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Conspiracy Theory Of The Month - Dumbing Down
Ian Thorpe.

humour, satire education, politics, war

The Conspiracy Theory of the Month feature kicks off with Dumbing Down. A stupid population is a compliant population so what better way for the New World Order brigade to strip people of their rights, liberties and the ability to think for themselves than by first making everybody stupid. The decline of education and its replacement by coaching to examination, the homogenisation of the media, all could be parts of a giant conspiracy to take us back to the days when ordinary people could be sent put in a very deep hole for breaking wind in front of a gentleman. The gentleman had a divine right to fart first. SOME RIGHTS RESERVED: Creative Commons licence, attrib; non-com; no derivs. If using this material in whole or part a link to this site or the authors own site is greatly appreciated.
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Conspiracy Theory of the Month #1

Dumbing Down



Many commentators on the Right of the political spectrum have banged on for years about the steady lowering of standards in education. Left of Centre opinion holds that a different type of education is needed if modern children are to grow up able to cope with the emotional demands ofpost - industrial society. The truth ought to lie somewhere between these extremes but the HEADBUTT investigative team have found what is actually going on to be much more sinister. Evidence suggests that the trend known as Dumbing Down has been engineered by a conspiracy of the Government, the Financial Institutions and the Entertainment Industry.

Consider the evidence. When the social reformers of the nineteenth century introduced free education for all, the life expectancy of a human adult was 47 years. By the end of the century it was 74 years. Who but a stupid person would want an extra thirty four years of declining libido, failing memory, gradual loss of physical abilities and finally senility and incontinence?

The advantages of a stupid population to government, financial institutions and entertainment businesses are indisputable. The business benefits are obvious. A generation ago the majority of people understood money. You worked. Each week you got money. When that money was spent there was no more until payday. Simple. Everyone knew that spending more money than you had could only result in a visit from several big men with baseball bats. The idea was so good that humankind developed advanced civilisations using it as a model. Then somebody realised that if people could be encouraged to spend money they did not have the banks, rather than sitting on a pile of cash would own lots of debts which were earning interest. Debts have to be secure of course. Give people $50000 and they will head for Vegas. Tell them "we will buy a house for $50000 which you pay for in instalments and on the day it becomes yours it will be worth $100000 and they think its a great deal. To have something worth $100k, more money than our great grandparents dreamed existed, would appeal to anybody. Nobody reads in the small print that the bank only agrees to buy you a house for $50k so long as you pay back, over twenty years $250k. Also, so long as a person lives they need somewhere to live so homebuyers are only rich when they are dead. The house scam worked so well it was extended to cars, consumer goods and holidays. We are so stupid we all think we are affluent even though thye money we are spending does not exist. The cash that the banks are advancing today is underwritten by the money we will earn tomorrow. How dumb had we to be in order to fall for that.

In entertainment the prime example of dumbing down is music. Sophisticated music the marriage of melody, harmony, counter-melody, rhythm and form, has to be played by highly trained and expensive to hire musicians who have a broad educational grounding and thus are cautious about iffy deals and such. Take away the complicated stuff and deploy a clever marketing ploy, like brown is the new black or uncool is the new cool, and it is easy to sign morons who can't read the simplest sentence unless is is repeated seventy - five times (check out rap lyrics) and will happily sign a contract stipulating the band will pay their management three hundred and twenty per cent of all revenues raised from record sales, tours, merchandising and standing on street corners singing a capella and passing round a hat. Does anybody seriously think Elvis would have signed such a contract? Well yes, he probably would actually, but that is not the point. Rap stars regularly saddle themselves with such deals and who but stupid people would buy the records of stupid people like that apart from people willing to wear the most uncool trousers ever sold?

Governments havealways maintained an interest in keeping the population stupid. The main reason for needing plenty of idiots is war. War is the politicians great get - out. Whenever things are going really well and the people start demanding social justice, lower taxes and better living standards for everybody, all the political leaders can ever think of to do is get into a war. Not only does it divert attention for a while, war also sets progress back by a few decades so lower taxes, social justice and better living standards take a back seat to Safeguarding National Security, which means constantly being ready to have a war. Since the days of the Roman Empire young men have responded to variations on the patriotic theme "Dulce et decorum est, per patri mori." which roughly translates as "thanks for being stupid, sucker." In the years prior to social reforms that gave us universal education, this patriotism had so distorted sanity that when the call to arms came, young men would compete to march in front of their regiment, towards a mass of heavily armed enemy soldiers, carrying a flag or beating a drum. Even though the penalty for cowardice was death one would think that rather than rushing to volunteer anybody with two live brain cells would skulk at the back of the troop trying to avoid the sergeants eye. Instead of saying "Why do I have to carry the flag, its not my turn, I carried it last time, why can't I have a musket or a sword or at least one of those long sticks with rusty nails in the end?" these guys were so brainwashed with the idea that dying a young hero was better than living to be an old coward they would say "No sergeant, give my musket to one of the other chaps, I want to carry the flag and have my chance to be a hero.

