Oddbean

To be fair most people would be terrified to have an authentic opinion. Which is how they get away with it (until they don't). I do think there is a difference between our situation now and, say, communist USSR or other historical totalitarian regimes. They seemed very much to be top-down, with the course of events predetermined by a high committee - as per agenda 2030 etc that you cite. But I think things are different now. The elites now gain their power from exploiting human herd dynamics - riding the waves of panic, fear and hate, pumping them up if they can - but not by creating the waves themselves which is much harder and more costly to them. Eg whatever the origins of covid I cannot see how anyone could have forecast the total panic it caused - and the commensurately huge opportunity it gave to extend tyranny. Where I live the government spent about 2 weeks literally saying covid was not a big deal, the most important thing was to keep going as normal. Then they realized they'd be washed away unless they got on board with the wave of hysteria sweeping through the herd. Which gives me great hope for humanity. I think we evolved to have 95% of ppl simply want to follow - without any conception of good or bad, right or wrong, except doing whatever the herd was doing or told them to do. You'd need that in a tribe that had to work together to kill food, resist other tribes etc. But there have always been about 5% who are different, who think independently and are connected to reality outside the herd. Most of the time these dissidents are persecuted and harassed but they are the ones from which all progress comes - and sooner or later the herd ends up following them. By which I mean us! For example I think we owe most of our traditions of western freedom (which are currently being eroded but which something happened to create in the first place) to the persecution of dissidents in europe in the 18th century. The puritans had a continent to go to and build a new society based on freedom from that persecution - and created America. I think a golden age is just around the corner - and bitcoin and nostr are the new continent where we can build a new world based on freedom.

I believe this stuff is still very much top down. They manufacture most of the things they call crises, many of which don't even exist anywhere but in the media, and many people simply take them at face value without questioning. The 'herd dynamics' as you accurately point out make it far easier for them to craft and drive these narratives today since communication and messaging is far-reaching. They put on 'table top' exercises like Event 201 in order to simulate their plans before executing them, so that they can study all the possible outcomes of a crisis and steer them in the intended direction, as well as propose solutions to these made-up issues. They simulate all of it. The people who orchestrated covid were very much aware of how much fear and panic they could drum up - that was the point. It was a military-grade psychological operation. The actual military and 'nudge' units were and are still involved. They gaslit and continue to gaslight people with bot accounts who attack anyone telling the truth, casting doubt on what is being said by anyone who reads it, when you have responses coming from sock-puppet accounts while real people are censored. None of it was real - overwhelmed hospitals, people dying in the streets, etc, but they used these as tools in order to attain their goals. Their efforts killed millions of people, and mental broke millions more. A process of demoralization, as Yuri Bezmenov once spoke about. The system is designed in such a way that many of the effects are organic, because most people (even in government) are not aware of the bigger picture and they conform to stay elected. Literal useful idiots, and people who are drawn to positions of power tend to skew towards having psychopathic tendencies, making them ideal candidates to execute inhumane actions against their fellow people. Not only under the guise of safety and decency, but also because they simply don't care about others, and are therefore the exact puppets the controllers seek out and elevate into positions of power. Mike Benz does a lot of good work talking how they orchestrate some of this stuff. Here is an older video of his where he explains the concept of 'capacity building' and 'capacity crippling', which I had not heard of before: https://x.com/MikeBenzCyber/status/1704606709098885629 The genius of these tactics is that once they create an industry out of something, it is very hard to dismantle because they appeal to the humanity of the average person - "think of all the people who won't have jobs, we can't just eliminate an entire sector even if it is all based on lies. But it's not a lie, shut-up or we'll arrest you!"

Yes, I have this discussion a lot - and I'm in a very small minority who believe its bottom up. To me they're kind of unfalsifiable hypotheses - but as with "science" I'd much rather carry around my unfalsifiable hypothesis than yours on this one! Also I feel many people "on our side" give "them" too much credit and respect - almost deifying them as all-powerful beings who are 10 steps ahead of anything. What's the point in resisting if that's the case? It feels almost like fetish with some people. And I think its not the case - they are just humans like us and most of them actually believe their own bullshit. For me there's no way eg bill gates is unjabbed. Even pfizer people who covered up the side-effects will be jabbed.

