A Conspiracy Against ATS?

i get the feeling this is something i should walk away from but it's just not me.

i'm going to go looking for internet gangs looking to take down ATS and i'll report back on my findings with the important stuff required for building a credible theory, like links and quotes.

unless we're afraid to confront the issue, credible deniability and all that!!

reply to post by neformore



I would prefer to return to the main topic personally as well.


Now, I read, read again, and re-read the OP.

I also asked a question that was sort of answered and sort of ignored about 25 pages ago.

I will try to clarify it and ask it again.

Political hucksters aside. That is, EXCLUDING the political party silliness that went on at election time.

Are you, Nef, making an assumption of a conspiracy towards this site based on more than just trend spotting? Do 'johndoe1' and supporting poster 'janegreen2' have the same IP numbers, etc.?

These trends. Is it possible they are just trends and NOT an organized conspiracy? Sometimes, nut-jobs just encourage other nut jobs on this medium. Do you have any reason OTHER than just trend spotting to suspect this? As a mod you are much more qualified to know than the average member.

My personal opinion is I would be surprised if this site has any more sinister groupes allied against it than the average internet message board.

Im a huge fan, but at the end of the day its 'just another message board' to most non-regulars.


Again and honestly ,let me apologize if this has been answered. I overlooked it if it was.

Originally posted by pieman
i'm going to go looking for internet gangs looking to take down ATS and i'll report back on my findings

While this is "ancient history" in Internet terms, it is one example of an extreme attempt to effect ATS...

Back in 2003/2004, a collection of members who were angry at our new focus on civility and decorum formed a site: shadowconfederacy.pdjkeelan.co.uk. Many of the members of that site were focused on hacking ATS for the purpose of "taking us offline." On at least two occasions, their attempts succeeded in causing extreme disruption (primarily due to the version of forum software we were using).

One example.

Originally posted by Clark Savage Jr.
Are you, Nef, making an assumption of a conspiracy towards this site based on more than just trend spotting? Do 'johndoe1' and supporting poster 'janegreen2' have the same IP numbers, etc.?

Alot of them hide behind IP masking. Alot of them also open accounts that are left dormant for periods of time and then suddenly become active before they deliberately implode.

Dates are important too. Theres something that is particularly noticeable. I'm most certainly not going to discuss specifics of it here, because like I said, I'm not in the business of witch hunting. But if you look hard enough, its there.

The MO is always the same. Pick a subject, hit it and hit it hard. Then as soon as there is staff intervention, scream "censorship", "free speech restriction", "nazi's" etc. Try and go out with as much publicity as possible, and also get some back-up in on the act on the way.

These trends. Is it possible they are just trends and NOT an organized conspiracy? Sometimes, nut-jobs just encourage other nut jobs on this medium. Do you have any reason OTHER than just trend spotting to suspect this? As a mod you are much more qualified to know than the average member.

Sometimes, people get disgruntled, and shout their mouths off about it.

Most people don't understand that for every major decision made here, there is a conversation, and that the mods actually do care about the membership. There are many instances where U2U's are exchanged with people that we're trying to help out, and get them back on "the level" as far as the T&C's go.

Theres a huge diference in the way that happens and what I'm talking about.

reply to post by SkepticOverlord


they don't seem to be around anymore, must have been their catchy name

i'm still looking but i haven't found anything outside the usual rubbish we know and love, so far, but, given the fact that there have been attacks since 2003, doesn't that suggest that i'm correct and this is nothing particularly new or sinister.

[edit on 3/3/09 by pieman]

reply to post by pieman


You`ve been given the example you requested.

reply to post by Skyfloating


i have and i appreciate the effort.
if i find more examples i'll present them.
i'm just sorry i'm not in a position to investigate the really sinister ones that have been hinted at. ah well.

[edit on 3/3/09 by pieman]

oh, and apparently you're an evil mason employed to fall upon and destroy any mention of masons in the government.

[edit on 3/3/09 by pieman]

reply to post by neformore


TY for the response, that answered what I was wondering.


