Science Fiction TV as a propaganda device.

[Hartmann von Aue]

It's quite obvious that most Sci-Fi TV plots are thinly veiled propaganda that are geared towards instilling NWO compliant, anti-racialist, anti-religious, anti-family attitudes into the viewer.

Shows like Dr. Who, the Outer Limits, and the Twilight Zone produce a psychological miasma and trance, with bizarre storylines and elements of horror inducing the right state of mind for indoctrination into ideas like "don't scape-goat people," "Hitler's alive"(Twilight Zone) "people with large families are like insects" (Outer Limits) "the Nazis = robotic daleks" (Dr. Who).

Then of course there are the Star Trek series, with the futuristic galactic "Federation." - a judeo-masonic fantasy if there ever was one, where family life seems non-existent, inter-species marriage is the norm, religion (except of course, for the "rational" religion of the Vulcans) is extinct, and autonomy and non-interference is the highest law.

Davros and his robots with an "authoritarian personality" (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TXrUyOurnOI)

Ghost of Hitler (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pkd55ws44EQ)

These shows target the young and intelligent and no doubt have a very pernicious effect.

Anyone have any stories and clips they would like to discuss?

[Petr]

Even worse, sci-fi is often contains popularization of Promethean/Luciferian ideas.

Thus, "science fiction" is a means of conditioning the masses to accept future visions that the elite wish to tangibly enact. This process of gradual and subtle inculcation is dubbed "predictive programming." Hoffman elaborates: "Predictive programming works by means of the propagation of the illusion of an infallibly accurate vision of how the world is going to look in the future" (205). Also dubbed "sci-fi inevitabilism" by Hoffman, predictive programming is analogous to a virus that infects its hosts with the false belief that it is:

-- Useless to resist central, establishment control.

-- Or it posits a counter-cultural alternative to such control which is actually a counterfeit, covertly emanating from the establishment itself.

-- That the blackening (pollution) of earth is as unavoidable as entropy.

-- That extinction ('evolution") of the species is inevitable.

-- That the reinhabitation of the earth by the "old gods" (Genesis 6:4), is our stellar scientific destiny. (8)

Memes (contagious ideas) are instilled through the circulation of "mass appeal" documents under the guise of "science fiction" literature. Once subsumed on a psychocognitive level, these memes become self-fulfilling prophecies, embraced by the masses and outwardly approximated through the efforts of the elite.
http://www.conspiracyarchive.com/NewAge/Sci.htm


Petr

[Charlie Robespierre]

Star Trek and the latest incarnation of Dr. Who are two outstanding examples. The former is powerful and effective propaganda, both are OTT, with Dr. Who being trite, artificial state sponsored propaganda being so extreme as to be thoroughly ridiculous. It doesn't work. Effective propaganda is far more subtle. You know that the writers' brainstorming room in Dr. Who is surrounded by a ring of burly state sponsored multicultural enforcers tapping clipboards with quota's, whereas the Star Trek species mixing utopia was born from those with unrestrained enthusiasm and genuine conviction..

[WFHermans]

I notice that every time I see some snippets of television science fiction.

I don't recall the title, but I saw a show that first seemed to be set in the Anglosaxon age, then a nigger in medieval clothes appeared as well and it was actually a science fiction show. (I also recall a British show that was set in ancient Rome with niggers in them, the white Romans deploring that the good wise niggers were slaves, et cetera.) Television is a waste of time and braincells.

[Kodos]

Hard science and engineering students, which comprise most sci fi fans tend to be more right wing.

Star Trek was sorta commie... but sci fi in general is not. Pournelle / Niven and Heinlein are reliably right wing.

[Sulla the Dictator]

Hard science and engineering students, which comprise most sci fi fans tend to be more right wing.

Star Trek was sorta commie... but sci fi in general is not. Pournelle / Niven and Heinlein are reliably right wing.

Petr needs to read Hyperion. :rofl:

[Kodos]

How was Hyperion right wing? It was good but I didn't see much political content...

[Thomas777]

How was Hyperion right wing? It was good but I didn't see much political content...

I didn't either. However, Sci-Fi (at least any worth reading) tends to be thinly veiled political theory, almost across the board.

When I was a kid, I first started thinking about these issues after reading stuff like Dune, Lucifer's Hammer, and Starship Troopers.

All of those sorts of stories may seem fantastical and silly when we grow up, but I think the essential mission of them was to get kids thinking about genuine, theoretical principles. Sci-Fi these days is probably devoid of that sort of thing...I haven't kept up with the genre in years.

[Sulla the Dictator]

How was Hyperion right wing? It was good but I didn't see much political content...

It isn't right wing. But it would infuriate Petr.

[il ragno]

Always thought it strange that sf and horror are so often linked together when they're so intrinsically, ideologically different. At least once upon a time.

There are still, however, two main schools of sf: what's traditionally thought of as 'rightist' or 'militarist' sf is directly descended from ASTOUNDING STORIES and the regning ideology of its legendary editor, John W Campbell. However, the socialist/utopian strain of sf also has its roots in the Campbell wing.

The leftist strain of sf - more literary and allegorical than that found in the ASTOUNDING branch, with less emphasis on hard science and more on characterizations, and a more cautionary view of technology and progress than Campbell's can-do high-tech optimism, was cultivated in the magazines that sprang up as an alternative to the Campbell model: GALAXY, IF, NEW WORLDS, FANTASY & SCIENCE FICTION, and more recently INTERZONE and ASIMOV'S.

Although the leftist model dominates now as thoroughly as the Campbell school did until the late 60s, it wouldn't shock me if the pendulum were already swinging back, as that's what pendulums do.

But Petr's comments I find absurd: to begin with, reinhabitation of the earth by the "old gods" is HP Lovecraft country, and nobody has ever mixed up Lovecraft with a science-fiction writer (while science occasionally makes cameo appearances in his work, it's the kind of nutty fantastical 20s pseudo-science that might as well have been called 'magic'). Secondly, and far more important, sf is inherently atheist literature.....even at its darkest and most pessimistic, it's always about knowledge and verifiable truth trumping superstition and medievalism, as manifested in futuristic wonders to come, and the ultimate triumph of those once-vaunted cure-all panaceas, Science and Progress. Not that there hasn't been sf with a pro-religious bent, but what passes for 'pro-religion' in literary sf is not the kind likely to please the Petrs and Michael Hoffmans of this world.

Not that any of this has anything to do with the sort of dumbed-down, bastardized sf popularized in movies and tv. If what we're talking about here is STAR TREK and DR WHO and SciFi Channel Presents MANSQUITO, I dunno what to tell you. This is actually a very fertile topic for discussion and I'm tempted to go on at length, but I'll wait until I have a clearer idea of what sort of science fiction is being discussed.

[Thomas777]

This is actually a very fertile topic for discussion and I'm tempted to go on at length, but I'll wait until I have a clearer idea of what sort of science fiction is being discussed.

Well, I'm no expert on sci-fi, but I think what we are discussing is the fact that sci-fi authors (as I knew the genre) were always writing with an eye to educate their readers on politics with fantastical counterfactuals. Discussing things like racial warring, Fascism, eugenics, and Faustian technophilia has (since 1945) required fantasy mediums for dissemination.

Genuinely 'Leftist' sci-fi doesn't really seem to have a reader base, because there is no point in veiling secular-humanism in science-fiction stories...an author can shout those sorts of messages from rooftops and be greeted with approving nods. Its the default setting for academic as well as 'popular' culture.

Orson Scott Card has been referred to as a mushy 'leftist' by some on these boards, but that really isn't accurate, IMO.

[MrRS]

Out of all the Sci-Fi i have watched the best was easily Babylon 5 and even that was politicised although it sent very mixed messages.

[Empress Cheesatine]

It's quite obvious that most Sci-Fi TV plots are thinly veiled propaganda that are geared towards instilling NWO compliant, anti-racialist, anti-religious, anti-family attitudes into the viewer.

That's exactly what's going on. In the 1950s, the Soviet-lovers of Hollyweird began producing these "antiracist" films with blacks and Jews being mistreated by the evil white devil, and it started from there.