"...there have always been about 5% who are different, who think independently and are connected to reality outside the herd." "...people who are drawn to positions of power tend to skew towards having psychopathic tendencies, making them ideal candidates to execute inhumane actions against their fellow people." This is almost funny... I can see the bell curve meme with 95% in the middle as mindless sheep, and 2.5% on each end representing good and evil. There are a small contingent who see through the error. What they decide to do with that knowledge is their path. These are targeted and enticed with desire and even those with the best intentions see corruption. "But he who peers into the perfect law that belongs to freedom and who persists in it, this man, because he has become, not a forgetful hearer, but a doer of the work, will be happy in his doing it." James 1:25

I can see it from that perspective, I have some friends who think the same way. I wouldn't say it's a minority position, but I think both are true to some extent. At some point, it becomes to difficult to pretend that all of these things are organic, such as all governments agreeing to shut down their countries and enforce the same 'guidelines' unilaterally. The few leaders who didn't, mysteriously died. The 'coincidences' only ever trend in the direction of the state. To me, its the same type of gaslighting (from state actors) as suggesting autism has solely gone up because of the way it is diagnosed. 'Experts are baffled. It may be red meat and racism.' type of nonsense. Pfizer gave their own people shots from a different batch than what was given to everyone else. People aren't heroes, they are just looking out for themselves, and in doing so they remain complicit, knowingly or ignorantly. "They" - the controllers, bankers, secret societies and elite families have been shaping the landscape forever. It is an incestuous revolving door between organizations, governmental and private, that all work against the people for themselves. Most are not in on some secret plan, but they are still working within a system that perpetuates the narratives set forth by think-tanks. There is a hierarchy to policy planning and distribution, it can only be top-down. We know the organizations that set and distribute the policies. We know who the members of these things are. They openly brag about infiltrating governments. https://m.primal.net/KMLm.png Compliance is mandated at all levels in varying ways, but the policies come from those nearest the levers of control. They react this way to resistance because it threatens them. We must be resisting at all times. It isn't futile, this is a continuous cycle that ebbs and flows throughout history. That is my perspective, of course. I'm not saying it is correct or that you should think the same, fwiw. It just makes sense to me.

There's not much I disagree with there. I think there may be "top down" edicts but not necessarily explicit ones - its just obvious to everyone involved what they should do if they're paying attention. But most of those will be "here's how to exploit and pump this herd dynamic" and not "now we move to phase 2.5b of the plan". For example, I can't believe all these leaders really report to the WEF, however much Klaus Schwab brags of "penetrating" ze governments. What seems far more likely is that the WEF is kind of like a conference organizer. The participants are people with power and people who want power - the elite if you will - but the power doesn't come from the WEF. So they socialize and they're all alike and they share their hopes and strategies for exploiting the masses - and when stuff happens it should be no surprise they act in a way that looks co-ordinated. They all jump on things like covid and climate change precisely because they all see the opportunities it affords them. The oppression evolves organically. I'd guess that you may agree the herd has some power - in which case our disagreement ultimately might be the balance between them?

That is what the WEF appears to be at a surface level. Politicians like Starmer have unequivocally stated they serve the interests of the WEF over that of their country. These are people who have aligned with globalists against their own citizens. https://video.nostr.build/42e0e8c68434aa494b5134816f9815af5139cf7e8957275af2f47bc4b5b4e76e.mp4 I think whenever I have these discussions, it is exactly to what you are saying - the balance between ignorant participation and knowingly acting in a certain manner for other reasons. And I agree with you on that mostly - they are largely just people doing things they genuinely believe in. However, bad actors do exist in these positions, too. Well, technically, I would say those people are above governments are not usually in the public light, but some hide out in plain sight. I think both these things are true. It is the tactic of compartmentalisation. It is how the policies can be distributed in a way that seems very organic, but hardly ever is.

"Politicians like Starmer have unequivocally stated they serve the interests of the WEF over that of their country" Well what he said was he'd rather be at Davos - not that he serves the WEF. I'd expect his reasoning would be exactly as I said - that its a place to network and plan with global partners in govts and business etc blah, we have global problems that need global solutions blah. "they are largely just people doing things they genuinely believe in" For what its worth I don't think these people (the sheep / normies / useful idiots) believe in anything at all. They simply follow the herd with varying degrees of awareness. I find the following classification useful: *Sheep* are those who follow the herd because they want an easy life - though they may well know its nonsense and say so. *Normies* are those who follow the herd because they've convinced themselves they "believe" in the issue at hand. Of course they don't really believe it, it could be anything at all, but they are committed to professing that belief extravagantly. What they really believe is in the importance of following the herd - and in their deserving of high status in it. But yeah nothing is real for them I think, except the herd. They will literally sacrifice their children in order to follow it.

I could accept that idea if everything Starmer does wasn't in complete lockstep with what the WEF preaches. To the letter. At some point you have to stop giving some of these people the benefit of the doubt. We even have enough evidence to raise reasonable suspicion on how organic the UK riots were, I posted a 2 minute video earlier. Same with Sunak before Starmer. Same with people like Khan, the mayor of London. That is why voting is pointless, when these people are obviously putting the interests of these orgs above those of their people. To me, it doesn't so much matter if they know or not - if they are complicit, they are guilty.

