115 Comments
Dec 10, 2022·edited Dec 10, 2022Liked by Chris Bray

There has been so much clown-world nonsense these past few years, but what has been particularly jarring and disorienting, at least to me, has been seeing formerly countercultural artists and activists on the Left go all-in with their support for war profiteers, big pharma, the FBI, the CIA, etc. And then comedians and entertainers crying out for more censorship. Writers and musicians and ex-hippies demanding more authoritarianism from federal governments. All the people whom you would have expected to be up in arms about the FBI and CIA controlling the public discourse on social media are instead cheering it on and attacking dissenters and skeptics. What the hell happened?

Expand full comment

I feel this too so deeply.

I'm 53 and lived most of my life in NYC and my friends were all more or less cynical libertines, free spirits artists musicians etc, and we probably discussed politics for about 2 hrs total in 20 years...but now the Social Justice brain virus has gotten to just about all of them, they are either spouting stale jargon or engaging in various eliminationist fantasies about the MAGA folk. I really feel like Kevin McCarthy in "Invasion of the Body Snatchers".

I just happen to be congenitally stubbornly contrary, and also I moved far away and have no career, so I've escaped most forms of social pressure—but for everyone else there just seems to be intense social and mental pressure if you have an active career and social life in our formerly wild & free big cities to convert to the new religion (or at least to publicly pay lip service).

Journalists against free speech! Artists for censorship! Rock stars for mandatory vaccines!

This would make a scary and/or hilarious movie but is no fun to live through.

Expand full comment

I was amazed that several people I know who were always counterculture and into natural medicines freaked out and jumped on the pro-injection train, refusing to read anything that wasn't mainstream media about it

Expand full comment

Oh yeah - all of those people who were against GMO foods are now proponents of being genetically modified themselves.

While one normally thinks of a "useful idiot" as an influential person being manipulated, in this case the masses are useful idiots as NPCs.

Expand full comment

Not all of them. ^_^

Expand full comment

Clearly! We're here, aren't we?

Expand full comment

Spot on. It's like our world has become a mashup of The Wizard of Oz and Idiocracy, with the Wizard being an AI chatbot programmed using dislogue from Monty Python and Marx Brothers movies. I mean, if you created such a world and put such a chatbot in charge of it, it would be no more absurd than much of what we've seen from our "leaders" these past few years. And like you said, if it was a movie, it would probably be hilarious and/or scary, but living through it is something else entirely.

Expand full comment

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sFBOQzSk14c

From Life of Brian, the true origin of gender identity politics...

Expand full comment

That movie is genius on so many levels. And sadly, as this clip demonstrates, it was also uncannily prophetic.

Expand full comment

Men have been impersonating women forEVer. But I do love the Pythons.

Expand full comment

True, transvestites and transsexuals have existed forever, BUT the mainstream culture has never demanded that everyone else play along and profess a sincere belief that they are exactly the same as actual women. That part is new, and the "arguments" that Stan/Loretta makes in that Python clip are pretty much the same type of argument being made by cultural influencers today.

Expand full comment

Yeah, I get that. I was pointing out drama, too, you know, like plays, on stage? It used to ALL be men, or boys. Choirs, etc. It's a long history of many things. The latest nonsense is a psy-op.

Expand full comment

dont forget Skynet from Terminator!

Expand full comment

It's just BIZARRE.

Expand full comment

Same, same, same. Makes me realize they were probably always full of shit and that I'm a worse judge of character than I knew. Also, that the egalitarian traditional liberalism I always touted seems to end in the breakdown of civilization.

Expand full comment

I'm less inclined to believe that just about everyone i've known my entire adult life is full of shit, i just think most people don't think outside the circumference of their own lives, and social and cultural pressures can be enormous at times and usually the safest bet (sadly) is to go along to get along.

and as for egalitarianism, it makes an excellent garnish but a weak main course. it seems to be a concept designed for abuse, as it can't ever be entirely achieved and what may look "Equal" to me may strike you as "Unequal". it is a recipe for permanent social upheaval and endless enforced tinkering by whichever commissar gains the whip hand.

Expand full comment

It ain't over yet. I think the breakdown actually involves FAR fewer peeps than the Bad Guys want us to think. It's all a lot of hot air, smoke and mirrors...

