Conspiracy Theory: The High Art of Exaggeration
Updates have been few and far between on this site for quite some time. Not because I haven’t been trying to find suitable material. Basically, the problem is this: my BS-detector has matured. Scepticism at the outset is actually a good thing.
Often I come across an article or video I would like to share; people send me stuff too, written by themselves or others. Upon closer inspection, however, errors or exaggerations abound. Many times this is due to the fact that the reporter of said material is somewhat of a newbie who has come across something that just blows their mind and feels duty-bound to inform others – immediately – never bothering to check if it is actually true or not. I used to be that way myself.
I’ve been a “conspiracy theory” consumer since the early 1990s and a “conspiracy theorist” web-writer/webmaster since the year 2000. A good chunk of what I believed in the early days of my indoctrination – let’s face it, that’s exactly what it is – has turned out to be wrong. So much so, that if I went back and re-read some of the material previously consumed, I would probably cringe in disgust every second page and not be able to finish.
The basic premise is sound, however. Conspiracy is a fact of nature. Animals and humans all conspire in some manner or other. Wolves are a good example. A raiding pack will march into another’s territory in a conspiracy to topple the alpha male, killing him and the other top dogs, to gain mating rights and larger hunting grounds. Sound familiar?
On occasion humans are more sophisticated than animals. We not only conspire, we weave incredibly detailed stories about how the other guy is conspiring against us. In an effort to persuade, data is cherry picked and fitted nicely into a plausible narrative according to a preconceived notion. As long as you have certain beliefs and dislikes in common, the story will be more believable. You’ll also be less inclined to question it.
I don’t want to make this into a long essay about the mentality of “conspiracy theorists.” The academics and the so-called “journalists” have already done it ad nauseam.
The bottom line is this: any story claims to present you with certain facts. Upon closer scrutiny, they either hold water or not. The idiom the “devil is in the details,” so sayeth Wikipedia, actually derives from an earlier one – “God is in the details”: expressing “the idea that whatever one does should be done thoroughly; i.e. details are important.”
I wholeheartedly agree with this, and try my best to incorporate it into all aspects of my life.
So should you…. And maybe these guys too. (Can you spot the BS in the details?)
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How bout this for a bonking helping of conspiratainment? Prepping up for a “Legitamate … protest [against] the Illuminazis sacrafice of children before the owl of moloch.” Pure gold 
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Tags: Conspiratainment, Skepticism
PERFECTIBILISTS: The 18th Century Bavarian Order of the Illuminati
The Ascendancy of the Scientific Dictatorship
Memoirs Illustrating the History of Jacobinism
Fire in the Minds of Men: Origins of the Revolutionary Faith
America's Secret Establishment: An Introduction to the Order of Skull & Bones
July 16th, 2011 at 1:20 pm
Funny I was just watching the videos in the above links before I read this article. What’s the b.s you spotted, I’d love to know. I know in the clip following the Rand thing he calls the mushroom cloud an Illumanti symbol along with the Georgia Guide Stones and the Owl of Bohemia, but I’ve come to take his use of Illuminati with a grain of salt.
Alex is given to frequent generalization and exaggeration that I often let slide since I’ve learned to auto-filter it in my own mind over the years. Though he is guilty of this, so too are the mainstream press especially the left or right wing pundits so really his no worse than O’Reilly or Maddow (which is really damning with faint praise). I simply accept Alex as a Conspiracy Pundit and try to filter out his somewhat naive “constitutionalist,” libertarian agenda.
To his credit, he has had, especially in recent years, a wide variety of guests who’s opinions conflict somewhat. There are socialists who think the NWO is gangster capitalism and libertarians who think it’s centralized socialist big gov tyranny, then there’s the real far out space nuts like David Icke. If you can ignore their respective agendas and simply latch on to whatever factual data (if any) they hold in common, you can get a lot out of his show.
