The Occult Conspiracy

[zuker12]

Okay, so I need some thoughts on this, since Iseem to be going through an OCD episode. (Yes I am in therapy and on meds, though lately Ive indulged mainly in my OCD behaviour.) It's actually hard to talk about conspiracies to anyone since most dont know what they entail except as internet culture references to the "doritos 420weed Illuminati". I actually have been very skeptical of conspiracy cranks, since their theories show mainly weak links to stuff like symbolism. Now I dont know - its been getting to me in a harmful way for the last couple of days.

 

I think there were a few people versed in occultism here at ExC - and Im also hoping for just some thoughts into this matter because i fear this conspiracy thing might undermine most atheistic arguments since "the academia" cannot be trusted. I'll try to keep this sweet and simple. I hope I wont rave too much.

 

I'll add some links later, since I'm writing this on the phone.

 

So first - there is the curious case of Albert Pike and his purported "Three World Wars" and "Lucifer is God" letters. Google up "pike lucifer letter hoax" and "pike three world wars" to find it. (The "letter" also appeared in an anti-masonic Chick tract.) Now I know there are dissertations on both from skeptics - and with my limited human capacity and no predisposition for a christian mindset, I could reasonably, I can assume the Lucifer letter is a hoax (look up "leo taxil hoax".) Now I only did a cursory look at the three world wars thing and could only find that the source for it is unknown as is the date - but some people link the letter to Leo Taxil, the previous hoaxer, which would mean the letter predates WW I by atleast 20 years. Keep in mind I only did a cursory look. In summary, the letter purports that the elites are preparing 3 world wars. It talks about deposing the russian czars in the first world war to set up a communist regime, then putting fascists, democrats and communists against each other in the second (???not entirely sure) and putting atheists and nihilists against each other in the third. At which point "they" swoop in and solve everyone's problems and starttheir One World Government. This is somewhat unnerving if it indeed predates WWI. Do you have any thoughts on this?

 

Secondly, a former "ex-Illuminati Grand Druid" defector whom you might have heard of is John Todd. He was a major source for Jack Chick and in his day he talked a lot about occultism, rock 'n roll being evil and the Illuminati. A lot of his claims are either tripe and complete bs, or unprovable to the maximum. I'll try to find a recapping link about his claims.... Now he has the profile of a delusional liar, switching back and forth between christianity, and being a sexual harasser. Not to mention being at times contradictory.

 

What makes me wonder is where did he get even an inspiration to talk imaginative things about a grand satanic conspiracy? For example, John Todd says of JRR Tolkien and CS Lewis (Ironhorse's favourite remember) that they were steeped in the occult. Tolkien copied his LOTR saga from a purported Book of Shadows (which actually is a personal "recipe" book for a wiccan practicioner instead of a grand ancient witchcraft bible. This practice was only invented by Gerald Gardner in the 50s, so even if Todd was referring to the first Book of Shadows by Gardner it is illogical since most of LOTR was written before and during WW2. Neither can I find any reference of Tolkien being inspired by a book of Shadows or plagiarizing one. Is there a published version of Gardner's own book of shadows, is there a creation story in it and does it correspond anyhow to the LOTR saga?)

 

Supposefly both Lewis and Tolkien were initiated into the order of the Golden Dawn, "the Rothschild church in London" iof which I can find no confirmation. Curiously, their literary partner in their university club called Inklings was a fellow named Charles Williams, a poet, who apparently was into Kabbalah, Tarot and was actually initiated in the Golden Dawn, was a great friend of CS Lewis and more or less Tolkien's too since Tolkien was a good friend of Lewis. All this seems rather suspect since Tolkien wasnt fond of any occult practice, but there may have been an occultic influence on him through Williams. (A lesser point of contention is that Tolkien was a Roman Catholic, which is a strict no-no for Protestant Fundamentalists.)

