The conspiracy bundle

On his 70th birthday, Mathias Bröckers published a collection of essays from his decades of work as a critical observer of contemporary events.

“The way in which the discourse on 'conspiracy theory' has been used to disinfect the opinion corridor and to take action against critics who have ignored this purity requirement provides an empirical example par excellence for future media research,” says Mathias Bröckers in an interview. In June, the journalist and author Bröckers celebrated his 70th birthday. To mark the occasion, he published the book “Inspiration, Conspiration, Evolution: Collected Essays and Reports from Everywhere”. Manova talks to the “grand seigneur of conspiracy theory” about his life, journalism, Gaia and the taz, which he co-founded. The author sees the newspaper “in the swamp of a paradoxical woke and weapons ideology that, like the Greens, has nothing to do with its anti-authoritarian, pacifist origins.” “During the ‘pandemic’,” says Bröckers, “the paper read like the ‘Watchtower’ of the ‘Coronavirus Witnesses’ and now like a Russophobic NATOstan rag.” In other words, Bröckers is starting the new decade of his life ready for battle.
by Marcus Klöckner

[This article posted on 7/19/2024 is translated from the German on the Internet, https://www.manova.news/artikel/das-konspirations-konvolut.]

“It would be a shame for the current human family, but if it continues to saw on the branch it is sitting on, it will inevitably crash” (Matthias Bröckers).
Marcus Klöckner: “Oh, it's all getting too complicated for me, Mathias, so I'd rather stick to what they say on TV.” That's what your mother once said to you. You quote this at the beginning of your new book. Why did you remember this statement? Does it generally reflect how many people still believe the major media?

Mathias Bröckers: The quote comes from a conversation with my mother shortly after 9/11, when we were watching the news together about the bombing of Tora Bora, where Osama bin Laden was supposedly hiding.
At the time, you had just written about the WTC conspiracy for the online magazine Telepolis.
Yes, and at the time I was commenting on the TV report with my research, for example that the alleged “hijackers” could hardly fly or that the cave fortress of Tora Bora was built by the CIA and bin Laden was one of their agents, and so on. That was too much for my 74-year-old mother at the time, and I didn't try to convert her to a 9/11 skeptic either. She read the local newspaper, listened to the news on Deutschlandradio, and watched the TV talk shows in the evening.
She was probably doing what most people were doing, right?

“With us or with the terrorists,” George W. Bush had announced, and the media went along with it: every ‘but’, every doubt was ignored, every objection to the clear friend-foe scheme was disqualified as support for terrorism. In this respect, the media audience, which had been put into a state of fear and uncertainty by an unprecedented event broadcast live on TV, could hardly do anything other than believe the official narrative, agree to the hunt for the clearly defined “evil” and go to war against terror.
And then, 20 years later? The same old pattern again?

The “war against the virus”, now against Russia: the pattern is always the same. And I quoted this in the introduction because it not only occurs in the mass psychological propaganda of politics , the “entertainment department of the military-industrial complex” (Frank Zappa), but also in the topics beyond the political day-to-day business that the essays in this book deal with.
You will soon be 70. When you look back, do you see a difference between the media world today and 30 or 40 years ago? Or to put it another way: what has changed, improved or worsened in your view?
Computers and the internet were a revolution for the media world and society, just as Gutenberg's printing press was 500 years ago. I had already illegally connected the first modem to my telephone line in 1984/85 and was able to connect to the server of the taz, where the first news tickers were already coming in digitally. I was then also able to visit the world's first Internet forum, The WELL in California, and shared all the hopes for free access to information, global networking and communication. Some of this has come true, the mobile videophone, which was still pure science fiction in the days of “Star Trek” when I was a teenager, is now an everyday reality with WhatsApp & Co.
You can see that as a positive thing, but…

... yes, but just as the mass distribution of books in Gutenberg's time led to tighter controls, bans and book burnings, so in the digital age, too, everything is censored, blocked and deleted. The state is investing billions to combat “disinformation”, that is, anything that contradicts the official narratives – see above.
You were a co-founder of the taz. Even back then, the aim was to have a kind of “alternative” medium to the mainstream. So even then there was probably a fundamental conflict with regard to the reporting of the major media. Now there are a lot of “alternative” media today. The internet has expanded the corridor of opinion – at least to a certain extent. And yet: the reporting of the major media on the corona crisis, the war in Ukraine and so on could hardly be more conformist. What are the causes?

Fewer and fewer corporations control the entire media. In the US, a handful of companies control over 90 percent of the entire output, and it's hardly any better here. What can you expect?

