All of the latest happenings in Boston are pinging my conspiracy radar.
If I speak to my family about it, they will say " The end of the world is nigh, repent! And blah blah blah

My art friends will say " eff the gubbernment."

Something about seeing armored vehicles rolling down the streets with mounted machine guns freaks me the hell out..

So, I'm asking you all, because there are a variety of viewpoints I value here.
I'm having a cog dis? Or some other moment of wtf.

What are your thoughts on the latest in Boston, Texas, and the aftermath?

Not sure what I'm trying to say... I am ambivalent. See screen name

You know, I think the world is a scary place. I think it has been that way during most of humanity's sojourn on this earth. It's just the way it is.

We kind of fool ourselves into thinking otherwise and then are shocked when reality intrudes.

I don't know why thinking in this way seems to help me, but it does.

Let me take a shot at this.

The "Government" upset that the "Government" didn't pass the right gun control bill has created a disaster to show how horrible people are and how much we need the "Government' to take care of us.

How's that?

I hate stupid bullshit, and I get very upset at conspiracy theories.

Every time I hear people say that I think...good thing it's not thousands of years ago. I think battles and killing and raping etc, etc. were a lot worse thousands of years ago up until even fairly recently. In a way, it seems to have gotten a lot better.

I agree that overall, with the exception of nuclear weapons proliferating, we are safer now.

What skews our perception is that we are inundated with every kind of story about stupid or hateful people that in the past, we would never have heard of.

The news said there are 9,000 armed police on the ground in Mass.

no conspiricay here..but that sure sounds like a police state to

me but what do I know.

I think what differentiates it is what that power is used for. It's only used when needed - like tracking down terrorists - not to prevent free speech, etc. But clearly the potential is there...



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 04/19/2013 04:14PM by The Oncoming Storm - bc.

Some people (including posters on rfm) are in some major denial about what is happening in USA today. :)

I can't talk about it here though, as this is not a USGuv approved "free speech zone". Besides, none of us really wants to think or hear about international genocide, do we?

"Something's happening here, what it is ain't exactly clear. There's a man with a gun over there, telling me I got to beware". (Steve Stills, "For What It's Worth")

wake up, Truman...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WhN1STep_zk&feature=player_embedded

Here's a link to a site seeking live actors for roles in "live action, real world security drills" performed by DHS, the military, and other intelligence and police agencies. See link in post above for context in digital media productions.

http://crisisactors.org/

Some people can't see the forest for the trees.

I think Will Ferrell summed it up in a tweet.

"I feel so blessed that the government protects my wife and me from the dangers of gay marriage so we can safely go buy some assault weapons."

Lol

The most likely answer is these were a couple of brothers who had a vendetta against society and thought they were making a point for some cause.

If it were a government conspiracy it would have done them no good to find the suspects.

Additionally they would have had to plant people there to get their photos taken and then later kill those people. Not likely.

Humans doing horrible stuff like this to other humans is nothing new and certainly not a sign of the end of times. The Israelites in the Bible did this kind of stuff to their neighbors and even themselves all the time.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 04/19/2013 04:09PM by The Oncoming Storm - bc.

Ok. Thank you. I had a moment of... Something there. I appreciate your feedback. I wonder when that bullshit churchco programming will disappear? I'm in recovery. Don't judge:)



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 04/19/2013 04:02PM by ambivalent exmo.

That's one of the other insideous aspects of the church's programming. They make your world soooo small that you can't see straight. It's hard to take a broad view when everything is scary, confusing, and insensible.

The reality is this. Two men decided to make a statement and become infamous by murdering innocent people. After the fact, law inforcement officials have to step in and find the men before more innocent people are killed. It's their job and there is no conspiricy going on. It's very straight forward.

Devoted Exmo Wrote:
>
> The reality is this. Two men decided to make a
> statement and become infamous by murdering
> innocent people. After the fact, law inforcement
> officials have to step in and find the men before
> more innocent people are killed. It's their job
> and there is no conspiricy going on. It's very
> straight forward."

That's YOUR reality. Perhaps your comfort zone requires things to be "straight forward".

One reason I love Rfm: I can get honest viewpoints/perspectives from other people.