 

My understanding is that a conspiracy culture was already somewhat existent in the 60s - judging by the fact that the writers Shea and Wilson got a lot of conspiracy theory letters in the late 60s from which they built their conspiracy fiction trilogy series "Illuminatus!" But where did John Todd get all of his "information"? I cant find a biography of Tolkien for example that is before 1972. Probably Tolkien, Lewis and Williams were talked about a lot since 50s because they are all famous writers, but where did he get the notion of the Golden Dawn thing for example? And how did he mess that one up? John Todd wasnt exactly an entirely "new" thing; conspiracy writers have been existent about the Illuminati since late 18th century starting from Abbe Barruel: John Robison, Nesta Webster, William Guy Carr, Myron Fagan. They all predated Todd.

 

(Curiously, Todd says that initiation into witchcraft requires reading of the works of Tolkien and Lewis. Now this is obviously tripe, since Tolkien's fiction makes for a very bad introduction into any form of witchcraft since it doesnt deal in practical magic inany way nor does it purport to be factual. Same goes for Harry Potter and the stupid notion that it tells kids about ouija boards, tarot and astrology. Maybe potion making, but the fictitious magic in them isnt anyway close to real world "real magick" as in the above examples. I discarded this notion and still do, but curiously some former "astrologer and fortuneteller" pastor David Meyer purports that they indeed do read Tolkien as an initiation into covens. Sounds silly, but hey, what do I know?)

 

One last thing. While the introduction of the Internet has probably skewered perceptions on this due to sheer masses of people, there seem to be at minimum anecdotally quite many "ex-illuminati survivors". This is atleast the experience I get from reading Fritz Springmeier and otherwise just coming across people writing on conspiracy topics who claim they know survivors from Illuminati. What is one to make of these? It's hard to believe they all are just under a mass delusion or in on something just so that they can help sell books. Most that talk about their own "experience" were supposedly in the higher levels of the conspiracy before they left. Some of these are obvious fakes (I suspect Todd is one. Mike Warnke too and William Schnoebelen also. Doc Marquis maybe.). Then you have these Svali's and Benjamin Friedman's and Kathy O'Briens. It's astonishing to think so many would lie though I guess that is how many cultural memes work. What do you think of this?

 

Of course christians attack a lot of popular culture and have been doing that for the longest time. It's possible they accidentally spawned this Illuminati conspiracy culture phenomenon, only formented by the Satanic Panic in the 80s and 90s.

 

Well this is a long rant and an immensely hard debate topic since conspiracy theories are a difficult area to navigate (especially with it's long history of naivete, pure bunk and obvious hoaxes. The "Goliath skull" thing was talked about here in exc some time ago.) I stopped believing these things a long time ago, since these things never manifest or translate into real life - the world is just more complex than that. Some of these things do unnerve me and probably anyone who has learned to trust his rational mind.

 

What would be the implications? Does it matter? Is this only in the way of a normal life? Do humans need this? Does this undermine an anti-christian position? Can we really ever know? Are there alternate explanations for this?

 

Anyone have any interest in putting any thought on this?

[mymistake]

I wouldn't worry about any of that.  Just relax.

[florduh]

Anybody can claim absolutely any ridiculous thing and someone will believe it. 

 

Conspiracy buffs would have us believe the moon is a hologram and nobody ever went there, others claim the moon is real and there are alien bases on the dark side of it. Some claim the earth is flat while others claim the globe of the earth is hollow. I'm currently conversing with a guy who claims David Copperfield, David Blaine, Dynamo and other professional magicians are using demonic power to do their tricks. He has lots of supporters. People are gullible and frequently stupid as well.

[Ravenstar]

I was a Witch (traditional/eclectic) and once belonged to The Order of the Golden Dawn, and almost accepted a sponsorship into the Rosicrucians… there's no conspiracy. There's Theosophy. That's it, that's all.

 

Tolkein is an introduction to poetry and epic heroic fairytales and decent English literature.

 

Modern Druidry is a pale shadow reconstructionist minor faith… the real faith with died out when the Romans occupied Britain.

 

"Occult" only mean 'hidden' knowledge... as in the Mystery Schools of old… where only initiates were given ALL the information (Like Jesus' disciples - read your Bible) or maybe like Alistair Crowley - who wasn't very good at keeping secrets since he wrote extensively on Ceremonial Magick. The Catholics still practice it at the priestly level - though I think the 'secrets' are more political and economic than spiritual.

