Conspiracy theories a threat.

[Cliff Varnell]

59 minutes ago, Rick McTague said:

Jim,

Then by this measurement, who riled up the Dayton shooter, and the majority of other mass shooters who lean left?

Another Big Lie promoted by the racist Right.

https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/democrat-shooters-list/

 

[Cliff Varnell]

 

Right-Wingers Are America’s Deadliest Terrorists

After this weekend, right-wing terrorists have killed more people on U.S. soil than jihadis have since 9/11. So why is the government’s focus still on Islamic radicalism?

https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2019/08/right-wing-terrorist-killings-government-focus-jihadis-islamic-radicalism.html

[Kirk Ross]

14 hours ago, John Kozlowski said:

He worked with a guy named Colin A. Ross, who was an “expert” on CIA mind control experiments.

FWIW, he wrote at least one book about it

https://www.amazon.com/CIA-Doctors-Violations-American-Psychiatrists/dp/0976550806

Seems odd that he would be accused of doing the same thing he was exposing. 

[W. Niederhut]

2 hours ago, Cliff Varnell said:

 

Right-Wingers Are America’s Deadliest Terrorists

After this weekend, right-wing terrorists have killed more people on U.S. soil than jihadis have since 9/11. So why is the government’s focus still on Islamic radicalism?

https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2019/08/right-wing-terrorist-killings-government-focus-jihadis-islamic-radicalism.html

It's the Green Peril, invented by the military-industrial complex and the Neocons after the collapse of the Soviet Union.

Be afraid.  Be very afraid... 🤪

[Ron Bulman]

9 hours ago, John Kozlowski said:

 

Turns out the manifesto was originally posted to Instagram by the shooter and another person uploaded it to 8chan. I don’t recall the news mentioning IG at all

https://www.mediamatters.org/fox-news/you-dont-need-read-el-paso-killers-manifesto-just-turn-fox-news

[W. Niederhut]

6 hours ago, Kirk Ross said:

FWIW, he wrote at least one book about it

https://www.amazon.com/CIA-Doctors-Violations-American-Psychiatrists/dp/0976550806

Seems odd that he would be accused of doing the same thing he was exposing. 

     I've never met Colin Ross, or read any of his books, but I have worked with a number of patients suffering from dissociative identity disorders, including MPD.  It is a very real psychiatric disorder, caused by childhood trauma.  In fact, I used to work at a private psychiatric hospital here in Colorado in the late 80s that had a specialty unit for adults suffering from MPD.  The best textbook on the subject is Dr. Frank Putnam's Multiple Personality Disorder.  Another national MPD expert who consulted with our staff on a case at the Colorado State Hospital in the 80s was Dr. Martin Orne.

   As for Ross, some of the above history sounds bizarre.  Was he involved in MK-Ultra?  I'll have to research that one.

[John Kozlowski]

1 hour ago, Ron Bulman said:

https://www.mediamatters.org/fox-news/you-dont-need-read-el-paso-killers-manifesto-just-turn-fox-news

http://republicbroadcasting.org/news/owner-of-8chan-says-the-manifesto-was-not-uploaded-by-the-el-paso-walmart-shooter/

Screenshots from IG were posted on reddit last night but of course they were taken down. That site is censored worse than google anymore.

[John Kozlowski]

6 hours ago, Kirk Ross said:

FWIW, he wrote at least one book about it

https://www.amazon.com/CIA-Doctors-Violations-American-Psychiatrists/dp/0976550806

Seems odd that he would be accused of doing the same thing he was exposing. 

There’s quite a bit of dirt on the guy online. People who claim to be former patients posted on a forum about him. 

  This guy sounds like a nut. Apparently he was on coast to coast a while back and made serious claims he’s able to project energy from his eyes into a speaker and a create a tone sound. Trying to find the clip of that now.

Edit: Forgot this but OJ Simpson wrote a book on the murders of his wife and Goldman. Do you think he was innocent?

Edited August 7, 2019 by John Kozlowski

[Ron Bulman]

6 hours ago, W. Niederhut said:

If I may comment on this, let me preface my remarks by mentioning that I have been a Board Certified psychiatrist in the U.S. for over 30 years.

I have been directly involved over the years in the assessment and treatment of a number of people who committed murders, and/or threatened to commit them.  I also know some of the faculty at UCHSC who knew James Holmes, (including the professor who kicked him out of the neuroscience graduate program.)

The motives behind mass murders are complex, and not monolithic.  The VAST majority are committed by males.

A high percentage are committed by misogynists, and 85% in a recent study have a history of documented domestic violence.

Obviously, some of these guys have been floridly psychotic and/or manic (e.g., Eric Harris, Cho, Loughner, Holmes, John Lewis Dear.)