[Empress Cheesatine]

//edit: The first interracial kiss on TV was done by Captain Kirk.

Is anyone besides me unsurprised at this?

[Kamandi]

Secondly, and far more important, sf is inherently atheist literature.....even at its darkest and most pessimistic, it's always about knowledge and verifiable truth trumping superstition and medievalism, as manifested in futuristic wonders to come, and the ultimate triumph of those once-vaunted cure-all panaceas, Science and Progress.
Not true in every case: there's clearly an Rousseauean sub-genre of dystopian, anti-progress sci-fi as well, highly critical of technological futurism.

Take Logan's Run or The Moon Is A Harsh Mistress, for example.

Even Star Trek had its right-wing elements, like its depiction of the Ferrengis, obviously intended to be the despicable "space Jews."

[Kamandi]

//edit: The first interracial kiss on TV was done by Captain Kirk.
^ And even more significantly, the first inter-species kiss, due to Kirk's fabled ability to get laid on any planet. :)

[Fernando Wood]

Then of course there are the Star Trek series, with the futuristic galactic "Federation." - a judeo-masonic fantasy if there ever was one, where family life seems non-existent, inter-species marriage is the norm, religion (except of course, for the "rational" religion of the Vulcans) is extinct, and autonomy and non-interference is the highest law.

Except that, in every episode of Star Trek I've ever seen, the Enterprise crew always winds up violating the non-interference rule.

[ZOGsoldier]

Star Wars would seem like the rare exception. The heroes are rebels and the jedis are very closely related to the holly orders of Medievil Europe, fighting for good and with a strong faith.

[Jake Featherston]

reinhabitation of the earth by the "old gods" is HP Lovecraft country, and nobody has ever mixed up Lovecraft with a science-fiction writer

I always thought of Lovecraft as something of a horrific science-fiction writer, due in part to the extra-terrestrial origins of the Great Olde Ones. He also did write one story about a (human) astronaut visiting Venus (and being destroyed by a sort of alien, invisible force field labrinth; it doesn't appear in many of his anthologies, so not every Lovecraft fan will necessarily be familiar with it).

[Jake Featherston]

Even Star Trek had its right-wing elements, like its depiction of the Ferrengis, obviously intended to be the despicable "space Jews."

LOL! I always thought the Ferrengis were intended to critique capitalism, not Jews, but your interpretation is more fun.

[Thomas777]

I always thought of Lovecraft as something of a horrific science-fiction writer, due in part to the extra-terrestrial origins of the Great Olde Ones. He also did write one story about a (human) astronaut visiting Venus (and being destroyed by a sort of alien, invisible force field labrinth; it doesn't appear in many of his anthologies, so not every Lovecraft fan will necessarily be familiar with it).

The 'science' in Lovecrafts work, IMO, is steeped in anxiety over Man's bestial origins. Its bio-anxiety, not techno-anxiety.

There is a story in one of his anthologies where some rich, decadent, explorer type finds some proto-human, ape race in the Congo and miscegenates with the females, thus creating monstrosities that be brings back home with him that run about on his ample estate.

I read a lot of scientific horror into Lovecraft, although its not tech-scientific, if that makes any sense.

[Jake Featherston]

Star Wars would seem like the rare exception. The heroes are rebels and the jedis are very closely related to the holly orders of Medievil Europe, fighting for good and with a strong faith.

"Star Wars" really isn't science-fiction; its fantasy in space.

[Jake Featherston]

There is a story in one of his anthologies where some rich, decadent, explorer type finds some proto-human, ape race in the Congo and miscegenates with the females, thus creating monstrosities that be brings back home with him that run about on his ample estate.

That story is called "Arthur Jermyn." Although there may be another one very much like it (although in fairness, half of Lovecraft's stories are at least somewhat similar to that one, although I think there may be a second story with that same, Afro-Congoid primate species theme).

But I think I see what you mean; Lovecraft is biological and social science sci-fi, rather than more conventional physics, math, & technological sci-fi.

[Delmac]

"the Nazis = robotic daleks" (Dr. Who)." WTF? The daleks are very obviously space zionists; a quick viewing of the original William Hartnell daleks episode should make this clear; it is the Thals who are the aryans. Davros = Menachem Begin; the resemblance is unmistakeable.

[Ahknaton]

Dr Who reminds me of Vishnu, with his many incarnations. "The Fifth Doctor" vs "The Fifth Incarnation of Lord Vishnu" etc, especially with the fact that there are a specific number of Time-Lords (Shiva?) in accordance with some cosmic plan. Most sci-fi is atheistic IMHO but when it does delve into "spiritual questions" (particularly on the nature of consciousness, reality as Maya/illusion etc) the predominant tendency is towards pantheism.

[Petr]

But Petr's comments I find absurd: to begin with, reinhabitation of the earth by the "old gods" is HP Lovecraft country, and nobody has ever mixed up Lovecraft with a science-fiction writer (while science occasionally makes cameo appearances in his work, it's the kind of nutty fantastical 20s pseudo-science that might as well have been called 'magic'). Secondly, and far more important, sf is inherently atheist literature.....even at its darkest and most pessimistic, it's always about knowledge and verifiable truth trumping superstition and medievalism, as manifested in futuristic wonders to come, and the ultimate triumph of those once-vaunted cure-all panaceas, Science and Progress. Not that there hasn't been sf with a pro-religious bent, but what passes for 'pro-religion' in literary sf is not the kind likely to please the Petrs and Michael Hoffmans of this world.
It may come as a surprise, but Lovecraft is actually more harmless as far as sci-fi occultism goes. Many more "respectable" authors entertain similar ideas under more moderate language.

Check out Arthur C. Clarke's The Childhood's End to see what Hoffman means. Demonic extraterrestrials visit the earth, and the idea is that they have come to put an end to mankind's "childhood" and raise them to the level of gods (ye shall be as gods), or at least perhaps some of them....

Arthur Clarke seems to be a Satanist. (Also a pedophile in Sri Lanka, I've heard rumors.)

Other satanists like Eric Pianka also dream about exterminating the great majority of mankind, after which the chosen few left will evolve into a whole new godlike species, possibly with the help of extraterrestrials.

Michael Hoffman further elaborates on the identity of Sirius:

“The mythical Satanic bringer of civilization to earth was supposed to be an alien from the star system Sirius, around whom the Egyptians and all subsequent Hermetic systems constructed their elaborate and obsessive religio-astronomic observances. This star Sirius also served as an astronomic secret code, an allegory of the illusory quality and inherent 'trickiness' of the material world.” (Hoffman, 26-27)

This Freemasonic mythology of extraterrestrial intervention in human evolution may be poised for a return. Given the impossibility of spontaneous generation, Darwinism has faced a major obstacle to its unquestioned primacy. Recognizing this obstacle, scientific materialist Francis Crick presented a theory bearing an uncanny resemblance to the Sirius myth. According to Crick, technologically advanced extraterrestrials 'seeded' the earth with life billions of years ago. Whether Crick was privy to the occult doctrines of the elite or was simply following the natural course of Darwinism's memetic metastasis, one thing is certain, he and other proponents of similar 'extraterrestrial intervention' theories are paving the way for the re-introduction of Freemasonic mysticism to mainstream science.

http://www.conspiracyarchive.com/NWO/Ascendancy2.htm

In Clarke's 2001, it was a mysterious alien intervention, symbolized by that black block, that transformed monkeys into men, and new alien intervention will supposedly transform them into overmen.

Occult organizations like Freemasonry have indeed been systematically promoting syncretistic mixture of science and supersition. Robert Heinlein was a propagandist for Ordo Templis Orientis and its Crowleyan ideas:

http://pturing.firehead.org/occult/grok/thelema.htm

Occult investigator Craig Heimbichner on OTO influence on popular culture:

You also claim that my book "falls flat" when it comes to "naming influential OTO members," and imply that I give little beyond the well-known names of Aleister Crowley and Jack Parsons. It appears that you have not read my book with sufficient attention, given the fact that I write at length about representative powerful individuals spanning the history of the twentieth century, who were connected to the OTO in significant ways in key areas, from the military and British Intelligence, to literature, journalism, medicine, science fiction, the homosexual rights movement and NAMBLA, the space program, Scientology, Hollywood, the pagan revival ("Wicca"), B'nai B'rith, the Zurich Union of Zionists, the Soviet Union's Trade Delegation, the Communist Party, Israeli Intelligence (Shin Bet), the CIA and even the Vatican and certain wings of Protestantism.

