Theories of the conspiratorial kind

[Doctor Crippen]

Not so much conspiracy but this should get things heated up in America

https://m.independent.ie/world-news/north-america/us-presidential-election-2020/american-man-admits-he-voted-for-trump-with-his-dead-mothers-name-i-listened-to-too-much-propaganda-40386803.html

[astfgyl]

Not so much conspiracy but this should get things heated up in America

https://m.independent.ie/world-news/north-america/us-presidential-election-2020/american-man-admits-he-voted-for-trump-with-his-dead-mothers-name-i-listened-to-too-much-propaganda-40386803.html

I've been keeping half an eye on the election audit in Maricopa County over the last week or so. I would be very very surprised if it didn't throw up bogus votes for both Biden and Trump, given how easy it seems to do with postal votes and no signature verification. The very fact that the election was stolen story is given such credence among republicans points to the fact that something might need to be fixed there. It will be an interesting outcome and Trump has started calling the whole thing The Big Lie which could be funny if his supporters were cheating.

[astfgyl]

https://unherd.com/thepost/long-live-the-tartarian-empire/

Here's one I haven't seen before, The Tartarian Empire. Edit: I should clarify the link isn't ancient stuff like I go on about in the next paragraph, I just got excited there was all. The Unherd article doesn't have a lot in it only mention of the idea but I found this explanation of the theory here https://www.stolenhistory.org/articles/tartary-aka-tartaria-an-empire-hidden-in-history-it-was-bigger-than-russia-once.5/ Have only heard of this last night so hopefully it's not instantly falsifiable with little to no effort. Where'd be the fun in that?

Of all the theories outside of the mainstream, the ancient builders stuff is my favourite. It's not even conspiracy theories about the ancient stuff, it's how amazing and unexplained it all is. The pyramids, the massive stone walls with homogenous designs in all parts of the world. It's not even a cover up story just loads of really interesting unknowns.

As Donald Rumsfeld once said

...as we know, there are known knowns; there are things we know we know. We also know there are known unknowns; that is to say we know there are some things we do not know. But there are also unknown unknowns—the ones we don't know we don't know

[astfgyl]

Looks like the UFO's or whatever the new term is are getting a bit of attention in the US lately. Youtube has been shoving US news reports of such things my way since I watched Bob Lazar and they seem to be giving the whole UFO thing a bit of a platform on the national channels.

Also, watch out for misinformation. It's everywhere.

https://twitter.com/rte/status/1395297188931010560

[Black Shepherd Carnage]

"The language of conspiracy - A psychological analysis of speech used by conspiracy theorists and their followers on Twitter."

https://t.co/1k6pmq8GNG?amp=1

[ochoill]

"The language of conspiracy - A psychological analysis of speech used by conspiracy theorists and their followers on Twitter."

https://t.co/1k6pmq8GNG?amp=1

Interested to read this later on, good to see a decent research on it.  Had some twitter threads bookmarked from before, but since lost, that I'm trying to find again related to this.  One in particular was about the path or radicalisation users follow on various social media platforms.  It was a few years back, an American woman involved in cyber security had some posts up that were slating Trump and she drew the ire of a range of characters online.  She picked a handful of the people attacking her and did a dive through any publicly available posts and info on them to identify patterns.  Taking one user then as an example, she posted about where he started online - late 2000s, Facebook posts, nothing out of the ordinary - and followed his data through various likes, posts, comments on different topics where he turnes from an apparently happy, very regular guy, into someone who was permanently online sharing QAnon posts on various platforms and in the comments of everything he stood against on a vicious attack.  She had found a lot of it started from liking local politics pages, then when these politicians began sharing right-leaning media, this guy would follow the pages and was then recommended more in line with that, which he interacts with and then causes the echo chamber like effect, over the course of about four years spiralling him into the poster she found in her comment sections.  She goes into significantly more detail than I have.  If I find it again I'll post it here.

[astfgyl]

"The language of conspiracy - A psychological analysis of speech used by conspiracy theorists and their followers on Twitter."

https://t.co/1k6pmq8GNG?amp=1

Presumably, whatever language that they are using, it's spelled wrong...

