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I recently spoke at the Real Left conference. My thanks go to Emily Garcia and the rest of the Real Left team for organising the conference and for extending to me such a warm welcome. I met a lovely bunch of people. Jacob Nordangård, a researcher, essayist, author, and musician who I greatly admire, gives a good account both of the event and his frustration at encountering the current extent of the Technocracy already in place in the UK—a Gilliamesque dystopia—upon his arrival from Sweden.
Though most who attended the Real Left conference were broadly of the traditional political left—not the modern neoliberal or woke left—there was a diversity of opinion expressed that I found refreshing. During one of the many vibrant discussions, one of the attendees asked where someone who accepted the man-made climate change hypothesis fitted in to the “Truth Movement.” I didn’t chip in with any opinion because I couldn’t articulate one. All I could form were more questions.
At their most effective, a social movement is a grassroots-based subgroup within a population. Members are collectively committed to a sustained social and/or political campaign. The movement’s primary goal may be to change the sociopolitical status quo, either in whole or in part, or to resist changes proposed by the guardians of the status quo—the Establishment.
In 1955, Henry Farlie Hose described the Establishment as “the whole matrix of official and social relations within which power is exercised.” He was not simply referring to the executive, legislature, and the judiciary. He meant a “matrix” of sociopolitical power held together by the “social relations” between leaders of the government and its institutions, the judiciary, the military, the church, academia, big business, the media, and the aristocracy, etc.
The Establishment can exert its power and influence over the entire sociopolitical system and the economy precisely because the Establishment cooperates to advance its shared objectives while simultaneously “not depend[ing] on any formal relationships, but on subtle social relationships.” Essentially, the Establishment is a fluid, decentralised and compartmentalised network with no single centre of control. Looking at how it operates internationally, I have expressed this view of the Establishment as a global public-private partnership.
National populations, manipulated where they live by the Establishment’s social engineering programmes, tend to oppose the individual actions undertaken by various branches of the Establishment rather than the Establishment as a whole. With little or no conception of the Establishment as a united and distinct network, opposition to the Establishment is inevitably fragmented and disjointed. Consequently, the Establishment operates a cohesive system of sociopolitical power that broadly escapes scrutiny and largely goes unchallenged.
As we consider the Truth Movement and its objectives, it is assumed that we all recognise that the Establishment does, in fact, exist. If we don’t, personally, I see no possible purpose of a Truth Movement.
Just like the Establishment, a successful movement’s membership is informal but each member supports the movement’s objective[s]. Seen as an example of a “movement,” the Establishment’s achievements are unparalleled. There is a lot we can learn from the Establishment’s methods. The Establishment’s ability to consistently act in its own interests over centuries is particularly notable. If we want a successful Truth Movement we don’t have to reinvent the wheel but we do need to commit to a generational anti-Establishment struggle.
Again, just like the Establishment, a strong sociopolitical movement is an alliance between many individuals and organisations. All are not constantly in absolute agreement, but all unwaveringly support and work towards the goals of the movement.
Prominent individuals may inspire the movement or represent it from time to time. Additionally, various aligned groups and organisation might administrate, coordinate or even lead the movement. The core strength of a successful movement, however, is the ability of its members to sustain their determination and to act collaboratively to achieve the movement’s primary campaign objectives.
Analysis suggests that successful movements have essential attributes:
- They are genuinely grassroot and focused on members’ “ownership” and participation, rather than on “elite leadership.” The successful movement maintains a decentralised organisational structure. The movement manages internal disagreements constructively for the benefit of the movement as a whole, and it supports and encourages as many members as possible to become movement spokespeople or leaders.
- A successful movements has “a clear, long-term vision” and capitalises on “incremental wins” to build momentum and thereby maximise wider engagement.
- A successful movement offers a compelling narrative that shifts public opinion and cultivates increasing support for the movement’s long-term vision.
- To achieve success, a movement combines a variety of tactics—direct action, use of media, protest, digital outreach, membership advocacy, lobbying, etc.
The questions, then, for the Truth Movement (TM) are:
- What is the nature of the sustained social and political campaign it is engaged in? What is the TM’s primary goal, its “long-term vision”?