I get that some think my question is strange or stupid. Remember living in a world complety upside down from reality, aka-the cult? The universe tilted on its head once I found out it was all bullshit.
I think I'm a reasonably intelligent person, therefore: I recognise that my notions of what is "real" and True, have been seriously fucked up. I'm attempting to educate myself out of my old mindset. It's been a year, but I'm still learning.
Asking for differing viewpoints and perspectives, reading, researching multiple sides to an issue, are helping me find my feet.

I don't think I am the only one who feels a bit shaky on this point. But: if I am, I can live with that, LOL



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 04/19/2013 06:44PM by ambivalent exmo.

I doubt that many here would find your question strange or stupid. Many of us have been where you are and know what it is like trying to figure out reality for the first time. We know conspiracies do exist: watergate anyone? But, when we are first trying to be rational and logical about things that we were only emotional about before, it can be difficult to know reality when our emotions are screaming at us something different.

When I am confused this way, I write things down. First I write down what I feel. Then I write down the facts of the situation. Not my interpretation of the facts, just the facts. Usually by doing so, I can see what is real and what is imagined. Good Luck.

There have been mass killings for a very long time. Remember that time that someone gave humanity free will / agency then mass killed millions of people (drowned them) for not using their free will the way he wanted them to use it? I'm trying to remember who that was...

But, yeah - mass killings have been around for a very long time. Not a sign of the end of the world.

I think the over-reaction by the government in Boston is more a result of seeing this as a great opportunity for some real-life training, mixed with paranoia from the american people in general. We don't like high-profile killers (human or not) and will invest vastly more into weeding them out than we will against low-profile or low-scale killers. The media plays a big role there. It's just how humans operate.

Cheer up, yould live in Iraq. Bombs go off there every week, hardly even makes the news anymore. The thing with conspiracy theorists is that they take themselves and their little world way too seriously. Try to zoom out once in a while, take a broader view. There is life outside the western world.

You don't need to embrace conspiracy theories to see that, by their own admission, the government failed, on 9/11 and during the Boston Marathon, to stop one single bad thing from happening. I suppose that someone who is pro-government could argue that by simply being there as a threat to the "bad guys," the government stopped those events from being worse. However, like conspiracy theorists, they will be unable to furnish any proof.

You also don't need to be a conspiracy theorist to see that the government, by its own admission, has slaughtered more than 1 million people in the Middle East and counting, yet very few Americans give a damn. That's fairly plain.

I think it's pretty healthy to realize that the "government" cannot read minds very well and cannot stop evil people intent on hurting others. There are sensible things that can be done to help prevent some bad things, but not everything.

As to the slaughter in the mid-east, many people were very much against us going in, but there was too much desire on the part of the "government" at the time to do it. And many others wouldn't stand up to it for fear of loosing their carreers. They'd rather not do the right thing and keep eating from the gravy train.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 04/19/2013 07:18PM by Devoted Exmo.

Devoted Exmo Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I think it's pretty healthy to realize that the
> "government" cannot read minds very well and
> cannot stop evil people intent on hurting others.
> There are sensible things that can be done to help
> prevent some bad things, but not everything.

If your comment is true, then I fail to see how "healthy" it is for "government" to tax and spend literally tens of trillions of dollars on missile shields and emplacements, nuclear deterrents, multitudes of air force and other military bases and people to staff them, super communications systems and intelligence centers, etc. etc., only to have an attack like 9/11, wherein NO air force planes or missiles were able to do squat to stop jets from crossing our air space and crashing into the WTC and Pentagon. How then is the entire military-industrial complex in any way "healthy" or "sensible"?

About as "sensible" as bombing Iraq, after an alleged attack by Saudis...

Don't really have a really good grasp on just how our air defense systems and the civilian air traffic control system worked in this country circa 2001 do you?

Do you?

Your grammar is vague and ambiguous here, so I am not really sure what you are trying to say. Are you disputing the basic facts I have stated?

hello Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Do you?
>
> Your grammar is vague and ambiguous here, so I am
> not really sure what you are trying to say. Are
> you disputing the basic facts I have stated?

You made the statement that all the money that was spent on defense systems, intelligence, etc that was spent by the "government" was wasted as "herein NO air force planes or missiles were able to do squat to stop jets from crossing our air space and crashing into the WTC and Pentagon".

My statement was a vague rebuttal that neither our domestic air defense system nor the civilian air traffic control system were designed to counter such a threat as of 2001.