Technology has changed things a bit of course, after all its hard to carry a flag in front of a batch of cruise missiles.So why do the government still need people dumb enough to volunteer for cannon fodder duty. Modern military hardware tends to keep soldiers safe while putting civilians in the firing line, that's why. In the first war of the twentieth century 80% of casulaties were military. In the last wars of that century 80% of the casualties were civilian. So it is not a good idea to have too many civilians who would rather watch CNN than the Simpsons.
The best wars, before the advent of the twentieth century were those in which the uncivilised aboriginal peoples of remote lands were considered to be a threat to Good Christians because they ran around naked and enjoyed themselves. Vast and well equipped armies were sent to oppress the tribespeople and teach them to honour the true God by being miserable and keeping their private parts covered up. Obviously such tactics could not last in the face of a growing awareness of human rights, improved contraceptive techniques and sufficient aesthetic awareness for people to realise that most bodies are sexier covered up.
The civilised nations had no alternative but to fight each other, which turned out to be counter - productive as the carnage produced even greater demands for justice and a fair deal for everybody. For many years in the latter half of the twentieth century a simple ruse involving pretend enemies preserved the delicate balance. When people got too stroppy all the politicians had to do was cry "the Russians are coming."

Committment to universal education spoiled this one too however, when the educated and empowered population woke up to the fact that Russian leaders were crying "the capitalists are coming" whenever their punters got stroppy too. We all realised that basically we were not different species but the same flawed, greedy, feckless and corrupt human beings as are found everywhere. The Russians wanted Levis, MacDonalds and Coca Cola. The west wanted Vodka, Caviare and wonderful cheekbones.

Having no primitive tribespeople to oppress and no pretend enemy with whom to exchange threats of mutual destruction the politicians needed a big idea quick!

It came from the United States of America as as most big ideas do. "Heeeyyyy, stoopid people are easy to manipulate," some Washington manipulator said, and to confirm his point the establishment connived to get Ronald Reagan, a former 'B' movie actor and sports commentator elected President. Ron was too stupid to bother interfering much in the running of the country thus making himself the most popular President ever. Between them the banks, the entertainment industry and the bureaucracy ushered in an era of unprecedented prosperity.

It was obvious then that the Education experiment had failed. Who needed to know anything if they had information at their fingertips. Let kids access the internet while taking exams, give them certificates for knowing how to get the information rather than for deductive reasoning and creative thought. Dumbing Down means there is no need to teach kids to read, diagnose dyslexia. Never discipline a child, let them develop behavioural problems and get them into therapy. Do not prepare people for work and life as a mature adult, let them become social problems and create work for the intellectual and bureaucratic elite. Why give people a work ethic when they can be given a credit card? Let computers do the thinking and free the minds of people from the need for education. Dumbing Down ensures political stability and guarantees economic growth. Its a great theory and it is working.


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Conspiracy Theory Of The Month - Dumbing Down, education politics, war, humour, humor, satire
LOGOFaith and Spirituality.
Conspiracy Theory Of The Month - Dumbing Down
Ian Thorpe.

humour, satire education, politics, war

The Conspiracy Theory of the Month feature kicks off with Dumbing Down. A stupid population is a compliant population so what better way for the New World Order brigade to strip people of their rights, liberties and the ability to think for themselves than by first making everybody stupid. The decline of education and its replacement by coaching to examination, the homogenisation of the media, all could be parts of a giant conspiracy to take us back to the days when ordinary people could be sent put in a very deep hole for breaking wind in front of a gentleman. The gentleman had a divine right to fart first. SOME RIGHTS RESERVED: Creative Commons licence, attrib; non-com; no derivs. If using this material in whole or part a link to this site or the authors own site is greatly appreciated.
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Latest Posts
Green Policies Will Not Save The Planet But Are Costing Poor Families The Earth>
Politicians bleat sabout the plight of the poor then press on with their clean, green, sustainable energy policies which include stealth taxes to subsidise expensive and inefficient wind turbine and solar panel power generators. Can they not see it is the green agenda that is driving up inflation ...