Expand full comment
RemovedDec 12, 2022·edited Dec 12, 2022
Comment removed
Expand full comment

It IS an insanity, isn't it? I hear you!!

I really have to be patient, I guess, because I WANT THIS TO BE OVER.

Meanwhile, there are still Good Things to do, see, and feel. Sigh.

Expand full comment

It wasn't those institutions they opposed, it was the those institutions in the hands of conservatives, religious people, you know the squares.

Once these things were controlled by the Marxists or the Marxist-adjacent they are tools to be used against the normies.

"Who, Whom?" as Lenin said.

Expand full comment

Excellent point.

Expand full comment

Yep, notice how they fought against military until they destroyed it, same as policy now. They hate organizations until they control them.

Expand full comment

Yes!

Expand full comment
Dec 10, 2022Liked by Chris Bray

When the Foo Fighters said everyone coming to their shows had to be deathjabbed, I knew life as we knew it would never be the same--the 'rebels' are the true RINOs--then Taylor Hawkins died--vax injury no doubt--and not one cover story on Rolling Stone, etc, to commemorate his life, band members are suspicously silent. I guess they would rather have his memory sullied by the accusation of him having '10 different drugs in his body' (reported in under 24 hours by Columbian officials when we all know those kinds of tests take weeks to perform) than have the real truth come out. It's an outrage to his family and his fans---

Expand full comment

Well said. Sad, and... disgusting.

Expand full comment
Comment removed
Expand full comment

It's amazing, seeing how many cowards are running around loose...

I guess it's these kinds of hideous psy-ops that really show what people are made of.

I'm glad I'm a DOG.

Expand full comment

Their people/narratives are in charge now so they have nothing to rail against......

Expand full comment

Probably a lot of bribery. Payoffs. It's the easiest way to get people to participate... That, and blackmail.

Expand full comment
Comment deleted
Expand full comment

this is true in politics, not human behavior. Parties have always tried to cheat to keep power. But, artistic expression for most of my life has been mostly counter culture. Punk rock was a direct indictment against the establishment, so was rap music. Now these same artists are carrying water for the same power structures they railed against. Art is dead. Liberalism doesnt exist. Free thought and ideas are dying. The Party has made people hostage to ideology. They are abandoning everything they believe in, without even knowing it to serve the Party. Its all very fascinating, and scary at the sme time. How did this happen?? Trump ruined liberals, they hate him so much they have abandoned every principle they held dear, to serve his defeat. Thats my uneducated, unexpert opinion anyway.

Expand full comment

All so true. It seems like the people you describe got so used to seeing republicans as the party that defended big industry, worked against limits on pollution etc, that they didn’t notice the gradual shift towards authoritarianism on the left. The state In service of the individual and the larger world became the state with absolute power over the individual and in service of big industry. But they didn’t notice and fell into the matrix instead, serving and defending the monster instead.

Expand full comment

I am now non-binary with regard to political parties.

Expand full comment

Tired of blaming Trump. My liberal friends - God bless them - always hated the idea that America was a great place. They actively disparaged people who believed that message always pointing to our history- slavery, robber barons, poverty, racism, yada, yada.

So along comes Trump and, like the magnet pointing north, they focused on HIM. He conveniently provided a place to park all their frustrations and nonsensical beliefs. I think that they then blindly followed whoever opposed him. Of course I never thought they were rational anyway so it came as no surprise to me …

Expand full comment

The amazing part about this whole situation is the prior perpetrators of this sort of thing were the likes of stalin and hitler. They were masters of minimizing those who spoke out against the narrative to the point that people would deny what they could see happening right in front of them for fear that if they admitted the saw what was going on the would be disappeared as well.

And when you have an entire group of people pointing at those who didn't get the jab and saying they should be denied medical care for anything because they wouldn't jeopardize themselves to "save others" you get a pretty good idea of who the guards and executioners of the new left will be.

Keep your guns folks, you will need to use them shortly to save your own lives from the left because that is what always happens.

Expand full comment

If you need any more proof of this, try this on for size.

The current "transgender" mania isn't actually sweeping the country as they would have us believe. Yes, there are far more mentally ill people today that believe they were born in the "wrong body" but when you look just a hair deeper you find that for every one of these confused souls there are an order of magnitude or 2 more family members who wonder who fucked up their child, grandchild, niece, nephew, brother or sister but won't say a word because they fear being branded as "transphobic".