Some of the names cited in my book include military strategist Major-General J. F. C. Fuller, OTO visionary James Wasserman, NAMBLA activist Harry Hay, B'nai B'rith leader Dr. Pinkus, Dr. Jung's associate Oscar Schlag, Martin Buber's colleague Friedrich Levke, Vatican Secretary of State Cardinal Rampolla, Aldous Huxley, Alfred Kinsey, filmmaker Kenneth Anger, actor John Carradine, "Wicca founder" Gerald Gardner, ordained Episcopalian priest Michael Bertiaux, Pulitzer prize- winning journalist and "Man in Moscow" Walter Duranty, sci-fi legend Robert Heinlein, and many others. I do not give a complete membership list, but you might try your creative luck with the current leaders of the OTO, "Hymenaeus Beta" (William Breeze) and his U.S. top man, "Sabazius" (David Scriven), or Michael Staley in England (representing Kenneth Grant).
http://www.revisionisthistory.org/essay25.html

(Yup, Aldous Huxley too with his "gates of perception". Clear-cut case of a descendant of a famous materialist turning into an occultist.)


C.S. Lewis (a sci-fi writer himself) also clearly smelled the Luciferian aroma in the writings of Fabianists like H.G. Wells - check out his That Hideous Strength. H.G. Wells was a pathetic excuse for a human being whose life ended in despair:

http://www.thephora.net/forum/showpost.php?p=74065&postcount=1

In the same manner, the faith of shallow scientistic fools in the human progress will eventually collapse and all that will be left is irrational misanthropic nihilism, perfect breeding-ground for occultism. C.S. Lewis' other sci-fi novels like Out of the Silent Planet and Voyage to Venus (Perelandra) deal largely with this theme.

Lewis also referred to these occult notions (that were peddled in the world of Anglo intelligentsia back in his days and that he thus intimately knew) in a more lighthearted manner in this famous passage of Screwtape Letters:

I wonder you should ask me whether it is essential to keep the patient in ignorance of your own existence. That question, at least for the present phase of the struggle, has been answered for us by the High Command. Our policy, for the moment, is to conceal ourselves. Of course this has not always been so. We are really faced with a cruel dilemma. When the humans disbelieve in our existence we lose all the pleasing results of direct terrorism and we make no magicians. On the other hand, when they believe in us, we cannot make them materialists and sceptics. At least, not yet. I have great hopes that we shall learn in due time how to emotionalise and mythologise their science to such an extent that what is, in effect, belief in us, (though not under that name) will creep in while the human mind remains closed to belief in the Enemy. The "Life Force", the worship of sex, and some aspects of Psychoanalysis, may here prove useful. If once we can produce our perfect work—the Materialist Magician, the man, not using, but veritably worshipping, what he vaguely calls "Forces" while denying the existence of "spirits"—then the end of the war will be in sight. But in the meantime we must obey our orders.
http://pasx.5u.com/upload/Lewis,%20C%20S%20-%20The%20Screwtape%20Letters.html#7


And it would seem that at least Sam Harris is close indeed to this ideal of "Materialist Magician":

Sam Harris's Faith in Eastern Spirituality and Muslim Torture

The best-selling author of "The End of Faith" may argue against Christianity, but he is also supportive of phenomena such as reincarnation and ESP, and calls for "compassionately killing" the "Muslim hordes."

http://www.originaldissent.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1096&highlight=harris


Petr

[ogenoct]

inter-species marriage is the norm

Strange though that in the Star Trek universe there are hardly any human-alien hybrids around (Mr. Spock, who is a human-Vulcan hybrid, is one of the exceptions). Also, humanity seems to be mostly made up of White people. The humans in the Star Trek universe must be doing something right.

Constantin

[Delmac]

"Dr Who reminds me of Vishnu, with his many incarnations. "The Fifth Doctor" vs "The Fifth Incarnation of Lord Vishnu" etc, especially with the fact that there are a specific number of Time-Lords (Shiva?) in accordance with some cosmic plan."

Very much so; in fact in some of the backstory recounted in the spin off novels (yes, I ought to be ashamed of having read this stuff), the story is that the Doctor is pretty much a clone of one of the three mythical founders of Gallifrey (i.e. effectively Timelord gods). Thus
Rassilon ?= Brahma
Omega ?= Siva
The Doctor (aka The Other) = Vishnu

[Petr]

The Sirius Mystery, the Supreme Council 33rd Degree, and the Great White Lodge of Freemasonry

Beam me up Hiram...

http://www.freemasonrywatch.org/siriusmystery.html


Petr

[Petr]

This piece was written during the 1990s tech-craze, when the appearance of things like Internet made people believe we'd enter techno-utopia/dystopia any moment now:

Despite their surface appearance of conflict, WIRED-style free-marketeering and Wells' "Open Conspiracy" both lead to the same political- economic outcome oligarchist/corporativist control of a global economy. This is why the modern intellectual progenitor of modern libertarianism, Hayek, spent his career at the nominally Fabian socialist London School of Economics alongside Keynes, they were simply two birds of the same feather. Another ying- yang twinned pairing pointing to a common endgame. While it admittedly flies in the face of conventional categorization, right-wing and left-wing utopian/oligarchists are still fundamentally and most significantly utopian/oligarchists even if their protective plumage might temporarily succeed in confusing some birdwatchers. They differ merely on the tactics, while presenting a home for confused fellow-travellers of all persuasions, while they thump for the same 1000 year empire and imagine themselves sitting behind the steering wheel. This should be no more confusing than watching Alvin Toffler, and his wife Heidi, move from active Communist Party membership and factory floor colonization to becoming chief advisors to Newt Gingrich. Tactics may change; the strategy remains unaltered.

The New Dark Age

What sort of future do the futurists see for us? Despite the sugar- coated promises of wealth and power being held out to those who make the cut and get inducted into the supreme religious cult which gets to play imperial Wizard of Oz, the reality of a Wells/WIRED future won't be nearly so cinematic for most earthlings. As every honest futurist has admitted, the future will be painful and pointless for most who survive. The Information Age will be a Dark Age. It will bring pre-mature death to half or more of the earth's population and it will represent the deliberate scrapping and then forgetting of humanity's greatest achievements.

Perhaps, the harsh truth of the Information Age was best described in Michael Vlahos' January 1995 speech, "ByteCity or Life After the Big Change." Vlahos is a Senior Fellow at Newt Gingrich's thinktank, the Progress and Freedom Foundation (PFF), and a past geo-political analyst who has led PFF's exploration of implementing the Toffler/Wells plans. Vlahos presents a terrifying future scenario roughly 20 years in the future in which society has stratified into elites and gangs. In fact, life is so threatening in ByteCity that we spent most of our time in our rooms staring at wall sized vidscreens if we're lucky enough to have a room, that is. Vlahos' world is run by stateless modern robber-barons, which he terms the "Brain Lords" and which he characterizes as "rampaging not through the landscape but making billions in the ether." These new aristocrats will come from the merger of telecommunications and entertainment multinational giants and much like in Wells' formulation, the "Brain Lords" do not inherit their class status and they will burn out from looting at an early age. After 40 they will retire to run the world. They will comprise 5 percent of the population, he says. They are Wells' "New Samurai."

Below them he stratifies in the "Upper Servers" and the "Agents" who comprise another 20 percent who will spend their lives destroying the value of professional education and association in a vicious "information" driven chase for individual recognition. Below that, roughly 50 percent of the population lives as service workers slaving 12- 15 hours a day in front their living-room vidscreens "servicing" their global clients in a world that respects no time zones. And the bottom 25 percent, who, if they are not pacified will provide ample motivation for people to stay indoors to avoid being attacked by roving gangs, are what Vlahos calls "The Lost."