Thanks again.

You would think that after all that the site administration would get the point. Can you consider, just for a moment, that it is possible that your T&C could use revising and that a different approach on some of these issues would be beneficial for everyone involved? I can tell by your post that you definitely had an 'us vs. them' attitude. Maybe there are positive solutions and compromises that can be found other then becoming frustrated and claiming a 'conspiracy' is taking place.

I definitely see your point about the partisan politics. I come to ATS to read interesting things about conspiracies but 4 out of 5 new threads is nothing different than what I could get by listening to a far left or far right radio talk show host. It really does deter from the site. Maybe instead of trying to ban everyone and become frustrated you could make a separate section called 'partisan politics' and move all these threads that really do not have much to do with conspiracies to that section.

As for your other point I have to respectfully disagree. Restricting the market place of ideas is not a good idea. If people want to discuss drugs or the holocaust, let them. We need not be afraid of speech and communication. If people are presenting faulty messages the community will recognize them and they will eventually be taken off the market place of ideas because no one will be 'buying' them.

So foundational to the tenants of a free society is the is the idea of free speech that I can tell you right now if you continue your policy of restricting curtain points of view, then as a site you will continue to have nothing but problems. Good luck with that. Maybe after you go through this enough times you will finally get it. Or your site will implode on itself, either way it is not a conspiracy, it is because of your own actions and your rigid adherence to principles that are not becoming of an academic community or a free society. You can continue to paint all naysayers as obstructionist and malicious attackers of the site. I can tell by your post that you even, and many other ATS admin have even convinced yourself that this is the proper paradigm. I hope for your sake, the sake of the site, and the sake of the members that you have a moment of clarity and take ownership of your part in this problem and work to fix it.

I know it will not bhe easy at this point. You have been defending one path for so long that you probably have some ego attached to this whole thing. I hope you can let go of that and get some clarity.

Why was my post denyed?
It was relevant to the conspiracy. People here are adults. They have the right to see honesty and respect.

I don't see it. I see ATS turning into a playschool. Where everything has to be censored.

KNock if off ATS. Grow up and allow reality to go forward. We are not children. We deny ignorance, stop preaching ignorance and disrespecting freedom of speech.

So there is alot of conspiracy within this site must be discuessed NOW

Originally posted by Boston Tea Party
Can you consider, just for a moment, that it is possible that your T&C could use revising and that a different approach on some of these issues would be beneficial for everyone involved?

In your mind, what would that approach be, and how could it alleviate the concerns and problems mentioned in the opening post?

Now... conspiracy theory IS a sensitive subject in general.

I would imagine that a lot of the material covered within the category of "conspiracy theory" is NOT very family friendly.

The problem arises when, for some god forsaken reason, a person wanders onto this site expecting family entertainment!!! And then complains to the staff when they get offended?!?! That's like an old conservative 1950s-sensibility woman walking into a porn shop....god knows why.... and gets offended when she sees wang and snatch everywhere.

You can't have a porn shop without the snatch and the wang!!! If you aren't into the poo fetish tapes, don't watch them! They are in the poo fetish category, and therefore all who are offended by poo fetish should have the simple damn sense NOT TO WANDER into the clearly marked poo fetish section.

So, just because someone likes the snatch, they like the wang, but they don't like the poo....does that mean that this person has any right to curtail the rights of others who wish to indulge in poo fetish? What idiot wandering into a porn shop is expecting polite and non-offensive porn?

This is the metaphoric "porn shop" of social commentary here. I'm not really sure what actuall poo fetish films can teach us about ourselves, but the metaphoric poo fetish films....such as topics about drugs, racism, the holocaust, judaism (a million threads bashing christianity, but any criticism of judaism and you're silenced....), etc.... are probably the most crucial topics to be discussed.

To deny ignorance means no holds barred. The truth isn't pretty. Nobody said it was. Censorship does not breed truth. It breeds ignorance and intolerance.

