contemporary political activism:
“What we are having now in activism, we are seeing a schism – it’s going into sectarian lines between conspiracy theory and the kind of irrational madness of it. It’s infecting true activism, or rational activism, or people trying to make a difference without going into madness… but you’ll find, my dear conspiracy theorists, that most activism, that most people who have changed the world, most resistance groups have not been riddled with conspiracy theory. The sectarian nature now, we need to try and ensure that we separate conspiracy theory, which is a hobby, it’s a Dungeons and Dragons in real life, and its not designed to change anything, which is why Infowars, (now what?) for 15 years running, is still “fighting the New World Order,” or David Icke has released now 25 books (they all seem to be a rewrite of the last one, I’ve read bout 3 or 4 of them, they are all very similar). When you understand that conspiracy theory, like many other subcultures, it’s cosplayers, you’re costume players, you’re doing WWF wrestling in real life. The Rock would be Alex Jones…David Icke is the British Bulldog, and the ‘fighting,’ the ‘activism,’ is not real activism.”
If anything, Veitch here seems to be describing a kind of whirlwind effect, whereby non-conspiratorially minded activists “get all caught up” in the various (and often contradictory) narratives being spun by the conspiracists (as he once was). I’m also glad he made an allusion to the video game mentality I’ve mentioned about before, which is critical to understanding the true motivations behind all these self-proclaimed “truth-seekers.” It’s no wonder Veitch has been the subject of derision and ridicule by these pseudo-revolutionaries who prefer to play make-believe, rather than actually risk their lives and resist tyrants. All I’ve ever asked from anyone, who is engaged politically, is for consistency; apparently, it may be the case that in regards to the conspiracists, I may be asking for too much.
Speaking of conspiracists desperately attempting to keep their story straight, who do they think is “behind everything?” Is it the Jesuits, the Zionists, the Freemasons, the Jews, the Illuminati, extraterrestrial reptilians, or simply garden-variety Europeans who are hell bent on world domination? I honestly don’t know, yet I also don’t think the answer matters very much, because what all these vague collective descriptors tell us is essentially the same story – a vast, mostly unidentifiable network of powerful individuals desire unmitigated totalitarian control over you and your family. And to top it all off, you can’t do anything about this omnipotently all-powerful cabal, but for some inexplicable reason, you should still bother to tell all your friends (and complete strangers) about them.
As if that wasn’t bad enough, the snobbery of the conspiracists is all too well-known. Veitch elaborates:
“Conspiracy theorists talk abut this thing of, ‘waking up’ or no longer being a sheep, or member of the sheeple class, and there is a deep narcissm involved in that, because suddenly you become Neo from The Matrix and you have access to behind the scenes [of] the Matrix, to the ‘real world,’ and you see world events, like 9/11, 7/7, the Boston Bombings, the Woolwich attempted beheading (the stabiness) – you see all these things as being orchestrated at the highest levels. Indeed they are, everything’s being orchestrated, but not at the highest levels, at the smallest levels, at the unified field, which is a theory backed up by science and maths.”
So, what you have here is a cocktail of unintelligible rhetoric about who is allegedly “behind everything,” coupled with a noticeable superiority complex. Not a good recipe for political success, but like I’ve said, it’s not supposed to be. Consider also Claire Wolfe’s stereotypically accurate Reactive Ralphie character from her Hardyville article series:
“What poor Ralphie cries is something more along the lines of: ‘Tyranny is coming! Tyranny is coming!’ And who could argue? With secret searches authorized by secret courts, ‘detention’ without trial, and internal passports now an accepted part [of] The American Way, the Land of the Once-Free is indeed beginning to resemble Everyday Stalinism. The only thing is – what to do about it?
“Reactive Ralphie knows – or thinks he knows – exactly what we should ALL do. Drop everything! Write your congressthing! Come to the rally! Email an alert! Send This Article to Everyone You Know! Study the 2,000 pages of Astounding Documented FACTS I’ve Assembled on My Web Site! Send a contribution! Sign The Petition! Support a Patriot in Need! Take a Stand! DO SOMETHING! NOW, NOW, NOW, NOW, NOW! And Ralphie means that each and every one of us should do all of the above. All day long. All life long. In response to every bit of tyrannical [male bovine product] that plops out of the Internet or governmental sphincter.”
What this reveals about the Carousel of Carnivores (which is comprised of conspiracists and their assorted cohorts) is that they latch onto whatever is happening in the news cycle this week, proselytize about how awful it is, and then they run around like chickens with their heads cut off pretending to achieve something all the while accomplishing absolutely nothing; and yet you should still tune in next week for another “revealed secret” of…whatever.
So, where is the harm, you may ask? Well, if you look at the other (not so) thin line, every time there’s a massive infusion of newer dissidents, a huge bubble enters at the far left side of the line. Unfortunately, most of them do not move in any significant strides toward the right side of the line, where they would begin to enter into a state of nature. Part of the reason for this is that some people prefer to act as “culture vultures,” by profiting from the expropriation of wealth through deceit and guile (these conmen are also known as “patriots for profit”). Once there is a surge, the carnivores go in for the kill. Had they been men of integrity, you’d think they would, for instance, use shotgun barrels for bongs (like the Vietnam GIs did), instead of soliciting for money ostensibly for a legal defense fund while simultaneously benefiting from using a public defender.
Another key characteristic of the Carousel is their noisy bleating whenever a suspiciously violent event occurs as if it were automatically a false flag operation. In light of Sandy Hook and the Boston Marathon bombing, I’ve never would have thought I would hear so much about crisis actors, yet it seems to be the main sticky point with them, for some strange reason. Having painfully watched half-assed “documentaries” about the Sandy Hook “hoax” and other such inconsequential garbage, I think it is more than fair to say that the Carousel intrinsically has absolutely no concept of due diligence. Despite some leads being potentially fruitful, what was completely irritating to me was that they would briefly mention some tidbit that could not be debunked (at least not right away), they then would haphazardly jump to something else, instead of properly following up on it and seeing where it lead.
This, of course, begs the question as to whether the controlled opposition Faketriots are willfully feeding us disinformation that is right in line with the government’s agenda, or are the “guess-what-I-know” useful idiots just parroting the baseless speculations, conjectures, and rumors of others? Worse yet, are we doing so as well, without realizing it? Is it possible that any real solution to this problem entails avoiding what passes for “the news” altogether?
The Last Bastille 