Caution, personal opinion coming up….For me the question of whether David Icke has anything worthwhile to say is quite complex. He produces an awful lot of material but in broad terms his contention seems to be that the vast majority of the worlds population are kept in at least semi-slavery by a global ruling elite, the illuminati. This ruling global elite is itself controlled by a race of alien/human hybrids who are shape shifting lizards. The population is controlled by a programme of dis-information and misdirection propagated by the media, large corporations and, indirectly governments. The illuminati are drawn from the upper ranks of freemasonry, from the historic aristocracy and from the upper echelons of global business. He draws on a vast range of ideas including, but not limited to the ancient aliens theory, the templars, atlantis and by association Theosophy and perhaps most closely linked to the pagan community, ceremonial magic and the Golden Dawn.
At first glance this appears to be quite a story to accept, and certainly rather difficult to take at face value. Mr. Icke claims to provide evidence of his contention, but having looked at a fair chunk of his information the evidence is a blend of supposition, conjecture, theory and hearsay, and I suspect would not stand up to the rigours of cross examination. For me, the primary issue is that common with many conspiracy theory proponents, there is a tendency to have a surprisingly closed minded attitude to counter argument, surprising in the sense that he entreats his audience to open their minds to the possibilities of his way of thinking.
To look (briefly) at the component parts of his argument starting with perhaps the most difficult. Is the Earth controlled by a race of alien/human hybrids? Carl Sagan suggested that it would be more likely that a human could mate with a petunia than with an alien, given that at least the human and petunia had developed in the same environment and with the same basic building blocks. It is generally considered unlikely that this would be the case with an extra-terrestrial species. There are caveats however. There are a number of biologists who suggest that there could be commonality universally on life, and the forms that it takes. One of the key pieces of evidence for this is the separate development in multiple species of the camera eye type. There is also a counter argument, which I believe Mr. Icke subscribes to himself, which runs that the human race were genetically manipulated in the ancient past by an extra-terrestrial race, and consequently alien/human hybridization became possible. This neatly circumvents the cross species hybridization issue neatly, but does little more than provide a possibility. There is, to date, no evidence to support this idea. Mr. Icke argues that any evidence would be immediately surpressed but I would suggest that if we had been subject to alien manipulation at a genetic level, and the aliens were still in control, it is unlikely that they would tolerate the level of research carried out in the field of genetics, since it allows the possibility of discovery. Of course, there is a counter argument to this as well, if we consider that the manipulation was so subtle as to be undetectable, or that the whole field of genetics is a misdirection allowed by the alien overlords.
You can, I suspect begin to see what I mean by a closed minded attitude. With the majority of conspiracy theories it is very difficult to successfully refute the arguments based on evidence since the refutation is not against evidence, but against conjecture, and can be defeated by further conjecture. All that can really be said about alien/human hybridization is that although we do not yet know how it would be possible on a biological level, the possibility can not be completely ruled out. In the same way we are currently not technologically advanced enough to develop interstellar travel, but the laws of physics as we understand them do not absolutely preclude such travel. Consequently, in my opinion, the hybrid argument is certainly unproven, probably not provable, and probably unlikely. I say unlikely, because a highly technologically advanced civilization that had mastered interstellar travel and genetic manipulation sufficiently to achieve this, would almost certainly have developed more sophisticated command and control methods over subjugated species.
Moving on to the idea that the global economy and consequently global governance is controlled by a secretive ruling elite, the illuminati. This is an idea that has been around for certainly the last 100 years in this form, but a lot longer in other guises. There is a suggestion that the annihilation of the Poor Knights of Christ at the Temple of Solomon (the Knights Templar) was carried out at the behest of King Phillip of France because they became to powerful in terms of landholdings and debts owed by the ruling families of Europe. Did this make them a controlling elite, even within Europe? Certainly it gave them power and influence, but I would argue that that was primarily a function of Papal approval and consequently subject to a greater control above them. The illuminati as a historical organization was created in Austria by Simon Weishaupt and was intended to be a group of industrialist and thinkers in much the same way as the Lunar Society in Birmingham, the Royal Society in London and various other groups around the same time operated. These societies were primarily early business clubs where leading business thinkers could develop mutually helpful associations to drive economic growth. It is perfectly possible to suggest that from these groups, there could be a development of significant power and influence certainly on a national, and potentially on a global level given the concurrent development of large scale trading empires, and the prevalent attitude to the treatment of populations of subjugated nations. However, this appears to misunderstand the legacy of these groups. Most appear from documentary evidence to have been rather more interested in creating a better world, and indeed were predominantly anti-slavery in stance.
As with the alien/hybrid idea, I am left in a position where the possibility of a ruling elite exists, but there is little if any evidence for this. Key to this is the question, what purpose would such an elite serve? What benefit would accrue to an elite by controlling the masses completely? If we look at global brands such as Coca-Cola or Macdonalds or Microsoft, they appear to be driven by an idea of global domination, but this is not their primary purpose, it is simple a means to an end, and that end appears to vary from corporation to corporation. Again, I would suggest that this idea is possible but very much unproven, and really quite unlikely.
The final part is the question of whether the majority of the global population lives in slavery, whether it is aware of this or not. If we ignore for the moment the rather more far fetched ideas, and look simply at this question, I believe that we are on far more solid ground. If we consider the current role of China in developing countries in Africa we clearly see a modified and updated version of the imperialist expansions of European nations of the 17th 18th and 19th centuries. The Chinese provide infrastructure, health care, education and employment in return for favourable trade positions. I would argue that the effect of this is to make the populations of the countries involved totally reliant on Chinese investment, which to my mind makes them slaves. I am not suggesting that this is a negative position at this stage, and may be a better way of assisting developing countries to achieve a better overall standard of living for their populations than providing aid, or allowing the country to develop organically. It is, however, difficult to argue that the populations are not controlled.
A similar argument can be made for the role of the media in controlling population groups. In the UK there have been suggestions that the political party supported by The Sun newspaper has a far higher chance of success than its opponents. Certainly the courting of the media by politicians is questionable. There are also questions of the editorial independence of media outlets, many media outlets being owned by a small group of proprietors. In China and parts of the middle east the media is controlled by the state, so it can be argued that there is evidence that the media can be used to control the population.
This, for me is the point at which there is relevance to the work of Mr. Icke and others. It is fairly clear that on a global scale the World is out of balance in terms of both wealth distribution ond living conditions. For me, the reason for this is only relevant in terms of knowing what to fix. This is my problem with conspiracy theory type reasons. If Mr. Icke is correct I don’t see how we, as a species can change the global balance, since if we are as controlled as he suggests it is unlikely that we would be allowed to develop to the point that we could overthrow our controllers. Ideas like these, despite their protestations to the contrary, argue for inactivity rather than actively seeking change. Far better, in my opinion to believe that the inequality is of our own making, because if that is the case, we can do something about it with sufficient will.
Taken as a method of causing discussion and thinking about the world, the universe and our position in it, conspiracy theories may have a place, in a similar way that sci-fi has a role to play in physics, or vampire fiction has a role in paganism. It is a convenient route into a mode of thinking. For that reason, I have no major beef with Mr. Icke in principle, even though I have little, if any, belief in his ideas.