Unfortunately, many new listeners will be taken in by his some what over simplistic presentation of the big picture. Though he gets a lot of important ideas out there in many ways he shoots himself in the foot since his more radical claims and Manichean presentation of things allows smug academics to pick apart his arguments. That’s why in terms of clearly sourced and cited work I prefer The Corbett Report and of course this site too (one of the first sites to get me into this stuff)
July 16th, 2011 at 5:32 pm
It’s an exercise. Mum’s the word until someone figures it out in each of the three examples.
Hyperbole and exaggeration, unfortunately, has become the norm. We have conspira-tainment and msm-tainment, liberal-tainment and conservo-tainment. They give ‘em what they want in each case. Now, especially, we should all make an effort to check things out for ourselves.
I like the Corbett Report too.
July 16th, 2011 at 9:32 pm
I beg to differ. Conspiracy Theorists are the 21st Century Shepherds. What they warn of is to their detriment, and for the benefit of others. They wade through the valley of darkness alone, in order to bring light for others.
What Conspiracy Theorists cringe at is not their own ideas, but the ideas of those they warn against. Carved owls, creepy bohemian homosexuals, aliens, are the fictions of the warped of mind, not the Conspiracy Theorists.
In religious speak, an apologist, is one who apologizes when none is needed. In Conspiracy speak, one need not think any thought, notion, or idea they had was off, when it is the conspiracy itself that we cringe and shudder at, but fearlessly defend our Bros against. These things are indescribably ugly, and the sooner they are identified, the sooner we can rid of them.
July 16th, 2011 at 10:14 pm
Oh, I agree, conspiracy theorists are indeed apologists. Your understanding of the word, however, is a bit off. Apologetics is defending a position, e.g. a justification; defending the faith. The word “apology” actually has two distinct definitions.
Conspiracy theorists do indeed liken themselves to modern day prophets, especially the one’s that do it for a living. They play fast and loose with factual particulars on a daily basis. The message is what counts. And the more of it, the better.
July 17th, 2011 at 10:47 am
I rather like Richard M. Dolan’s description of conspiracy from his work on UFOs and the National Security State:
“In popular culture, the very term [conspiracy theory] serves as an automatic dismissal, as though no one ever acts in secret. Let us bring some perspective and common sense to this issue.The United States is comprised of large organizations - corporations, bureaucracies, “interest groups” and the like - which are conspiratorial by nature. That is, they are hierarchical, their important decisions are made in secret by a few key decision-makers, and they are not above lying about their activities. Such is the nature of organizational behavior. “Conspiracy,” in this key sense, is a way of life around the globe.”
That’s pretty much it. It is also the modus operandi of those whose nature is pathological embedded as they are in social systems which are themselves are a reflection of that same pathology.
I hate the term “conspiracy theorist” simple due to the fact that it has such loaded associations. Say that word in a conversation and it acts as a potent buffer to rational discourse.
I prefer the label “journalist.”
July 17th, 2011 at 11:32 pm
Perhaps trying to do what you just said will take too much time, if one is to do a thorough and fair historical analysis of everything being said in the videos.
But that is the point, isn’t it?
Many of the conclusions being drawn by these people I honestly cannot readily debunk, and no one -outside of a graduate student in history specializing in the specific subject- can either. One should not jump into the conspira-tainment argument without having done a modicum of research on whatever topic you wish to look into more thoroughly. If you do not present a good refutation with facts you will then be open to all sorts of attacks from these people, usually of the “sheeple” variety or “why believe the government” type.
Let’s look at one of the first things Alex Jones talks about for instance: The sculpture in front of the Rand Corporation.
I am not wholly unaware of the Rand Corporation. It is a mega-think tank set up by the military following World War2. And I also know that because of their very close operating arrangement with the security establishment inside the beltway, they have been the target of a lot of criticism, principally in 1970s from the anti-war left and probably before that from the conspiracy-minded far-right. Probably a lot of the information that came from both of these groups about Rand were correct and probably some of the conclusions were over-heated, but that’s the way it is.