Roughly twice as large a population share as those who were discarded by the Industrial Revolution in Britain according to Vlahos, "The Lost" are those that will never become a functioning part of "ByteCity." Sustained by modern "Victorians" who know the threat posed by the poor, "The Lost" are merely the most wretched of the wretches. Life all the way up the line from "lost" to "lord" will entail such radical disruption of personal safety and well-being that, in effect, Vlahos has turned dystopian cyberpunk literature into a policy statement. Naturally, expecting to rise to the top, Vlahos appears to feverishly await the "Big Change." No less chilling is the scenarios planning exercise that WIRED's wizards-behind-the-curtain perform on their multi-national clients. From General Motors to AT&T, the Global Business Network (GBN) charges hefty sums to show the yellow-brick-road towards "ByteCity" to strategic planners and top corporate brass.
http://www.culturewars.com/CultureWars/Archives/cw_recent/Wired.html


Petr

[Björn]

Logans run is a damn good movie. Although I don't know if it was on purpose, the movie "Dark City" has a lot of anti-progressive elements. The antagonist of the movie was a race who had reached the peak of evolution and yet were dying off from what the director explained was out of "boredom". It has a similar notion to the movie Logan's Run as it is the individual versus the collective.

It's unfortunate cyberpunk and post-apocalypse died out as a genre. Althhough they are typically characterized as "anarchist" I have found much of the themes behind them to be right wing or antiprogressivist.

I find it odd that so many consider Starship Troopers to be a conservative book. The author has to be on of the most liberal of his time. His utopia he describes in that boring attemt at a manifesto disguised as a pseudo action novel is so absurd it can almost be classified as a comedy. He wrote a book about white slaves with a "see how you like it" theme.

[Larrikin]

Except that, in every episode of Star Trek I've ever seen, the Enterprise crew always winds up violating the non-interference rule.
The Star Trek universe in over the edge of sociological shizophrenia anyway.

All the time they discuss their "non interference" and vote for individualism and freedom for all, while at the same time inevitably say "Yes, Sir" to about anything a higher rank can come up with.

"Be free to follow your leader".

[Hartmann von Aue]

But Petr's comments I find absurd: to begin with, reinhabitation of the earth by the "old gods"

I have to disagree there. Post apocalyptic earth inhabited by aliens or robots is a common theme. Consider the movie AI.

2001: A Space Odyssey may not refer to an apocalyptic end of earth, but since man becomes like the gods that created him - it's a similar idea, and the movie is steeped in occult symbolism.

Planet of the Apes suggests something similar as well. Could Charleton Heston actually represent a member of an earlier earth civilization who is returning to the apes, who represent ourselves?

And of course there are the Bulwer-Lytton/GI Joe the Movie subterranean people who burrowed down there to escape past catastrophes - global Pompeiis, runaway greenhouse effects, or ice ages that permitted upstart man to get take their place.

[Ahknaton]

And of course there are the Bulwer-Lytton/GI Joe the Movie subterranean people who burrowed down there to escape past catastrophes - global Pompeiis, runaway greenhouse effects, or ice ages that permitted upstart man to get take their place.
Another example is X-Files the movie, where an ancient alien underground base is found beneath the Antarctic (that's straight out of Thulean polar mythology), containing technology waiting to be reactivated. Yet another is the dormant underground alien technology to reconstitute the Martian atmosphere in Total Recall. Ancient alien races = "old gods".

Edit: Another one I just thought of is Mission to Mars (the one with Mark Wahlberg) where they go to Mars and find an alien temple (basically a rip-off of the monolith from 2001: A Space Odyssey). Even though these movies deal with mankind making their "next evolutionary leap" I wouldn't describe 2001 as "techno-utopian" since there is a clear warning against "letting the technology take over" in the form of HAL 9000. The Terminator series also has this theme.

[Delmac]

"Quatermass and the Pit" is a good TV drama with the same structure - a real classic. Although some might say that its "We are all Nazis really" implication is an early example of the current dominant propaganda model.

[Fernando Wood]

There is a story in one of his anthologies where some rich, decadent, explorer type finds some proto-human, ape race in the Congo and miscegenates with the females, thus creating monstrosities that be brings back home with him that run about on his ample estate.

Another Lovecraft story concerning the monstrous results of miscegenation is one of his best: The Shadow Over Innsmouth. I've always thought it was his most chilling work.

[Petr]

Ancient alien races = "old gods".
Christians have a version of their own about this story (it seems to be getting more popular especially among the end-time apocalypse folks). IMHO it updates classic Christian demonology surprisingly well.

In fact, one could say that UFOs have brought a whole new kind of "respectability" to demonological speculations, not seen since the 17th century! :p As in Greco-Roman antiquity, both Christians and pagans can posit the existence of daimones, the only question being whether they are benevolent or malevolent.

An example:

What does the Bible say about UFO's and extraterrestrials?

The world is not looking for a theological savior. The world is looking for a technological savior, who will save them from war, famine, poverty, and disease. Unregenerate man wants heaven on earth, on his own terms, and apart from G-d.

What better way for the powers of darkness to reveal themselves, than as the technological saviors of mankind. The world of the occult openly embraces the UFO's, and alien extraterrestrials. The occult will always proclaim these beings as benevolent. The alien contacts always speak of things which contradict the bible. The consistent theology of the extraterrestrial is antichrist. The consistent message of the aliens is hostile to Christianity. The high tech extraterrestrials are demons. This is the only consistent, scientific, and biblically sound explanation. 2 Th 2:9 Even him, whose coming is after the working of Satan with all power and signs and lying wonders, 2 Th 2:10 And with all deceivableness of unrighteousness in them that perish; because they received not the love of the truth, that they might be saved. 2 Th 2:11 And for this cause God shall send them strong delusion, that they should believe a lie: 2 Th 2:12 That they all might be damned who believed not the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness.

The main theme of the end times is deception. It is time of strong delusion, deception, lying signs and wonders, in the name of messiah. The last days will see UFO occupants having a prominent role in the establishment of a global world order government under the pseudo christ prince. After 42 months, this global world order government of the pseudo christ prince will ultimately be absolutely crushed and destroyed by the brightness of the glorious coming of the True Messiah Yeshua (Christ Jesus).

...

Just as in the Days of Noah, the iron mingles with the clay, demons mingle and come together and join with humankind. The contacts with the exterrestrials consistently refer to humans as "CONTAINERS." These are spirit beings from another space-time continuium. They want to operate in this physical universe and therfore will need to come into or MINGLE with their human "CONTAINERS." They will possess their human "containers" making their human containers feel good as they lead them to their mutual distruction at the return of the True Messiah Yeshua.

Daniel tells Nebuchadneser and us, if we will have ears to hear, that they (demon fallen angels, the iron), they shall mingle themselves with the seed of men; but, they shall not cleave one to another, even as iron is not mixed with clay. He is speaking politically. To mingle with the seed of men, they must be something other than the seed of men. Now in Genesis 6, not only are there Nephilim but we must think of the "they" who took the daughters of men unto them. "They", mingling the seed of the" iron", with the daughters of men, "miry clay", to produce the Nephilim. This is "as it was in the Days of Noah."

God declared a war on Satan. Enmity, war, is declared between the woman and "thy seed." We understand the seed of the woman. What about the seed of the serpent?
http://www.dccsa.com/greatjoy/UFO.htm

See also this compendium:

http://www.geocities.com/raptureapologetics/Nephilim.html

Heck, I put together a whole thread on this topic, here:

http://www.thephora.net/forum/showthread.php?t=4541&highlight=cthulhu

The sixth chapter of Genesis details Satan's attempt to physically corrupt all of humankind. Certain fallen angels known in the Hebrew tongue as the ben Elohim (Genesis 6:2) were able to reproduce with humankind. Satan sought to merge the bloodline of the ben Elohim with the bloodline of Adam, because of God's promise to send mankind's Redeemer through Adam's offspring.

By mating his fallen angels with women, Satan sought to extend his influence from the spirit realm into the physical realm, and thereby forever taint the human race. Had Satan been successful, the virgin birth of Jesus would have never occurred--for it would have been antithetical to the nature of an All-Pure, All-Good, Almighty God to manifest Himself in a polluted race of half-humans/half-demons. In fact, understanding this little known Bible truth is the key to understanding the story of Noah and the Flood.