How do I know this? I have a niece that came out as trans 2 years ago publicly. On her social media posts to that effect I replied that none of the things she cited as being a "cause" actually applied to her and it was possible to genetically test these conditions and I would gladly pay for those genetic tests to be done to prove it. This rattled her so much that she blocked me on social media because she knows what she posted was untrue.

I had friends and family members, so many family members message me saying they agreed with me but those same people had responded to her with thumbs ups and hearts. They understand she has lost her mind and now that she has started hormone treatments to "transition" they are now realizing they should have said something then.

All of the so called "friends" who "stood up" for her and trashed me by calling me hitler and transphobic are equally mentally ill thinking they are something other than they were born. And to top it all off she is now cutting her parents out of her life though they have never shown anything but support for her. Why? Because she wants to have "top surgery" and since she is on their insurance until she is 26 she doesn't want them to say no to it.

If it were my kids she would wake up to find all sources of funding for school and everything else ended. But they can't do that so they are going to end up on the hook for her mutilating herself.

And I am not afraid of trans people at all. I feel sorry for them. When I was younger I worked with the developmentally disabled and still count some of those among my closest friends. I was taught early on that they didn't need someone to feel sorry for them, they needed people who could lend a hand to them to achieve their full potential.

I just feel sorry for the trans people, they weren't born fucked up, they brought it on themselves with dumb ideas about connecting happiness to something that they will never be able to achieve. It is no wonder the successful suicide rate is so much higher for people who transition compared to kids who just think they are something they can never be, once you go down that road with hormones or surgery you can never really be anything truly.

No, I don't fear them at all, which is why the idea that I am transphobic makes me laugh. Most of the ones I see saying they are trans look like 300 pounds of chewed bubblegum and are a waste of oxygen. What I do fear is that they will try to involve my kids in their little games. Bad idea, I will end anyone who tries because just because you got messed up is no reason to go messing up other kids.

Expand full comment
author

Any story that ends with "top surgery" -- bodily mutilation -- is a tragic story. This is heartbreaking.

Expand full comment

It used to be called mastectomy. Maybe we should call it what it is, and not adopt their language? Validating someone’s language validates their worldview.

Expand full comment
Comment removed
Expand full comment

The horror of this is staggering.

It takes ALL my wherewithal to tell those who want to hunt down these globalists, publicly disembowel them, and do other hideous things to them and slaughter them like hogs... that it's not good for the soul to enact vengeance in this way...

But I sure do understand the impetus for wanting to.

Expand full comment

Love this. Two of my sons are developmentally disabled at this point, and we love them and turn our lives upside down to take care of them and help them. But you would never take any irrational fear or belief seriously and allow them to make decisions that would destroy their lives. They need people who see things as they really are keeping them steady. All these gender confused kids need the adults to freaking be adults and help them through a tough period, not allow them to make decisions that a damaged mind should not make. Period.

Expand full comment

“dumb ideas about connecting happiness to something that they will never be able to achieve. “

Excellent point. I don’t even know what to say about people who can’t figure it out.

Expand full comment

I do: They are victims.

Expand full comment

I guess that’s part of the problem: Too many worry about being name-called “-phobic” that they forget to be the adults in the room.

Expand full comment
Comment deleted
Expand full comment

It’s absolute escape.

Expand full comment

They won't learn anything from this, either. If a bunch of them wind up disabled and unable to work, they will demand communism to keep from starving.

Expand full comment

"...if you regard yourself as a liberal, a progressive, a Democrat, or any other related identity, surely you agree that the national security state shouldn’t be intervening in our political discourse..." I thought this might be true until fairly recently, when I got into an argument with a woman who very happily campaigned for George McGovern in 1972. They've gone from "Question Authority" to "Authority." At the risk of over-generalizing, most liberals lack the courage of their supposed convictions. Obviously, the national security state shouldn't be intervening in our political discourse... but Trump poses such an extraordinary threat, we must make this exception. COVID poses such an extraordinary threat, we must make this exception. The January 6 "insurrectionists" pose such an extraordinary threat, we must make this exception. Bogeyman X and Hobgoblin Y pose such extraordinary threats, we must make this exception . . .