 

Gardner's "Book of Shadows" is a joke… and borrows heavily from the Golden Dawn, Alistair Crowley and Margaret Murray O'Hare. I'm not trying to offend Wiccans here, but his religion is wholly modern. Wicca itself has evolved into a different form than his original which was based a whole lot on sex magick and the Great Rites. You don't see that much these days.

 

No Witch would read Lewis… hahahahahaha, no. except maybe for entertainment value.

 

Just what I know… people make things up when they don't have the knowledge.  

[zuker12]

Yeah. Now I'm not entirely sure I believe this John Todd character - much of what he claims is either tripe or a lot unprovable. In regards to Tolkien anecdotally Ive heard two accounts relating him to Golden Dawn or possibly A.*.A.*. First one an unnamed "ex high-priest" (John Todd?) Who is apparently irritated at the lack of background information people have... second one is this A..A.*. Adept, again unnamed, who says he had been initiated but expelled for laziness and incompetence. Why this Christian wingnut would deal with adepts is beyond my knowledge.

 

What gives me weird feelings is the whole "Three World Wars" letters thing... and supposedly the documents from the original Illuminati that got into the hands of the Bavarian government which detailed their plans for the French revolution. They are supposedly somewhere on the net, but l dont know with what name to look for them.

 

Also John Todds supposed ancestral family, the Collins - now aside from there being many Collinses in history it is actually hard to pinpoint if this character has any relations to Collins at Salem during the witch trials. Collins is apparently a major Satanic bloodline. But his "grand ancestor" Francis Collins died before the witch trial hysteria of 1692. (Died 1689) No one seems to have done any research on this and Fritz Springmeier's research is notoriously bad - especially when his book is just copied and thrown around without any sources or references. A major part in this claim is that the witchcraft practicing Collins (or Putnams or whatever) instigated on purpose or atleast formented the hysteria leading to executions (but only one witch was hanged, a prostitute, the rest were Christians). Now its of course probable that not many actual witches were executed there being a hysteria and all that. Of course I cant find anything linking any Collins of that time to any witchcraft.... suupposedly a Sara Aynn Collins continued their occult practices when the rest of the family wanted to give up on them.

[Ravenstar]

There are no 'satanic' bloodlines - there are no angelic bloodlines either (Sorry Dan). There were no 'satanic' kidnappings and mass child killings in the 70's either. It's all bunk. If there exists adepts… you wouldn't know about it, no one would because they wouldn't CARE about things like politics. Mystics/Esoterics are too busy studying to pay much attention to the real world - trust me on this.

 

I've met too many people who are pagan to even begin to tell you how misunderstood they are… it's not nearly as dramatic as others believe.

 

They are pretty much one of 4 things… scholars who have an fascination with Ceremonial/Golden Dawn philosophy, complete and utter woo-woo wing nuts who believe they are psychic or in contact with aliens (or want to sell something to you), humanist-vegan hippies who need a spiritual community, or people who have left christianity and are drawn to paganism because it offers them the ritual they need and maybe - comfort of having structure and some anthropomorphized deities to focus on.

 

There are a couple of others who don't fit these categories, but they are extremely rare and practice traditional witchcraft… much more about herbalism, self-development and attuning oneself to one's local environment. There are maybe 5000 in the entire western world…  they don't care about politics either - except as regular citizens of their locale.

 

I've met satanists… there are three types, Complete and utter wing-nuts who actually believe in satan as a real figure, usually male metal-heads of a certain age with anger issues or unbalanced people who need something to help them feel they have some control in their lives… and extreme individualists who found the philosophy of satanism (extreme individualism and weirdly, humanism too) appealing. They are also rare compared to any other faith.

 

The rest is imagination and made up stuff. 

 

The thing to ask yourself is this… if these things (letters, people, whatever) exist… where is the evidence? Why is it so hard to find?  These days it's not hard to find pretty much anything. This is the age of information. If it's there.. it get's out. Look at the Duggars! (sorry - bad example).

 

Snopes is a good site to check stuff out, especially if it's in the news. Just a resource that may be helpful.

 

 

*disclaimer

This is not intended in any way to disrespect those of non-christian faiths. We have those here who follow pagan paths and there are legitimate ways to have spirituality in one's life.. and not be a wing nut. But this particular thread is addressing pagan/satanic conspiracy at the public and political level.. a completely different issue.

