Sneelock
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hey Daddy-O. I don't wanna go.
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Post by Sneelock on May 8, 2020 17:12:12 GMT
did you see where Alex JONES warned that he would eat his neighbors? it's amazing that someone would leap directly to cannibalism when faced with social distancing rules. it's become a habit with a lot of people to get WAY too mad over way too little way too fast.
I can't be expected to stay at home because I'm honest and I will eat my neighbors. what the fuck?
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Post by Deleted on May 8, 2020 17:25:25 GMT
did you see where Alex JONES warned that he would eat his neighbors? it's amazing that someone would leap directly to cannibalism when faced with social distancing rules. it's become a habit with a lot of people to get WAY too mad over way too little way too fast. I can't be expected to stay at home because I'm honest and I will eat my neighbors. what the fuck? And he seemed obsessed with eating the ASS of the neighbor specifically..hmmmm..
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Sneelock
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hey Daddy-O. I don't wanna go.
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Post by Sneelock on May 8, 2020 17:33:33 GMT
LOL. That’s where all the protein is!
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Post by Deleted on May 10, 2020 10:10:21 GMT
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Post by Deleted on May 10, 2020 12:05:01 GMT
It's a shame that the alternative internet media have devalued conspiracy theory to the point where anything even vaguely conspiratorial in nature is automatically dismissed as " tin foil hat".
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tory
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Post by tory on May 10, 2020 15:03:40 GMT
Most conspiracy theories ARE rot.
The idea that there are shadowy, nebulous forces controlling sectors of the media, economy and the like is a nonsense for example.
It's true that perhaps, from time to time, some people perceived as being powerful might meet and discuss "the future" of the earth or whatever. But whether they actually possess the power to do anything concrete without the knowledge of nation-states is risible.
There are, of course, opportunities for, say, individual corporations and individuals in government to exploit situations for their advantage and that does happen from time time. There are stories out there to be investigated and people and organisations to be held to account. Yet the wilder conspiracy theories, in particular ones based about money and power, illuminati and all that, are just baseless bollocks with very little in the way of evidence.
The issue is that, essentially, people speculate wildly without any concrete evidence at all about theories and there is a market out there for people to be exploited with such guff.
My view on conspiracy theories is that they emerge because people "naturally" project narratives onto situations that are extremely complex and difficult to comprehend. It's like "there's all this stuff happening and it must be someone's fault somewhere".
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Post by Deleted on May 10, 2020 16:42:37 GMT
. There are, of course, opportunities for, say, individual corporations and individuals in government to exploit situations for their advantage and that does happen from time time. I think 'frequently' would be a better and more accurate word. The kind of meta 'illuminati' conspiracy might be rot. But your idea that history is full of the powerful acting transparently and for the greater interest of humanity seems charmingly naive, a form of conservative wishful thinking.
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tory
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Post by tory on May 10, 2020 17:08:02 GMT
I don't think that at all.
History shows us that people exploit power and that it corrupts them.
Conspiracy theories, however, are generally farcical narratives that attempt to make sense of extremely complex situations and bind them to some sort of meaning through an explicit purpose rather than perhaps accepting that they are made by a huge number of variables and that, often, there are all manner of factors involved in the outcome, none of which were working in cahoots with one another.
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Sneelock
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hey Daddy-O. I don't wanna go.
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Post by Sneelock on May 10, 2020 22:07:35 GMT
I believe it was Jesus Christ who said that conspiracy theories will be with us always. I’ve been around conspricy theories as a topic of conversation for years. JFK theories, Birchers, moon landing denial... Still, I think something new has been added. Russian State Media has been weaponizing them for a while now. I think Xi ping is on board and so is President TRUMP with his many sentences that begin with “some people say”
A week or so back people were asking me what I thought of charges by the TUMP admin that the virus was deliberately manipulated in the Wuhan lab. I told them that I don’t know because I don’t. BUT, shouldn’t there be an obligation from the administration to PROVE it? They have quite a track record of making untrue claims. Already I know people who repeat this claim as fact. Now add a dozen more unproven claims. I’m not doing the math but I think this is much of the reason that it’s getting very hard to discuss current affairs with people. There is no longer anything resembling a general consensus.
I see this as a bad problem that is getting worse.