The Dayton murderer, Betts, was a rabidly misogynistic personality who had a "kill list" of women in high school, and was in some sort of misogynistic heavy metal band.  I believe he was probably psychotic, from a mental illness, and/or substance abuse.

Trump's incendiary rhetoric has been cited as a direct stimulus of some attackers-- including the El Paso killer and Sayoc, the "MAGA Bomber."

W, you Jim, Rick and Andrew all are getting to a key point for me.  Whether your a rabid riled up right winged racist or abused bullied mentally ill person, no one needs access to an ARmalite 15 or it's knockoffs, with a 30 round clip.  This is not a hunting rifle unless your hunting to kill or wound as many people or animals you can.  If you need it for self defense your being attacked from a distance by multiple persons, and, your already in deep trouble (why?), doesn't happen much.  Nobody needs one.  There is a reason they outlawed machine guns in the 30's.  So terrorist gangs couldn't shoot up bank's, cops or innocent victims.  The AR15 is not a machine gun.  But it's not far behind.  Fast as you can pull the trigger.  They say the guy on Dayton was taken down in 30 seconds.  He killed 9 and wounded 22.  That's 31 hit's in 30 seconds, likely one a pass through as I don't see him having time to change clip's.  A shot a second.  Into a crowd the effects are proven devastating.  Hog hunting from helicopters?  A special restricted license.  Militia?  Maybe if registered, monitored, kept under lock and key when not used for training/practice.  Otherwise just about nobody needs one. Riled up racist, mentally disturbed, you or me.

I realize many of the mass shootings, at least four shot, 251 this year, more than one per day, or mass murders four or more killed, 22 times this year, are perpetrated with hand gun's.  I personally can't see the need for a 15 or more round semi automatic hand gun clip.   Once again if you need that many shot's for self defense, your in trouble.  Once again a shot a second.  If your Not stopped in 15 or more seconds, new clip in 5 or so more.

I'll keep my old 5 shot hunting rifle though I've not been deer hunting in years, maybe someday once more if I can ever afford a lease again.  I'll keep my 5 shot shotgun though I never really enjoyed dove hunting (not enough meat there) and most of the quail in this area are gone from hunting and habitat loss.  The gun works great on copperhead's, which I don't like around the grandkids, or me either.  I'll keep my 7 shot 22 semi automatic rifle for target practice of if I ever do go squirrel or rabbit hunting again.  I'll keep my 6 shot pistol handy, but secured, in case anybody ever decides to break in or attacks me or my family at home.  I believe in the right to keep and bear arms.  But I don't want or need a Assault Rifle or a 15 + shot semi automatic hand gun, don't want one around my kids or grand kids.  Nobody needs one unless their planning on shooting a bunch of people.  JMO.

I really think the problem is money.  The investors in fire arms and ammunition want a return on profit.  To keep selling more guns and ammo world wide and in the USA.  Thus what the NRA has become with it's lobbyists.  They also arm the drug cartels in Mexico, for profit.  So Mexicans flee the terror seeking safety and a chance to make a living. Good article in Rolling Stone this month on this. 

Call this my manifesto if you like.  Don't know where else to post it.  I think the laws need to change.  Yesterday. imho.  I don't think JFK would have ignored, exacerbated, or let the problem get this far.  Maybe that's part of why he was shot down in the street by multiple assassins.

 

[John Kozlowski]

12 minutes ago, Ron Bulman said:

They say the guy on Dayton was taken down in 30 seconds.  He killed 9 and wounded 22.  That's 31 hit's in 30 seconds, likely one a pass through as I don't see him having time to change clip's. 

Thankfully they were able to get him that fast. He had a 100 round drum on the gun he was using.  The garlic fest shooter had a 75 rd drum load and multiple 40 rd drums as back up. Like you said there’s no reason something like that should be available to a private citizen. 

[Ron Bulman]

I didn't know about the double 100 round double drum magazine he was using or that it existed.  Nor the intricate legal mumbo jumbo allowing it.  Seems some in the FBI & ATF agree they shouldn't be available to the public.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/dayton-shooters-gun-called-an-orchestra-of-metal-and-hellfire/ar-AAFpS8N?li=BBnbcA1

 

[Joe Bauer]

Quote

 

A Mannlicher Carcano would be laughed at today.

[Guest]

Another unwelcome dose of reality:  Research does not establish that the psychological traits which characterize conspiracy thinking are dangerous per se, but it does establish that they are distinctly "different."  This is from an article in Science Daily summarizing some recent research, https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2018/09/180925075108.htm:

New research by Josh Hart, associate professor of psychology, suggests that people with certain personality traits and cognitive styles are more likely to believe in conspiracy theories. The research was recently published in the Journal of Individual Differences.

