Out of Pod Experience

This is why I don't hold much respect for people with psychology degrees. Xenuria, who's a self proclaimed psychology student, can't understand what gives a person credibility and misses the simplest concepts of an organization he's supposedly heavily involved with.

The idea is to do things anonymously. You shouldn't be able to publicly point at an individual as being a member of anonymous. The actions of anonymous are carried out by everyone and no one. I mean, one of the inspirations for the way anonymous operates was in Fight Club, and the first rule is you don't talk about it.

The other thing that just seems incomprehensible is that you're complaining that people didn't just believe you on your word. How you don't understand that people are skeptical after playing EVE is just revealing your naivete. Again, you shouldn't be able to point to anyone individual as having been instrumental in an event.

The purpose was to inform people about what's going on in the world.

Really? People don't care unless it directly impacts upon their own tiny bubble-world in a meaningful way and that's the kind of information people - except stalkers - can't provide.

Cassandra Syndrome is a form of Asperger's, but most likely or occam's razor version? People want to refute it for the craic.



Also, you do actually risk standing out in a crowd as outrageous. If your ideas are concrete and you believe that the influence was malevolent in any way see someone.


You should join a different Hacktivist group


EDIT**: Or leave hack groups altogther and become a Jesuit.

How do you not see the inspiration from Fight Club in anonymous, when anonymous is putting out videos for a "project mayhem" as part of the efforts of gathering up credit card information, which is referenced right in the video you linked. I'm not saying it's an exact copy of the organization in the movie because obviously it also takes inspiration from V, but the point of anonymous is to be anonymous. You're putting a face on it, yours, by continuing to bring up the claim that you were a hacktivist with whatever work took place in the Arab countries and being upset that you're not being given credit for your work. That just comes across as you trying to elevate yourself and profit from it, regardless of whether that was your intention.

He's saying you should become a Jesuit.

IIRC that is the NSA, not the CIA

Unless I dreamt it, I was under the impression the NSA was internal and the CIA did the stuff on foreign soil.

They don't even share information with the president. Amusingly, Bill Clinton repeatedly tried to get information from the CIA about UFOs and the JFK assassination when he was president, only to be denied by George Bush Senior who was head of the CIA at the time.

They are part of the 'shadow government' Cheney and others have made reference to. The extremely well funded military industrial complex Eisenhower warned everyone might take control of the US and undermine the democratic process/presidency. They don't truly serve US citizens or even America. Just various corporations.

First you "inform" people about what you think are the facts, based on one slideshow on a news site and your personal viewpoint. You keep referring to "the OP" (containing the aforementioned sources) and your research (which you do not share). You also make claims about the magnitude of Anonymous' effect in the Arab Spring, without any data to make such an evaluation. Then, when people disagree with you, you invoke a sense of guilt (that people are offensive or ignorant by disagreeing) and sanctify the topic by saying "There are just some things you do NOT troll about, and what Anonymous has done for the middle east is one of those things.", effectively moving the issue outside of dialog (in your mind at least).

The points I drew out above show, in my opinion, that your claim of "informing" people about facts, providing sources to backup those facts and trying to further propagation of information, are baseless.

Then you go on to say "And yet we have toppled dictatorships..." (underlining mine), identifying yourself with a force that you hold in high regard. Then there's the comment I already quoted above, in which you take people's criticism personally (that claiming something contrary to your, unsupported, claims is insulting to you). These, again in my opinion, show that you have vested personal interest in the subject and the issue is no longer only about Anonymous and it's actions, but to some degree about your personal integrity.

Months pass. You return with a recent documentary (which arguably shows that Anonymous had influence on the revolutions that happened in northern Africa and Middle East) with personal anecdote about how you are repeatedly misunderstood in your life (either inadvertently or deliberately).

There's my basis on interpreting that you have a personal agenda in this matter, and it's not just my choice. If you want, like you say, inform people, I would suggest that you:

1) Provide substantial evidence to your claims (the demography of EVE players and forum posters consists of quite old people with enough life-experience to be sceptical about baseless claims and have enough media-literacy to be able to distinguish between sources and their content).

2) Respond to scepticism in an impersonal matter. You are not Anonymous. If I were to say "Anonymous sucks", it isn't projected to you by any other means than your own.

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About the topic itself: while I recognize that Anonymous has supported Arab Spring and made statements about political matters in a way that "The Man" can not ignore, I would be on my toes about any group that consists of people, who initially have no power, being empowered but not being held accountable for their actions. If Anonymous screws up in a way that hurts real people and not just their computers (and personally, I think it's just a matter of time and hopefully I'm wrong), who takes the blame? The anonymous member?

While Wikileaks and Julian Assange were talking about the free flow of information and toppling corrupt governments, real people were in danger because of the information they leaked (namely local informants in volatile countries such as Pakistan, whose names were leaked). Everything has a price someone has to pay and it's not up to hackers to decide who. The world is more than zeros and ones and as magnificent as the Internet is, you can't understand everything through it.

And while some people identifying themselves with the Anonymous boast their victory for toppling dictatorships, people in Tunis (for example) are still killed in political rivalries. Uploading democracy doesn't happen over night (or over year...). It still remains to be seen what the long term consequences of the Arab Spring are, and it seems to me that understanding long term issues is not something the Anonymous can help us with.