There are many broadcasters and newspapers, but there can be no talk of media diversity. This also applies to public media, which are obliged to provide balanced and objective reporting, and not, as in the case of the so-called pandemic, to push through government measures and defame those who think differently.
The way in which the discourse of “conspiracy theory” was used to disinfect the opinion corridor and to take action against critics who disregarded this purity law provides an empirical example par excellence for future media research. And “alternative” media can only remain an alternative as long as they do not achieve a wide reach; if they reach an audience of millions – as, for example, KenFM does – the Inquisition strikes immediately, no different than in Gutenberg's times at the end of the Middle Ages. And with the same methods: the “Vatican” in Washington demanded 175 years in prison for the head of the most important alternative medium of our time, WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange. The fact that he was released yesterday after a legal deal and almost ten years in prison has saved his life and is a great piece of luck. But it will not change the fact that the exposure of war lies and war crimes continues to be defamed and sanctioned by the state.
And the taz? Where does the paper stand today?

Economically – thanks to the cooperative as a sponsor – it has never been better, but in terms of content it is rather in the mire of a paradoxical woke and weapons ideology that, like the Greens, has nothing to do with its anti-authoritarian, pacifist origins. During the “pandemic”, the paper read like the “Watchtower of the Witnesses of Corona” and now like a Russophobic NATOstan rag. Of course, I am saddened by so much hyper-conformism, so much stupidity, so much olive-green tastelessness. But fortunately there is the AfD, which you can point your finger at as “Nazis” and prove to yourself that you are somehow “left-wing” – while at the same time equipping the real Nazis of the Azov Brigades in Ukraine with money and weapons.
I actually wanted to interview you about your book. But in a way, we are doing that too, aren't we? Your book brings together texts on topics that you have been dealing with for decades. The topic of the media, the state of the media and media criticism – you are closely connected to it. Why is that?

My father was an editor and took me to the printing house when I was a child. Since then, I have loved the smell of printer's ink. But it certainly wasn't just because, at the end of my studies, I joined the people who announced at the TUNIX Congress in 1978 that they were going to found a new daily newspaper. But it was also, and above all, a reaction to the state of the German media in the “German Autumn”, which was already very close to a state of synchronization. However, this book is not about classic media criticism, and if it is, then in a very broad sense. For example, in the report on the most amazing medium I have ever come into contact with, which could also be considered an “alternative” medium because of its illegalization – even by the Inquisition of the Middle Ages.
Which is?

The “Spitzkegelige Kahlkopf”.
Who or what is that?

I have compared the function of its active ingredient – psilocybin – to a satellite dish that allows consciousness to receive new, undreamt-of programs. Two further essays deal with the role that these magical “talking mushrooms” played in the computer revolution and the emergence of Silicon Valley – as well as 2,000 years ago in the mystery of Eleusis and the emergence of Greek philosophy. Plato's Allegory of the Cave is a media story: “juggler” throw “shadow images” on the wall, which are mistaken for reality by the cave dwellers. With his reference to what would happen to a fugitive who returns to enlighten the inmates about these illusions – “they will probably kill him” – Plato foresaw the “cancel culture” of our days quite well.
Your book addresses life, progress, but also – at least in some respects – regression, regress. Where do we stand as a species? The Doomsday Clock is set at 90 seconds to midnight. This is probably also to be understood in view of the situation between NATO and Russia. How do you look at it now, at almost 70 years of age? With optimism? With pessimism? Or with… well, what else?

The first essay in the book is about Gaia, the Earth as a self-organizing system, and the central rule that applies to all inhabitants of the planet: parasites must become symbionts. Because this has been recognized, one could be quite optimistic about the human species, the only question is when the realization will be implemented that parasitic “Kaputtalism” and destructive “Zuvielisation” are leading the species into a dead end.

A great dying is taking place on this planet – the worldwide destruction of ecosystems – and it is undisputed that humans are responsible for it. The dispute over man-made CO2 increases is a side issue that has become the only battlefield in the climate debate, while the great dying of forests, oceans, soils, wetlands and the destruction of animal and plant species are considered secondary.
Reducing greenhouse gases – that is the magic formula.

Anyone who believes that this problem can be solved by reducing anthropogenic greenhouse gases is fooling themselves. After all, fever-reducing measures make little sense if the heart, kidneys and lungs, etc. continue to be massively destroyed.

As far as the stupidity of humans is concerned, I agree with Einstein, who believed that it is limitless, and in this respect I am pessimistic; but as far as “life” is concerned, one can only be an optimist. We humans can only destroy our species and a few lovable relatives on this earth, but life will go on. When the domesticated primates who call themselves “Homo sapiens”, even armed with AI, have definitely proven themselves to be too stupid because they have made the planet uninhabitable as uninhibited parasites, more intelligent beings will follow. This may take a few hundred thousand years, but on Gaia's “clock” it is hardly a quarter of an hour. In this respect, we can be optimistic in the long term, as the Frankfurt “Eintracht” philosopher Steppi Stepanovic said after the relegation: “Lebbe gehd weider!”