Since your policy has gotten more heavy handed, guess what? I've noticed that the problems on this site just keep getting bigger. The quality of posts goes down, the open-mindedness disappears, and the general atmosphere of the whole place just gets a little more malevolent and foul.

Denying ignorance offends too many people to mention here. I suspect that there's not much money nor notoriety in true enlightenment. No atars, no flags, no applauses, no people wanting to invest great wealth in you..... because everyone on this site would be denying ignorance. Wait, they're using this site to hawk weightloss pills? Wait, they're using the site to recruit for the army? Wait, they're selling a book? Wait, they're sponsored by who?

Then, before ya know it.... you've offended your ignorance deniers with your denial of attentiveness, and now you have no more website. So you've gotta keep your constituents ignorant and afraid of the status quo in order to make this corporation what it is... because if ultimate ignorance is denies, this corporation would cease to exist. Nobody could make money off enlightened minds, because the whole schtick with making money off of people is that you've gotta have the upper hand on them, and you're dependent on them not knowing that you've got the upper hand, dependent on them thinking that you are offering them a service out of the kindness of your heart.

Well.... to be frank, I've never offered anyone my services at any price. Kindness of heart does not require that you benefit. It requires that you feel that it is right and just to do so.

If there is any conspiracy against anything related to ATS, it is a conspiracy of open minded people with legitimate questions. If the people running this site were truly TRULY in it for figuring out life's ultimate questions, they would be willing to sacrifice wealth and notoriety.

Who cares how many people view this site or what celebrities or organizations have taken notice? That's not the truth! That's like flavor of the month type #... and I guarantee you that if you stake your whole reputation on becoming the biggest and most popular alternative subject site on the net, the faster and harder it falls.

Why would you ban or censor people who are just trying to keep this site pure, simple, honest, and open minded?

I mean.... seriously no offense here, but this site is beginning to look more and more like an episode of Red Eye or Glenn Beck or some other very conservative corporate shill of an excuse for "alternative media". Do you wanna be on Fox News that bad???

Your banning of talk about drugs, about participation in social movements and talk about anything which is critical of sheltered ideologies has conveyed a few messages to me personally:

1) That you do not view the opinions of drug users as worthwhile opinions, therefore drug users do not have freedom of speech here. Drug users are not as welcome here as anyone else. Imagine if war and blood sports were illegal, the weapons and artilery buffs would have a cow. Seems a bit hypocritical, that whole policy. Seems to give certain people an advantage over others... mainly the people who are not here to deny ignorance, but to spread it like herpes.

2) That you feel threatened by any challenge to the status quo, and therefore your very motto and your very website's premise is rendered pointless from its source to its last constituent. What if your website was the only hope for humanty to survive some coming apocalypse, and your policies prevented the world from being saved. What the # would be the point of having this website then and having all this fame and success if the very system which supports it will destroy it?

3) That you are practicing favoritism. Certain ideologies are sheltered, whist others are openly lambasted with glee. You'd think the staff would have some faith that their constituents could handle truly rude and harmful posters. Why are you parenting a crowd of mostly adults?

I don't think I've met anyone in here under the age of 17, and if I have....either they've acted their age and it showed, therefore I paid it no mind.... or they've showed their aptitude and that they are perfectly capable of partaking in mature intelligent discussions.

There is no conspiracy against ATS. People over at other sites are not out to get ATS. They mostly just wish to become alies in the fight against denying ignorance, but people have been finding it harder and harder to maintain good relations with this site because time and time again, this site has showed that it cares more about the appearance of denying ignorance, rather than the actual act itself. I've seen some ATS refugees that have gone from defending ATS with fervor to being anti-ATS overnight.

There's good reason for the people to be rebelling against the heavy handed tactics being employed here, and it is absolutely astounding that the ones employing these tactics are not worried that in the end they will just strengthen their competition by becoming so convoluted with policy and maintaining order and maintaining corporate interest that the source of their revenue, the PEOPLE who contribute to this fine site, will up and leave. You can't ban everyone. You can't restrict free speech without contradicting yourselves. You can't fool the fools forever.... and to be honest, is THAT who you want contributing to your site? Fools? The smart and open minded people are and will leave here in droves if the policies continue getting more extensive and restrictive.