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Post by Deleted on May 10, 2020 22:30:42 GMT
I don't think that at all. History shows us that people exploit power and that it corrupts them. Conspiracy theories, however, are generally farcical narratives that attempt to make sense of extremely complex situations and bind them to some sort of meaning through an explicit purpose rather than perhaps accepting that they are made by a huge number of variables and that, often, there are all manner of factors involved in the outcome, none of which were working in cahoots with one another. All of them? That seems too pat and dismissive. Watergate was a conspiracy theory until it was proved true.
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Post by Deleted on May 10, 2020 22:37:47 GMT
I believe it was Jesus Christ who said that conspiracy theories will be with us always. I’ve been around conspricy theories as a topic of conversation for years. JFK theories, Birchers, moon landing denial... Still, I think something new has been added. Russian State Media has been weaponizing them for a while now. I think Xi ping is on board and so is President TRUMP with his many sentences that begin with “some people say” A week or so back people were asking me what I thought of charges by the TUMP admin that the virus was deliberately manipulated in the Wuhan lab. I told them that I don’t know because I don’t. BUT, shouldn’t there be an obligation from the administration to PROVE it? They have quite a track record of making untrue claims. Already I know people who repeat this claim as fact. Now add a dozen more unproven claims. I’m not doing the math but I think this is much of the reason that it’s getting very hard to discuss current affairs with people. There is no longer anything resembling a general consensus. I see this as a bad problem that is getting worse. The problem is we now live in a world of too much information. This information overload creates the real difficulty of how do you consume it all and what sources can you trust. The way many cope with this is by filtering their information by choosing stuff that reinforces their world view. This why views are getting increasingly entrenched and polarised.
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Sneelock
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hey Daddy-O. I don't wanna go.
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Post by Sneelock on May 10, 2020 23:02:31 GMT
People called it a conspiracy theory until it was proven. That may seem a minor distinction but I think it’s important. Now we have “Russia Gate” treated as a conspiracy even as testimony and redacted information is blocked from the congressional process. I think things have gone topsy-Turvy like Jimbo calling real news “fake news” and planted,outrageous, unvetted claims “censored”
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Post by daveythefatboy on May 11, 2020 0:38:36 GMT
Watergate wasn’t much of a conspiracy. The President’s guys broke into the offices of the DNC to gather some information they hoped they could use. That was the whole thing. The rest was all about covering up.
That’s completely different than the load of shit my brother laid on me last night that Bill Gates and Dr. Fauci intentionally developed COVID 19 in order to take over the world.
I completely believe that the Watergate kind of conspiracy happens. I even believe that Russia tried to influence our election, and that we’ve done similar to other countries. Geopolitical intrigue doesn’t seem far-fetched.
But the kind of conspiracy where someone hatched an evil plan to rule the world, or where a President kills thousands of his own people and pretends it is a terrorist attack in order to start a war... That kind of horseshit doesn’t fly.
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tory
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Post by tory on May 11, 2020 8:15:57 GMT
That's the thing - most of the time it's about some sort of blunder or low-level corruption that someone attempts to silence or cover up. The obfuscation and silence is then interpreted as being a conspiracy.
On the Russia thing - I believe that's a whole load of speculation that no-one has any real evidence of.
I just don't think that Russia itself is capable of such a high-level operation to convince and manoeuvre political candidates of its choosing into positions of power. The fact is that Russia simply doesn't have the strategic and cultural capability to do such a thing. Of course the Americans could do it after WW2 and did to many countries, because, essentially, it held all the cards.
Russia has nuclear weapons and that's it. It doesn't have the cultural capacity to interfere in the manner that people suggest it does. What it can attempt to do, and does, is to try and cause fractures and splinters in an attempt to break up hegemonic power blocs, such as the EU, or NATO. It can try and produce disinformation where possible - but some sort of concerted campaign to do this sort of thing is just very unlikely.
If Russia was such a powerful country, why does anyone with any sense leave at the first opportunity? That in itself tells you everything you need to know.
The whole raison d'etre of Russian geopolitics is some sort of low-level fighting and snarkery. They are faced by 3 very big opponents - China, the EU & NATO. The Cuban missile crisis was precipitated by the fact that Kennedy had situated nukes in Turkey. The Ukraine crisis stemmed from the fact that the EU & NATO, who had promised not to encroach on Russia's borders back in 1997, had now reneged on their promises and were precipitating a coup under their noses in the Ukraine.
The Russians are combative.
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Post by Crunchy Col on May 11, 2020 8:28:54 GMT
Should I move all this to a 'conspiracy' thread?
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