Satan, always one to pervert scripture (Matthew 4:6), has attempted to alter the true meaning of the Flood story. Satan would like man to believe that the story of the Deluge, wherein all were destroyed except Noah and his family, proves that we serve an arbitrary and cruel God. Just such a Satanic doctrine was recently heavily promoted during a 10 hour television special hosted by apostate minister Bill Moyers on PBS (the government funded television network).

However, just the opposite is true. For God so loved mankind and so wanted to bring about our redemption through His only begotten son Jesus, that He graciously and lovingly decided to save the human race, by ridding the planet of all the human/demon hybrids and saving the last pure human on Earth, Noah ("who was perfect in all his generations"--Genesis 6:9). God could have let man totally destroy himself, for surely one of Noah's descendants would have eventually mingled with the hybrids. And then it would have been impossible for God to manifest Himself in the demon contaminated flesh of humanity.

So God destroyed all the hybrids in the Flood, therefore allowing Noah and his family to repopulate the Earth with an uncorrupted human race. Praise God Almighty! God did not destroy the human race in the Flood, He saved the human race!

Petr

[littlewhitelies]

The Sirius Mystery, the Supreme Council 33rd Degree, and the Great White Lodge of Freemasonry

Beam me up Hiram...

http://www.freemasonrywatch.org/siriusmystery.html


Petr

Do you actually put any stock in these anti-masonic anti-occult conspiracy wackjobs?

[Petr]

Do you actually put any stock in these anti-masonic anti-occult conspiracy wackjobs?
I do believe that Masons have esoteric lore (dating back from Pharaonic Egypt that they fetishize) about extraterrestrial benefactors of mankind (old gods). Especially from the "dog star" Sirius which they especially venerate. The pentagram ("Eastern Star") is an astral symbol of Sirius.

If you have only shallow banalities to comment, don't bother.


Petr

[il ragno]

Too many crossed wires in this thread to go back and address them all. I'll say just that the majority of comment so far has dealt with television sf, and television brings its own agenda and road-markers into the mix. For instance, where most people were/are scandalized by Kirk kissing Uhura, by the standards of the contemporaneous written sf of the era, the gesture was timidly cautious and didn't go nearly far enough.

Gene Roddenberry wrote a lot of today's SF and he was a well known Communist in his early years.
No...Roddenberry, like Rod Serling, was a tv writer and pitchman, although to most people that's the same thing as a "book writer". Also like Serling, the treatments Roddenberry actually wrote tend to be laughably, fatally obvious and maudlin. It's as if they'd internalized the infantilizing effects of the tv business into their plotting and dialogue, consciously or not. Serling at least took the time to convert a number of his teleplays to proper short stories for later publication....but Roddenberry "wrote" next to nothing. Both men's reputations rest mostly in the reflected glory of others' contributions to their programs.

Without getting back into Lovecraft, and/or the hybrid-genre of sf/horror, the main difference between the two categories is stark. Horror stories - the best ones, the ones that last - are about the necessity of boundaries and borders, and the danger of human hubris- the horror always results from arrogance supplanting tradition, and the breakdown of order: it's a deeply, inherently conservative literature...which may be why it lured so many women writers and clergymen scribes to the field in the late 19th /early 20th century.

Science fiction, at its core, posits that the breaking of old orders - and consigning outmoded traditions to history's dustbin - is a prerequisite to the liberation, transcendence and/or salvation of the human race. It's marked by both anticlericalism and messianism, although as a far newer fiction category, it's still in the process of evolving and mutating. But the sf that will last will always be characterized by what-if; a boldness of curiosity played out on vast cosmic canvases. Or as Philip Dick phrased it, "The SF writer sees not just possibilities but wild possibilities. It’s not just ‘What if—'...it’s ‘My God, what if—' in frenzy and hysteria."

[Jake Featherston]

Check out Arthur C. Clarke's The Childhood's End to see what Hoffman means. Demonic extraterrestrials visit the earth, and the idea is that they have come to put an end to mankind's "childhood" and raise them to the level of gods (ye shall be as gods), or at least perhaps some of them....

I read Clarke's Childhood's End back in '86, and it was a very depressing and disturbing experience. I also recall that the aliens had it in for South Africa, because of their racialism.

[Jake Featherston]

All the time they discuss their "non interference" and vote for individualism and freedom for all, while at the same time inevitably say "Yes, Sir" to about anything a higher rank can come up with.

"Be free to follow your leader".

Well, duh, dude; they're members of Star Fleet! Star Fleet is essentially derived from the Navy, and thus has a military-like command structure. Just because soldiers have to obey orders from superior officers, that doesn't make that society any less free (unless, perhaps, one is mandated to become a solider). They still tend to follow orders even in today's pussified German army, for that matter.

[Petr]

I read Clarke's Childhood's End back in '86, and it was a very depressing and disturbing experience.
Beneath the surface of superficial scientistic optimism and rationalism of science fiction lies the occult horror. "Must think happy thoughts, must think happy thoughts..."

Ragman divided horror and sci-fi into two opposing categories - I would call them Jekyll & Hyde (or Janus-faced) aspects of the same entity.


Petr

[Jake Featherston]

"Quatermass and the Pit" is a good TV drama with the same structure - a real classic. Although some might say that its "We are all Nazis really" implication is an early example of the current dominant propaganda model.

The "Quatermass" movies are excellent! I've only seen the first two, alas (there are three of four total; "Quatermass and the Pit" was either the third or fourth).

"Quatermass 2" is pretty close to being one of my favorite movies, despite its being a black-and-white, B-movie, British sci-fi production from around 1960.

[il ragno]

I enjoyed the first two, just for the sight of Brian Donlevy barking orders at horrified Englishmen like they were all his personal valets.

[Thomas777]

I'm sort of shocked nobody has mentioned The Prisoner. That is the best sci-fi program ever produced, bar none.

[Jake Featherston]

Another Lovecraft story concerning the monstrous results of miscegenation is one of his best: The Shadow Over Innsmouth. I've always thought it was his most chilling work.

Yes, I strongly advocate the position that The Shadow Over Innsmouth is Lovecraft's finest and most signature work. Many of Lovecraft's stories, such as the previously referenced "Arthur Jermyn," "The Lurking Fear," and numerous others, deal with the horrors of trans-species miscegenation (so to speak), but the Innsmouth tale is pretty much definitive in that regard.

I would further argue that at some level, it has served as the inspiration for half the horror movies ever made. The whole thing, about an outsider who visits an insular community where something is clearly not right, meets an eccentric dissident in that community (a homeless alcoholic, it was in Lovecraft's story), who is terrified "they" will find out he's been speaking to the outsider, the final uncovering of the unspeakable evil within the community when that evil itself arises in order to destroy the newcomer, etc. I don't know how many times I've seen movies based on that same basic storyline. In fact, when I was a kid in the 70s, I used to love movies based on that theme, which probably explains why, whe I first started reading Lovecraft in the early 1980s, I liked the Innsmouth tale so much ie., because it was the pure form of the same tale of which all the others were mere shadows.

[Jake Featherston]

I do believe that Masons have esoteric lore (dating back from Pharaonic Egypt that they fetishize) about extraterrestrial benefactors of mankind (old gods). Especially from the "dog star" Sirius which they especially venerate. The pentagram ("Eastern Star") is an astral symbol of Sirius.

But do you believe that really happened, or that their lore is fallacious?

[il ragno]

The whole thing, about an outsider who visits an insular community where something is clearly not right, meets an eccentric dissident in that community (a homeless alcoholic, it was in Lovecraft's story), who is terrified "they" will find out he's been speaking to the outsider, the final uncovering of the unspeakable evil within the community when that evil itself arises in order to destroy the newcomer, etc.

Actually, that "setup" predates Lovecraft by a good margin.

