Forward Unto Dawn...

Being finally done with the Gary Allen book, I think it's probably something that I should continue doing. Not Allen of course, he's just finished. The issue that I am having is whether or not I should move forward in time from Allen or move backward in time. 

Even though Allen's book was written in the 1970s, it still seems relevant because nothing changed in the dialogue from the right. The only difference is what was considered fringe is no longer considered so. As you should have been able to see from the months of reading the Allen book: it's the same rhetoric. These people attacked Nixon from the right just as they attacked John Boehner from the right. Ideological partisanship is what they want, not "freedom" or "liberty." They don't support the Consitution, because they've never read it. They just like the word and now that it carries weight with their supporters. The same is true in the 1970s as it is in the 2020s. 

Yet because of the similarity in the rhetoric, I feel I want something completely different. For this, as I have said, I can go in two directions. The first direction is the rather short "Proofs of a Conspiracy Against All the Religions and Governments of Europe Carried on in the Secret Meetings of Free-Masons, Illuminati, and Reading Societies," by John Robison. Robison was a member of the Scottish Enlightenment, having invented the siren, an early discovery that led to Columb's law, and worked with James Watt on an early steam engine. Though Robison was a conspiracist as proven by this book. The book is important because it was published ten years after the disbanding of the Illuminati and is one of the reasons that the conspiracy theory exists today. 

The other option is to go with Bill Cooper's "Behold a Pale Horse." Cooper was a conspiracy radio broadcaster, who serves as a proto-Alex Jones (though Cooper hated Jones and publicly denounced him on his show). Behold a Pale Horse, is a book that has the standard Illuminati NWO conspiracy theories in it, but also mixes in the science fiction UFO angle as well. An interesting facet of Cooper's book is that while it is extremely popular in the right-wing anti-government conspiracy theory world, it is also popular in prisons and amongst Black Americans. It gets a mention in a few Wu-Tang tracks for example. 

There are advantages to both books. The Robison book is an original conspiracy work. As I said it declared the Illuminati to be an anti-establishment conspiracy puppet master group only ten years after they had been disbanded in Bavaria. Robison could have talked to members of the actual group (as far as I know he didn't). The book will also have the delightful 18th century feel to it as well. Robison is no joke either, he's a scientist so I'm anticipating a bit of the old-timey scientific language as well. 

The Cooper book is much more of a direct conspiracy book. Cooper's work tied the UFO world into the conspiracy theory world in a way that no one had before...well, he popularized the idea. While there had always been a UFO conspiracy that conspiracy was essentially that "the government is covering it up." Cooper's work claimed that the saucer people worked with the Illuminati and they, in turn, controlled the governments. He's very anti-NWO in a 90s nostalgic bit that is somehow timely today. 

In the long run, I am going to read both books, it's just which book comes first is the big issue here. They've both done damage to the world, but I think the Robison book is worse and maybe deserves the first read. I make this claim because Robison kept a conspiracy going when the Illuminati would have been lost to the sweep of history as an obscure club for atheist cosplayers in an 18th-century country that doesn't exist anymore. When the king of Bavaria issued the edict that banned secret societies, it wasn't just the Illuminati that lost their charter. They are the only ones we know about and that is thanks to Robison. 

I think I've convinced myself then: Robison first then Cooper. The version I will be using can be found here: Proofs of a Conspiracy, by John Robison [1798] (conspiracyarchive.com)

This book is in the public domain and we do not have to worry about copyright here. I will follow the same format as the Allen book. Next week we will begin our sordid tale.