What sparked your interest in ATS?

Just curious really as to what 'event' or 'incident' led to people's interest in ATS, conspiracy theories, aliens, paranormal, etc.

Was it through watching a film, hearing a rumour, or seeing something out of the ordinary?

There's no 1 thing I can pin it down to myself, but my earliest memories are of my brother claiming to be psychic (I don't think he actually was), he used to take the mick out of me when I was young. This coupled with the resident ghost living in my bedroom cupboard. Oh those were the days.

Well, Ive always been interested seriously in conspiracy subjects, mainly government coverups and the like, and UFOs. However, it wasn't until 2001 that I bcame active on the internet. A few months after 9/11, I began think that 9/11 was perhaps not as it seemed, and began to look into it, and after alot of reading, cross referencing, and doing a little investigation myself, I became convinced that 9/11 was perhaps a conspiracy with our government.

However, I had never heard of ATS, and most conspiracy discussions I ever had were in person with close friends. I first learned about ats from an unlikely source who linked me to this site after I told him about a really weird incident that happened on Easter 2003. he said I would find people on ATS who might know more about it, since it was a place where people discussed the weird. So I came.

And here I am.

9/11 was probably what pushed me toward the world of conspiracy theory. That and the Oklahoma bombing incident. You can smell deceit.

OKC definitely. I was in Saudi when that happened, a months later, even in the ranks, people were talking about various oddities they had heard from back home.

Before OKC, I remember a number of us soldiers talking about the first Gulf War and how we were beginning to think it was staged to test out in real life situations new untested military hardware and drugs. Gulf War Sickness was talked about alot too.

It's funny you should mention the Gulf War. I was just reading an article about it.

Campbell [2] doesn't know whether to believe the Gulf War conspiracy theory or not, but it goes something like this:

After the Cold War was over, low oil prices made it difficult for the Saudis -- and oilman President George Bush's friends -- to make ends meet because OPEC members were cheating on quotas.

The obvious solution to OPEC cheating was to sequester an entire country: Iraq. In order for our scheme to work, Saddam would have to remain in power and the UN would have to embargo his oil. That's exactly what we did.

We only need to keep Saddam in power for a few years -- till the rest of the world's oil production "peaks".

Source

So you were out in the thick of it then?

I was in Saudi after the ceasefire, when we were there enforcing the no fly zones over Iraq and supposedly preventing Saddam from invading again. We were also bombing the crap out of alot of military facilities in Iraq. I was in a Patriot unit. No scud launches.

But alot of guys in my unit were there during desert storm, and they had some very interesting tales about some of the weirdness going on.

One consistent tale was several sightings of some really weird, unknown craft flying around. Several different people told me about this. Since these guys are missile operators and are amongst the best qualified in aircraft identification, I was extremely intrigued that none of them knew what the hell these craft were, or what they were doing. They were stealth craft as we know them.

Other repetitive themes were stories of unamed vaccinations, guys being told to go into a bombed out area where a scud hit without their chemical protective gear. This was told to me by guys in many different units.

There are some people on this board who were in Desert Storm who could tell you alot more about what went on during the actual conflict.

The prevailing theory amongst troops was that the war was about testing new crap. Youd be surpised how many people in the military quietly look into and discuss CTs.

That's very interesting. I shall look into it more. Thanks for sharing Skadi.

I got told this was a secret topless hangout bar where you were lavished with free pints of dom perignon '55..I,m still waiting

I actually found this place years ago while doing a study on the bermuda triangle.I signed up a couple of years later but lost my login and lapsed due net connection hassles.

The thread that got my attention was the start of the area 51 thread.. but I,m sure posts have disappeared from it. Namely a guy who clamied to be a scientist who worked there.A member then proceeded to confirm this and hacked the puter he was on and got private details all the way up to chief of staff and posted it elsewhere on the web. I,m pretty sure I didn,t dream all of this

A member then proceeded to confirm this and hacked the puter he was on and got private details all the way up to chief of staff and posted it elsewhere on the web.

