T. J. Lane, the alleged shooter at Chardon High School, Chardon, Ohio.
Yet, not even the surface of the David Icke phenomenon was touched.
David Icke (above) reminds some folks, in appearance and in his cult following, of Marshall Applegate (below, seen as part of UFO's Bo and Peep) of later Heaven's Gate infamy.
Furthermore, T. J. Lane left other clues about his David Icke affection that were not mentioned.
The February 27th notes on this blog about the Icke "favorites" of T. J. Lane resulted in fiery remarks (see comments here). To gain more insights about the Icke fan reaction, I interviewed the authors of a new book, Ritual America that is getting much attention among twilight language and conspiracy readers:
Adam Parfrey's and Craig Heimbichner's Ritual America.
Adam Parfrey & Craig Heimbichner
Loren Coleman (LC): In your new book, Ritual America, you mention a guy named David Icke. The alleged school shooter in Chardon, Ohio, T. J. Lane wrote on his Facebook page that one of the people who inspired him is David Icke. No one has blamed Icke for the Chardon shootings, but nevertheless, in a preemptive strike, there's been an amazing outpouring of Icke fans who have come to Icke's defense even though he's not been accused of anything. Why do you think this has occurred?
Adam Parfrey (AP): It seems to me that the charismatic and compelling speaker David Icke mixes up believable concepts of high corporate crime with strange conceits that open up those risky ideas to derision—the reptilian alien villain, for example. The result of all this is to isolate Icke's audience into a cultic group of truth seekers who feel privileged to know and believe this strange mashup, and as cults are want to do, protect their charismatic truth-sayer from people who just don't "get it."
Craig Heimbichner (CH): One of the phenomena of American ritual culture, including the larger sociological "ritualizing" of response described in our book, is the intense emotionalism surrounding both secret brotherhoods and those who criticize them. We include several dramatic examples of this in our chapter, "Raising Tubal-Cain," which title is a play on the Master Mason password derived from Genesis 4:22 in the Bible, referencing the descendant of Cain, first killer. We also include David Icke in this chapter along with an excerpt representing his thinking on the Illuminati, the Matrix, the Lower 4th Dimension, and Satanism.
Icke positions himself as an uber-critic of the Brotherhoods, tying them in to accusations of Zionism and alien intrigue. Those who are devoted to his thinking would naturally see criticism of Icke as part of that grand plot and hence I am not surprised that they are reacting as though a battle is on. Icke has cultivated that high-stakes mind-set, although I hasten to add that I don't blame him for any violence or shootings.
LC: Despite what Icke admirers state about Icke being peaceful in his writings, doesn't Icke promote some bizarre notions that some humans are shape-shifting reptilians?
CH: David Icke certainly does. We quote Icke in our book: "The reptilians and other manipulating entities exist only just outside the frequency range of our physical senses. Their own physical form has broken down and they can no longer reproduce. Thus they have sought to infiltrate human form and so use that to exist and control in this dimension. They chose the Earth for this infiltration..."
Kent Tayler cartoon
LC: How might a teenager internalize Icke's theories?
CH: Throw in hormones, video-games, drugs, social/family problems, and the belief that some X-Files style nightmare is the truth--aliens are leading the country--maybe even the classroom--and it's anyone's guess. It's conceivable that someone might decide to fight a nightmare by creating another one. It's a great tragedy however we finally explain it.
LC: In what context does your Ritual America place David Icke?
AP: Ritual America includes David Icke's material to show the modern day version of the anti-Mason, a lot of it risky and believable, and some of it is just so "out there" to cultivate its believers as wacky and isolated cultists.
CH: As I mentioned above, we place David Icke in a context of over a century of anti-Masonic authors, specifically quoting him on the Illuminati (after quoting James Wasserman, a current Epopt of the Illuminati in the OTO who gives an entirely different perspective). We write: "People don't quite know how to interpret the work of David Vaughan Icke, the 1952-born speaker and writer who famously describes leaders like George W. Bush and Queen Elizabeth II as being reptilian aliens. For Icke, borrowing from Nazi literature, situates Freemasonry as a Zionist-Illuminati structure with unlimited resources to drain human beings' energy and resources."
What an interesting article and the calm approach to Icke is refreshing.
ReplyDeleteThere seems to be a conglomeration of disparate individuals who have long subscribed to what Hofstadter called ‘paranoid style.’ I suspect that if Icke didn’t exist, someone very similar would be presenting identical ideas to the disturbing sub-culture that demands them. Although Hofstadter was focused on US politics, thanks to globalisation and the rapid transfer of ideas via internet, the negative ideas have found expression, or comradeship, everywhere else too.
Where I believe Icke is a dangerous individual is in the way his ideas dehumanise huge populations. As we all know, to demonise people is to remove morality or make excuses for our ethics in the way we can conceivably treat others. Icke’s patter of describing people as reptilians, satanists and murderous pedophiles is hardly likely to instil compassion for his targets amongst the more mentally suspect of his followers.
It’d be absurd to attribute JT Lane’s actions to Icke’s oily rhetoric although his ideas may have played a part in teasing Lane away from perceived culpability.