Another reason I'm skeptical of the "top-down" thesis is the fact that covid has made things much, much harder for the elites. Things were going along nicely with climate change. No big jumps to put people on the alert. All roads leading inexorably towards communism and no obvious obstacles, hardly any dissent. But with covid they woke maybe 10% of the western world up to the fact they were being lied to systematically. Those people will never believe anything they're told now. Things are much, much harder for the elites as a result. So literally I think that the most plausible "top-down" thesis, for covid anyway, is one where the elites are benevolent, and actively trying to wake people up in order to free humanity. Not saying I believe that - the bottom-up thesis seems far more likely - but I cannot see covid being part of any rational strategy for global enslavement. Unless the elites are retarded, in which case I think you end up with bottom up anyway.

Things definitely didn't go as they expected, and I agree that is has become that much harder for their narratives now. I never said covid was a strategy for enslavement. I said it was a scam. They saw an opportunity as they themselves told us, and they went with it. Many people had various reasons to support lockdowns and such, for example corporations stayed open while small business were forced to close. That wasn't part of some greater conspiracy, but just from that siloed perspective, the corporations would have had to engage within some sort of 'conspiracy' in order for legislators to allow them to keep operating. We can speculate about all the reasons, but that is how the world works - everyone thinking of their own interests. Especially people in higher positions. So in that sense, most people went along with it because it served them, and others got drunk on the extra power and showed how unfit they were for their positions. What I questioned was where all those guidelines and the policies that everyone adopted came from. I questioned the validity of their claims about vaccines, the illogical measures they proposed, and based on how absolutely every single thing they said and did was either a lie or the opposite of common sense, I decided the whole thing was a scam with a lot of stupid and complicit people. The planning starts at the top so that it can be distributed down to the lower channels, most things below that are organic "bottom up", as you say. Just pay attention to how the media operate, in lockstep, parroting and setting the narratives for people to fight over. That is just one arm of the entire propaganda network.

"At some point, it becomes to difficult to pretend that all of these things are organic, such as all governments agreeing to shut down their countries and enforce the same 'guidelines' unilaterally. " Having worked in a govt this is absolutly what I think. They had specific plans for pandemics (which I worked on). When they were clearly not going to fly they'll have looked around for any alternative, and there's none better than doing what everyone else was doing. They were even explicit about this - eg saying we had to lock down because the rest of Europe was locking down. And they were right. It's herd logic. The only thing that has changed to make covid etc far worse than previous panics is that the herd is now supercharged by phones. The waves of fear and anger are hugely more powerful.

At that level I would say it is typically all organic - the 'useful idiots' I refer too. I guess I am doing a not-so-great job of trying to bring across a nuanced point, because I said, I don't think everyone is in on something. Most people involved in government are not particularly wise; those people are usually spending their time doing other things in life. The majority of people still believe there was a pandemic of natural origin to this day, because they don't care to consider anything else. There were obvious precursors to the pandemic and many reasons that it happened, and I don't believe any of them are of natural originals. The going direct BlackRock plan started in the months leading up to it, and the pandemic was the perfect cover-up to print money. That was just one of many reasons. The other was an opportunity to seize more control over people. You think they are just saying, "There WILL be another pandemic." is just for fun? They are telling us over and over what they plan to do. Many in government or any position of power became tyrannical, taking things too far like arresting people because they went for a walk. That is just normal useful idiot behaviour. I am in no way suggesting those people are 'in' on something. The vast majority of those people are not involved in any plans. How does one explain those who opposed covid (I think it was 5 of them) all dying under suspicious circumstances? It is something that is easy to dismiss when you don't consider the somewhat obvious explanation for it. They had plans for pandemics, and instead they followed some completely novel ideas, which coincidentally happened to be the same as those outlined in 'preparedness' exercises but nothing like what they had originally planned for. They threw out all their plans and went with what everyone else was doing. It is a great demonstration for herd mentality - since none of what they did had any evidence backing it. It was all made up. That's how useless these people are, they still can't discern that TODAY. They still can't admit they fucked up, instead most of them double down. I highly recommend checking this 20 min clip from Mike Benz. It is a breakdown of declassified documents of how governments infiltrate all sorts of movements with careful planning that seem so incredibly unlikely that people just can't comprehend it. These are planned, coordinated efforts that go above what most people are privy to. That is how they get away with it - using the useful idiots as cover, and compartmentalising the rest. https://x.com/MikeBenzCyber/status/1825048993136546230

Haiti, Jovenel Moïse Ivory Coast, Hamed Bakayoko Swaziland, Ambrose Dlamini Burundi, Pierre Nkurunziza Tanzania, John Magufuli "Magufuli tested a goat, papaya and oil amongst other things to show that these things were testing positive for covid and refused the vaccines." Of course the state-owned fact-checkers were quick to publish debunks of these deaths, but the patterns are pretty clear.