Globalisation can work, but only with a unified international plan says Will Hutton. WRONG!
by John de Roe.

>We need global economic and social institutions working across national borders economist Will Hutton who now appears to have been re educated and started working for The New World Order argued recently. If only it were that simple. Unfortunately globalization is the enemy not the trigger of the kind of economic recovery we need.

Egypt Football Riot kills dozens
Remember the hope and anticipation that followed the downfall of former Egyptian President Honsi Mubarack. Remember how American President Barack Hussein Obama strutted around the world stage as if he had personally led the protests in Tahir Square that led to the overthrow of the dictator's regime? Remember how The Daily Stirrer told you it would all end in tears? After the outbreak of violence at ...

No Jobs For The Masses In The New Economy Despite University Education
No matter how leaders like David Cameron and Barack Obama try to talk up their economies or assure voters the jobs market is improving, growth returning and unemployment will soon start falling, the truth is change does not equal progress and forcing the pace of social change has only masked the true depth of economic and social problems. One of these is unemployment and particularly joblessness among the young. Even a universdity education does not provide a guaranteed career path.

First Libya. next Syrian then The World for The Emperor Obama?
Led by The All Conquering Emperor Obama, jingoistic calls for military invervention are gaining volume if not support. Well OK we know the great peacemaker hopes a middle east war will save his Presidency as Iraq saved Bush's but just as more than half of Libyans supported Gadaffi so, according to polls conducted by western firms, more than half of all Syrians support Assad. The only justification for war then is Obama's need to inflate his ego.

At Least Britain Has It's Own Currency Dukle Of York Tells EU Single Nations Proponents
The Daily Stirrer does not have much time for Royalty and so we seldom mention them. But when a Royal Prince (fat Andy) stands up for British sovereigny and by extension the national sovereignty of the EU's other member nations which is gradually being eroded by the unelected bureaucrats in Brussels, fair play to him.
Addressing an audience of businessmen attending the Davos summit in Switzerland, the Duke urged

More Old People Are Falling Through Gaps In The Care System Old people are increasingly being let down by a lack of co-operation and communication between the NHS and council-run social care, MPs looking at the crisis in care will reporert this week.
Conclusuions drawn from a study by the all-party health select committee ...

Not Qualified To Press A Button
Janice Woodward spent 75 minutes trapped with her granddaughter in a lift at her local ASDA store at Portland, Dorset, after health and safety rules stopped staff pushing a button to rescue them according to ...

Drivers Cool About Electric Cars
Have you purchased your new, clean, green, politically correct, all electric car yet? No? I thought not. Neither have I. It is not so much that I hate the enviroment or that I do not want to support the fabulous clean, green, sustainable job creating indistries fabulous, clean, green Dave has promised us will ...

Gay Marriage Row Set To Erupt Again
Led by that evil little crypto - Nazi Peter Tachell they Gay lobby are turning up the whineometer to extra loud as they once again demand that gays be given the same right as the rest of us enjoy, the right to marry. You might think gays already have the right to marry, after all Hello Magazine is full of pictures of turd burglar and rug muncher coulpes getting hitched every week. Sadly civil ceremonies are not enough for some ...

Will Warmageddonists Tell Us Where The Missing Heat Is Or Shut The Fuck Up
After recent revelations from NASA and NOAA that the earth is not warming as quickly as climate scientists mathematical models predict, the Warmageddonist loobby came up with a ridiculous (even by their standards) respose that some of the heat has gone missing. Respected global warming sceptic ...

HMS Politically Correct - The New Navy
As tensions rise one again the the Persian Gulf and America prepares to use it's proxies, Israel, France and Britain to kick off a war with Iran the Royal Navy is preparing to deploy it's Type 45 Destroyers in the area to ...

Spare Us The Identity Politics
It is a characteristic of the era in which we live that the assaults of the collectivist, authoritarian left on the traditional value that hold nations buit on the Graeco Roman culture together has created identity politics, one of the most destructive trends of the past half century. The human rights movement having gasined roughly equal rights in most developed nations turned its attention to minority rights. They obsess about gay rights, Muslims rights, black rights, children'r rights and womens rights as if ...

