BBC NEWS: Are conspiracy theories destroying democracy?

[centreoflight]

Beloveds,
the mainstreem media is exposed, specially the BBC after the Jimmy Savile Scandal.
Now the BBC is telling that tell conspiracy facts are all crazy and paranoied.
Here is the article:


http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-24650841

The more information we have about what governments and corporations are up to the less we seem to trust them. Will conspiracy theories eventually destroy democracy?

What if I told you I had conclusive proof that the moon landings were faked, but I had been told to keep it under wraps by my BBC bosses acting under orders from the CIA, NSA and MI6. Most of you would think I had finally lost my mind.

But, for some, that scenario - a journalist working for a mainstream media organisation being manipulated by shadowy forces to keep vital information from the public - would seem entirely plausible, or even likely.

We live in a golden age for conspiracy theories. There is a growing assumption that everything we are told by the authorities is wrong, or not quite as it seems. That the truth is being manipulated or obscured by powerful vested interests.

And, in some cases, it is.
'Inside job'

"The reason we have conspiracy theories is that sometimes governments and organisations do conspire," says Observer columnist and academic John Naughton.

It would be wrong to write off all conspiracy theorists as "swivel-eyed loons," with "poor personal hygiene and halitosis," he told a Cambridge University Festival of Ideas debate.

They are not all "crazy". The difficult part, for those of us trying to make sense of a complex world, is working out which parts of the conspiracy theory to keep and which to throw away.

Mr Naughton is one of three lead investigators in a major new Cambridge University project to investigate the impact of conspiracy theories on democracy.

The internet is generally assumed to be the main driving force behind the growth in conspiracy theories but, says Mr Naughton, there has been little research into whether that is really the case.

He plans to compare internet theories on 9/11 with pre-internet theories about John F Kennedy's assassination.

Like the other researchers, he is wary, or perhaps that should be weary, of delving into the darker recesses of the conspiracy world.

"The minute you get into the JFK stuff, and the minute you sniff at the 9/11 stuff, you begin to lose the will to live," he told the audience in Cambridge.

Like Sir Richard Evans, who heads the five-year Conspiracy and Democracy project, he is at pains to stress that the aim is not to prove or disprove particular theories, simply to study their impact on culture and society.

Why are we so fascinated by them? Are they undermining trust in democratic institutions?

David Runciman, professor of politics at Cambridge University, the third principal investigator, is keen to explode the idea that most conspiracies are actually "cock-ups".

"The line between cock-up, conspiracy and conspiracy theory are much more blurred than the conventional view that you have got to choose between them," he told the Festival of Ideas.

"There's a conventional view that you get these conspirators, who are these kind of sinister, malign people who know what they are doing, and the conspiracy theorists, who occasionally stumble upon the truth but who are on the whole paranoid and crazy.

"Actually the conspirators are often the paranoid and crazy conspiracy theorists, because in their attempt to cover up the cock-up they get drawn into a web in which their self-justification posits some giant conspiracy trying to expose their conspiracy.

"And I think that's consistently true through a lot of political scandals, Watergate included."
'Curry house plot'

It may also be true, he argues, of the "vicious" in-fighting and plotting that characterised New Labour's years in power, as recently exposed in the memoirs of Gordon Brown's former spin doctor Damian McBride.

The Brownite conspiracies to remove Tony Blair were "pathetically ineffectual" - with the exception of the 2006 "curry house" plot that forced Blair to name a departure date - but the picture painted by Mr McBride of a "paranoid" and "chaotic" inner circle has the ring of truth about it, he claims.
Gordon Brown Gordon Brown was a keen student of conspiracy theories

And Mr Brown - said to be a keen student of the JFK assassination - knew a conspiracy when he saw one.

"You feel he sees conspiracies out there because he has a mindset that is not dissimilar to the conspiracy theorists," said Prof Runciman.

He is also examining whether the push for greater openness and transparency in public life will fuel, rather than kill off, conspiracy theories.

"It may be that one of the things conspiracy theories feed on as well as silence, is a surfeit of information. And when there is a mass of information out there, it becomes easier for people to find their way through to come to the conclusion they want to come to.

"Plus, you don't have to be an especial cynic to believe that, in the age of open government, governments will be even more careful to keep secret the things they want to keep secret.

"The demand for openness always produces, as well as more openness, more secrecy."

Which brings us back to the moon landings. I should state, for the avoidance of any doubt, and to kill off any internet speculation, that I am not in possession of any classified information about whether they were faked or not. My contacts at Nasa are not that good.

But then I would say that wouldn't I?

[ulli]

This is quite healthy. Anything that opens discussions on the subject ought to be welcomed.