I myself find Lovecraft turgid going, although I read everything he did as a kid (like every monster/horror-crazed kid did in the 50s, 60s and 70s). But if I had to recommend one HPL piece it would be his long essay "Supernatural Horror in Literature"....which is basically HPL's version of Where I Got My Ideas, that doubles as an excellent historical survey of weird storytelling from antiquity to Arkham, with special emphasis on the fin-de-siecle writers who inspired him. And it's available free of charge right here (http://gaslight.mtroyal.ab.ca/superhor.htm):

[Jake Featherston]

Roddenberry "wrote" next to nothing. Both men's reputations rest mostly in the reflected glory of others' contributions to their programs.

Star Trek: The Next Generation actually improved after Roddenberry died. Not that I was ever a big fan of TNG's ultra-sanitized, the-Klingons-are-our-friends-now version of Star Trek. I mean, did they even once visit an uncharted planet, in the entire what, seven year run of the series? If so, I don't recall it.

The last Star Trek series, Enterprise, which takes places in the 22nd century (as opposed to Kirk, who lived in the 23rd century, and Picard, who lived in the 24th) was the best one to ever come out, in my opinion. That's actually a really good show (minus the first eight episodes or so, which were weak). My wife and I are presently watching all the re-run episodes (in order) Monday nights on the Sci-Fi Channel.

Anyone of you mugs ever watch the British sci-fi show, Blake's 7? It was a late 70s/early 80s BBC production (four seasons, beginning in 1978), so the special effects were terrible (perhaps even worse than Doctor Who), but damn, some of the story lines about a dystopian galactic empire were excellent*, as were some of the characters, particularly the anti-hero, Avon (played by Paul Darrow). I've recently viewed all of season one and the first 2-3 epsidoes of season two off YouTube; I'm pretty sure all the episodes have been posted, or soon will be. If anyone's interested, I can give you the links.


*In the first episode, a bunch of children are drugged, hypnotized, and have false memories of being sexually molested by rebel leader Rog Blake implanted in their minds, in order to discredit and imprison him. I could easily see our present regime evolving into an entity that would do things like that (it was fairly perceptive for 1978, however).

[Jake Featherston]

I'm sort of shocked nobody has mentioned The Prisoner. That is the best sci-fi program ever produced, bar none.

Yes, it is the best sci-fi t.v. production of all time. Hell, after all these years, I still want to visit that resort community in Wales where it was filmed.

[il ragno]

They'll be happy to accomodate you; it's now a tourist resort. I might check it out myself....

[Felix the Cat]

http://www.thephora.net/forum/showthread.php?t=8840

[Dan Dare]

The "Quatermass" movies are excellent! I've only seen the first two, alas (there are three of four total; "Quatermass and the Pit" was either the third or fourth).

"Quatermass 2" is pretty close to being one of my favorite movies, despite its being a black-and-white, B-movie, British sci-fi production from around 1960.

Actually Jake, the movies are Hammer Films adaptations of the original BBC TV series:

The Quatermass Experiment (1953 - remade by Hammer in 1955. Trivia note: it was the commercial success of this movie that launched Hammer on its horror film productions)

Quatermass II (1955 -remade by Hammer in 1956)

Quatermass and the Pit (1959 - remade by Hammer in 1967)

Quatermass (1979 - reissued in severely truncated form for cinema release in 1979 as The Quatermass Conclusion)

Note that the running time of each movie is half or less than the corresponding TV series, and I find the latter generally more appealing.

For my money the TV version of "Quatermass and the Pit" is the best of the bunch. Although I'm baffled by the comment above that it includes an implicit message that "We are all Nazis Really". It seems to have more to do with the re-awakening of atavistic fears of the possibility of an alien provenance, the Cthulhu Mythos if you like, rather than National Socialism.

[Dan Dare]

Yes, it is the best sci-fi t.v. production of all time. Hell, after all these years, I still want to visit that resort community in Wales where it was filmed.

Portmeirion.

It's well worth a visit although quite a way off the usual tourist track. Mrs. Dare and I spent our honeymoon in the area many moons ago.

[Hartmann von Aue]

Ragman divided horror and sci-fi into two opposing categories - I would call them Jekyll & Hyde (or Janus-faced) aspects of the same entity.
Petr

You mention Dr. Jeckyl and Mr. Hyde, I guess the first really famous (that I'm aware of) was Frankenstein.

I think of Jules Verne as the prototypical "Science Fiction" writer.

While's there are plenty of unbelievable things in Verne - no matter how outlandish his conceptions it is only testing the edges of scientific plausibility - not mere fantasy with the pretext of being based on science.

I don't really consider his works to be subversive or anti-traditional in any meaningful sense.

HG Wells seems much closer to what is ordinarily encountered in Science Fiction, where the stories become more fantastic and much less concerned with real science than with expositing the themes one would expect from the Round Table (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rhodes-Milner_Round_Table_Groups) types.

[Felix the Cat]

http://www.thephora.net/forum/showpost.php?p=23961&postcount=9

[Thomas777]

Without going too far afield, the perfect merger of sci-fi and horror is represented by John Carpenter's The Thing. I went to see that picture with my Dad when I was a kid and found it horrifying as well as utterly fascinating. It disturbed my sleep regularly, but I was so obsessed with the movie, my old man actually bought me the VHS tape so that I would stop renting it.

The Thing is a peculiar film for many reasons, not the least of which that it is one of the only films I can think of that has an all-male cast. It sort of examines all of the character archetypes of different men in desperate situations, IMO, in a more honest capacity than do most war films that simply present us with the tried and true cliches (i.e. tough but dimwitted Dago, God-fearing southerner, mercenary who is only out for himself but comes through in the end, philisophical martyr-type, etc.)

The Thing not only is a man vs. nature piece, it also is existentially horrific in the sense that not only is the Thing in question some superior form of intelligence, its also not even really a 'creature' as we think of it...its some sort of horrible, bizarre form of cancer that threatens not only the Arctic research team, but all of humanity if it is not destroyed.

I also think that its one of the only 'credible' (although I am reluctant to use that term) films/stories about an extraterrestrial intelligence that there is. The Thing really isn't intelligible. Its not a mammal, a reptile, or really even a pure 'animal'. Its not a plant or a vegetable, and its not really a virus. Instead, its a chimera of all of those sorts of things, but it is also self-aware and intelligent. Its not simply a humanoid or mamallian creature that opposes man. The Thing kills people for the same reason that we intake oxygen...it simply does so because it needs to in order to survive.

[Vindex]

I noticed most shows and movies treat the evil greys like friends and only a few show them for what they really are.

[Petr]

This just in:

http://www.evolutionnews.org/2007/09/msnbc_jumps_on_the_transhumani.html#more


MSNBC Jumps on the Transhumanist / New-Age Evolutionary Bandwagon


MSNBC loves to promote the view that humans evolved from anthropoid ancestors (see here or here for a couple examples). Now MSNBC has created an online exhibit (and accompanying article) entitled "Before and After Humans" that not only promotes standard views of humans evolution, but also supports transhumanism: the view that humans will evolve into a new, higher species. MSNBC's "possible future[e]" for the human species goes something like this: Within one million years, global gene mixing eliminates the races and the "Unihumans" develop a global "monoculture." That sounds reasonable enough. Next some global catastrophe kills off large portions of humanity, and the "Survivalistians" must adapt to extreme conditions, evolving "night-vision" and "radiation-shielding skin." If that sounds a little weird, wait until our next stage of evolution. 2 million years from now, humans turn into Dr. Strangelove-like beings who genetically engineer new "mini-species" of humans. This results in war between the "naturals" and the "Numans." At 3 million years, the Matrix apparently becomes reality, where we become "Cyborgs" and compete with our robotic creations in an evolutionary fight for survival. The organic beings must win, because at 4-million years, the "Cyborgs" evolve into "Astrans," who bear a strangely close resemblance to Coneheads, but with ears like a Vulcan (see the picture at right). The "Astrans" apprently travel the stars to impregnate the universe with our "Astran" way of life. Yes, that's right: Dan Aykroyd's famous (and funny) Saturday Night Live "Coneheads" sketch apparently predicted the pinnacle of human evolution.