So Jones is in front of the Rand Corporation in Santa Monica, CA. He claims in an accompanying video that the sculpture (which appears to be across the street from Rand), “doesn’t get any more Illuminati than this.” He further goes on to say in the short video, “another one of their idols…they hide their love of death and dark power in plain view. The Rand Corporation”
Now, without taking on the information in the video you offered, where Jones lists a litany of projects that supposedly make Rand such a dark power, one can observe his technique with the short sculpture video.
We are asked a to assume the truth of a whole slew of things about this sculpture that, to be honest, before today, I never knew existed. And, to be honest, I never knew Rand even had an office in Santa Monica. So, I am confronted with information I had never thought of before, even though I had a somewhat pedestrian knowledge of Rand and may have even read a book or several articles on it long ago.
In other words, even with a simple thing like the sculpture, I am forced to spend a lot of time learning about something I care little about (a sculpture) before I can be intellectually honest about Jones’ very simple act of theatrical agitprop.
And therein lies the effectiveness of conspira-tainment and conspiracy theory in general. We are asked to assume that this sculpture belongs to Rand. We are also asked to assume that it is an “idol” of the Illuminati, as Jones compares it to the Georgia Guidestones and the Owl at the Bohemian Grove. That of course, opens up an entire set of new assumptions about the political inter-connectiveness of government, secret societies, and well, the whole conspiracy as we know it.
Finally, in his short video we are asked to assume that the sculpture symbolizes a nuclear explosion, and that it actually celebrates the “mega-death” that the deployment of such a weapon usually leaves in its wake.
After a google search I found this article (http://articles.latimes.com/2011/jun/29/local/la-me-sculpture-danger-20110629) about the sculpture, luckily in the news recently because there is talk about it needing repair.
First, the sculpture is called “Chain Reaction” and it does symbolize nuclear war’s destructiveness. However, it was created by an anti-nuke peacenik artist, Paul Conrad in order to remind people of the devastation of nuclear war.
Second, according to the article, the sculpture is apparently in disrepair because it was put in place in 1991, twenty years ago. That is an important date because, according to the same article, the Rand Corporation moved to the offices in Santa Monica in 2004, 13 years after the sculpture went up.
Third, Conrad actually offered the sculpture to the city in 1987 which is important if you have something about the number 13.
Fourth, the sculpture is owned by the city and is in place at the Santa Monica Civic Center and apparently, Rand has nothing to do with it. Local peace activists have actually accused Rand of wanting to have the sculpture removed because it is an uncomfortable reminder of what “Rand actually does.”
Now, for one short video, Jones has asked us to assume a lot of information that CANNOT be debunked in the same time it took Jones to shoot the video; all of 36 seconds. I spent about an hour finding info on “Chain Reaction” and combing through the article and writing this post. In 36 seconds, Jones has made Rand a satanic organization of untold historical evil by associating it with a sculpture called “Chain Reaction.” I just spent an hour showing you he is a decepticon.
But who cares about me?
July 18th, 2011 at 12:09 am
It took me a bit less than an hour, but I didn’t actually think about how I was going to present it and then write it out in a coherent and persuasive manner - I encouraged someone else to do it this time
I sympathize with your point. And you’re probably right. I’ve done the same before too, on many occasions, and it is always a thankless task. I do it for my own curiosity now, and generally just to get good at educating myself. It would be a full-time job, with a team of people on it, day and night, if one wanted to call out most of the bs we encounter. Even then, it would probably be impossible to accomplish anyway as partisan motives would naturally co-opt the original purpose.
I don’t think it’s a waste of time though, even if you keep it to yourself. A waste of time would be watching, perhaps believing, and then moving on to the next time-waster.
