virus: A Short Phenomenology of the Conspiracy Theorist

From: joedees@bellsouth.net
Date: Sat Aug 24 2002 - 19:50:42 MDT


        Conspiracy theorists are constitutionally compelled to attribute
the movements of historical events to the manipulations of dark and
powerful forces, a cognoscenti or illuminati that holds and guides the
reins of political, economic, media and/or military power from behind the
scenes. They are perpetual believers in the existence of a Kantian
noumenon beneath the apparent phenomena, and dismiss the apparent
as an unreal simulacral facade proferred by such forces to confuse and
divert the populace from their malevolent manipulations. It is important
to them for their theories to remain on the margins, outside of the
acceptance of the intersubjective consensus, for they deeply believe
that such acceptance is the kiss of death to their theories, as it
indicates that they must have been proferrred by a propaganda-savvy
hidden hierarchy, and thus must be false and, furthermore, expressly
intended to obscure the occult truth.

They encounter a difficulty, however, when a conspiracy theory gains
wide public acceptance through the promulgation of a plethora of
evidence to the masses at large. In such cases, they typically tend
towards psychological inversion, blaming the victim for the disaster, and
claiming that it was surreptitiously effected in order to reflect negatively
upon the perpetrator. In this manner, they can both preserve the
precious 'hidden' character of their powerful malevolents, and keep
their particular interpretation of the historical events safely on the
margin, a position that allows them to conserve their self-concept as
themselves illuminated cognoscenti, with knowledge of the
machinations if not direct participation in them (for what they really
crave is to be members of the powerful dark force cabal), possessing a
deeper and more profound understanding than is available to the
'ignorant and easily swayed' masses.



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