The main question that ought to asked here is who is behind the investigation of those theories?
The more prominent and established a person is in the world out there, the more they have to lose,
and the less likely they are to look into questions the answers of which might knock over their apple cart.
This even includes journalists and writers who have made a name as someone who questions, and carved out a niche for themselves. How far they will go with their questioning is then what this is about.
If Julian Assange has decided that his life is about maintaining a certain degree of credibility
and also can see that the immense impact that exposing ET cover ups would have on society
would not be in the best interest of all of humanity, then that is his right.
Not all disclosure is appropriate, all at once. I just saw the most awful pictures of an African elephant that was left lying to die after poachers cut the front of his face off with a chainsaw...there is simply no way I would pass that picture on to others...just being told about it in writing gives a big enough shock to many.

It's important to use one's judgement in these matters. Anyway, this article is a good start, IMHO.

Good quote below, and I have seen this to be true with people I know, who are in no position to figure out a new course in life where this knowledge is part of their paradigm. Let them sleep a little longer, at least until their kids are out of school.



"The minute you get into the JFK stuff, and the minute you sniff at the 9/11 stuff, you begin to lose the will to live," he told the audience in Cambridge"

[Asyloth]

Yeah that was to foresee, they're making everything upside down, so now that they're exposed they're trying to make those who are saving the planet look like they're destroying it. And those that are destroying it for those who are saving it -_- These people are so sick that just looking at them makes you feel sick.

[ghostrider]

The TRUTH about some leaders and their actions is what will destroy democracy , we expect them to honor social contracts and work with the good of all in mind, not the good of their personal wealth and ego ... Not to mention take extra care not to destroy our PLANET with their actions or agendas ... When their loyalities lie with secret groups or corporations instead of the country and it's citizens , then houston we have a problem , thus THEY create a term called conspiracy to cover their evil steps ...

[Wind]

What democracy, I might ask? Most if not all of us are living in a plutocracy.

[ghostrider]

What democracy, I might ask? Most if not all of us are living in a plutocracy.

we here in the U.S. do live in a sort of tyranny, I am forced to buy something I cannot afford and if I don't they will fine me ...either way I pay ...

[Corncrake]

5_ZsftZ9GCM

I remember some years ago before Cameron became Prime Minister he was asked the UFO question. He turned it into a joke and the audience tittered as conditioned by years of the BBC making references to 'little green men', etc. This is what happens with most conspiracy theories - they are ridiculed and humans do not like being embarrassed or laughed at (at least unintentionally).

David Aaronovitch (a regular Times columnist) wrote Voodoo Histories debunking conspiracy theories a few years ago and I forced myself to read it as away of being forearmed when confronted by some of my more cynical aquaintances. I found some of his arguments to be cherry picking at best but really the main thrust of the book is clearly to rubbish conspiracy theorists.

Most ideas are labelled conspiracy theories because they are in areas politicians and their controllers do not want us to go - there is too much at stake - but we must continue to ask the questions. Embarrass them more than they embarrass us.

[aranuk]

The TRUTH about some leaders and their actions is what will destroy democracy , we expect them to honor social contracts and work with the good of all in mind, not the good of their personal wealth and ego ... Not to mention take extra care not to destroy our PLANET with their actions or agendas ... When their loyalities lie with secret groups or corporations instead of the country and it's citizens , then houston we have a problem , thus THEY create a term called conspiracy to cover their evil steps ...

I agree Ghostrider. Where is the democracy when our elected representatives ignore our welfare and they take money from lobbyists from abroad or at home which results in damaging the welfare we are supposed to be receiving from them. This way parliament or congress is there only for the rich people. There is as much corruption going on in British politics as there is in US politics, but the British politician is way much more sneaky. The corrupt politician hides behind the lies and when their lies are being exposed to the public's attention their last resort at hiding is when they draw the Conspiracy Theory card, the one where the accuser is labelled a nut case. A clever trick they use these days more and more. The more you hear in the Mainstream Media conspiracy theorist the more likelihood they are being found out about their crimes.

Stan

[Etherios]

You all miss the point ... ITS VERY ACCURATE ... conspiracy theories are destroying the "Democracy" of today (AKA Oligarchy/elitism/corporatism etc). Its true that conspiracies expose to the people the other side of the fake stories they try to push down our throats.

Todays "Democracy" has nothing to do with demos (people) of the old Ancient Greek Democracy. Different times and different human mentality but still on those times the citizens had a voice for EVERYTHING that was decided. Many decisions were wrong ofc but at least it was after the majority vote and not cause someone in a closed door room decided to do so. The politicians of that age had to pay themselves and be servants of the people ... not the other way like today. Not perfect but ... hugely better than todays "democracy".

SO why all the fuzz ... the BBC is actually telling the truth for the first time.

[Sabrina]

I´ve read that the term ´conspiracy theory´was first created by the CIA at the time of the JFK assassination. Go figure... probably the most successful propaganda in the world :)...