One of the reason I don’t listen to talk radio on the internet is because, well, I just don’t sit back and listen. I feel compelled to research anything and everything that either I didn’t know, or that is suspect at the outset. I guess it’s just the way I am. The internet to me is the greatest research tool ever devised and its capabilities increase exponentially by the minute.
Writing about what I’ve found, however, is always akin to pulling teeth. I don’t enjoy that part as much.
July 19th, 2011 at 11:46 am
Thanks Terry. I didn’t mean to come off as complaining about the work it takes to research the… umm….exaggerations as you call them. Rather, I was making a comment on the technique Jones has used to turn his twisted ideology into a serious political movement, despite the facts.
It is my belief that the Alex Jones view of the world has become the view of the “man on the street” in a lot of places in the world. Many in the United States for instance, are basing their political activity on his information and it has become a political movement via Ron Paul libertarianism.
Most of the 9/11 Truth Movement was facilitated by Jones and most of them support Ron Paul.
Russia Today, the Moscow-sponsored internet and TV news channel, has been using Alex Jones and various other conspira-tainment figures to promote Russia’s anti-American agenda to the world and-quite brazenly- within the United States itself.
The Ron Paul people who consider themselves “beyond the left/right paradigm” and more politically literate than almost everyone else, have in fact become Moscow’s useful idiots for the 21st century.
Anyway, I also did research on Alex Jones claims that Osama bin Laden was killed long before May 1, 2011. I found Jones’ evidence spurious, yet he repeated it over and over again for about a week on his show, as conclusive and historical fact.
I post all I found below. (with help from leaving Alex Jones blog)
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After Osama Bin Laden was killed in Pakistan on May1 of this year, Alex Jones immediately announced on his May 2, 2011 radio show that the killing was a fraud. On that same show, and in order to prove his assertions, Jones interviewed former Pakistan intelligence chief (ISI) General Hamid Gul, who claimed that the bin laden killing was staged in order to build a case against Pakistan in order to expand American military operations inside that country.
Then, the following day on May 3rd, Jones repeatedly claimed that Walter Cronkite, Madeline Albright, and Theresa Heinz Kerry affirmatively stated bin Laden had been killed long before May of 2011. On the same day, he also featured a lengthy interview with Steve Pieczenik, a supposed “insider” and “top-level government official” who had positive proof that Osama bin Laden had been killed in 2002 and was being kept “on ice” by the U.S. government since then.
However, upon closer examination of this evidence, it is clear that none of the people that Alex Jones relied upon to establish that bin Laden’s killing was a fraud, said exactly what Jones seemed to hear, or their evidence of what they said was extremely thin.
For instance, in an interview on May 2 with Russia Today, General Gul (who said 9/11 was committed by “neocons and zionists”) spent precious few seconds on the matter of when bin Laden was killed and then spent the rest of his interview criticizing U.S. policy and talking about how ineffective a player Al-Quaeda had become in terrorist politics. It is important to note that Gul offered no evidence that he affirmatively witnessed bin Laden’s death, viewed the corpse or anything like that. All he could muster was that “according to my information” Bin Laden died of natural causes some time ago. That’s it. You are charging the U.S. with a massive fraud on the world and history here, you need to offer more than “according to my information!” to prove that fraud!
So what about the other people Jones cited to prove the Bin Laden death a fraud?
“Insider” Steve Pieczenik
Jones repeatedly said that Pieczenik had insider knowledge that Bin laden was killed in 2002. However,
here is what he told Jones in 2002: “I think that Musharraf, the President of Pakistan, spilled the beans by accident three months ago when he said that bin Laden was dead because his kidney dialysis machines were destroyed in East Afghanistan. Well, he was one of the few that knew he had a kidney problem. That wasn’t well known before. Everybody thought he had a heart disease. ”
That’s it, the quote in its entirety. Pieczenik was just repeating what Musharraf had said in a CNN interview in January 2002. Musharraf didn’t say bin Laden was dead. He said, “I think now, frankly, he is dead for the reason he is a … kidney patient. I would give the first priority that he is dead and the second priority that he is alive somewhere in Afghanistan.”