It would be a shame for the current human family, but if it continues to saw on the branch it is sitting on, it will inevitably crash.

Life is a team sport, and the team consists of everything that creeps and flies, from bacteria to blue whales, including the self-proclaimed “crown of creation”, which is nothing without this team.

Understanding the Earth as a self-organizing, living system is a new way of looking at things that not only redefines the role of humans, but also their idea of natural evolution, which has brought them to this supposedly “royal” position. Even in the Vatican, where cosmological revolutions have traditionally met with inquisitorial rejection, this seems to be felt; Pope Francis recently pointed out a crucial translation error in the biblical commandment “subdue the earth”: “subdue THE earth” is what it should read. Regardless of what one thinks of popes and their fallibility, the planetary “Gaia” perspective makes it clear that people have no choice but to adapt.
What are your thoughts when you hear that “we” have to become “war-ready”?

The last two times Germans tried that, they got their asses kicked, and I don't think the former mayor of Osnabrück as head coach “Pistolius” will do any better now. Team Russia has been undefeated in home games for 300 years, while Team NATOstan was recently chased off the pitch by a sandal-wearing troop in Afghanistan and can only do something against teams without any defense. If at all. The alleged top attacker – the multi-billion dollar aircraft carrier “Eisenhower” – has just been chased out of the Red Sea by the Huthis, and in Ukraine, one overpriced wonder weapon after another is being flattened. To take “the war to Russia” with such a bunch of amateurs, as the war-drunk hooligans from the military-industrial north stand chant, is suicidal madness, and even “in five years”, when commander Pistorius wants to be ready for Barbarossa 2.0, the chances are no better. Especially since Real Madrid now has the entire FC Barcelona on the bench, which means that Team Russia and Team China could form a team in case of emergency.

For 2,500 years, Sunzi's first commandment of military preparedness has been: “Know your enemy!” The shameless disregard of this commandment has now cost half a million Ukrainian soldiers their lives, and it has created the coalition of these global top clubs, the raw materials giant and the production giant of the world. If you take a close look at this opponent, you will quickly realize that the only option is to become “negotiable” rather than “war-ready”.
Your book begins with 9/11 and ends with 9/11. And in between, around it, before and after, it is all about “inspiration, conspiracy, evolution” and the “collected reports from everywhere”. Finally, two more questions. September 11: Where does the investigation stand after almost a quarter of a century? And: Can you characterize “everywhere” today?

Just as the coup d'état 60 years ago – the assassination of John F. Kennedy – has not yet been fully investigated and documents are being kept under lock and key, the “inside job” of 9/11 also faces many decades of darkness in the archives, sealed off by “national security”.

The official story of September 11, 9/11, appears at the beginning and end of the book because it is THE false message of the 21st century. The other essays in the volume deal with topics that I have been working on beyond current day-to-day politics in recent decades and for which I have been “everywhere” – from the Stone Age to antiquity to the present, from anthropology, biology, philosophy to the space of the soul. For me, everywhere also includes the worlds of consciousness and the mind, the inspiration of the material, without which nothing living would ever have come into being and which had been buried in the sciences with the age of rationalism and materialism – only to return through the back door with quantum physics and its irrational, immaterial matrix.

Ultimately, most of the contributions deal with such aspects or building blocks for a new cosmology, to put it in a nutshell, a new understanding of mind and nature and the role of man. Of course, I have no answers to these profound questions, but I can perhaps provide some suggestions for further research and self-reflection. Also and especially about the “controversial” researchers – such as Paracelsus, Albert Hofmann or Rupert Sheldrake – who have always interested me because they looked beyond the prevailing narratives.
You can order the book here: “Inspiration, Conspiration, Evolution: Collected Essays and Reports from Everywhere”

Marcus Klöckner studied sociology, media studies and American studies. His path into the media led him from local journalism to political journalism. The critical view of power and the media is a trademark of his work. In the spirit of the sociology of Pierre Bourdieu and Charles Wright Mills, he lifts the veil on the power and dominance relationships in our society. He is co-editor of the classic sociology book “The Power Elite”, a study of the distortions in US democracy. His most recent publications are “Sabotierte Wirklichkeit: Wenn Journalismus zur Glaubenslehre wird” and “Zombie-Journalismus: Was kommt nach dem Tod der Meinungsfreiheit?”. For more information, visit twitter.com/KlocknerMarcus.