 

Thank you

[zuker12]

Well, I cant find anything on this John Todd character after years of sporadic research. The believers resort to apologetics when something doesnt match up to facts or is unprovable: "if you know what Dissociative Identity Disorder is, and how it relates to mind control and ritual abuse, then you'd know why John behaved erratically, contradicted himself and lied on occasion. He has multiple personas in him, few of which are satanic and few which are christian. So he gets tremendous anxiety when he tries to to speak out about "them"." (Paraphrasing the incoherent Illuminati researcher Fritz Springmeier)

 

Of course, what I have learned is that in some ways, this "being saved out of Satanofascism" and conspiracy culture has been in existence in some form from atleast the 60s. Doreen Irvine was the first I guess prominent ex-witch "Black Queen" who got saved in 1964 or 1965. She released a book in 1973 "from witchcraft to christianity" and was supposedly giving her testimonial in unnamed platforms ever since her conversion, before she released her book.

 

Now this isnt really a good source or explanation for John Todd, since she is UK based I think and her book was released only in 1973 when John Todd was apparently preaching in San Antonio according to a San Antonio Express newspaper dated Oct 22 1972. I think this is actually the source for the only image of John Todd keeps circulating on the net. There are better more imminent sources where John Todd could have gotten his theories from, such as Myron Fagan and William Guy Carr, mixed with horror pop lore and a botched image of witchcraft practices. Now I do wonder, does this newspaper report contradict various reports of christian groups that he wasnt a witch during the time he was reported to be? Curiously the newspaper contradicts his later testimonial from 1978 where he says he was discharged 1970, and then he went through his witchcraft initiation. Unless that took some 2 years, which would also render highly suspect his claims of personally delivering money to various churches and corporations and running the nonexistent largest recording company in the world, since in the newspaper he says he only moved there only 2,5 months ago. It would be impossible in my mind to have done all this in just 2,5 months.

 

One of the things that got my curious attention was from his prison tape where he tells that an unnamed newspaper supposedly got an interview or something from the military about the legendary Phoenix Project, somehow ruining the dismissals maade in late 70s by various christian ministries and investigative bodies. I think his name was mentioned or something? I couldnt find any such newspaper report, but if one could be found it would be definitive evidence that something is wrong.

 

One of the hardest pills to swallow in these theories is that anywhere from hundreds of thousands to hundreds of millions of people would be complicit to commit atrocities such as murder and human sacrifice. Not to mention indulge in corrupt politics and with a snap of the finger would be ready to start holocausts. This just doesnt correspond to my experience with human beings...

[Ellinas]

Having read Ravenstar's last post, i have just recovered from a fit of giggles.  Not that I disagree with her - I just rather like the idea of being a "pagan wing-nut"...

 

Anyhow, the problem with this type of conspiracy theory is that it is pretty well founded on a specious concoction of myth, fabrication, coincidence and non sequiturs.  And that makes it impossible to kill.  Write a letter after 1945 talking about 3 world wars, maybe pass it off as something written much earlier, and bingo, you've got an idea that will appeal to the paranoid, and will become self supporting as more and more people find the time and energy to find more or less silly arguments to support it.

 

Let's get real.

 

Prophecies, biblical or otherwise, are generally inaccurate.  The state of this world conforms to the cock-up theory far better than to the conspiracy theory.  There is no global occult order controlling things - not least because occult orders have a proven history of schism no better than any other so called spiritual organization.

 

These ideas are the wishful thinking of the paranoid, the doomsayers and those whose own religious outlook is supported if they can find evidence of general satanic activity (i.e. gullible Christians).

[zuker12]

Okay I checked up on Christianity Today's article and compared it to the newspaper account... there isn't a direct contradiction - Todd met Ken Long late in 1972 who I think was a preacher based in Phoenix and Todd went on preaching trips. It is entirely possible one of his trips was in San Antonio, or that he even preached/testified of his own accord somewhere, since he has been involved in Jesus name only -theology and storefront preavhing since 1968. I dont remember the names of the churches mentioned in the 1972 SA Express article nor if he even mentioned the Illuminati. Just some "occult prophecy" about the earth opening up in San Antonio thus opening the gates to hell - which doesnt figure anywhere in later testimonials of his.