You will probably adapt to it, though. You'll probably change formats gradually and eventually end up like MTV is to music, ya know....

If that is what you wish, that is where you are headed. I certainly won't stop you. It IS your site, after all.

Sorry if that's a bit too honest for the censors, but what's the point of talking if it's just polite bull# all the time?

Originally posted by neformore

Originally posted by carslake
A Conspiracy against ATS

WTF! Carefull with your accusations neforemore your generalising, so if we don't agree with the way ATS is going were in a conspiracy against ATS.

No one has said that.

then please answer me honestly when i ask you why members that posed an opposition to your view are now banned from the site?

I didnt see any T & C violations.

And you said you wernt here to point fingers or assemble a witch hunt?

edit to say that you STILL have not addressed any of previous comments that have been asked to be addressed.

Ill be back tonite patiently awaiting your responce to those on-topic concerns. Thank you.

[edit on 3-3-2009 by eyeforalie]

Crackdown.









It truly is a fact of nature: Only the strong survive.



I'll leave you to the definition of strong.

Originally posted by eyeforalie
then please answer me honestly when i ask you why members that posed an opposition to your view are now banned from the site?

Without any specific information as to which members you're referring to (not that it would matter, we typically don't discuss individual bannings), but being the person who terminated the accounts, I can provide an answer. These were people who already had some apparent deep-seated animosity toward what we do, how we do it, why we do it, the fact that we do what we do, or even the color shirt we're wearing while we do it (that's sarcasm, but the point is, for some nothing we do is acceptable).

I didnt see any T & C violations.

They may not have occurred in this thread, or the violating posts were removed (which is often the case).

And you said you wernt here to point fingers or assemble a witch hunt?

What makes you think the author of this thread is interested in a "witch hunt?"

Are people just signing up purely to criticize the operations?

Maybe if new members spent more time reading the actual content supplied by valued members,they'd have less time to whinge and bleat about rules you agree to when you sign up.

Maybe a new 'moaners' forum is required.

When you've been here more than ten minutes,you'll see why the griping is an annoyance and disrespectful to the real content contributors.

Originally posted by Zepherian
I'm sorry, but to me your post seems like debate moulding. You're taking a few choice examples and framing them as a conspiracy against ATS, when in reality it is ATS, scared of the atention those subjects would cause, that is trying to hide them away.

Specifically the two very hot topics are Zionism (in as much as this conspiracy theory would branch out into revisionist history of the holocaust, Isreal and possibly even organised religion) and drugs (in as much that it would branch out into drug advocacy because of the alleged spiritual enlightenment and natural connection attained by the use of psychadelics).

I won't comment on the two topics, I'm mearly listing them as the elephants in the room ATS apparently dosen't want to deal with. And a mountain of rhetoric won't change the fact that you guys are scared stiff of the implications of dealing with these topics, as they are very close to the source of all conspiracy and indeed political and economic power. It's where things start getting "unconfortable".

Unless I'm just being paranoid of course, after all, this is ATS.

Your call ATS, either you let the debate evolve naturally or you attempt to shape them to avoid facing your own fears. So, deny ignorance?

Edit: All my posts are my personal opinion, no organised anything here, just somebody who knows that things are not as they seem and who would like to see them as they are. Take it for what it's worth, I'm not forcing anyone to do anything, unlike the ATS policy, which is to force people to avoid certain subjects. You are in no way victims here, at least not of the membership.

Cheers.