[Black Shepherd Carnage]

Found this a bit rambling myself, but interesting nonetheless, if nothing else then because of who wrote it:
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/jul/01/edward-snowdon-conspiracy-theories-belief-powerlessness

The core thing he starts off with is very Chomsky; why get caught up in conspiracy theories when, humanistically speaking at least, the things done in the open are as bad if not worse than the imagined things people put so much energy into trying to prove?

[astfgyl]

I'll have to get a look at that but I'd guess most people don't really believe most of the theories even as they read them. Like the moon landings for example. I don't believe the theories around that but I still like reading them. I see it as an extension of reading mysteries like Bigfoot and all that shit. Like there's lots of real conspiracies but I like reading the unbelievable stuff instead or the fun stuff like Andrew WK or the stuff that could possibly be real but 99 percent chance it isn't. Take The Weekly World News for example and there's probably people somewhere who think that shit was all real. Poor fuckers.

[livingabortion]

The Weekly World News was class.

https://weeklyworldnews.com/headlines/182087/blondie-song-rapture-predicted-alien-attack/

[astfgyl]

Here's one I spotted today



So I checked it

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adolf_Heusinger
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kurt_Waldheim
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wernher_von_Braun
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walter_Hallstein

Now to be fair, I don't know what conspiracy exactly this is supposed to be pointing out (that the EU/UN etc is an extension of Nazi Germany, I suppose) but it's a bit interesting to see how it all panned out for these lads

[astfgyl]

And here's another one https://www.dn.se/sverige/ewa-stenberg-nu-hanger-det-pa-annie-loof-igen/

And another from what seems like a proper source: https://www.businessinsider.com/military-government-secret-experiments-biological-chemical-weapons-2016-9?r=US&IR=T

[Black Shepherd Carnage]

Not really sure where to put this one, but it's barely been mentioned. There are countless articles in the new Pegasus dossier on the Guardian website, of more or less interest, but I guess this one of an interview with Snowden has the broadest appeal:
https://www.theguardian.com/news/2021/jul/19/edward-snowden-calls-spyware-trade-ban-pegasus-revelations

[astfgyl]

Of course I'd be the one to read it.

I'm really surprised that this seems like new news as I'd find it more shocking if it wasn't the case. I guess the future under potential constant surveillance will be one of constant self-censorship. I believe Snowden when he says there is no way to avoid things like this. John McAfee was another one saying something similar. I expect him to crop up more and more in the theories soon enough after the hanging but he said all the antivirus software had back doors built in, which is also wholly unsurprising. He also said he wouldn't hang himself, which will surely be the basis of most of the theories to come which involve him. Not much doing as of yet on that but I would imagine it would be Snowden type revelations if anything. I see why you were not sure where to put it though as it's proper news and not a theory as such but will have a lot of theorists saying told you so, or such like. Must read into some of the other ones on there.

Speaking of theories, here's a bit of an article about them that I encountered today: https://www.livescience.com/56479-americans-believe-conspiracy-theories.html

Headline says over half believe 9/11 theories. I am iffy about certain elements of it, bu of course it's again like reading the Bigfoot stories because it makes fuck all difference now anyway but is still fun to think about every now and again. So now I'm seemingly lumped in with the "white, employed Republican with a lower income, who is affiliated with a Christian denomination but doesn't attend religious services too often" contingent. Downer, but I suppose the minorities are too busy trying to feed themselves or avoid being shot to have time for this sort of stuff so there is that.

[astfgyl]

Think I might have found the best of them all. Have heard a similar version of this with the Free Man of The Land movement here in Ireland the last few years.

It's something along the lines of "Legally, you're already dead, and that being legally dead has legal implications for those who use a dead person's name" ..... https://pstramer.wordpress.com/2018/02/19/an-education-on-the-birth-certificate-from-frank-ocollins/

Can't imagine a practical situation to use it in either but I really hope somebody somewhere challenges a government on it for the craic. I'd love to hear the legal back-and-forth