- Who are the members of the TM and what groups and organisations are welcome? What conduct or norms are asked of its members?
- What is the organisational structure of the TM and how does it support and encourage its members to act as spokespersons or assist them to develop leadership skills? What opportunities does the movement provide for members?
- How does the TM resolve internal disputes?
- How is the movement funded? What safeguards does it have in place to protect against financial influence or other forms of coercion?
- What is the clear long-term vision of the TM and what incremental wins can it use to build momentum for that vision?
- What compelling narrative does the TM offer to shift public opinion and gather wider support for its long-term vision?
- What strategies and tactics does the TM favour to maximise the effectiveness of its campaign[s] and how do they combine to achieve its long-term vision?
Considering all of these attributes of a successful movement, and in light of the questions we might ask of the so-called Truth Movement, can anyone identify any such movement? I know I can’t.
There is no Truth Movement.
Those who highlight their own contribution and argue about when the TM began, who’s in it, who’s out, potential infiltrators, etc., are overlooking the most crucial factor: there is nothing to suggest any kind of functioning TM exists. Such discussions are diversions away from the realisation that if we want a Truth Movement to succeed we first have to form one.
Movements are often created by the Establishment. Similarly, genuine grassroots movements are frequently corrupted by the Establishment. Either way, such movements ultimately serve the Establishment.
Examples of those created by the Establishment include Extinction Rebellion, which was set up to promote climate alarm and thereby sell the United Nations’ sustainable development goals. Various colour revolutionary movements, such as the Orange Revolution in Ukraine, have been orchestrated by the Establishment. The Orange Revolution, the forerunner to the Maiden coup, lay, or rather solidified, the foundation for the subsequent war.
Movements such as the Occupy movement, which sought to overturn social and economic injustice, are genuine and garner real popular support. These authentic movements are commonly infiltrated and co-opted by the Establishment. Occupy, for example, presented a tangible threat to the Establishment’s status quo. Consequently, it was evidently subverted by Establishment backed groups.
From the Establishment’s perspective, the movement facsimile represents the best kind of movement. With no organisational structure, no identifiable campaign objectives, without any discernible strategies, absent any compelling narrative and possessing no long-term vision, the mythical movement is perfect for Establishment purposes. The Establishment’s propagandist can pretend it exists and then create fake movement “actors” to attack the people it labels as members of the aimless pseudo-movement. The people’s well-founded grievances and any anti-Establishment dissent can be corralled and marginalised within the phantasm, replete with its fictional bogeymen and concocted menaces to society.
The Establishment wants its opponents to believe in the mock TM precisely because it leads those who stand against the Establishment’s agendas nowhere. This is an age-old Establishment trick.
Political parties are stage managed by the Establishment and offered to the public for the same reason. The people imagine they have a route to influence decision making. Some devote a lot of time and energy to squabbling over control of the pursuant democratic political system. The pointless division among the people most likely to question its governance enables the Establishment, with a little tweak here and a nudge there, to rule unmolested. As long as enough people fantasize that the Establishment’s “democratic” system affords them a voice, the Establishment is free to act as it wishes.
Frustrating everyone who identifies as a member of a TM that does not exist is another Establishment goal. Some of the leading proponents of the fake Truth Movement are Establishment lackies but most are just terminally disheartened people. Instead of forming a real movement with clear goals, their effort is consumed without purpose. This inevitably leaves them powerless and directionless. Any threat they could have posed to the Establishment is gone once they inevitably lose interest and give up.
As the faux TM benefits the Establishment, no one who genuinely opposes the Establishment should ever align themselves with it. Those who keep banging on about their struggle in the TM simulacrum are either wittingly or unwittingly serving the Establishment.
Pontificating on the perceived failures, or assumed successes, of an imaginary movement is, regrettably, exactly what some of the people who could contribute to forming a real movement have been doing. As there is no chance that any anti-Establishment truth, of any flavour, will ever be accurately reported by the Establishment’s own “mainstream” media outlets, it has fallen to the independent media to perform this task. The independent media needs to report the evidence and offer the analysis people can use to find the truth for themselves. Very few independent media journalists appear to care about this important mission.