And that professor seems to be missing the point when he says once he delves into so called conspiracy theories like that of JFK and 9/11 he loses the will to live. Shouldn´t he be outraged at what´s really happening - or would he lose his nice juicy academic grant...

[jackovesk]

Didn't even need to read the BBC article because the 'Headline'...


Are 'Conspiracy Theories' destroying democracy?

Tells you just 1 simple thing...

The PTW are well & Truly on the back-foot...

...and


We are (WINNING) the 'Information War'...:yes4: :yes4: :yes4:

The PTW's game is already (UP - PERIOD!!!) the arseholes just haven't accepted it yet..!!! :)

[Rocky_Shorz]

Will conspiracy theories eventually destroy democracy?



cut the whole article down to one sentence...

will truths eventually destroy Democracy...

does democracy depend on lies to survive?

[Akasha]

"The minute you get into the JFK stuff, and the minute you sniff at the 9/11 stuff, you begin to lose the will to live," he told the audience in Cambridge.

This is the crux of the article and the prime message Auntie Beeb, queen of programming, will be wanting to get across.

The irony, not surprisingly is that the truth of the matter is quite the opposite being that the information serves to empower the individual: a personal state which will always be discouraged by those in power.

[sigma6]

The TRUTH about some leaders and their actions is what will destroy democracy , we expect them to honor social contracts and work with the good of all in mind, not the good of their personal wealth and ego ... Not to mention take extra care not to destroy our PLANET with their actions or agendas ... When their loyalities lie with secret groups or corporations instead of the country and it's citizens , then houston we have a problem , thus THEY create a term called conspiracy to cover their evil steps ...

I'll second that... but I am laughing all the way... haha looks like we got their attention... the old media vacuum technique just doesn't work anymore... they can't spread around enough bribes, and they can't intimidate and kill enough people anymore... and they have less and less money every day to keep doing it... what's a government crime syndicate to do? They have to fall back on propaganda, and they are losing that war on the internet... Thugs are ultimately soulless materialists... they CAN'T see what is happening on the 'conscious spiritual' front... anyone feeling any pity for them? (NOT!)

btw... reading from the responses, I am proud to be an Avalonian !!! brimming right now.... cheers to all my brothers in peace and truth...

and I will honestly say I did the same jackovesk, I didn't even read it either, (maybe later when I am bored...)

[norman]

Losing the will to live is just a stage you go through before you find a reason to carry on with a will for truth.

That smug Proff' has got to decide if he's going to hang on to the fakery that passes for intellect, or get his priorities sorted for the long haul out of this mess.

He finds comfort in an audience that laughs along with his decapitated intellect. A comfort that will become increasingly hollow.

[jackovesk]

Any article the MSM doesn't pen is always a 'Conspiracy Theory' to them...:yes4:

[EYES WIDE OPEN]

Sibel Edmonds spills the beans on who is behind this research and article:

http://www.boilingfrogspost.com/2013/10/29/conspiracy-theorists-are-the-greatest-challenge-to-democracy-according-to-heres-who/


British establishment mouthpiece BBC leads the way again. This time it is about the biggest threat to democracy today. No, it is not terrorists. No, it is not Islamism. And, no, it is not the Western-Installed Dictator Regimes around the world. No, no, no, no, no. The new enemy is the conspiracy theorists. It is those who question their governments. It is those who find facts and confront the mainstream lies and liars such as BBC. Basically, it is you … and me.

Allow me to wade through all the fillers and present you with a few telling excerpts from this BBC report:

Are conspiracy theories destroying democracy?

The more information we have about what governments and corporations are up to the less we seem to trust them. Will conspiracy theories eventually destroy democracy?

…

Mr. Naughton is one of three lead investigators in a major new Cambridge University project to investigate the impact of conspiracy theories on democracy.

…

David Runciman, professor of politics at Cambridge University, the third principal investigator, is keen to explode the idea that most conspiracies are actually “cock-ups”.

…

“Actually the conspirators are often the paranoid and crazy conspiracy theorists, because in their attempt to cover up the cock-up they get drawn into a web in which their self-justification posits some giant conspiracy trying to expose their conspiracy. “And I think that’s consistently true through a lot of political scandals, Watergate included.”

…

He is also examining whether the push for greater openness and transparency in public life will fuel, rather than kill off, conspiracy theories… “It may be that one of the things conspiracy theories feed on as well as silence, is a surfeit of information. And when there is a mass of information out there, it becomes easier for people to find their way through to come to the conclusion they want to come to.

…

What are they really talking about? What are they really presenting? A few things.

1- Challenging official stories, no matter how the record and history proves them to be false or exaggerated, lowers trust in government and government officials. This is a threat to the establishment and their operations through states. Thus, this is a threat to democracy. That is, if you believe that the state, the government, represents democracy. It means government equals democracy, thus, you are challenging democracy every time you challenge your government and what your government is telling you.