Another French Hopeful With His Foot In His Mouth
To a delirious crowd of around 20,000, M. Hollande, the Socialist candidate cited The Bard of Stratford on Avon as he promised to cast off the ennui of the Nicolas Sarkozy era with a new wave of egalitarian idealism. In dismisssing Sarko as sans balls, sans brains and sans achievements Mr Hollande told the crowd, was best summed up by Shakespeare's great words: "They failed because they did not start with a dream." ...

Europe Does Not Just Have A Debt Crisis But A Crisis Of Democracy

Europe's debt crisis and the possible collapseb of the Euro zone are exercising many political commentators. But is the crisis just about debt and saving the single currency or is something more sinister going on. Are we witnessing an attempt to dump democracy and impose a totalitarian oligarchy?

David Cameron Blames Madness Of Bussels Red Tape For Euro Crisis

Speaking at the EU economic forum in Davos, Switzerland The Prime Minister said Europe is still in a perilous time (up shit creek to you and me) because of its debts and the financial burden of over - generous statutory welfare systems. He told the gathering the EU Central Bureaucracy must stop throttling growth with pointless rules and regulations. Mr. Cameron urged his fellow leaders not to impose ...

Alien Life? Who Needs Lizard Men There Is A Universe Of Ideas Out There.
What If We Are Alone? Scientist insit we must spend $£€ mega on trying to contact alien life forms. But putting aside the thought that such aliens may be hostile and hungry, why do we need to. There is a uinverse of ideas we can explore right here in our minds. Sady scientists lack the imagination to understand that.

Solar Storm Armageddon: Will This Be What Makes Warmageddonists Shut T F UP
An eruption on the surface of the sun, aka solar storn will send a flood of highly charged particles towards earth. Satellite communications and other technology might suffer sone disruption but the best thing about it is from here in the north of England we will be able to see the Aurora.

Massive Solar Radiation Storm Set To Hit Earth
The Daily Stirrere has told you all along that the climate change doom and gloom merchants and the climate science tax eaters were a bunch of con men whose aim was to divert our attention from the real threats facing humanity, some of which are man made (but not related to carbon emissions) and some which are natural and completely beyond the control of smart arse scientists, the pompous politicians who fund them or ...

Iran: Britain could send military reinforcements to Gulf
Britain could send military reinforcements back to the Persian Gulf region if the dispute with betwen Obamaland and Iran's theocratioc regime escalates, according to Philip Hammond, the Defence Secretary. He said the decision to send ...

While Socialist Occupy Protestors Call Punitive Tax On Weath, Socialist Tony Blair Pays 5% Tax

With Harriet Harman's Inequsalitries Bill having for the first time enshrined the superiority of minorities over the mainstream you might think at last there was some chance of making the elite live by the same rules as the rest of us. No chance as Tony Blair's use of offshotre tax havens and shell companies to blatantly dodge tax shows.
Nick Clegg: housing benefit reform will not cause 'mass homelessness'
Lib Dem leader has been defending the government's plan to cap the amount of state benefits that can be paid to a houehold. About time too. When claimants can make more than the average household income by playing the system what incentive does anyone have to work. There are strong opinions here, you've been warned.
Indian Minister Accused Of Abusing A Young Man With A Shoelace
Gauri Shankar Bisen, a minister in the government of the Indian State Madhya Pradesh, has eaten elephan dung, publicly disembowelled himself and offered to resign after admitting that he was guilty of shoelace related ...

Take your Ugg boots and stick them so far up your ...
The smammers are still busy in spite of all Google's inept and ineffectual attempts to stop them. In one way it is satisfying to know everything that bunch of incompetent semi autistic idiots do to try to stomp on comment spam actually rewards ...

GCSE Skydiving? And They Call It Education?
It's good to see the education system have decided to stop making exams as easy as falling off a wall. At least is the conclusion one might draw from the fact that a new exam introduced by the WJEC exam board will require candidate to jump out of a plane ...

Obama Prepares To Kick Off War With Iran.
We Old Gits who write The Daily Strrer love to say, with the obligatory show of false modesty, we told you so. And we get to indulge in this pleasure quite often as we are always right. So as we have predicted the US was preparing foir war with Iran several times of the thre years since we started The Daily Stirrer you might wel ask "Will they admit they were wrong on this one? Well we would be happy to admit we were wrong had we been wrong. Things are never what they seem to be however

Has The Fanaticism Of Militant Athreists Stigmatized Atheism Again
Not long ago, even though the nation had largely abandoned churchgoing, to describe oneself as an atheist carried a certain stigma. In the nineteen eighties and nineties that receded however as regular worshippers in Britain comprised just 6% of the population. Now however, thanks to militant atheism, the stigma is on the way back.