By definition independent media journalists are not “beholden to governments, corporations, and other outside influences,” they are not “constrained by those with power” and they are “under no pressure to alter their reports”—they should be free from editorial influence. If we accept Henry Farlie Hose’s concept of the Establishment, unlike their mainstream counterparts, independent media journalists question and interrogate the Establishment. This doesn’t necessarily mean they are anti-Establishment but serving the Establishment or its agendas isn’t a function of the independent media. Or, at least, it shouldn’t be. That’s the mainstream media’s role.
Debate is healthy, and uniform agreement across the independent media isn’t necessary if reporting evidence and expressing opinions that challenge the Establishment’s status quo is the goal. There is, nevertheless, a professional and constructive way to conduct debate and an unprofessional, destructive approach. It often seems that the independent media is incapable of the former.
Readers and audiences would probably be enthralled by adversarial debates covering varying interpretation of evidence, differing analysis of events, reasoned opposing opinions, and arguments that seek dialectic understanding, even resolution. For such debates to take place, the independent researchers, journalists, authors, and analysts willing to participate would need to concede that they might not know everything a could be wrong. This appears to be beyond the scope of many.
Unfortunately, a sizeable swathe of the independent media has devolved into a pathetic, ego-driven pissing contest. Aside from spreading the falsehood that there is a Truth Movement, a fair proportion of so-called independent journalists appear to be preoccupied with elevating themselves, their favourite analytical methods, pet theories, and personal hobby-horses above those of other independent journalists.
The few independent media journalists that try to engage in debate and offer constructive criticisms, the minority who challenge common perceptions of the “truth” and question evidence, are all too frequently met by defensive character assassinations. Every criticism is taken as a personal attack, even when none is implied, questions are imagined accusations, perfectly well-formed counter-arguments are reframed as malicious dismissals, and casual comments apparently warrant a prolonged vilification of the independent journalist who made them, while their evidence-based questions are simply ignored.
Most of the people who the independent media should serve surely find these internal spats and the incessant shoe-gazing unedifying and unprofessional—and boring I would have thought. If every attempt at discourse within the independent media dissolves into a tit-for-tat slanging match, why should anyone be interested? I know I’m not.
Many of the most prickly and confrontational independent journalists—who seemingly specialise in attacking the person instead of their ideas—will be Establishment plants deliberately sowing division. I suspect, however, that most are just fragile braggarts or those for whom the bottom-line is maintaining their sponsorship deals, protecting their advertising income or extracting as much money as possible from their small clique of loyal followers.
Depressingly, in anticipation of the pushback my comments will receive from some quarters, a pre-emptive personal segue is probably required. You can click below if you want to support my work with your money.
Everyone needs to earn a living and many independent media journalists who rely on the subscriber model and whatever they earn from freelance work, such as myself, wouldn’t be able to continue without the financial support of readers. Therefore, of course it matters to me that I produce articles that hopefully encourage as many readers as possible to support me, though less than 0.2% are able to do so. I want to carry on and I understand the pressures. But I also refuse to compromise my anti-Establishment stance in order to do so. If I go under, so be it. I’ll have to do something else.
I am not claiming to be anyone’s hero. My family comes first, end of. The reason I do this work is because I am sick to death of me and mine—and everyone else—being farmed cash cows, liable to be culled at any moment, on an illegitimately seized estate run by a bunch of parasitic robber barons for their own exclusive benefit. That is not my lot, I won’t accept it, and if the Establishment collectively thinks my loved ones are equally expendable I am not going to lie down and take it. So fuck the Establishment!
Anyway, moving on.
Some people who follow the stick-the-boot-in variety of independent media journalists love a good fight and can’t wait to get involved in a social media pile-on. All good fun I’m sure, but worse than useless if we actually want a Truth Movement that achieves anything. The Establishment couldn’t be more delighted with this behaviour. That’s why it uses its online agents, military propaganda operatives and AI bots to encourage and organise it.
I am not making these observations as an argument against criticism within the independent media. I’ve certainly offered my own. On the contrary, I think we should all be free to criticise everything and anyone’s claims, analysis or ideas. Alas, though this could be a source of strength for the independent media, it currently looks like it might be its undoing.