Musharraf now believes bin Laden was killed on May 1, 2011 (and is desperately trying to convince the world that Pakistan knew nothing about bin Laden’s presence in his country). So Pieczenik’s sole piece of “evidence” - Musharraf’s 2002 opinion that bin Laden could be dead - is null and void. Pieczenik was making a guess based on someone else’s guess.
Sometime between April 2002 and his May 3 interview, Pieczenik’s story changed dramatically. Now he claims that back in ‘02, he knew from the “intelligence roster” that bin Laden had Marfan Syndrome and had been treated by CIA doctors. He died in late 2001.Pieczenik does not claim to have seen bin Laden’s corpse, he does not provide any details about the circumstances of his alleged death, and he doesn’t or will not give the specifics of bin Laden’s alleged treatment by CIA physicians.
Madeline Albright
On December 17, 2003, former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright was about to be interviewed on the Fox News show Special Report With Brit Hume when she turned to Fox News analyst Morton Kondracke and wondered aloud if the Bush administration could already have a living Osama bin Laden in captivity, and was just waiting for the most politically expedient moment to announce his capture. She said nothing about bin Laden being dead. She did not say he was “on ice”, as Jones repeatedly stated. Kondracke promptly relayed her comments to the world, and the story was picked up by many news outlets, notably the Washington Times. If she had accidentally spilled the beans, Albright could have denied the conversation even took place. Instead, she confirmed her comments, but hastily assured the public that her speculation was made in jest.
Walter Cronkite
The late Walter Cronkite never stated that bin Laden was dead. Just the opposite, actually. Like Heinz and Albright, he made a cheeky remark about bin Laden being used to boost Bush’s approval ratings in the run-up to the 2004 elections. Specifically, he commented on Larry King Live about the bin Laden tape released on October 29, 2004: “I have a feeling that it could tilt the election a bit. In fact, I’m a little inclined to think that Karl Rove, the political manager at the White House, who is a very clever man, that he probably set up bin Laden to this thing.” Cronkite believed it was bin Laden on that tape, alive and well. In fact, he conceded the tape could be a “double-edged sword” for Bush, because it presented the threat of further attacks along with evidence that his administration still hadn’t bagged their number one enemy.
Theresa Heinz Kerry
It seems that just like Madeleine Albright and Walter Cronkite she made a highly speculative and blustery remark remark about Bush capturing bin Laden just in time for the 2004 elections. At a fundraiser held in Pheonix, Arizona on September 22, 2004, she said, “I wouldn’t be surprised if he [bin Laden] appeared in the next month.” Eventually, these October Surprise remarks came to nothing. Bin Laden did not appear in time for the 2004 elections - yet Bush nabbed a second term, anyway. Which should have left these remarks discredited.
July 19th, 2011 at 3:03 pm
Very important point Terry.
But what troubles me, is the fact that many conspiracy theorists use the same techniques they preach against. Like the Nazi’s Big Lie (lizards, demons, aliens, etc.), or like religion, basing their “indoctrination” upon faith and not facts. Their mistakes are too obvious to be overlooked. So are these people really clumsy researchers? or are they in it for the money? disinfo…??
Despite how many other “Taxil hoaxes” are being perpetuated by them, there is no doubt in my mind that the conspiracy is real. But the mainstream picture of it so far out reality that its hard for me to believe is a careless mistake. On the contrary, I think it should have a purpose.
July 19th, 2011 at 4:33 pm
I believe that there is a power elite, that is semi-hereditary and occult, and with careful research one can identify what they believe.
I think it is undeniable that on the political level there is a great surge towards global governance, and has been for some time. Who can deny all the talk of new world order coming out of the EU and the United Nations. Who can deny the reason these two institutions exist in the first place is to globalize the political order of nations.
And there is a definite move towards global constitutionalism in law all over the world.