New Toilet Computer Game Will Really Piss People Off
Digital games colsole and game maker Sega is hoping to make a spash by nstalling video games in men's toilets. It could only happen in Japan of course: the firm is planning to install game consoles called "Toylets" at urinals for men in bars around ...

Immigrants Who Have Never Paid UK Tax Or National Insurance Claiming Billions A Year In Benefits

While the bleeding hearts of the "progressive left" wail and gnash their teeth over the plight of the world's poor a new report reveals hundreds of thousands of illegal immigrants who came to this country on the pretext of studying or visiting relatives are living in fine style thanks to our lax approach to illegals and the incomptence of those who run the benefit system.

Are Feminists More Evil Than Nazis
A campaign by feiminists and lefties to get t shirts will slightly sexist slogans withdrawn from sale shows how authoritarian the progressive left are prepared to be in imposing their warped moral values on everybody.

The Decline And Fall Of The Bureaucratic Empire
The societies we live in, the companies we work for and by extension our lives are run by people who tell us they are much cleverer than we are. This is why we need elites and why, we are told, we must tolerate their high living, their jollies off to luxury resorts where they may focus their minds fully on how better to exploit us, use our money filched from tax revenues that should be spent to our benefit, on high class hookers. The point is we the ordinary punters are, according to these people, simply too stupid to ...

Hungary Faces Bankruptcy and Default as EU loses patience
The European Commission has launched legal action against Hungary's Fidesz government for violations of European Union treaty law and erosion of democracy, marking a dramatic escalation in the war of words with the EU's enfant terrible. "We'll use all our powers to make sure that Hungary complies with the rules of ..."

Drop in UK inflation Is Not Good News
The Office for National Statistics has reported a sharp fall in the Consumer Prices Index - down from 4.8 per cent in November to 4.2 per cent last month - was the sharpest drop in the annual rate since December 2008 when the UK was in recession and VAT was reduced. Government ministers and propagandists will try to talk this up as a sing that the economy is starting to recover. We should be wary however, in the current economic circumstances a drop in inflation, especially one this rapid in what is traditionally the best month of the year for retailers, is not good news ...

Google Has Comptely Forgotten 'Don't Be Evil' As The World Domination Agend Gathers Pace
At last Google has been caught stealing information from a business rival rather than private induviduals. Will people now wise up to these scumsucking pirates of the internet search engine world.

There Are Some Very Weird People Out There
A list of the strangest items left behind in bedrooms by guests at
hotels in the Travelodge budgret hotel chain is mind boggling. One has to wonder what sort of freaky things these people had been getting up to.

The Lard Hadron Collider
As excitements grows in the scientific community about the imminent announcement from the Large Hadron Collider team at CERN about how they have nearly found something interesting, Xavier Connolly explains why the whole thing is just a science a scam.

Euro Zone Gazes Into The Abyss As France Loses Its AAA Credit Rating
Stock markets fell sharply in late trading on Friday (13 January - oo-er) and the Euro zone single currency plunged against all other major currencies as Standard and Poor’s cut France’s AAA rating. Habitual debtor Italy saw its long-term rating dropped by two notches, along with Spain, Portugal and Cyprus. Malta, Slovakia, and Slovenia had their ratings lowered by one notch. A surprise victim of ...

Statistics, Graphs and Hockey Sticks
A poem about the famous hocvkey stick graph and the science scam it was a frony for. Posted now as a valedictory celebration because US climate monitoring agncies NASA and NOAA have at last admitted the global average temperature has risen only marginally over the past few decades.

Osborne Says Cuts To Across The Board Child Benefit Will Go Ahead.

Chancellor George Osborne has said the Coalition government's plan to cut child benefit for higher rate taxpayers will go ahead but after ministers' hints the policy could be made "fairer" Mr Osborne has agreed to review the plans. While Lib Deems and Labour MPs, the unthinking droids of the politically correct left wail and gnash their teeth at the prospect of any benefit being cut ever and the idiot fringe lefties at ...

Euro Zone Crisis: The Decline And Fall Of The Bureaucratic Empire
Euro zone leaders continue to insist the single currency must be saved even though any fool would recognise a dead parrot when they see one. So why are they prepared to sacrifice the furture for the single currency project. And was it ever really about money?


GO TO Boggart Blog Back Catalogue for links to older posts...

COMMENTS AND RECOMMENDED REA.DING AROUND THE WEB

In this section we do not necessarily support the views expressed in linked articles but try to give a coss section of interesting and well written articles that we think are likely to stir things up a bit.

