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The CIA's Quest for Mind Control: Torture, LSD and a 'Poisoner in Chief'

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Re: The CIA's Quest for Mind Control: Torture, LSD and a 'Poisoner in Chief'

#171

Post by seppin »

krageon wrote: post #88
seppin wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're right: "Through the credible threat of violence, the racketeers deter people from swindling, robbing, injuring, sabotaging or otherwise harming their clients." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protection_racket It implies that the protector has the absolute ability to control if an attack occurs or not. So if the CIA had a little more budget, they would have stopped 9/11. Because they had the ability to, they jus…

Part of a protection racket is staging attacks when you think you're not going to get paid (or you're not getting paid yet). You could just as easily make a case along those lines, but both cases would be disingenuous because real life is complicated. Just because it's a protection racket doesn't mean that it needs to at all times 100% conform to a sentence that you found on wikipedia. As in a real life protection ra…

> Part of a protection racket is staging attacks when you think you're not going to get paid

Are you implying this has happened or does happen? Please cite your source if so.

> Just because it's a protection racket doesn't mean that it needs to at all times 100% conform to a sentence that you found on wikipedia.

No but going off an existing definition is better than throwing around a concept with any real connection to reality.

> The core of a racket is to respond with disproportionate violence. For example, sending your army to harass the entire country that some of your attackers were part of.

What does that have to do with CIA?

> Drone strikes on schools that are known to be full of children.

So a drone strike on country B is payback for them not ponying up protection money to the intel agency of country A. Did I get that right?

That is nonsensical.

Re: The CIA's Quest for Mind Control: Torture, LSD and a 'Poisoner in Chief'

#172

Post by DoreenMichele »

mistermann wrote: post #168
DoreenMichele wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm pretty controversial. I've been banned from a number of forums, including Metafilter where it was mod policy at the time that I joined to actively encourage the membership to gang up on and bully certain members. I was homeless when I was gifted a membership to Metafilter, which was an extremely classist environment, and I was one of the people the moderating staff actively encouraged members to gang up on. No am…

I'm quite familiar with your comments here, I consider myself a fan (I too can be controversial). But my disagreement in this specific case is the accuracy of your description. In your prior comment, you seemed to be evaluating HN on an absolute basis, whereas this one seems to be mostly on a relative (to MetaFilter) basis. Indeed, HN is one of the best forums going, even as its popularity has grown which makes moder…

I consider myself a fan

Thank you. That's nice to hear.

I don't think HN borders on perfection and I don't think I said anything of the sort anywhere. I said stuff like: HN does a much better job than most platforms of allowing people to genuinely express a minority view.

That's still a relative rating, not an absolute one. It does a better job than average. Your remark seems to generally agree with that, so I'm not sure I understand what the issue here is.

I have not had an easy time here and at one point I left for 18 months in part because I felt it was too rough for me here. But I was also really sick at the time and homeless and "wherever you go, there you are." My primary reasons for taking a break were not, per se, "HN is a shit show and everyone there is mean to me!"

I'm quite open about the fact that posting here as openly female was only "a bed of roses" if you are thinking of it in terms of the thorns. That opinion isn't one that is very welcome here. It gets a lot of push back.

I've had college classes in things like Social Psychology and Negotiation and Conflict Management. I know something about best practices for dealing with difficult group dynamics.

I'm not claiming there is no bias here. I'm not claiming things are always rosy and I used the word "hubbub" in my remark, above.

I don't really understand why you think I am engaging in hyperbole and attributing some kind of perfection to the site. My very first comment was basically a recipe for how to weather the downvote storm and wait and see where it goes after that.

And in my experience and opinion, it will go better if you actually follow the guidelines and don't start complaining about downvotes. As someone who attracts a lot of negative reactions on HN, my firsthand experience is that if you actually follow the guidelines and say nothing about the voting and wait and see, things will be less negative and a few hours later you may feel differently about how people are perceiving your comment because it may no longer be in the negatives and there may even be constructive engagement.

And you are less likely to experience that if you start complaining about bias and about downvotes and about people disagreeing with you.

I don't agree with you that I can't know what I know without spreadsheets full of data. I think I do know what I know based on having studied how social stuff works and having participated on a variety of forums over the years.

Metafilter is not the only forum where I had really negative experiences and was ultimately banned. It's just the only one I happened to use as an example to try to illustrate my point in one particular remark.

Re: The CIA's Quest for Mind Control: Torture, LSD and a 'Poisoner in Chief'

#173

Post by mistermann »

DoreenMichele wrote: post #172
mistermann wrote: post #168

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm quite familiar with your comments here, I consider myself a fan (I too can be controversial). But my disagreement in this specific case is the accuracy of your description. In your prior comment, you seemed to be evaluating HN on an absolute basis, whereas this one seems to be mostly on a relative (to MetaFilter) basis. Indeed, HN is one of the best forums going, even as its popularity has grown which makes moder…

I consider myself a fan Thank you. That's nice to hear. I don't think HN borders on perfection and I don't think I said anything of the sort anywhere. I said stuff like: HN does a much better job than most platforms of allowing people to genuinely express a minority view. That's still a relative rating, not an absolute one. It does a better job than average. Your remark seems to generally agree with that, so I'm not…

> I've had college classes in things like Social Psychology and Negotiation and Conflict Management. I know something about best practices for dealing with difficult group dynamics.

