David Icke banned off Facebook

[Orang Utan]

The Fortean Times is quite rigorous and not at all given to conspiraloonery

 

[Proper Tidy]

The Fortean Times is quite rigorous and not at all given to conspiraloonery

Its a long time ago now but I do remember a lot of stuff about crop circles and yetis and stuff

 

[two sheds]

The Fortean Times is quite rigorous and not at all given to conspiraloonery

Yes that's what I remember of it from ooo 30 years ago. All about strange phenomena but generally sceptical of reasons for them.

 

[Orang Utan]

Its a long time ago now but I do remember a lot of stuff about crop circles and yetis and stuff

They do investigate that stuff but it’s mostly to debunk

 

[Proper Tidy]

Fair enough.

Funnily enough an old mate of mine from school years is currently going in heavy in the conspiracists on facebook, all power to him, he's not having it - but he's also part of a paranormal investigations/ghost hunting thing, has been for at least a decade. Funny old world.

 

[Part 2]

I always think conspiracy types are the same sort of people in knew late 80s who would enlighten everyone with their knowledge of Nostradamus and Mother Shipton.

 

[Idris2002]

Surely if you had multiple heads it would increase brain power. I reckon anyway.

Look at TV favourite Zaphod Beeblebrox, for example.

 

[Dogsauce]

Its a long time ago now but I do remember a lot of stuff about crop circles and yetis and stuff

Even though I don’t remember it being heavily loony, just the subject matters (even when reviewed sceptical) may have drawn people to have an interest in those areas, and easy enough to fall down a rabbit hole. Just seemed to be part of the background culture at the time with the people I hung out with. And remember a lot of loons think of themselves as sceptical, think they are the debunkers seeing through the fallacy of ‘truth’.

 

[campanula]

My next door neighbour (in Brighton, obvs) used to advertise in FT as a 'Genuine Seer'. He did breast readings. I kid you not. Mostly though, he scammed the gullible with runes with a bit of gropology on the side.
Also lived in a skanky junkie squat in Camden (1973), full of Aleister Crowley types who wore cloaks and referred to themselves as Frater Aviorth (sp?) and other made-up titles.
Currently, another neighbour insists satanists are spying on him, life is in danger because of 'what he knows' (such as a secret code to the traffic lights). And my own daughter still spouts some astrological guff. What a world..

 

[campanula]

dbl post (nitwit)

 

[8ball]

They do investigate that stuff but it’s mostly to debunk

Really? It must have changed in the intervening years.

 

[two sheds]

I mainly remember things like places raining frogs

 

[Orang Utan]

Really? It must have changed in the intervening years.

No, it’s still the same - researching unexplained phenomena with scepticism. That’s their ethos

 

[8ball]

No, it’s still the same - researching unexplained phenomena with scepticism. That’s their ethos

Fair enough. The people I knew who read it were loons.

 

[Saul Goodman]

Really? It must have changed in the intervening years.

It was never about research when I saw it many moons ago. It was guff about Alien abductions and crop circles, with no hint of scepticism.

 

[Orang Utan]

Not true

 

[8ball]

It was never about research when I saw it many moons ago. It was guff about Alien abductions and crop circles, with no hint of scepticism.

Wiki articles etc. seem to back up the idea of a benignly sceptical stance (with a couple of noted aberration over the decades).
I can't comment directly.

 

[Orang Utan]

An important part of the magazine is the letters pages which do have a lot of kooks writing in, but mostly they’re robust and informative disagreement. It’s never made big claims about aliens or anytime and many of the weirdest articles conclude that the phenomenon described could be ascribed to mass hysteria

 

[Lurdan]

My take on Forteanism would be slightly different. Charles Fort himself presented stuff quite deadpan - "Here's weird stuff which there isn't an obvious explanation for. Make of it what you will". 'Forteanism' contains different schools. One approaches stuff from a essentially sceptical perspective, but one that is far less strident than the rather tiresome 'ME ME ME' stuff produced by Celebrity Skeptics, Debunkers and Atheists. Another school just 'presents' 'interesting' stuff without any commentary and leaves it entirely to the reader. Within the latter school sometimes the choice of subject matter - often whatever is currently fashionable amongst shitheads - could be read as a kind of vanilla 'pandering' to shitheadedness.

But generally Forteanism's strength/weakness is that it leaves the reader space to make their own mind up.