Too many independent media journalists are incapable of conducting polite debate professionally without straying into personal attacks. In my view, this widespread failure greatly diminishes the independent media’s potential to be an effective voice for any possible TM.
Assuming a Truth Movement is something we want, I can envisage a major hurdle that future TM members will have to overcome before they can form a real movement. Rather like the war on terror—a war against some nebulous concept—a Truth Movement runs the risk of campaigning for a truth no one else can perceive. As people are unlikely to be convinced by a truth they can’t clearly discern, what is the verifiable, objective truth that the prospective movement is going to base its campaigns on?
Just establishing the nature of “truth” immediately takes us into some fairly deep philosophical weeds. All I can say is that I believe truth is absolute and objectively knowable. I cannot say that I know with certainty what the truth is, only that I think some things are true and some things aren’t.
I am not being obtuse just for argument’s sake. An effective Truth Movement must campaign for a single “truth” that all of its members advocate equally. More importantly, it has to be a revelatory truth that, once understood, convinces others to align themselves with and hopefully join or act in support of the “movement.”
Therefore, for a TM to succeed, the one truth it insists upon has to be both demonstrable and substantive. The TM’s “truth” cannot be grounded in endless debates about what is true and what isn’t. 9/11 Truth, Covid truth, climate truth, virus truth, space program truth, suppressed energy truth, and the truth about the nature of reality are all fascinating and important subjects that elicit a range of views. In isolation, none of these points of contention can possibly unite all prospective members of a Truth Movement.
Nonetheless, the aforementioned explorations of the truth do perhaps suggest a common theme: the official account, for whatever reason, is false. Regardless of their favoured explanatory theory, everyone who holds to one or more of these truths shares a common apprehension: they are aware that they have been deceived, to some degree, by the Establishment.
Spreading that awareness has recruitment potential for a possible Truth Movement. Solely raising awareness, however, is not enough for our hopeful TM to make a difference.
Once the TM members have agreed their one “truth,” the TM can formulate and develop the compelling narratives to propel its sustained campaigns. These campaigns can then build momentum for the TM’s long-term vision which will address the problems that awareness of “the truth” reveals.
I hope most reading this at least recognise that the Establishment’s status quo does not serve the interests of the people. That is to say, collectively we have an Establishment status quo problem. If we cannot agree on the problem either, then the envisaged TM will never get off the ground.
As the point of any movement is to campaign to address the deleterious aspects of the Establishment’s status quo, presumably we prospective members of the potential Truth Movement ultimately aim to remedy the problem we have identified through our understanding of the truth—whatever that may be. For the purpose of this discussion, let’s call ourselves “T-Mers.”
The goal of a movement is not just to complain. Successful movements campaign to challenge inequities but also “for” some sort of constructive outcome, some manner of practical redress. Therefore, our potential Truth Movement must not only agree on the nature of the Establishment problem exposed by the one truth but also offer a collectively endorsed solution.
Without the potential remedy, promoting society-wide awareness of the problem is unlikely to build any significant social momentum. People already know there are lots of problems with the Establishment’s status quo but, for reasons we’ll explore in Part 2, they don’t do anything about them because they think they can’t. A successful Truth Movement will not only encourage broad social awareness of the truth, it will empower as many people as possible to act by showing them how they can do something to rectify the identified problem[s] revealed by the truth.
As the Establishment never passively allows any dissent against it to go unchallenged, what we are talking about here is unavoidably more than just an ordinary grassroots movement. The Truth Movement, should it ever come into being, will have to challenge the Establishment’s status quo in its entirety: the TM will be a revolutionary movement.
There won’t be a Truth Movement of any kind unless every T-Mer works together to raise awareness of the one truth. So what is the whole truth? What prospective “truth” can inform a movement’s compelling narratives, drive the incremental success of its campaigns, build social momentum and convince enough people that the movement’s long-term vision is the vital remedy to the problems exposed by that truth?
What truth unites all T-Mers?
These are the questions we’ll try to answer in Part 2.
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