And it shows! That's a big part of why I'm a fan. That, and that you are an independent thinker (no small feat these days), and lots of other things.

> And in my experience and opinion, it will go better if you actually follow the guidelines and don't start complaining about downvotes. As someone who attracts a lot of negative reactions on HN, my firsthand experience is that if you actually follow the guidelines and say nothing about the voting and wait and see, things will be less negative and a few hours later you may feel differently about how people are perceiving your comment because it may no longer be in the negatives and there may even be constructive engagement.

I have more than enough first hand experience to know that your intuition is off in this case. Certain ideas (perspectives on reality, even though they are accurate) are not acceptable here - and that's ok, it is phase that Western culture is going through, what can you do.

Re: The CIA's Quest for Mind Control: Torture, LSD and a 'Poisoner in Chief'

#174

Post by DoreenMichele »

mistermann wrote: post #173
DoreenMichele wrote: post #172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I consider myself a fan Thank you. That's nice to hear. I don't think HN borders on perfection and I don't think I said anything of the sort anywhere. I said stuff like: HN does a much better job than most platforms of allowing people to genuinely express a minority view. That's still a relative rating, not an absolute one. It does a better job than average. Your remark seems to generally agree with that, so I'm not…

> I've had college classes in things like Social Psychology and Negotiation and Conflict Management. I know something about best practices for dealing with difficult group dynamics. And it shows! That's a big part of why I'm a fan. That, and that you are an independent thinker (no small feat these days), and lots of other things. > And in my experience and opinion, it will go better if you actually follow the guideli…

Certain ideas (perspectives on reality, even though they are accurate) are not acceptable here

I'm so controversial on so many axes that I simply don't care that some of my opinions don't play well here and I've largely stopped talking about certain things here.

Like vaccines. No matter what I say, both pro-vaxxers and anti-vaxxers are equally hateful. And I feel it's not super important and it's just something I rarely talk about anymore.

Anyway, this is real off topic and I am feeling like you just don't really understand me or something on this topic and it's not important, really, for you in specific to understand every little thing I say.

I don't intend to continue this discussion.

Have a great day.

Re: The CIA's Quest for Mind Control: Torture, LSD and a 'Poisoner in Chief'

#175

Post by colonelanguz »

seppin wrote: post #170
colonelanguz wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can't tell if you're trolling/deliberately obtuse or what Here's what I meant: Your wrong conception of how a protection racket works undermines your argument that the person who said "That's like supporting a protection racket" is wrong. No idea what you're talking about with "implies that the protector has the absolute ability to control if an attack occurs or not." Have you ever seen a gangster film? Anyways every…

> Have you ever seen a gangster film? I'm sorry i'm not basing my arguments on movies i've seen. Combine that with you arrogance in implying i'm getting concepts wrong (i'm citing them, you are not), I think this conversation has run its course. Your entire response amounts to "you are wrong but i'm not going to say how".

You cited a source which proves you were wrong in exactly the way I pointed out. Your entire original comment hinged on a bizarre metaphor you created out of your false premise that in protection rackets, the "threat" is fake or choreographed. It isn't, so your comment isn't an intelligible critique of the comment it was intended to respond to. Yes, that's my point: your critique is wrong. I told you how: it is based on a false premise.

> (i'm citing them, you are not)

You cited Wikipedia, and you haven't cited a single source for any proposition other than the one you were specifically wrong about.

> I'm sorry i'm not basing my arguments on movies i've seen.

Deliberate obtuseness. The obvious implication of the reference to gangster films is that anyone who has even a passing familiarity with protection rackets knows that harm from the racketeer is not the only threatened harm. The third sentence of the Wikipedia entry you mentioned confirms this: "Through the credible threat of violence, the racketeers deter people from swindling, robbing, injuring, sabotaging or otherwise harming their clients." That means that the analogy between the CIA and a protection racket is perfectly tenable—in the parlance of your Wikipedia entry, a "broader protection racket" rather than a "pure extortion racket."

Not sure how to spell it out any clearer than that. I'm not implying you're getting concepts wrong. You got them both wrong.

Re: The CIA's Quest for Mind Control: Torture, LSD and a 'Poisoner in Chief'

#177

Post by seppin »

colonelanguz wrote: post #175
seppin wrote: post #170

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Have you ever seen a gangster film? I'm sorry i'm not basing my arguments on movies i've seen. Combine that with you arrogance in implying i'm getting concepts wrong (i'm citing them, you are not), I think this conversation has run its course. Your entire response amounts to "you are wrong but i'm not going to say how".