I also think that population and economic control is part of their agenda and that this can be proven.
There is also a very traceable religious agenda.
The problem with people like Jones is that they refuse to actually debate the globalists, who, in the end, will say their project is all a good thing and very benign, thank you very much.
Most of what we call the New World Order was actually an expansion into the realm of international institutions of the old British Empire, updated and supported (financially and militarily) by the United States.
Lionel Curtis in his Commonwealth of Nations (1916) and Clarence Streit in his Union Now (1939) explains this.
This Anglo-American order has had a lot of enemies since its inception after WW2 and now, Russia, China, Islam and the Bolivarian Revolution are all aligned against it. Thus, over-heated tales of its power and dominance over world events and history are exaggerated and does not really explain emerging and competitive global power blocks.
July 19th, 2011 at 7:01 pm
Oh, I also agree with Jason that the Russians, Chinese, Islamic World and others are using the so called truth movement to counter punch the Western Elite. Not that I love the Western Elite mind you, just not crazy about the alternatives either.
July 28th, 2011 at 11:00 pm
One time I saw aj chasing michelle malkin down the street in denver, near the mint. He was a blithering, spitting, bully-dog, slob. G.Noory used to have him on c2c. Today, not so much. Good enough for me.
Really, I never saw the attraction.
November 18th, 2011 at 6:01 pm
What makes me laugh about the denigration of “conspiracy theorists” is encapsulated in a couple of incidents from my own life.
I was working in a school in the UK on 7/7/05 when the Tube and bus bombings took place. Around lunchtime I heard two teaching assistants managing to convince themselves that the people responsible for the outrage were most likely French!
The day before Britain had pipped the French and won the bid to stage the 2012 Olympics. On this basis these two eminent cultural commentators (LOL) surmised that our French continental neighbours ad decided to blow us up!
Four years later I had joined a new reading group. Towards the end of the first meeting the group leader began to denigrate “conspiracy theorists” who peddled the view that 7/7 never actually took place. A colleague chipped in in agreement to aver that disproving “conspiracy theorists” was so easy. I mean look all the people who had had their legs blown off on 7/7? Ergo 7/7 must have taken place just as the official media said it did.
Not wanting to offend anyone on my first attendance I did not intervene to defend my “conspiracy theorist” brethren. I just wondered how apt the term “sheeple” used by “conspiracy theorists” to describe the mind-controlled majority actually was. How was it possible that these supposedly educated people could think that questioning the fable re-muslim suicide bombers on 7/7 amounted to denying that the event had taken place at
all?
At the next meeting we discovered that the groupleader’s favourite author was no other than George Orwell!
I kid you not!
November 19th, 2011 at 2:46 pm
Orwell-for Chrissakes!
As he wrote his last work on the Scottish island of Jura Orwell slept with a gun under his pillow so convinced was he that Big Brother sought his doom.
Orwell described Big Brother as “a dedicated sect doing evil”.
Who was Big Brother exactly? Orwell meant the global intelligence agencies.
So a guy who believes a small elite sect is intent on imposing tyranny on the rest of the world-of stamping on the human face with its boot-is NOT a conspiracy theorist.
As a conspiracy theorist it is quite clear to me that the rest of the world is quite mad. I am convinced that it has been the case throughout recorded time that most of the people on the planet at any one time have not really had any clear grasp on the reality that surrounds them.
Who are the few who strive for the knowledge that leads to this grasp on the true reality of the world about them?
Oh we’re the “conspiracy theorists” of course!
All this prissy effete navel gazing about “conspiracy theory” not ringing true is laughable given the BIG LIES spewed forth by Big Brother everyday of our lives. When one is liable at any time in one’s professional and social life to have to encounter people who will suddenly come out with the most brazenly ignorant and counter-intuitive remarks based on their official media-derived grasp on reality to fret about Alex Jones taking some poetic licence here and there seems positively inane.