"These people tend to be more suspicious, untrusting, eccentric, needing to feel special, with a tendency to regard the world as an inherently dangerous place," Hart said. "They are also more likely to detect meaningful patterns where they might not exist. People who are reluctant to believe in conspiracy theories tend to have the opposite qualities."

...

Hart and Graether wanted to build on this [past] research by testing how much each of several previously identified traits could explain generic conspiracy beliefs. By examining multiple traits simultaneously, the pair could determine which ones were most important.

"Our results clearly showed that the strongest predictor of conspiracy belief was a constellation of personality characteristics collectively referred to as 'schizotypy,'" Hart said.

The trait borrows its name from schizophrenia, but it does not imply a clinical diagnosis. Hart's study also showed that conspiracists had distinct cognitive tendencies: they were more likely than nonbelievers to judge nonsensical statements as profound (a tendency known as "BS receptivity").

In turn, they were more likely to say that nonhuman objects -- triangle shapes moving around on a computer screen -- were acting intentionally.

"In other words, they inferred meaning and motive where others did not," he said.

Sound like anyone you know?  I didn't think so.

Or this from a 2017 issue of the journal of the Association for Psychological Science, https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/0963721417718261:

Research thus far has successfully articulated some of the motivations that, together with deficiencies in available information, cognitive ability, and motivation to think critically, may contribute to conspiracy belief. Although scholars have theorized about the consequences of conspiracy beliefs for their adherents and the community, relatively little empirical research has been done to explore them. Nevertheless, preliminary work suggests that despite the allure of conspiracy beliefs for people who have heightened epistemic, existential, and social motives, they may ultimately thwart those motives further. In this sense, conspiracy theories might be seen as an ironic or self-defeating manifestation of motivated social cognition. There are grounds to expect further research to corroborate this preliminary picture since, as we have seen, conspiracy theories have some attributes that do not lend themselves to the fulfillment of these motives—for example, they are generally speculative and contrarian, represent the public as ignorant and at the mercy of unaccountable powers, and impute highly antisocial and cynical motives to other individuals.

Lest you miss the point of the latter statement: if you are prone to conspiracy thinking, immersion in conspiracy thinking may actually be counterproductive and exacerbate the very psychological traits that lead to conspiracy thinking in the first place!

The point is merely that it is scarcely irrational for the FBI to have conspiracy communities on its radar screen.  This is also why conspiracy thinking receives so much attention within academia - it's a particular psychological and sociological phenomena that demands attention.  But discussions of conspiracy thinking are, of course, anathema to the conspiracy communities themselves, for obvious reasons.

[W. Niederhut]

Several points for the amateur "psychologist," Lance Pay-out to think about...

 

1)  The oft-overused CIA propaganda term,  "conspiracy theorist," does not define any monolithic demographic group, or psychiatric phenotype.   As an obvious example, the official Bush-Cheney administration/PNAC narrative about 9/11 is a "conspiracy theory."  Does the "study" by Josh Hart include "conspiracy theorists" who accept the bizarre U.S. government narrative about 9/11?

2)  Therefore, "studies" that purport to generalize about so-called "conspiracy theorists" are essentially meaningless.  Which "conspiracy theorists" are they studying-- uneducated flat Earthers or highly educated, accurate research scholars who debunk false government narratives?  Big difference!

3)   More meaningful generalizations can, and have, been made about people who reflexively reject "conspiracy theories" that are based on true facts. Such "deniers" are, typically, impaired by blind faith in authority, cognitive rigidity, and a limited capacity for rational empiricism-- independent of mass delusions.

 

 

 

[Joe Bauer]

32 minutes ago, W. Niederhut said:

Several points for the amateur "psychologist," Lance Pay-out to think about...

 

1)  The oft-overused CIA propaganda term,  "conspiracy theorist," does not define any monolithic demographic group, or psychiatric phenotype.   As an obvious example, the official Bush-Cheney administration/PNAC narrative about 9/11 is a "conspiracy theory."  Does the "study" by Josh Hart include "conspiracy theorists" who accept the bizarre U.S. government narrative about 9/11?

2)  Therefore, "studies" that purport to generalize about so-called "conspiracy theorists" are essentially meaningless.  Which "conspiracy theorists" are they studying-- uneducated flat Earthers or highly educated, accurate research scholars who debunk false government narratives?  Big difference!

3)   More meaningful generalizations can, and have, been made about people who reflexively reject "conspiracy theories" that are based on true facts. Such "deniers" are, typically, impaired by blind faith in authority, cognitive rigidity, and a limited capacity for rational empiricism-- independent of mass delusions.

 

 

 

Thank you for the above post W. Niederhut.