You cited a source which proves you were wrong in exactly the way I pointed out. Your entire original comment hinged on a bizarre metaphor you created out of your false premise that in protection rackets, the "threat" is fake or choreographed. It isn't, so your comment isn't an intelligible critique of the comment it was intended to respond to. Yes, that's my point: your critique is wrong. I told you how: it is based…

No, I admitted my original comment didn't cover everything it needed to, hoping such a concession would lead to a more civilized discussion. I was wrong, you are more interested in attacking people and defending yourself than discussing anything.

> "Through the credible threat of violence, the racketeers deter people from swindling, robbing, injuring, sabotaging or otherwise harming their clients."

Ok, so the CIA approaches their mark, in this case their own government. They say we will threaten other actors that threaten you, in exchange for money. You've just described the Pentagon, DoD, and every standing army on earth. A "broader protection racket" can literally mean any security service, from mall guard to 4-star general.

Besides, you are being disingenuous. When people think of a "protection racket" they think of extortion and the mob, not the broad security guarantees of an army or intel service.

Or as clearly stated on wikipedia:

> "Protection rackets are indistinguishable in practice from extortion rackets"

You a deflecting from the accepted definition of a term you used in order to make your original claim less fantastical and attention seeking. I don't blame you for making such a claim, social media and websites that allow for upvoting are made for such actions.

Doesn't mean you are anywhere near correct.

Re: The CIA's Quest for Mind Control: Torture, LSD and a 'Poisoner in Chief'

#178

Post by [deleted] »

3131s wrote: post #97
kortilla wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But that’s lame even for a conspiracy. Step 1 if it was a conspiracy would have been certainly to go after the funders because they were loose ends.

You don't know who you're talking about. Prince Bandar is not going to become a "loose end", they'd sooner off Bush himself. If you or I had transferred $130,000 into the accounts of two of the hijackers just before the attack, do you think we'd be roaming around freely today? This is a billionaire arms trafficker, not some pleb.

[deleted]

Re: The CIA's Quest for Mind Control: Torture, LSD and a 'Poisoner in Chief'

#179

Post by 3pt14159 »

realce wrote: post #146
3pt14159 wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not the person you are responding to, but I liked Fair Game and The Billion Dollar spy. Cyberspies was also decent, but it's less exciting and more technical. I don't share arminiusreturns' view on the intelligence community. I know there are the black site psychos, but most of the people I've met in the IC care deeply about the rule of law and making the world safe for all of us. But they are right that things truly…

> but most of the people I've met in the IC care deeply about the rule of law and making the world safe for all of us. I don't mean to twist your words, but that's what all suppliers of State power want. It doesn't make the outcomes good or moral, it doesn't mean the will of the population is actually adhered to. "Making the world safe for all of us" is a simple paradox of Asimov-level complexity and outcome.

Well, I respectively disagree. Some actors want money, some want power. What I was trying to convey was that in the west, most actors want safety and prosperity and peace.

For example, these people from my country talk at length about the nitty gritty legal aspects of national security related law and how it is practiced by the Canadian intelligence community:

https://www.intrepidpodcast.com/podcast

Or the overworked RCMP officer I met that spent most of his time trying to find kids being trafficked for pornography. Or the guys I met in the US that were working on arms control of nuclear weapons. These people aren't using their considerable skills to make money, which they could clearly do on Wall St. They're focussed on making the world better and safer. These people literally work on arms control for WMDs and I fail to see how you can dismiss their efforts with a straight face.

Re: The CIA's Quest for Mind Control: Torture, LSD and a 'Poisoner in Chief'

#180

Post by gurkendoktor »

jonathanstrange wrote: post #153
artvark11 wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>but the media - and especially social media - are not directed by a uniform actor with intentions. There are 6 corporations that control the vast majority of the news media you consume. The idea that it is unfathomable that they would work together to push their narrative is utter nonsense. https://techstartups.com/2020/09/18/6-corporations-control-9...

Two problems with your reply: 1. It only talks about "in America", meaning the US. There are 192 other countries. 2. I haven't said it's unfathomable. It's ridiculously unlikely, though. Journalists are not exactly known for their secrecy, even if they wanted to they wouldn't be able to hide a gigantic mind control collusion among the six corporations you've mentioned. There is no grand conspiracy. On a side note, ed…

Or maybe this insane nonsense has become so powerful because the official narratives are much dumber than I seem to remember them from before. Probably a result of both increasing polarization and shrinking media budgets.

For example, covid is just the flu, and only xenophobes would enact travel bans over it. No wait, corona is terrible and it's Trump's fault for not containing it. No wait, we should all go to BLM protests, did you know they actually _lower_ Covid rates? Listen to the science, don't wear masks! No wait, wear masks! ...

(The most effective "alt-right"/trust erosion accounts I've seen don't do much more than put screenshots of contradictory statements from the same source next to each other.)

Or Pizzagate, where it felt like the official narrative had solidly won after someone wanted to raid the pedophile dungeon and couldn't find it. Case closed! Until the Epstein story happened, Clinton's name was on flight list several times, and the media acted in actual unison by ignoring the implications. (I get it! Touching this case is suicide by proxy for journalists. But then don't blame normies for getting paranoid about pedophile elites.)

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