This can raise dark suspicions among some middle-class types of the kind who, for example, stridently insist that the lower strata of society aren't thick, but that instead they just need 'guidance', be it by presenting stuff in a way that makes the 'right way' to read it 'nice and simple', or in the form of little accompanying sermons. Or by preventing them from being 'confused' by discouraging access to stuff. It flows from all the middle-class 'concern' about what 'sort' of person would be interested in 'this kind of thing'.

I was having a good chuckle about the discussion on this thread last night about who would watch Icke or Trump videos and what this might lead them into. At this very moment I'm leaning back against some bookshelves stuffed with the category I think of as 'old bollocks'. Conspiracy theory crap, Satanic Panic nonsense, occult idiocy, cult shit, far and extreme right and antisemitic filth. Not just books about them, a small (but perfectly formed) collection of the texts themselves. What has this turned me into

Well my interest derived from the same impulse that made me a teenage horror film fan. Bizarre shit can be entertaining - who knew. And as I became interested in politics the other dimensions of this stuff only made it more interesting still. I approach pretty much everything from a glass half empty perspective. I don't have a problem seeing that stuff is comic or absurd or 'entertaining' (if only in a very black way), but then I also don't have a problem seeing that the very same stuff can also be repulsive, and express unacceptable viewpoints. But of course I would say that wouldn't I

How many dreadful slasher movies can somebody watch and not turn into a raving psycho? In my case, and in the case of most horror film fans, the answer is "how many have you got". (If you asked a different question about how many you could watch without turning into a dreadful fucking bore the answer would of course be rather different). The same is true of reading conspiraloon texts or texts about weird shit. Personally a little of David Icke goes a very very long way, but if the only choice was that or such middle-class bonding rituals as 'football appreciation', or celebrity gossip about Labour Party functionaries I guess I'd just have to put up with it

And if that other stuff floats your boat why not. I suppose it might lead you down a rabbit hole in which you believed a Labour Government might do something other than shit on anyone who wasn't middle class, but just believing in unicorns isn't dangerous. The problem starts when you begin dressing up as one.

 

[Saul Goodman]

just believing in unicorns isn't dangerous. The problem starts when you begin dressing up as one.

Or having sex with them.

 

[William of Walworth]

My next door neighbour (in Brighton, obvs) used to advertise in FT as a 'Genuine Seer'. He did breast readings. I kid you not. Mostly though, he scammed the gullible with runes with a bit of gropology on the side.
Also lived in a skanky junkie squat in Camden (1973), full of Aleister Crowley types who wore cloaks and referred to themselves as Frater Aviorth (sp?) and other made-up titles.
Currently, another neighbour insists satanists are spying on him, life is in danger because of 'what he knows' (such as a secret code to the traffic lights). And my own daughter still spouts some astrological guff. What a world..

What quantity of strong beer/strong weed/acid/mushrooms/pills and so forth do they intake?

Just asking!

 

[editor]

I'm watching this now. This Brian Rose bloke sounds well dodgy.

 

[existentialist]

I'm watching this now. This Brian Rose bloke sounds well dodgy.

What a very, very boring man.

 

[editor]

What a very, very boring man.

Who the presenter? Or Brian Rose?

The video above isn't laden with bells and whistles but it does a good job of exposing the very dubious funding being used by Brian Rose and London Real.

 

[AmateurAgitator]

What a very, very boring man.

Thats the thing, it's very mediocre if anything and anything interesting Icke has to say is stuff other people have come up with, such as talking about the 1%.

 

[existentialist]

Who the presenter? Or Brian Rose?

The video above isn't laden with bells and whistles but it does a good job of exposing the very dubious funding being used by Brian Rose and London Real.

Whoever it was burbling on about "truth" in the first 3 minutes. That's as far as I got: self-regarding stupid isn't a good vibe for me

 

[gentlegreen]

Brian Rose drinks his own piss apparently.

As for Icke, just how dull does someone have to be to be impressed by him ?

 

[krtek a houby]

I mainly remember things like places raining frogs

I remember that from Arthur C Clarke's Mysterious World. Loved all that thing, back then. Anything on UFOs, Bigfoot... Then briefly the Fortean Times and Robert Anton Wilson.

 

[gentlegreen]

Scary to remember how"open" we were in the 70s to ESP and all sorts of bollocks...in my defence I was only a teenager...

 

[phillm]

I'm watching this now. This Brian Rose bloke sounds well dodgy.

We've all got far too much time on our hands....