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Yeah I guess those things don’t really strike me as conspiracies, like I guess they fit the technical definition in some ways especially if they’re deemed illeg
by dools 5y ago
Yeah I guess those things don’t really strike me as conspiracies, like I guess they fit the technical definition in some ways especially if they’re deemed illegal but just because a program is covert doesn’t make it a conspiracy. It might just be a dumb or poorly executed idea (although I suppose also “harm” may be in the eye of the beholder)
- Joeboy 5y agoMaybe it's an age difference thing (I'm old), but to me MKULTRA feels like the absolute archetype of "conspiracy theory" material. I'm fairly sure that's how it was regarded before the Church Committee investigation, and to a large extent afterwards. I think if you were applying the "real conspiracies are boring" heuristic you'd have dismissed it pretty quickly. Edit: There's a bit in Jon Ronson's Them: Adventures with Extremists, where he hangs out with Alex Jones, who tells him about secret events where powerful men don robes and perform weird rituals. Which sounds outlandish but Ronson goes along with Jones to infiltrate Bohemian Grove, and sure enough there are powerful men in robes, performing weird rituals. At that point, Ronson notes that it no longer seems outlandish, it just seems like some middle aged men letting off steam. I think perhaps things just seem inherently more boring when there's no mystery attached.