 

This all feels rather contradictory and hard - could he have been onto something, although he wasnt an Illuminati?

[Ellinas]

Do you think a real live genuine Illuminatus exists?

 

No, I don't believe he's "on to" anything.  This sort of thing usually amounts to giving vent to one's own prejudices to personal, sensationalist ends, with no basis in the real world.  If you continue trying to follow these threads, you will end up only tying yourself in knots, I fear.

[midniterider]

Has anyone mentioned Kevin Bacon yet? I think he's related to all this somehow.

[Ravenstar]

^^^^  perfect!  Thanks for that… 6º   He's in there somewhere.

 

 

There is zero evidence of this "illuminati"… are there rich people who get together and manipulate shit.. so they can make more money? Probably, pretty damn likely actually. Do they have their fingers in politics? I would think, yes. Are they a secret Cabal with ancient mystery knowledge and sacred bloodlines?

 

no

 

People aren't known for their ability to plan long term… it's just not in our nature, unfortunately. Look at how well we've planned how to handle our debris and byproducts.  HUGE fail. Long term planning (like centuries or millennia) is what something like an "Illuminati" thing would require. The only organization that comes even close is the Catholic Church… and they've screwed up many times and have lost a lot of their former power and influence… another fail.

 

Logic… it's a good thing.

[Fweethawt]

Oooooooor -- the Catholic church IS the illuminati's main headquarters?!?

 

You know -- the whole hide-in-plain-sight thingy "they" like to do.

[zuker12]

Yeah, its probably not good to follow this illuminati shit anymore. It's done me more harm than anything over the years... and I just dont see how it could be true, atleast in such a massive scale. I also came across a few damning things and waters muddying stuff.

 

-Reading papeers from san antonio circa 1971 and googling I cant find a single reference to a local celebrity witch called Lance Collins. I can however find two articles concerning John Todd from 1972 october, where he has already apparently made his testimony and rallied youth into a campaign against satan. There are some discrepancies: First, he has apparently only been involved in witchcraft only for 6 years (when later he is a generational satanist) and apparently The Vatican, the Church of Satan, and many witchcraft covens both black and white are meeting in San Antonio the next halloween weekend. He neglects to mention anything about his infamous 8-year world takeover plan (nor does he mention this New World Church in later testimonials) and the Satanists have not even formed any HQ in San Antonio but would form one after the meeting. John himself was sent there only last June (which is rather damning against him being a famous witch since how would he ever be get known as a local celeb and how would he have done the myriad of political manipulations, meetings, payments etc. in just some 2 months?) To establish covens in preparation for the planned HQ. He was by this time some sort of super druid apparently, "one of thirteen in the world." Years later in his testimonial he says he was initiated Grand Druid on May 1971 (?) And moved to San Antonio to establish his personal headquarters for his thirteen state rule. This is all just fuzzy and contradictory and I get the feeling he's been modifying his story and added to it as time passed by. A thing to note; Jack Taylor, the pastor to whom John made a profession of faith, says his background was mostly unknown and very soon he just stormed into his short-lived local revival and then disappeared until 1973. I guess this is why when Todd recounts his testimony later, he says the pastor who first came to him wasnt Jack Taylor.

 

-Green berets claim/vietnam claim: unsubstantiated. After raping a girl who was a student of the University of South Carolina, He says someone in the news (The State?) outed him as being part of Phoenix group in Vietnam and people got angry since this somehow destroyed the rebuttals made of him by various agencies. Thus he was smeared as the "green beret rapist" or "survivalist rapist". More commonly he was known as the "USC rapist". I couldnt find anything about a "green beret rapist" anywhere, but a "survivalist" Todd was mentioned. Instead of this state-wide smearibg campaign that they were supposedly doing, I could only find few articles on this "survivalist" rapist. After the rape, the police searched Todd's apartment and subsequently arrested Todd in 1987. Next year he was convicted of it plus for molesting two girls at a karate school he was working at the time. (In Todd's version he was supposedly smeared from every direction and was in the front pages everyday. Now drawing tons of publicity to a single rapist especially since he knows of "Them" would be incredibly stupid from "Them" but what do I know?) I cant find anything on Todd's supposed involvement in Vietnam or Phoenix. He says they took a lot of his research materials, some survival equipment and miscellania items. I the news, they apparently found survival items, but also photos of women and and women's underwear. Which Todd and his lawyer wanted back. I think this is where Todd took the notion that he was being smeared, and exaggerated it by a lot. Certainly it wasnt everyday news though he was reported on other papers in SC too than The State.