When was this?!

Looks like I missed out there! Do you have any further info on this?

I WISH.
i U2U,d a Mod about it and they didn,t recall the posts in concern.
I know ATS has had a few refits since then though. but I,m sure it was on the thread where people were discussing daft ideas about storming the gates of Area 51.
The insider was extremely irate..Shouting about how it was idiotic to discuss such things and implored to be left alone to ''work on protecting the US through it,s secret progs'' or simply be shot on sight and continue being shot until they run out of bullets.

Call to all older members/mods.. doesn,t anyone recall the thread?. you can even u2u me if there are any security issues involved.

I know ATS didn,t take part and has always frowned upon taking part in hacking of any kind.
One other member even pointed out that the hacker was in deep doo doo and better start running.
Apparently there were 50 or so contacts posted from security to guards to scientists all the way up on an obscure forum...I,m gonna guess '03 march-ish.

Someone please tell me I wasn,t imagining this

Ultimately .... Abu Grahib!!. The light for me and my typically overtly inquisitive nature did not kick in until well after 9/11. I knew with those torturous photos that my country had been hi-jacked. Through sources like ATS I discovered that the hi-jacking took place years ago and we are now seeing the audacity of that evil.

Year 2002, I just typed in the search engine the word "Top Secret". Then I found this site. Very much different then. But the website already had the colors of black, red & white. (Is there any paticular purpose for these colors?)

My main interest was Area 51. Lots of interesting pictures. Actually, I was not even aware that there is forum.

Ghosts. Other dimensions. Ghosts. Time portals. Did I mention ghosts?

I have been on other boards but when the supernatural came up I got tired of having a bunch of fundamentalists bash me and tell me I wasn't a christian because I believed in ghosts. I have had ghost experiences and I like to look out for when they are around. I figured I'd be able to post here and say that I believed in Jesus AND that I know ghosts are real without having to deal with someone bashing me upside the head.

Then I discovered the other forums .... and so that's why ya'll have had to put up with me for the past 2 1/2 years!

Ghosts. Ley lines. UFO information. Predictions. And this IS NOT A ECHO CHAMBER! It is a bunch of different opinions and insights which, if listened to, can help a person grow in understanding and wisdom. Also - smacking around the anti-American posts can be fun.

I was looking into flying saucers, and checking out a search for Bismuth, element 115. It led me here and I was intrigued by all the topics and somewhat open discussion. If you looked hard and carefully, there were/are some really deep threads here.

Then I had some stuff come to light in my own life, and I started contributing to the content here. I don't post anywhere else.

[edit on 25-10-2006 by Icarus Rising]

for me..i was just surfing, reading news and began looking at, what i considered at the time..to be a buch of lies about 911. i came across a thread about the pentagon incident....at first i thought it was just a hoax but i had to keep reading.. and damn my inquisitive mind, i never looked back

as opposed to alot of the other sites i've been on...alot of facts and references get used on ATS as opposed to alot of emotion on other sites. plus it's cool to have the fancy avatars

that said, i think eventually ATS will be heavily censored ( not by ATS itself) or even shutdown because, now-a-days in AMERIKA, you can not continue to have sites that dig as deep as the people do here and have that type of info readily available to anybody who wants to spend some time reading. i never forget that participation in this forum may lead to ...'scutiny' .... at a later time.

kudos to snap, crackle and pop for putting together, in my view, the best and a much needed resource in these trying time of open war on information.

the only easy day was yesterday.......................................

The huge amount of theory's that can't be found as well the (biggest) database on conspiracy links in the whole world . 2 the 3 Amigos

I started coming here for no real reason other than waking up every morning and 'knowing' that something is badly wrong a nagging doubt you might call it.

Allthough 9/11 and wot came out of it was the catalyst for me.

I was looking for a "Question Authority" bumper sticker and thru some round about quirk of fate, wound up at ATS. Now it's sort of like the line in the Eagles song "Hotel California",, "you can check out anytime you like, but you can never leave"...........