[edit on 28-2-2009 by Zepherian]

Zeph overall good post......the OP may have good intentions with the thread but i thought that if so....the wording was poor....and some of the reasoning WAS misleading and/or poor...... i don't think ATS wants to bury them b/c they will dangerously expose truth, but i do believe they want them burried other reasons (redundant need for moderating these discussions, possible loss of advertising$, and a few overopinionated members some racists/some afraid to question topics that are not politically correct, ) or perhaps something i am missing, i could be not understanding something, anyone could be and probably is

other points have been brought up (i haven't read the 31 pages lol) but the last springer comment was surely a legitamite threat....but only indirectly and not related to the OP's reasoning and thus....[

boston tea party knocked one out of the pahhhk like big papi (boston red sox reference) with his last post and i am on board with eyeforalie (or at least he makes sense to me.......

**but i'm not in the mod's shoe's and perhaps they have been attacked from different people at different times and like a conspiracy theorist that has been burned by officialdom they are sometimes overly protective of their hunches**



[edit on 3-3-2009 by cpdaman]

Originally posted by SkepticOverlord
Without any specific information as to which members you're referring to (not that it would matter, we typically don't discuss individual bannings), but being the person who terminated the accounts, I can provide an answer. These were people who already had some apparent deep-seated animosity toward what we do, how we do it, why we do it, the fact that we do what we do, or even the color shirt we're wearing while we do it (that's sarcasm, but the point is, for some nothing we do is acceptable).

I can understand your point but only in reference to this thread. Those members, in my opinion, were banned for something else. You and I both know what that reason is. I know you know that I know. This thread, from the beginning has singled out groups, and deemed them to be dis-info (or whatever youd like to call it, were all on the same page here with that.). These groups were labeled under a broad generalization, and it seems to me like the members banned seemed to fall into ONE of these categories----

Then there are the simple ones. The "blazes of glory". Again, they come via deliberate T&C infractions, stuff that is very basic - usually from people who claim to be new to the site but seem to know an awful lot about the rules here. Sometimes they latch on to a particular mod who has done/said something to them. Its never their fault that they cause a problem, its ATS's fault....

But they did not, as you have stated, violated the T&C and if they did (and only you would know) ite ended in a removal.

I didnt see any T & C violations

They may not have occurred in this thread, or the violating posts were removed (which is often the case).

We saw that the violations occurred early in this thread and were labeled as off topic. There was nothing later in the conversation that was deemed inappropriate (but if they were removed i cannot judge that.)

They voiced their opinion, which ended up with a conclusion from the admin of:

...essentially ended up illustrating a whole host of problems via posts filled with the typical vitriol about "selling out, censorship, government control, the death of freedom speech, etc..." in spite of the fact the real issues were clearly expressed and had nothing to do with any of that.

But the thing was, it had everything to do with the issue, which I have posted in this thread numerous times. There have been others who have agreed with me.

We all know that in conspiracy, you need to read between the lines.

What makes you think the author of this thread is interested in a "witch hunt?"

He generalized these groups to the point that anyone going against the views of ATS could possibly be labeled as conspirators. Then silent examples were made of these members who did this in this very thread.

I'm my opinion, members (the banned and others) have been making very valid points. These points have been ignored. When brought up again they were personally attacked by a number of mods, and other members; some of who could possibly fit into the description of the conspirators the OP is referring too. It seems to me like this conspiracy, based on the findings from this very thread, determine the possibility that this could be a natural occurrence. Or its also possibly organized.

I have repeditively requested to have my specific concerns addressed. If you would like we can hash this out in a non-public discussion, with public disclosure. It really seems like this topic doesnt want to be talked about by SOME of us.

P.s. check my IP(if you havnt already) Im a lone gun.

edit to fix quotations

[edit on 3-3-2009 by eyeforalie]

Sorry to double up here but i just thought of something...

The reason i finally signed up here was because as an Anon visiter, the page continuiously reloads untill your re-directed. This may be a completly seperate tech issue but it could be relevent to the inactive memberships that became active durring the election.

I personally never really ment to post. This and a few other threads just kind of struck me. Thats why i have low points. Im a reader and a learner. I probably would have never actually signed up if my page didnt reload and re-redirect as a non-member user. This topic has just been something that i saw straight through from the beginning. It was my duty to say something.