Just as I thought! Scary how much they've infiltrated groups in my town., I'm starting to worry about airing my opinions with aoot of my friends asso many of them have attached themselves to some or all of these theories.
The worst is that clear local far right activists / lunatics are spearheading some of this stuff annd people hang on their every word as though all the fascist unpleasantness is behind us now
I am so sorry to hear about your friends. Where I live several acquaintances have opined very enthusiastically in support of these bizarre conspiracy theories
Unfortunately the conspiracy promoters will use any cracks and flaws in our government and statutory services as a platform for promoting their hateful agendas.
I posted this excellent documentary before but am posting it again as it is incredibly helpful for anyone interested in how nation states use "divide and conquer" to cause division in nation states whose resources and assets they wish to appropriate
for readers with limited time this section is possibly the most important
The Seven Commandments of Fake News
Rule 1 - look for "cracks" - divisions / flaws / vulnerablities
Rule 2 - create a big lie so outrageous that nobody sane believes it
Rule 3 - wrap the big lie around a small truth
Rule 4 - conceal your hand - make it appear that the story arose from a whistleblower or grass roots community group
Rule 5 - find yourself useful idiots
Rule 6 - deny, deny, deny, bluster, blag
Rule 7 - play the long game - put resources into many operations, some of which will not bear fruit. The ones that do, bear fruit over time, can create havoc in the targeted nation state
I would like to add an additional commandment to the seven stated in the above video
The 8th is, in my experience, to use the strengths of the opponent against them.
This commandment is one that any martial artist will understand immediately.
It is pointless to use force against force when the opponent is bigger and stronger than you are. You will lose if you attempt this. In such a situation you must use the opponent's strengths against them.
If the opponent is bigger and stronger you must bait them into using all their force against you and then use "empty force" (get out of the way having baited them with a little fake resistance), ideally tripping them up as their full force moves into an empty space.
If the opponent has long arms and a better reach then you you have to bait them into over-extending their strikes so you can break their arm.
I will provide some examples here
In the UK we have many organisations concerned with human rights and many human rights lawyers. I believe that human rights are extremely important, of course. However any good cause can be over-extended to become a counter-productive or even an evil force.
Thus we have human rights lawyers who enable terrorists to stay in the UK, who enable people who kill police officers to recieve huge amounts of legal aid, who empower the worst kinds of abusive criminals to gain all kinds of benefits.
In the UK we have some very good laws protecting animals and allowing the police to prosecute cases of animal cruelty. Many people in the UK pride themselves on their attitude towards pets and other animals. Issues around animal welfare are complex and various racist, Islamophobic and antisemitic discourses are founded on questionable beliefs about animal rights.
Animal rights activism is a very obvious focus for astroturfing to create divide and rule. Thus we have vegan and extreme green activists who regard humans as a disease upon the planet and who think that deadly viruses are a great thing is they kill off lots of people. There is also a growing Nazi hipster / Nispter movement where neo-Nazis abandon the traditional far right appearance and to adopt a softer image. There is a significant movement of vegan / animal rights Nazis.
an actually rather good RT video about nipsters
Re animal rights, there is also a perspective about British people promoted on social media that we care more about our pets than we do about children.
This is a view opined by Camila Batmanghelidjh in this interview with the Voice of Russia radio station
Possibly the most fruitful arena for astroturfing and creating chaos has been the astroturfing of LGB rights to include transgender rights.
I believe that trans rights are important but are nothing to do with LGB rights.
I also believe that vulnerable people with autism and trauma related mental illnesses have been exploited by sinister organisations to promote an extreme version of trans rights that harms all citizens but mostly it harms the LGB cause and vulnerable people, especially people who identify as trans.
So, briefly, the Rule no 8 is about taking a good, worthy cause and over-extending it to the point that it creates chaos and division