https://www.smbc-comics.com/comic/they-2
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This is a surprising take from Zach, considering that the World Economic Forum exists, and the LIBOR fixing scandal wasn’t too long ago.
Ultimately, nothing big can happen in the world without the complexity of a ton of people, systems, etc being involved. The world is complicated. But there are absolutely many examples throughout history and even recent events of small groups of individuals having outsized amounts of influence.
Reminds me of Parenti’s joke about people in power
Transcript for anyone that doesn’t do video:
“Conspiracy theory” is a term that’s used whenever anybody ascribes conscious intent to people with power. So I can say to you that school teachers are concerned about their salaries and they’re organizing and they’re threatening a strike and they’re pressuring. I can say to you that farmers are doing this and looking for subsidies and and facing certain policies. But the minute I say to you that the very people at the top of the plutocracy the very rich and powerful the ones who own most of America, that they are consciously pursuing power and wealth someone will come along and say “what do you have a conspiracy theory?” or they’ll say “oh you’re cynical” or “you’re paranoid”. Their view is that stuff just happens. Things just happen. Unintended consequences or our leaders are stupid and they’re jerks or they’re confused and they don’t know any better and of course the critic knows much better than everybody.
Yeah people who operate in this world operate with intent. There’s no such thing as imperialism without imperialists. There’s no such thing as capitalism without capitalists. There’s no such thing as rulers who are some somnambulers, who walk around in their sleep. You watch out for your interests. You watch out and you make calculations. What makes you think that David Rockefeller doesn’t - what makes you think that the people at the top don’t do it, and what makes you think they don’t collude and organize, or what do you think, you have a group of people who sit around in a room and they plan this? And I always say “oh no god they don’t sit around in a room they meet on carousels they go up and down merry-go-rounds or they meet skydiving they hold hands and they argue”. Of course they sit in rooms, where the hell else are they going to meet?
I think the biggest issue with this argument is that he’s arguing about an overloaded term. “Conspiracy theory” in terms of stuff like MKUltra? 100% a thing. “Conspiracy theory” in terms of “The democrats made the hurricane to kill god-fearing republicans!”? Not so much.
Thanks for the transcript! He’s remixed this statement so many times in speeches and interviews that I didn’t have a hope to find the right one.
I understand your point about arguing on an overloaded term, but in his speeches he’s making a point that there is no conspiracy it’s what’s happening. The only reason it’s called conspiracy is because there aren’t many other words to describe it.
