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Wednesday, December 19, 2012

Radio broadcaster criticizes RAW

Is "dishonest right-wing radio broadcaster" a redundant phrase?

Alex Jones, a right wing radio broadcaster who rails against "world government," has a piece on the Internet criticizing the Mayan doomsday hoax, the claim that Mayans predicted the end of the world in 2012.

I'm fine with that, but if you watch the video, you'll see that he claims that Robert Anton Wilson helped foment the hysteria in Cosmic Trigger 1. 

Here's the full paragraph that Jones cites, with the one sentence that Jones took out of context highlighted: "Sirius is only 8.6 lightyears away. The British Interplanetary Society already has a design for a starship that could be sent to Barnard's Star (6 lightyears away) in 2000. The first O'Neill space cities will be orbiting the earth by then, and by 2004, according to Dr. Asimov's calculations, the biological revolution will be producing DNA for any purpose we want, possibly including immortality. In 2012, if the McKenna scenario is right, comes the Omega Point. In that case, Dr. Temple, we are all pulling a cosmic trigger."

Obviously, this is another example of Wilson's technological optimism running away with reality. I haven't noticed any space cities. (Notice, incidentally, how this goes back to what I blogged about on Dec. 17.) But there's nothing about Mayans or the Apocalypse. (If you search inside the book on Amazon for "Maya" or "Mayan," you get nothing.)

Hat tip: Aidan-Isaacs Cooley at Robert Anton Wilson Fans.

Update: Rob's comment makes me think I was a little harsh, so I've toned down my headline and lead sentence.


23 comments:

Rob Pugh said...

Well, to be fair, Jones has always considered himself anti-authoritarian and libertarian/constitutionalist. And he's not the first to confuse/conflate/team-up the 2012 Mayan bit with McKenna's Timewave/novelty 2012 predictions... In fact, I'm fairly sure that was my path => Wilson to Mckenna to the Mayans...

Cleveland Okie (Tom Jackson) said...

Hi Rob,

Good of you to comment. My opinion remains that most people watching the video would assume Wilson was talking about the Mayans. The words "Maya" and "Mayans" do not appear in Wilson's book, nor do I recall a prediction that the world will end in 2012.

christucker said...

Alex Jones appears to me to be so sensational that I have difficulty sensing what his agenda is, if its anything more than ratings. So I'm not surprised if the think you overreacted. He comes off as both so knee jerk and so paranoid it actually at times is like reading Illuminatus. Gasp! Perhaps that's his agenda?

PQ said...

I live in Austin where the show is broadcasted and get to hear him all the time. He is HILARIOUS yet he'll never break character.

The more I hear him, the more he strikes me as a Stephen Colbert type. I certainly find that his views on things (and the views of his guests) align with mine surprisingly often but then he so often goes way over the top that it turns into great comedy and entertainment.

As christucker said, his agenda really is hard to figure out. But if you can listen without taking him too seriously, it's great fun.

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