COMMENT:
(A random and ecletic mix of what we thought was worth reading recently)

Much Media Ado About Nothing What connects seemingly disparate works such as The Silence of the Lambs, Cape Fear, Mad Men, and Seinfeld? It is the philosophy of nihilism, first popularized by Friedrich Nietzsche in the late 19th century. But in the last few decades, how did it become the dominant worldview of Hollywood? Dawn Of The Ice Age Signals The End Of The Global Warming Scam Back then, the media and activists trumpeted the arrival of a new ice age, with the specter of ice sheets and glaciers covering half the northern hemisphere, and brutal winters in the remaining ice-free zones. The fact that the media and popular culture and academia have veered from one panic-inducing disaster scenario to another one which completely contradicts the first one is funny enough in its own right. But reading The Weather Conspiracy: The Coming of the New Ice Age opened my eyes to an even more significant aspect ...

Hundreds of Independent Bookshops Face Closure
Hundreds of independent bookshops could be forced to close unless local authorities do more to support them, a leading retail group has warned. The Booksellers Association (BA), which represents 3,500 independent bookshops across the UK, has written to almost 400 council chiefs urging them to do more to support their local high streets or risk ...

Solar Panels Subsidy Was The Most Ridiculous Green Scheme Deramed Up
A plan to subsidise solar panels on homes was “one of the most ridiculous schemes ever dreamed up”, a Government minister has said.
Lord Marland, an Energy minister, hit out at the cost of so-called feed-in tariffs, which the Government has axed as part of the cuts programme. Last week Court of Appeal ruled that the sudden axing of the tariffs ...

Goodbye Great Britain
Recently, there have been two powerful challenges to the conventional wisdom about the United States. First, Robert Kagan published a lengthy essay in The New Republic, arguing that predictions of America's decline as a global power are woefully premature. .Is it possible, I found myself wondering, to do something similar for Britain? Robert Colvile has a go in this Daily Telegraph article ...

Our rising debt levels are becoming unsustainable – soon we may be talking about wealth confiscation (By Daniel Knowles, Daily Telegraph)
Debt, debt, debt; we’re drowning in it. This morning, the Office for National Statistics published the latest estimates of public sector borrowing. Though borrowing is falling faster than anticipated, thanks to the fact that spending cuts are finally beginning to kick in, the national debt has risen to 64.2 per cent of GDP. More significantly,…

The Obama administration knifes Britain in the back again over the Falklands - By Nile Gardiner World
In yet another display of disdain for the Anglo-American Special Relationship, the Obama administration has weighed in on the mounting tensions between Great Britain and Argentina over the Falkland Islands. Just two days after Prime Minister David Cameron issued a robust statement in the House of Commons vowing to defend the sovereignty of the Falklands,…

Drones In The Hands Of The Paparrazi - It's an ethical minefield
America's use of drones for targeted killings is serious enough. But commercial and law enforcement uses are on the horizon. Whether you view them as model aeroplanes for grown-ups or the handmaidens of the killer robot, unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), commonly known as drones, are taking off in earnest. ...

The Observer uncritically regurgitates Trotskyist smears against Katharine Birbalsingh- By Toby Young, Daily Telegraph
There’s a disgraceful attempt to smear Katharine Birbalsingh in this morning’s Observer. Under the headline “Katharine Birbalsingh criticised over ‘wasteful’ free school project“, the paper’s policy editor Daniel Boffey tries to create the impression that there’s growing local opposition to the Michaela Community School – Birbalsingh’s free school – which is due to open in…

We’re being sent the bill for the euro crisis again – this time by the IMF - By Daniel Hannan First it was individual banks; then whole industries; then entire countries; now it’s the world. Western leaders have reacted to the failure of each bailout by decreeing a bigger one. Unable to admit their mistake, slaves to the defunct economist whose thinking dominates our economics faculties and central banks, they act like so many Nick Leesons,…

The Three Parent Family More on the progressive left's war on the family and the scientific dictaorship's attempts to dehumanize us all. Babies with three biological parents could be born within three years. Scientists have come up with an IVF technique that uses the undamaged DNA of a third party when couples risk giving their children a genetic conditions such as muscular dystrophy or ataxia. The Wellcome Trust has funded the research (the figures vary between £4 million and six million …

As Obama Positions Himself For A War In Syria We Learn That Like Gadaffi, Assad Is Popular With His People
Most Syrians back President Assad, but you'd never know from western mediaAssad's popularity, Arab League observers, US military involvement: all distorted in the west's propaganda war. Suppose a respectable opinion poll found that most Syrians are in favour of Bashar al-Assad remaining as president, would that not be major news? Well one did and we never heard a word of it in the Obama felching western media ...