 

All this is probably meaningless to devout believers since they'll say that this sounds a lot like framing. Who knows? Aside from that how do they now reconcile the 3 accounts surrounding his death? In 1979, in 1994, or in 2007? The last one is the official account. Then, what to do with this rape shit if the guy arrested for rape is a plant and says that he was accidentally outed as a Green Beret, wouldnt this be contradictory? The 1994 thing about black helicopters taking him away sounds stupid and overtly dramatic - and is also unsubstantiatef according to his appeal records. Then we get into the whole question of "John Todd ex-satanist disappears in preparation for the end-times" only to move to South Carolina and start businesses there (and labour work apparently, possibly at the same time) like nothing ever happened? And for some reason "They" didnt know or didnt react to what John was doing when theyve been tracking him for years (and somehow could kill anyone they wanted including earlier exposers like Tom Collins and William Morgan who btw only exposed the rituals of Masonry but not this Todd type) and he was just let to settle in SC? Sounds stupid to me. They are efficient and ever vigilant and everywhere except in Todds case.

 

Bah.

 

I dont know what Todd wanted - his profile seems to be that of a habituar liar who might have actually believed some of what he was saying. I know a person who is a habituar liar and yes, his story grows each and everytime (accompanied with phrases like "dont tell him/her/anyone but i did this and that here and there with him/her"). Maybe John wanted to be a revival legend orr wanted to create some sort of movement or possibly cult. Maybe he wanted to be the hero. I've no clue - but he did inspire greatly the future christian conspiracy generation with his rallies and "cassette tape" ministry. I think he was actually a pioneer of the popularization of conspiracy culture since his talks have spread far and wide especially with the Internet. In that respect he was successful. Someone threw around the theory that he was an Illuminist anarchist, but not actually a generational satanist. He wanted to create confusion to cause aa change in the religio-political athmosphere with his wwild talks. Maybe?

 

I dont know. I dont believe this guy, too much of him is just false, too much is exaggeration and mistakes and too much is unprovable (thus true to believers). Who knows what he was actually doing since he was practically unknown before 1972 and became a christian celebrity from 1977 onwards. No one vouches for him, no one vouches against him except church persons from various places and times. He is a mysterious enigma and I have no more willingness to pursue it.

 

I might be wrong with all this - but I dont think so due to having had enough life experience and education and knowing that i pushed all this shit behind me once since it was lacking. Well if there be Satans out there, there be Satans. I dont think I actually even care at this point - ive lost enough to futile guilt trips already. This shouldnt even be my "job" as I have no reason or desire to believe all this fantastic conspiracy melodrama.

[FreeThinkerNZ]

I think people believe in conspiracy theories out of fear; fear that someone, somewhere knows what is really going on in the world, and we don't.

 

I think a more reliable statement to make about the world is that many things are unexplainable at this time, and accepting uncertainty is part of living in reality.

 

Zuker, if you're ready to have a laugh about it, you might enjoy this:

 

http://crispian-jago.blogspot.co.nz/2013/04/the-conspiracy-theory-flowchart-they.html

[Ravenstar]

^^^  oH!   well done  lol

[zuker12]

Yeah, this is maddeningly annoying. I cant believe Ive let myself be duped by a delusional "revelator"... this John Todd. I wonder where got all his material from, but I think he mostly just found tidbits of info around here and there, then altered or mixed them or even got confused with them. He lashed out against things that fundies have hated byadding his own interpretations or lies to them and lashed out against anyone or anything that wasnt deemed to be christian enough.