And yes I do understand both the domestic air defense system and the civilian air traffic control system and the design thereof as I was a part of one and used and relied on the other for several years prior to 2001. The attacks carried out were very ingenious in that they exploited weaknesses that were never envisioned prior to 9/11.

Most people are just good people trying to make a living and living the best way they know how to.

When you watch the news, the focus is all on the worst of the lot, so that you get the idea that there are way more bad guys out there than there are.

And with 24-hour per day newscasts now, they just go crazy when there's a big news story happening. We're over-saturated with the stuff.

I pretty much bop along accepting things at face value. DH, especially now that he feels he has stripped the LDS scales from his eyes is always on alert for all the other ways that someone is trying to pull the wool over his eyes. He looks a lot at the "conspiracy" theories and is always trying to judge where reality lies. Some of the ideas he shares with me I can see "holes" in - as in there are a lot of other explanations I can see that would or could explain some things. Other ideas are interesting. They very well could be reality. Or at least a part of reality.

To me that is the hard thing about truth. I think that is the problem with trying to have a conversation with a TBM. We each have our own version of truth based on our experiences, the sources we have researched, our biases, what we are willing to consider, etc. For example, those who have looked at polygamy from a FAIR/FARMS viewpoint versus those who look at it from an RFM viewpoint both think they know THE TRUTH. There is this spectrum of truth, with shades on either end that are blatantly false - but still to someone they are true. Where is reality? It is so hard to pin down.

I guess I'm just saying you have to be willing to look at a lot of different ideas. Where is the truth? It is probably a mixture of a lot of different truths. Looking to deep may draw you into some wacky worm holes. Looking too shallow may make you a tool for the system. I'm trying to be less of a tool - remember, I like to bop along, taking it all in at face value. At the same time, I don't want to jump down the rabbit hole and become a tool for some other agenda. I just try the best I can to apply the critical thinking skills that helped me find my way out of the church.

I agree with bc's statement above; I think that the Tsarnaev brothers planned and carried out this crime largely or entirely by themselves.

I do think, however, that the federal government (and many state governments as well) use any opportunity they can get to put on a show of force. Tragedies and large-scale crimes such as the Boston bombing are a showcase for them--they know the media will be on the scene and that other countries are watching our response for signs of disarray or weakness.

"There has been more change since 1992 than in the previous thousand years. Change is accelerating. Invention, connection, adumbration of ideas, mathematical algorithms, connectivity of people, social systems, this is all accelerating furiously, and under the control of no one – not the Catholic church, the community party, the IMF, no one is in charge of this process!

This is what makes history so interesting: it’s a runaway freight train on a dark and stormy night!

This is why I’m not particularly sympathetic to conspiracy theory – because I can’t make the leap of faith that would cause you to believe anyone could get hold of the beast enough to control it! – I mean, conspiracies, of course, we have conspiracies up the kazoo; but none of them are succeeding! – they’re all being swept away, compromised, astonished by new information, and endlessly agonised!"

- Terence Mckenna

Hey, I'm offended by those who are offended by conspiracy theory fans. I'm a conspiracy theory fan. More precisely, I like to hear/read alternative explanations to official explanations. That's exactly how I got out of the cult in the first place.

How can one not be at least interested in alternative explanations when one learns how any government can lie and cover up? This is especially true when it results in geo-political cloak and dagger and upheavals in just this century alone. History attests to this: WMD, Saddam, Khomeini, CIA, Black Ops, Iran Contra, Watergate, JFK<Lee Harvey Oswald<Jack Ruby, Blackwater, Wall Street, etc. in no particular order. Things that just boggle the mind, many bald faced lies, half truths and non-revelations.

That being said, take everything with a grain of salt, follow your gut feel when something doesn't sound right, and patiently wait for the truth to be revealed all the while keeping a cool head. Frankly, the Boston Marathon Bombing and subsequent hunt and capture of the perps unfolds like an episode of any cop tv show we've ever watched. We all want this to be solved and case closed, again like our favorite cop show. It's too pat, too neat, too much like a script. Something ain't right here.

I'm a skeptic about everything until I get good info, so that includes both sides of an issue. I don't automatically believe or disbelieve the media, govt. or conspiracy enthusiasts until I get more info, and some things can never be determined accurately because that good evidence never arrives. It's best not to make unwarranted conclusions about anything. If everybody thought like I'm trying to, there never would have been TSCC or any cults, etc.