Bullshit Sherlock
While other blogs are full of how great the cliff - faller ending of Sherlock Holmes was I felt a bit let down. The fake suicide was telegraphed all through the show. And the coda assured us Sherlock had survived. We should not forget of course it was the habit of ...

Will bringing back grammar schools boost social mobility? by Toby Young Daily Telegraph
The possibility that England may shortly see its first new grammar school in over 50 years has, predictably enough, re-opened the debate about selective education. Yesterday, for instance, Allison Pearson came down firmly in favour, while Fiona Millar shot back with an instant rebuttal. I’ll get into that argument in a moment, but first let’s be…

So Why Read Books Anymore
There is great “truth and beauty” in Homer’s Iliad, but I would not try to make his sale on such platitudes. Gibbon’s The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire remains a classic. But I confess it can be hard to get through. Conrad’s Victory or Knut Hamsun’s Growth of the Soil, if authored by writer X this year, would be trashed on Amazon.So what are the reasons, in this age of ...

Eric Holder and the Chicago Way In America Obama's Brownshirts are getting hysterical as they try to make race the major issue in the election campaign.

Dystopian Prophecies Are Coming True - The Government Will Soon Choose Our Wives
Thinking of this entertaining new literary award – “the Hatchet Job of the Year” – it was natural to turn to Macaulay’s Essays, for few reviewers have ever been less reluctant to wound. I had in mind two long review-essays, one on Robert Montgomery’s Poems, the other on The State in its relations with ...
FOR OLDER COMMENTS from our blog index click here. MORE Featured posts

Conspiracy Theory of the Month #1

Dumbing Down



Many commentators on the Right of the political spectrum have banged on for years about the steady lowering of standards in education. Left of Centre opinion holds that a different type of education is needed if modern children are to grow up able to cope with the emotional demands ofpost - industrial society. The truth ought to lie somewhere between these extremes but the HEADBUTT investigative team have found what is actually going on to be much more sinister. Evidence suggests that the trend known as Dumbing Down has been engineered by a conspiracy of the Government, the Financial Institutions and the Entertainment Industry.

Consider the evidence. When the social reformers of the nineteenth century introduced free education for all, the life expectancy of a human adult was 47 years. By the end of the century it was 74 years. Who but a stupid person would want an extra thirty four years of declining libido, failing memory, gradual loss of physical abilities and finally senility and incontinence?

The advantages of a stupid population to government, financial institutions and entertainment businesses are indisputable. The business benefits are obvious. A generation ago the majority of people understood money. You worked. Each week you got money. When that money was spent there was no more until payday. Simple. Everyone knew that spending more money than you had could only result in a visit from several big men with baseball bats. The idea was so good that humankind developed advanced civilisations using it as a model. Then somebody realised that if people could be encouraged to spend money they did not have the banks, rather than sitting on a pile of cash would own lots of debts which were earning interest. Debts have to be secure of course. Give people $50000 and they will head for Vegas. Tell them "we will buy a house for $50000 which you pay for in instalments and on the day it becomes yours it will be worth $100000 and they think its a great deal. To have something worth $100k, more money than our great grandparents dreamed existed, would appeal to anybody. Nobody reads in the small print that the bank only agrees to buy you a house for $50k so long as you pay back, over twenty years $250k. Also, so long as a person lives they need somewhere to live so homebuyers are only rich when they are dead. The house scam worked so well it was extended to cars, consumer goods and holidays. We are so stupid we all think we are affluent even though thye money we are spending does not exist. The cash that the banks are advancing today is underwritten by the money we will earn tomorrow. How dumb had we to be in order to fall for that.

In entertainment the prime example of dumbing down is music. Sophisticated music the marriage of melody, harmony, counter-melody, rhythm and form, has to be played by highly trained and expensive to hire musicians who have a broad educational grounding and thus are cautious about iffy deals and such. Take away the complicated stuff and deploy a clever marketing ploy, like brown is the new black or uncool is the new cool, and it is easy to sign morons who can't read the simplest sentence unless is is repeated seventy - five times (check out rap lyrics) and will happily sign a contract stipulating the band will pay their management three hundred and twenty per cent of all revenues raised from record sales, tours, merchandising and standing on street corners singing a capella and passing round a hat. Does anybody seriously think Elvis would have signed such a contract? Well yes, he probably would actually, but that is not the point. Rap stars regularly saddle themselves with such deals and who but stupid people would buy the records of stupid people like that apart from people willing to wear the most uncool trousers ever sold?