Expand full comment

Greenwald and Taibbi are notable exceptions. Michael Schellenberger, too.

Expand full comment
author

Always. Rock steady.

Expand full comment

Michael tries to walk the middle line. He does an excellent job in his writing and research. I don’t know if he yet realizes how deeply lobotomized his former colleagues are. But I applaud his efforts to bring sanity to the ‘climate movement’.

Expand full comment

“Of course I believe in free speech, but……”

Expand full comment

Astute observation. I have found the same. And even knowing the jabs don't work and they get covid over and over again, the cognitive dissonance is too strong...they cannot question anything.

My sister is a total Asch line experiment.

And if you really want to follow me down the rabbit hole, I am beginning to suspect that the jabs might be affecting how people feel and think...and it is quite medically possible, because the MNRA crosses the blood brain barrier, and degrades the myelin sheaths.....

Expand full comment

Another thing that affects thinking is heavy metals in your system... like aluminum. We've been hearing for decades how aluminum causes Alzheimer's... and not only is it EVERYWHERE in our food supply, but there's shitloads of it in these jabs, along with the graphene, the mercury, all the metals in chem trails, and all the rest of it.

These people are not messing around... They've planned this for decades, and had time to sneak it into damn near everything... Look at the incidence of Alzheimer's sky-rocketing over the past few years.

I think all these other fear trips, the mRNA, the snake venom, etc-- distractions. All they need are these metals and EMF's. Ba-da-boom, ba-da-bing.

Expand full comment
Dec 10, 2022Liked by Chris Bray

I’m very worried that Chris Bray may be an asset of the Kremlin. Has anyone other than me noticed that he doesn’t believe everything the CIA tells us???

Expand full comment
author

Sshhhhh!

Expand full comment

This is a vitally important meta-story, defining the emergence of a new paradigm for our times (equivalent to “totalitarianism” in the 1930s) and I’m glad you’re on it.

Expand full comment

Jessica Hertz has to figure somewhere in this story. She left Facebook in early October to work with the Biden transition team (already anticipating the win). Then she led Biden's staffing search for his administration before becoming his Staff Secretary, one of the most important positions in a presidential administration - John Podesta held that role in the Clinton administration for perspective. Thing is, progressives didn't think very highly of her, thought she was too much of a sellout to corporations.

Here's some interesting pieces on Jessica Hertz:

https://nypost.com/2020/10/01/joe-biden-hires-facebooks-jessica-hertz-for-transition-team/

https://prospect.org/blogs-and-newsletters/tap/bidens-progressive-appointees-watch-out-below-the-radar/

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10086113/Bidens-staff-secretary-quits-Former-lawyer-Facebook-leave-White-House-coming-days.html

Here's another story that Jessica Hertz is mentioned in dealing with Big Tech, Facebook, Google, etc. The primary subject of the piece is Cass Sunstein. Again, written by progressives saying they are too friendly with corporations. Jessica Hertz is described as being one of Sunstein's protégé's.:

https://bluetent.us/articles/governing/cass-sunstein-biden-white-house-oira/

Cass Sunstein is a very important part of the Information War we are in. He co-authored a book, "Nudge" with Richard Thaler from the UK. Both nations established "Nudge units" at the same time in the Obama and Cameron administrations. The Social and Behavioral Science Team (US) and Behavioural Insights Team (UK). Behavioral science is the science that studies the efficacy of propaganda, symbols, messaging, coercion, psychological manipulation to change a targeted population's perspectives so they change behaviors to fit what authorities want. Propaganda by definition includes censorship.

Epidemiology utilizes behavioral science to theoretically control the spread of infectious disease. Theoretically.