It's tough to tell if this exhibit is stealing pages from Star Trek, a New Age / transhumanism manifesto, or an evolutionary anthropologist's armchair speculation. One thing is for sure, MSNBC didn't get its ideas from Saturday Night Live, because there is no evidence that any of this is to be taken as a joke. Given recent admissions from paleoanthropologists that we know very little about how humans evolved from ape-like species (for example, see here and here), it does not seem unreasonable to regard the claim that humans evolved from ape-like species to be a bit of unwarranted speculation. But MSNBC's foray into New Age and Transhumanist philosophy in the "Before and After Humans" exhibit is pure science fiction. I love science-fiction, so if you take the "Before and After Humans" exhibit as such, it's all good fun. But this is being promoted with a half-serious tone on one of the internet's largest news websites. Perhaps MSNBC's editors could benefit from watching a few SNL reruns.


Posted by Casey Luskin on September 7, 2007 11:35 AM |

[Helios Panoptes]

Horror stories - the best ones, the ones that last - are about the necessity of boundaries and borders, and the danger of human hubris- the horror always results from arrogance supplanting tradition, and the breakdown of order: it's a deeply, inherently conservative literature...which may be why it lured so many women writers and clergymen scribes to the field in the late 19th /early 20th century.

Good point. Another way in which the genre is conservative is that in the beginning of a horror story, everything is fine, then the horror begins and the rest of the story is devoted to figuring out what the horrifying thing is and how it can be stopped to restore the earlier conditions, before the trouble started. Of course, sometimes it doesn't work quite like that. Maybe the story begins and things are already in disarray. In that case, the goal is to return to when things were normal, whenever that was.

[Stanley]

I was watching Star Trek: Deep Space Nine with a friend and I told him the Ferengi were Jews. He didn't believe me. A few minutes later Quark jumped on a nickle rolling on the floor. Then he believed me.

Firefly is one of my favorite shows. The heroes are thinly disguised Confederates. The main character is an former Christian who has lost his faith, but religion is treated sympathetically.

[Thinker]

Not all sci-fi has been "liberal" propaganda. Especially prior to WWII, some of it might even have warmed the heart of Hitler . . .

http://www.fabiofeminofantascience.org/RETROFUTURE/tomorrowcities.jpg

. . . who, after all, was known for his megalomaniacal tastes.

http://www.ralphmag.org/BS/dome-speer481x290.gif

[Ahknaton]

Especially from the "dog star" Sirius which they especially venerate. The pentagram ("Eastern Star") is an astral symbol of Sirius.
That's true for Freemasons, but Sirius is also associated with the Star of David. The pentagram is also associated with Venus.

http://72.14.253.104/search?q=cache:2PUXURpv0HgJ:www.festivalmondial.org/history.html+star+of+david+sirius&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=16&gl=au

SIRIUS :- Alpha Lanis Majoris

The Leading Star - As is Above , So is Below -transitional stage -The Axis of the Universe - moving consciousness from one reality to another frequency evolution -The spirit of wisdom- the Brightly radiaitng one -The Dogon Star -Star of David - Osiris -Isis - The Blue and White star.

http://www.lexiline.com/lexiline/lexi17.htm



The Star of David, a six-sided star or hexagram
is known among Hebrews today as Mogen David
(perhaps similar is Latvian Mi(r)dzina Tauta = the (star) folk sparkles)
It was also called Solomon's Seal
and consisted of two interlaced triangles.

The Star of David is appropriately called a "STAR"
and - in our "very speculative" view -
it represents a double-triangulation which "maps"
the position of the major stars of the heavens
with the major axis along the Milky Way
from Sirius to Aquila.

As such, the Star of David was originally
the secret symbol of the stargazing priests,
later adopted by the Israelite Kings David and Solomon
and subsequently by the Hebrew people as a whole.

http://www.lexiline.com/lexiline/akstrdvd.gif

The confusion of the Star of David with the Pentagram is possibly due to the fact that the Greek word for "Star of David" is pentalpha.

[Thinker]

Incidentally, one of the main "purposes" of science fiction is to examine how societies might work (or, not work) given different potential future conditions. The underlying premise is that things will change in the future. If they didn't change, it wouldn't be very science fiction-y. To many, the assumption that things will change in the future may seem "liberal," but without examining how a society might work under different future conditions, much of the genre would have no purpose.

[Dan Dare]

Not all sci-fi has been "liberal" propaganda. Especially prior to WWII, some of it might even have warmed the heart of Hitler . . . who, after all, was known for his megalomaniacal tastes.

Actually such images even predate Hitler.

Fritz Lang's Metropolis, for example, dates from 1927. Lang was of Jewish descent on his mother's side.

http://www.cmu.edu/mcs/images/photos/metropolis-whole.jpg

[Kodos]

I do believe that Masons have esoteric lore (dating back from Pharaonic Egypt that they fetishize) about extraterrestrial benefactors of mankind (old gods). Especially from the "dog star" Sirius which they especially venerate. The pentagram ("Eastern Star") is an astral symbol of Sirius.

Petr

Ive heard they have occult and gnostic lore, but its not directly about satan worship.

[Kodos]

I'm sort of shocked nobody has mentioned The Prisoner. That is the best sci-fi program ever produced, bar none.

I saw one episode on TVland once... I wasn't sure what to make of it but I was damn sure the writers regulary partaked of hallucinogens.

Vote #6 for #2.

[Petr]

Ive heard they have occult and gnostic lore, but its not directly about satan worship.
I don't think that even the high-level Masonic adepts believe that they are worshipping "Satan" as understood by Christians, but rather Promethean light-bringer Lucifer, the benefactor and liberator of mankind and the opponent of the false Christian god of superstition and subjection. But hey, who can really get inside the head of occultists?

In any case, it's Satan in his "angel of light"-camouflage. Devil in disguise, or like Sauron in Silmarillion's "Akâllabeth".

Here you can see Lucifer-Prometheus right on the cover of the famous 18th-century Enlightenment work Encyclopédie:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:ENC_1-NA5_600px.jpeg


Petr

[il ragno]

Any thread running longer than 7 pages risks Petr dragging in the Freemasons.

[Hartmann von Aue]

Alchemical Kubrick
2001: A Space Odyssey (http://www.rense.com/general7/alchemkubrick.htm)

[Hartmann von Aue]

Pi trailer (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oQ1sZSCz47w)

[Petr]

I support science and rationality, and oppose rationalism and scientism.

Men of faith formed modern science, men of unfaith (starting with 18th-century philosophes) then parasitically stole its fruits. Christianity creates real science, atheism and occultism create science fiction.


Petr

[Ahknaton]

Alchemical Kubrick
2001: A Space Odyssey (http://www.rense.com/general7/alchemkubrick.htm)
Great article. This paragraph is interesting:

Before going on with rest of the film it is important to stop and address the monolith. This is the most important single aspect of the film. It unites all of the plot elements and it is, in a sense, the author of the film. It is interesting and extremely pertinent to the argument that I am making here that one understands the meaning of the word 'monolith'. Monolith come from the Greek Mon and Lith. Mon means 'one' and lith means 'stone'. So the monolith is a direct reference to 'one stone'. This film then, is about the one stone, or the single stone.
Mono-Lith
One-Stone
Ein-Stein
This film then, is about the one stone, or the single stone. And in this case, Kubrick has made sure that the stone is black. In alchemy all things that exist come from the black stone, or the 'prima materia'. The black stone is the stone of transformation, and even more important to this argument the stone of projection. This is the Philosopher's Stone. This is the object that can change, or transmute mankind, according to alchemical lore. It is rare and, when it makes an appearance, it transforms the seeker. There is little doubt that the black monolith in 2001 is the Philosopher's Stone.

[Hartmann von Aue]

At first it was planned for the monolith to be shaped as a pyramid. In this shot we can see it as an unfinished pyramid.

http://www.rense.com/1.imagesC/monolith.gif

[Ratatoskur]

At first the monolith was intended to be a pyramid. In this shot perspective allows us to see it as an unfinished pyramid.

http://www.rense.com/1.imagesC/monolith.gif

One can see a faint refraction of the sun a bit above the actual sun. I seems to be aligned with the slopes of the pyramid. Alas, I am not inclined to measure it, sick.