Governments havealways maintained an interest in keeping the population stupid. The main reason for needing plenty of idiots is war. War is the politicians great get - out. Whenever things are going really well and the people start demanding social justice, lower taxes and better living standards for everybody, all the political leaders can ever think of to do is get into a war. Not only does it divert attention for a while, war also sets progress back by a few decades so lower taxes, social justice and better living standards take a back seat to Safeguarding National Security, which means constantly being ready to have a war. Since the days of the Roman Empire young men have responded to variations on the patriotic theme "Dulce et decorum est, per patri mori." which roughly translates as "thanks for being stupid, sucker." In the years prior to social reforms that gave us universal education, this patriotism had so distorted sanity that when the call to arms came, young men would compete to march in front of their regiment, towards a mass of heavily armed enemy soldiers, carrying a flag or beating a drum. Even though the penalty for cowardice was death one would think that rather than rushing to volunteer anybody with two live brain cells would skulk at the back of the troop trying to avoid the sergeants eye. Instead of saying "Why do I have to carry the flag, its not my turn, I carried it last time, why can't I have a musket or a sword or at least one of those long sticks with rusty nails in the end?" these guys were so brainwashed with the idea that dying a young hero was better than living to be an old coward they would say "No sergeant, give my musket to one of the other chaps, I want to carry the flag and have my chance to be a hero.

Technology has changed things a bit of course, after all its hard to carry a flag in front of a batch of cruise missiles.So why do the government still need people dumb enough to volunteer for cannon fodder duty. Modern military hardware tends to keep soldiers safe while putting civilians in the firing line, that's why. In the first war of the twentieth century 80% of casulaties were military. In the last wars of that century 80% of the casualties were civilian. So it is not a good idea to have too many civilians who would rather watch CNN than the Simpsons.
The best wars, before the advent of the twentieth century were those in which the uncivilised aboriginal peoples of remote lands were considered to be a threat to Good Christians because they ran around naked and enjoyed themselves. Vast and well equipped armies were sent to oppress the tribespeople and teach them to honour the true God by being miserable and keeping their private parts covered up. Obviously such tactics could not last in the face of a growing awareness of human rights, improved contraceptive techniques and sufficient aesthetic awareness for people to realise that most bodies are sexier covered up.
The civilised nations had no alternative but to fight each other, which turned out to be counter - productive as the carnage produced even greater demands for justice and a fair deal for everybody. For many years in the latter half of the twentieth century a simple ruse involving pretend enemies preserved the delicate balance. When people got too stroppy all the politicians had to do was cry "the Russians are coming."

Committment to universal education spoiled this one too however, when the educated and empowered population woke up to the fact that Russian leaders were crying "the capitalists are coming" whenever their punters got stroppy too. We all realised that basically we were not different species but the same flawed, greedy, feckless and corrupt human beings as are found everywhere. The Russians wanted Levis, MacDonalds and Coca Cola. The west wanted Vodka, Caviare and wonderful cheekbones.

Having no primitive tribespeople to oppress and no pretend enemy with whom to exchange threats of mutual destruction the politicians needed a big idea quick!

It came from the United States of America as as most big ideas do. "Heeeyyyy, stoopid people are easy to manipulate," some Washington manipulator said, and to confirm his point the establishment connived to get Ronald Reagan, a former 'B' movie actor and sports commentator elected President. Ron was too stupid to bother interfering much in the running of the country thus making himself the most popular President ever. Between them the banks, the entertainment industry and the bureaucracy ushered in an era of unprecedented prosperity.

It was obvious then that the Education experiment had failed. Who needed to know anything if they had information at their fingertips. Let kids access the internet while taking exams, give them certificates for knowing how to get the information rather than for deductive reasoning and creative thought. Dumbing Down means there is no need to teach kids to read, diagnose dyslexia. Never discipline a child, let them develop behavioural problems and get them into therapy. Do not prepare people for work and life as a mature adult, let them become social problems and create work for the intellectual and bureaucratic elite. Why give people a work ethic when they can be given a credit card? Let computers do the thinking and free the minds of people from the need for education. Dumbing Down ensures political stability and guarantees economic growth. Its a great theory and it is working.


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