SBST established (is now known as the Office of Evaluation Services (OES) under the GSA):

https://behavioralscientist.org/executive-order-formally-establishes-us-nudge-unit/

Sunstein even co-authored the behavioral science plan adopted by health officials and politicians:

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/32355299/

Behavioral science is The Science (TM) of the pandemic, masking, social distancing, howling from windows to show solidarity and build buy-in to the need for lockdowns, contact tracing, all of it. Pandemic NPI was never based in medical science. It's all been behavioral science. The Science (TM) that cannot be questioned. Thing is, Behavioral Science is also known as the science of totalitarianism by practitioners of it:

https://web.archive.org/web/20210519003131/https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/05/14/scientists-admit-totalitarian-use-fear-control-behaviour-covid/

The UK's pandemic behavioral science team, SPI-B, has been led by a radical Marxist, Susan Michie - described as such by her fellow Marxists:

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/04/25/government-scientist-has-advocated-covid-controls-member-communist/

Sunstein's UK co-author, Richard Thaler and Nudge:

https://behavioralscientist.org/five-takeaways-from-our-conversation-with-richard-thaler-about-the-past-present-and-future-of-nudge/

Sunstein also had a protégé, Maya Shankar, who headed up the SBST. She also works for Big Tech - Google's Chief Global Behavioral Scientist:

https://knowledge.wharton.upenn.edu/article/power-nudges-maya-shankar-changing-peoples-minds/

With some interesting friends, Chelsea Clinton and Frank Luntz (GOP messaging guru, incoming Speaker Kevin McCarthy's BFF and roommate):

https://ms.player.fm/series/in-fact-with-chelsea-clinton/changing-minds-with-maya-shankar-and-frank-luntz

She also co-author of Behavioural Insights at the United Nations – Achieving Agenda 2030 (WEF's Great Reset) Hint: More propaganda and censorship:

https://www.undp.org/publications/behavioural-insights-united-nations-achieving-agenda-2030

We can't forget about Sunstein's wife, Samantha Power. Former NSC Director and UN Ambassador under Obama, Benghazi infamy. Now heads up US AID, establishing media propaganda (and censorship) outlets across the third world Note: billions of dollars of "aid" is missing in Afghanistan and other places she's funded propaganda outlets:

https://www.usaid.gov/who-we-are/organization/samantha-power

This is all one massive, tangled web of deceit. That even intermingles with DARPA when you go deeper down the rabbit hole. To the extent that Musk lets the bird sing no doubt we'll find many of the receipts go to and through these people, agencies and businesses. Because it is all connected. It is the machine with all of the bells and whistles, levers and pullies, blinking lights and buttons behind the curtain being controlled by the Wizard to appear all-knowing and all-powerful. When they are really just pathetic little men and women using linguistic sorcery and illusions to get people to do what they want, including owning nothing and being happy eating bugs. Sunlight. Needs lots of sunlight. So the sorcerer's magic tricks can be revealed to the masses. And once you know how the magic tricks are done you can't be fooled by them. Word.

Expand full comment

Don’t need Musk to know all of the above.

Expand full comment

The Emperor's New Clothes. Can't you see them?

Expand full comment
author

Yep!

Expand full comment
author

I woke up this morning realizing that the term "preference falsification" belonged somewhere in this piece.

Expand full comment

The video simulationcommander linked today is glorious:

https://open.substack.com/pub/simulationcommander/p/the-twitter-files-part-2-hits-the?r=7v442&utm_medium=ios&utm_campaign=post

(Too busy to share direct rumble link)

Expand full comment
author

HOLY SHIT

Expand full comment

Thank you!

Expand full comment

That MSNBC anchor sure knows how it’s done!

Expand full comment
Dec 10, 2022Liked by Chris Bray

"That’s what they were doing"

And that is what they are 'still' doing for the Climate Change psyop.

Re: The Twitter tails. It just keeps getting worse. And that is vetted content...

Peace.

Expand full comment
Dec 10, 2022Liked by Chris Bray

Chris, it surprises me that you don’t understand the simple fact that our government, by censoring truth, is trying to protect us. Why would they want anything other than the best for us all?

Expand full comment
author

Raymond Shaw is the kindest, bravest, warmest, most wonderful human being I’ve ever known in my life.

Expand full comment
Dec 10, 2022Liked by Chris Bray

US government goons stabbed the USA in the back their paychecks will bounce too.

Expand full comment
author

I sincerely hope so.

Expand full comment

No need to hope, it will happen, its just a matter of when. Until then its best to learn how to be independent of fascism in America methinks. Like what there was before Nixon the collaborator came on the scene and wrecked it.