2- These guys, these credible Cambridge professors, claim that openness, the internet, and greater information accessibility creates more conspiracies and conspiracy theorists.

3- Now, if you add item 2 to item 1, you get this: Openness and greater information accessibility leads to more conspiracies and increases the number of conspiracy theorists, and that my friend presents the greatest threat to our democracy today.

Wow. Oh, wow. I am not going to even bother with the logical fallacies imbedded in the points made by these distinguished professors. Of course I won’t bother with BBC and its reputation and consistency when it comes to representing the establishment. Instead, I am going to get down and check out the source of funding for these academic hit-men.

Now, that was easy. I checked out Cambridge and this conspiracy theorist oriented research program, and I found the source of its funding right away:

Professor David Runciman is part of a new Leverhulme-funded interdisciplinary, collaborative project on conspiracy theories at the University of Cambridge.

Here is a short canned background on Leverhulme Trust:

The Leverhulme Trust was established in 1925 under the will of the First Viscount Leverhulme, William Hesketh Lever, with the instruction that its resources should be used to support “scholarships for the purposes of research and education.” Since that time, the Trust has provided funding for research projects, fellowships, studentships, bursaries and prizes; it operates across all the academic disciplines, the intention being to support talented individuals as they realize their personal vision in research and professional training. With annual funding of some £50 million, the Trust is amongst the largest all-subject providers of research funding in the UK.

…

From the canned background I moved to the fund’s founder, William Lever, and a few noteworthy points got my attention:

He began manufacturing Sunlight Soap and built a business empire with many well-known brands. He was an advocate for expansion of the British Empire, particularly in Africa and Asia, which supplied palm oil, a key ingredient in Lever’s product line.

…

Lever was involved with freemasonry and by 1902 was first initiate to a lodge bearing his name, William Hesketh Lever Lodge No. 2916, he later formed Leverhulme Lodge 4438. He saw freemasonry as a tool to reinforce the hierarchy within Lever Brothers…

…

In the early 1900s Lever was using palm oil produced in the British West African colonies. When he encountered difficulties in obtaining more palm plantation concessions, he started looking elsewhere in other colonies. In 1911, Lever visited the Belgian Congo to take advantage of cheap labour and palm oil concessions in that country. Lever’s attitudes towards the Congolese were paternalistic and by today’s standards, racist, and his negotiations with the Belgian coloniser to enforce the system known as travail forcé (forced labour) are well documented in the book ‘Lord Leverhulme’s Ghosts,’ in which the author states: “Leverhulme set up a private kingdom reliant on the horrific Belgian system of forced labour, a program that reduced the population of Congo by half and accounted for more deaths than the Nazi holocaust.” As such, he participated in this system of formalised labour…

…

You see, when you read about William Lever and Leverhulme Trust’s background things start making more sense. Don’t they?

William Lever was a high-level Freemason and very committed to the secret society. The kind of commitment Freemasonry demanded:

Regular Freemasonry has in its core ritual a formal obligation: to be quiet and peaceable citizens, true to the lawful government of the country in which they live, and not to countenance disloyalty or rebellion.[12] A Freemason makes a further obligation, before being made Master of his Lodge, to pay a proper respect to the civil magistrates

You see, those who challenge the establishment are also challenging the core of Freemasonry. No?

Lever was an avid advocate for expansion of the British Empire, particularly in Africa and Asia. Have you ever come across an imperialist who was keen on activists challenging the establishment, aka conspiracy theorists who challenge establishment-packaged information (propaganda)? I haven’t. Not one.

Lever was an enforcer of a system known as travail forcé, forced labour, in colonies where his business ripped the resources (Labor and agriculture). Back then, as it is today, moguls like Lever thrived based on their close partnerships with their imperial governments: colonization. What does that mean? It means, for imperialist business moguls like Lever, any challenge to the empires, challenging and questioning the imperial propaganda, equals a challenge to the empire’s business partners such as Lever.

Now, with all the above, do you see how a handful of Leverhulme funded pea-brain academics spend millions of dollars to paint those who challenge imperial governments’ misinformation as conspiracy theorists who present a great threat to democracy? Do you see how these conspirators easily grab spots under the spotlights of the imperial media machine-such as BBC?

Please take notice of another highly important fact about this entire operation: They, the establishment, must be getting extremely nervous and threatened to put on such a goofy show with even goofier players via the ultimately goofy outlet BBC. That, my friends, is really good news for the conspiracy theorists … you … and me.

[Corncrake]

Thanks for posting E-W-O. Sibel Edmonds is always worth listening to and it is good to have someone doing the research I am often, at worst, too lazy or, at best, too busy to do. The internet has provided an immediately accessible library and a platform for people to speak their truths. Pre-internet days and you would have had to have been a full time researcher at the library to reach the material we have access to today. Yes, they must be getting nervous.