In that sense, perhaps a disturbed individual found validation for selective misanthropy and provisional approval from a ‘like mind?’
Demonizing your opponents is sadly a very old tactic in the history of bigotry. The Nazis were eager to 'scientifically' demonstrate the genetic superiority of the Aryan race, and the sub-human status of the Jewish population, as well as other undesirables.
ReplyDeleteLikewise, there used to be a great deal of esoteric books published not too long ago, that sought to demonstrate how Adolf Hitler had accepted to partake in a ritual where he became possessed by a demonic entity.
To perceive your current strife as a Manicheistic struggle between good & evil is a co-opting manipulation to qualm any second doubts about the validity of your side's arguments ...until you don't find those damned WMD.
With that black & white mindset against an insidiously perceived enemy, use of lethal force is not only granted; it's encouraged. Specially against figures of institutionalized authority.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vzr98AIDwew
IMHO the only reptilians we should be wary of, is the R complex inside our own brain.
Well, Icke's claims and ideas are often outrageous. He also quotes from many, many writers in a wide range of fields, quoting from their works and using their various writings to somehow support his theories about reptilians, the moon, astral beings, and so on.
ReplyDeleteThe problem arises when anyone starts to "blame" him for the actions of someone else, however, particularly someone suffering from a severe and violent psychosis. Imagine if someone went berserk and killed people with beards and body hair, because of a delusion that bigfoot-hybrid humanoids are infiltrating society: would those who wrote books about cryptozoology and giant hairy man-like beings thereby be guilty of something?
The same thing can be said about UFO/"alien" research and writing, folklore writing, urban legends, and any and all "fringe" topics and conspiracy topics.
Guilt by association is a dangerous slope, slippery and jutted with sharp rocks. We should be very careful before we blame the delusions of one person on the delusions, or even just the ideas, of another person.
Many people suffering from violent psychosis often base their delusions on the writings, films, and other publicly-available works of others. While it's interesting that this guy had an Icke-fixation, it's not Icke's fault or responsibility. If it hadn't been Icke's writings, it would have been something else that the shooter used to fuel and justify his actions.
As a postscript: Not saying that Loren is "blaming" Icke for anything. He's just reporting what was said in regard to this young man's personal belief-system and possible motivations.
ReplyDeleteIcke will probably be blamed as part of the criminal defense, and in an attempt to use a plea of insanity. Icke, and any number of writers, could be accused of this sort of thing at any time. This is a very disturbing trend in our society. Video games are also a common scapegoat along these lines. We need to make sure that freedom of expression and thought are not curtailed by the deranged thoughts and actions of a defective few.
I'm not a big David Icke fan, but this is just demonization; or "reptilian-ization". David Icke stands against everything this kid did, and quite a bit of what he says politically, spiritually, existentially- happens to be true, even if he's way too fixated on the existence of physical "reptilians". Go listen to Icke speak for yourself. It's like blaming Salinger for Chapman, and Lennon.
ReplyDeleteSpooky, lost psychos, like this kid, fixate. Not Icke's fault he was the object of this lost little kid's pathology. Unfair. Cheers.
This was a fair assessment of David Icke and his followers. I AM a huge David Icke fan since his reading his book “The Robot’s Rebellion” back in 96.
ReplyDeleteI truly appreciate David’s drawing of awareness to the very real issue of trauma based ritual abuse (or satanic ritual abuse) of children, something to which I have a close connection and passion towards it's exposure. It is far more widespread and institutionalized than most would dare dream.
While I don't know with absolute certainty that reptillians (Draco) are the ones running the show, IMHOP it is completely plausible. Based on my own numerous and highly anomalous experiences (which includes UFO sightings, a visitation by a grey, an awareness that Faeries are real, YES faeries ARE real, yes you can laugh all you want – I don’t give a shit =D). Thus I believe that "they" (the reptoids) COULD very easily be real too. David Icke is far from the only one reporting on these sleezestacks.
That said, I know humans have the capacity to be just as evil as any of them being reported to be, so I am not going to place blame on reptillians alone. One should take the following into consideration when it comes to “alien” entities…
To quote Tom Montalk...
"Hyperdimensional Characteristics – Aliens are sophisticated nonhuman entities. Technological superiority is their least important advantage; what matters more is their dimensional superiority. Their native state of existence transcends the limitations of space-time. Whereas our existence is constrained by linear time, aliens can see and manipulate our past, present, and future possibilities simultaneously from a position outside linear time. They can also temporarily project themselves into our universe, taking physical form according to what archetypes in our collective unconscious best approximate their higher dimensional essence. The assumption that aliens are three-dimensional beings like us who have flown here in mechanically constructed spaceships from planets far away covers only a small subset of the entire alien presence, and it is severely insular to examine only the hardest physical evidence of the alien phenomenon in the name of science. The alien presence is mostly hyper dimensional and therefore nebulous because its true nature far exceeds the boundaries of popular assumption."
D.Icke and Chardon
ReplyDeleterhymes with
Dick and Hardon
Apologies for vulgarity
cheers