Expand full comment
Dec 11, 2022·edited Dec 13, 2022Liked by Chris Bray

Excellent piece. You nailed it, in my humble opinion. And while the turn to authoritarianism by some public and formerly independent thinkers has been distressing (at least for me,) it is not hard to understand. Everyone is susceptible to Believing in X if the social shaming is dialed up high enough.

For me, I don't participate in social media. I have a social life, but not online. I'm also fortunate that my livelihood, my social standing, my finances, etc. are not dependent upon Believing in X. It's a sometimes (very much lately) lonely road but that is the price to pay for independence these days. I think the reality is that lots of us are on this road. Who engages with Twitter or watches TV "news"...5%, 10% of the actual population of the US? Maybe more, I don't know. I'd like to think it's a minority.

Corporate media tools and former Twitter employees, though their voices are amplified to the max, are also a minority. They should be wished well and largely ignored in my opinion. I'd like to think their false reality cannot hold.

Expand full comment
Dec 10, 2022Liked by Chris Bray

So yesterday evening a neighbor posted on NextDoor.com some information about a book published by the American Girl doll makers that focuses on “body image” and features a section on puberty blockers. As expected, immediately, a large graphic was posted by someone with the caption “stop trans hate.” As we are a conservative area, another 20 folks supported the original poster and her concern for young girls who might be exposed to this book. Well, this morning the post was gone. NextDoor evidently can’t deal with the reality of the culture. Most people don’t want little girls who still play with dolls to be encouraged to ask for dangerous drugs. It’s not just Twitter. All social media is complicit.

Expand full comment
author

I was on Nextdoor for about a month, and never managed to post anything that wasn't promptly removed. It's garbage.

Expand full comment

Do you know what I have noticed? Nobody cares. The people who knew about this years ago are bored and want some action. The people who have ignored it or haven't cared continue to ignore it and couldn't care less. Every institution in this country is crumbling. Half of us know and no longer care and the other half are watching a netflix documentary about cross dressing kids.

Expand full comment

Well, that seems a bit overboard. What about all of us here on SS? I'm not ignoring it, I care about it, and I'm thinking there MUST be a bunch of people like me... like you?

Expand full comment
Dec 10, 2022Liked by Chris Bray

I guess it depends on where you live and who you are friends with. I live in Los Angeles and I just found out today that I will not be allowed in the gym for my son's basketball because I decided against the shot. We were disinvited by family on the east coast for xmas last year because we didn't get the shot. Our "leaders" routinely screw us over and just did it again on this last election. We have about 0 power over celebrity and entertainment but maybe if we keep playing fair things will go our way and people will wake up. Maybe Kevin McCarthy and Mitch will come through? HAHAHAHAHHA. They are just getting the nooses ready.

Expand full comment
author

That gym thing -- that's pretty amazing.

Expand full comment
Dec 10, 2022Liked by Chris Bray

HA. Yes it is. Everyone above age 12 is being required to show proof of vaccination. This LA Parks

https://www.laparks.org

Expand full comment
author

Disgusting.

Expand full comment

I'm sorry to hear about that... CA, where I lived for nearly 25 years, SF/Bay Area, has gone completely insane. Now I live near Seattle (far enough away that it's not TOO hideous, but...), where it's very, very "woke," and I have a few friends that are jabbed, but they are very smug and we don't ever talk about jabular issues... It seems to be the "thing" to turn everything into Dem v. Repub, which just isn't the issue at all, in my view.

I was reading something the other day and the person was talking about how to "fight back," and basically saying, and I agree with him/her (I forget who it was), that the best way to undo this attempt to tyrannize the entire planet is to make the tyrants IRRELEVANT. IE, Do Not Comply.

Expand full comment
Comment removed
Expand full comment

Yeah, I agree. If I could find those peeps, I'd be pleased. My struggle is HOW to find them. It seems better to not be too "obvious" straight away.

Expand full comment

You are so spot on. I am sad for what used to be my country..the one I thought I had. I'm about ready to give up on the ordinary people...the ones who don't care and just want to go on with their little lives.

Where are the Men of the West?

Expand full comment

Well, there are men of the West. And there are also women of the West.

Expand full comment
Dec 10, 2022Liked by Chris Bray

You think we’re not on to you?!?!? I smell Russia!!!!

Expand full comment
author

Is not Russia, Amerikan! You smell nothing!

Expand full comment