 

For example this broken cross thing. The peace symbol is an inverted cross where the bars of the cross have been broken. Witches use it supposedly to bring a peace of mind while they practice witchcraft... Yet the true origin is not ancient. It was designed and accepted for the british Nuclear disarmation movement in 1958. The inspiration for the design came from the artist's feeling of despair and it's a simplification of a man stretching his hands outwards and down. It also means the semaphore signals for Nuclear Disarmament. Later the symbolism was linked to more esoteric signs where the inside of it means "death of man" and the outside circle is the "symbol for the unborn child". Interpret that how you will. For a lay person, it probably means that peace is waiting to be born, but it might come at a cost. For the nwo fundie it probably means that through death the new age will be born. What if I interpret it with a christian mind? Through the death of Jesus, many of the sleeping/spiritually dead can be born-again.

 

The reason why it is a broken cross is because during its creation, motifs with christian crosses were presented yet they had too many wrong associations - The Crusades, military medals, religionists helping politicians in war - that kind of thing.

[Ellinas]

I always assumed the CND symbol was a representation of a missile.  Calling it a "broken cross" I rather suspect has its' basis in Christian paranoia.  If witches use it, that's probably because they often support disarmament.

 

I would tend to suspect anything beyond that as reading levels of meaning into a symbol that it was never meant to contain.

[Will02]

I've met satanists… there are three types, Complete and utter wing-nuts who actually believe in satan as a real figure, usually male metal-heads of a certain age with anger issues or unbalanced people who need something to help them feel they have some control in their lives… and extreme individualists who found the philosophy of satanism (extreme individualism and weirdly, humanism too) appealing. They are also rare compared to any other faith.

 

 

They LaVey-type Satanists at least make sense, but the theistic types actually seem more like reverse Christians to me since all they do is take standard Xian dogma and flip it on its head. Never actually  met any, though.

 

 

I have to question whether the people in the Black Metal scene really believe in a literal statan. The lyrics make it seem that way but I think they're just lashing out at xianity in general, which is something most of us here can definitely relate to and understand. The whole point seems to be the glorification and flaunting of things the church condemns.  I listen to Black Metal sometimes (kind of an antidote for the xian stuff I see every day) and parts of the message renonates with me even though as a pagan I admit I find the theistic statanic stuff rather silly whenever it comes up.

[zuker12]

This is all just a jumbled mess. Todd seems to think that the Illuminati and Rothschilds is at the top of everything, yet another dude Alberto Rivera says it's the Vatican controlling jesuits controlling all secret societies and through them governments. Todd never acknowledges Vatican nor the Vatican version of the NWO according to conspiracy theorists. It's messy. Later on these dudes (including Jack Chick) link the theories together saying Vatican controls the Illuminati through the Jesuits. The proof? Adam Weishaupt was a jesuit supposedly, yet he despised the jesuits. He also despised esotericism, yet he applied esoteric degrees like the masons because it was a powerful recruitment ploy. Various lodges and secret orders proved to be popular at the time.

 

Conclusively I cannot say anything about these conspiracies. I am baffled at the various sparks of genius and weak links people form when examining conspiracy theory angle. With all this contradictory stuff, I am only prone to say that this conspiracy examination is a venture without profit or merit. It feels like an underhanded attempt at convincing people to convert to their ideology - be htat religious political or cultural.

 

Fir example, the Vatican created Islam. The proof? Muhammad met a catholic missionary on his travels. Rivera saw some secret Vatican papers in which he says is an account of the manipulation of Muhammad so that he creates islam. The reason? To either have an excuse to capture Jerusalem or trade it with the Muslims. Maybe also to unify the catholic world But why go tvrough this silly cloak and dagger stuff and create a murderous machine that turns against them? They would have been able to take Jerusalem much easier and faster without islam. Since catholicism is apparently ddevil worship and the devil held the known world in his grip already through catholicism, this reasoning falls flat too. All this just seems to for dramatic effect and not reasonable. Course the muslims could be used as dupes - but why?

 

Not to mention that various popes have railed against movements like communism nazism and islam - when they supposedly created it. It's possible but very messy and confusing. Course Vaatican supported Hitler for a time - though Hitler would have apparently betrayed the church at some point in time if he didnt lose.

 

Messy, so messy.