But then again, y'all never seen the sun, the moon, and a bit of aurora at the same time, with shrooms and glaciers groaning. Let alone the thunderstorms of volcanoes.

http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/image/0201/volcanoaurora2_shs.jpg
Chaos clockworks of universe pwns human construct.

[Ahknaton]

At first the monolith was planned to be shaped like a pyramid. In this shot we can see it as an unfinished pyramid.

http://www.rense.com/1.imagesC/monolith.gif
That's such a perfect shot. If you extend the lines at the side till they meet at a vanishing point, it just touches the base of the moon.

What's missing from the pyramid is the "capstone".

http://www.lope.ca/halo/masonic.jpg

Going back to the original image, is the light of the sun somehow a "consciousness shock" (the appearance of a "monolith"/revelation) that allows us to complete the pyramid and reach the "moon" (presumably representing some kind of enlightenment)? This kind of makes sense according to the Kabbalistic interpretation of 2001 in that article you posted, because this particular monolith is the one that takes humanity from the Earth->Moon sphere. Damn Cube-brick is awesome. I'm going to have to watch 2001 again to pick up on everything I missed last time I saw it (about 5 years ago).

P.S. I wonder if the pyramid on the dollar bill is actually a tetrahedron (as Kubrick was originally going to fashion the monolith) instead of a square-based pyramid?

[Macrobius]

The secret of Star Trek as propaganda (and I am referring here to the original series, since I have not seen the others), is that it adapts the moral tension of the Western to what is, transparently, an American Office circa 1970. You will notice that family life is far more alien in the world of the Enterprise than dignitaries from other planets. It gave the office worker of its time something he could relate to, at a time that branding cows or fighting Indians (or courting a woman) was too distant a memory to bear moral relevance. I'll admit, though, a black receptionist was a bit of a stretch, even when the new series began.

[Petr]

At first it was planned for the monolith to be shaped as a pyramid. In this shot we can see it as an unfinished pyramid.

http://www.rense.com/1.imagesC/monolith.gif
What's missing from the pyramid is the "capstone".

http://www.lope.ca/halo/masonic.jpg
See El Ragman, this is why it is rather relevant to speak about Freemasonry on a science-fiction thread. :)

Masonry was (and is) very much a part of the cultural soil from which sci-fi arose. Sort of like Rock'n Roll's connection to voodoo.


Petr

[il ragno]

I see nothing of the kind. Certain shapes and designs have fascinated men for millenia, the pyramid among them. By the way, the pyramid monolith was rejected for the "black handball court" design used in the film: shouldn't that signify a crushing defeat for the sinister-handshake gang?

I support science and rationality...

Nonsense, you see demons crouched behind hedgerows and millenia-old conspiracies everywhere. Nor is there any such thing as mere coincidence in Petrworld. Honestly, you spend more time connecting dots that aren't there than Charles Fort.

[Petr]

Nonsense, you see demons crouched behind hedgerows and millenia-old conspiracies everywhere. Nor is there any such thing as mere coincidence in Petrworld. Honestly, you spend more time connecting dots that aren't there than Charles Fort.
Ragman, why do you persistently refuse to acknowledge my awesome genius? :(


Petr

[Ahknaton]

I see nothing of the kind. Certain shapes and designs have fascinated men for millenia, the pyramid among them. By the way, the pyramid monolith was rejected for the "black handball court" design used in the film: shouldn't that signify a crushing defeat for the sinister-handshake gang?
I personally don't believe that Kubrick was a free-basin' Freemason, but it's not ridiculous to suppose that movie directors compose certain shots with an eye to symbolism, or make reference to religious or occult iconography, especially in a movie as full of allegory as 2001.

[il ragno]

I personally don't believe that Kubrick was a free-basin' Freemason, but it's not ridiculous to suppose that movie directors compose certain shots with an eye to symbolism, or make reference to religious or occult iconography, especially in a movie as full of allegory as 2001.

Absolutely. I'm not arguing that point at all - that's a natural byproduct of wonder/curiosity/imagination. Symbols can be powerful, metaphoric, iconographic and all the rest of it. But Jesus H Christ, the Great Pyramid of Cheops was already considered a Wonder of the World....the idea of an artist utilizing such a storied design is hardly provocative. It's the notion that it's all a plot, enacted by sinister eminences acting in concert, towards a shared evil goal, according to a prewritten script, that I object to.

Besides....everybody already knows that describes the J0000000z!

[Hartmann von Aue]

It's quite absurd to suggest that the movie does not have an occult message. Consider the fact that most people would leave the theatres scratching their heads as to what it means. Why is there so little dialogue after all? The movie is full of symbolism, and yes, hermetic symbolism.

The beginning of the movie is a creation story.

From Egyptian Creation myths:

The twins separated the sky from the waters. They produced children named Geb, the dry land, and Nut, the sky. When the primeval waters receded, a mound of earth (Geb) appeared, providing the first solid dry land for the sun god, Re, to rest. During the dynastic period, Atum was also known as Re, meaning the sun at its first rising.

http://www.civilization.ca/civil/egypt/egcr09e.html

The monolith represents the coupling of earth and sky.

The myth is also the basis for the Coptic Calendar, with its reference to the Egyptian creation story and the involvement of Thoth (Thoth and Hermes were identified with each other)

The myth was that Nut, goddess of the Sky, was separated from her lover Geb, god of the Earth, and cursed with barrenness: She could not give birth in any month of the year. Thoth, moon-god of time, measurement and wisdom, decided to help Nut and Geb. In a game of dice with the reigning gods, he won 5 extra days not belonging to any particular month, which Nut used to produce 5 children, including Isis and Osiris.

http://www.andrewfanous.com/CopticCorner/CopticCalendar.htm


Of course this first day of the year is 1 Thout, or the first of thoth, September 11, before non-leap years.

The movie is about the dawning of the New Age.

Great Seal of the United States Unzipped (http://www.masoncode.com/The%20Great%20Seal.htm)

[Jake Featherston]

Without going too far afield, the perfect merger of sci-fi and horror is represented by John Carpenter's The Thing. I went to see that picture with my Dad when I was a kid and found it horrifying as well as utterly fascinating. It disturbed my sleep regularly, but I was so obsessed with the movie, my old man actually bought me the VHS tape so that I would stop renting it.

Back in the early 1980s, my next-door neighbor (Jason Gorman, although we used to always call him "Gortman") had a copy of "The Thing" on one of those old laser discs (you know, the kind that were like the size of vinyl records, if not a little larger), and we must have watched it around 50 times.

[Jake Featherston]

Actually such images even predate Hitler.

http://ec1.images-amazon.com/images/I/51HV06Q55HL._BO2,204,203,200_PIsitb-dp-500-arrow,TopRight,45,-64_OU01_AA240_SH20_.jpg

I wish that pic was a little larger; its the cover of the Jules Verne novel, Paris in the Twentieth Century.

[Hartmann von Aue]

http://ec1.images-amazon.com/images/I/51HV06Q55HL._BO2,204,203,200_PIsitb-dp-500-arrow,TopRight,45,-64_OU01_AA240_SH20_.jpg

I wish that pic was a little larger; its the cover of the Jules Verne novel, Paris in the Twentieth Century.

Which wasn't published until recently.

[Ahknaton]

"Quatermass and the Pit" is a good TV drama with the same structure - a real classic. Although some might say that its "We are all Nazis really" implication is an early example of the current dominant propaganda model.
I'm watching it now, it's pretty cool. Here's a screenshot I took in VLC media player of a marking on the ancient capsule that they discover:

http://i19.photobucket.com/albums/b199/Stormfronter/QuatermassAndPit.jpg

Quatermass refers to the pattern as "a pentagon, one of the Kabbalistic signs used in ancient magic", but it is rather obviously not a pentagon, and more closely resembles the Seed of Life (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flower_of_Life#Seed_of_Life), which dates back to ancient Egypt.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/a/ac/Seed-of-Life.jpg/180px-Seed-of-Life.jpg

[il ragno]

Like most 50s/60s movies, the difference between seeing the pan & scan version, and seeing the widescreen cut, is night and day. It's damn near unwatchable in p&s.