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Post by Achilles on Oct 15, 2017 22:15:04 GMT
I was having a completely unrelated conversation on another forum and the conversation turned towards the way that films and other popular media offered almost a commentary on the culture of our times. as a part of that conversation I made the following post:
I expanded it a little, later on, to discuss the potential impact of the internet and information access v's previous generations publications via printing press and even handwritten copies but this was the post that started the conversation.
I thought I'd throw it open for any opinion here.
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Post by Avacyn on Oct 15, 2017 22:21:45 GMT
I think you have something here. I'll have to see what I can provide.
You know, I've been watching a video series going onto the Dominion War from Star Trek. It has some very interesting and key connections, and makes you think in terms of today.
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Post by Avacyn on Oct 15, 2017 22:32:52 GMT
This clip is regarded as some to be a warning/foreshadowing of the whole Social Justice activism we have going on at the moment:
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Post by UnseenI on Oct 16, 2017 5:50:14 GMT
In addition to providing a commentary, they may predict, reflect, write the script and set the tone. There may also be some agenda at work.
I ignore much of what the media produce today as it doesn't hold my attention at best and revolts me at worst!
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Post by Avacyn on Oct 17, 2017 23:28:10 GMT
Oh, there is certainly that. I keep on looking out for such stuff. I remember having to stop watching the film Sucker Punch, because I was constantly assaulted by symbolisms. It's crammed with it.
I think that there is always an agenda behind storytelling, though. Storytelling is a powerful way to get ideas, concepts and information across to others. But sometimes, there is an Agenda in the story, as opposed to an agenda.
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Post by UnseenI on Oct 18, 2017 7:38:21 GMT
This has reminded me of previous mentions of 'Hollywood Values' and diversity for its own sake...
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Post by UnseenI on Oct 19, 2017 16:34:12 GMT
Many Science Fiction writers were ahead of their time; some were prophetic. Many stories were written to answer the question, “What if…” Achilles I hope a few examples I created for the old board are not completely off-topic or not what you intended to discuss. |
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Post by UnseenI on Oct 19, 2017 16:37:56 GMT
A Science Fiction story that was ahead of its time
The Marching Morons by Cyril M. Kornbluth was written in 1951. “The story is set hundreds of years in the future...due to a combination of intelligent people not having children and excessive breeding by less intelligent people the world is full of morons, with the exception of an elite few who work slavishly to keep order. The human population is now 3,000,000 highbred elite and 5,000,000,000 morons...” Read the story online: www.gutenberg.org/files/51233/51233-h/51233-h.htmThe film Idiocracy has a similar theme.
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Post by UnseenI on Oct 19, 2017 16:40:09 GMT
Regression to the mean – in a way
Another science fiction story comes to mind here. I can't remember who wrote it and I can't remember the title either!
It is about a world that has had enough of the criminal element in society. They are all rounded up, packed into spaceships and launched on a journey that will take them into exile far away forever.
The respectable people think that now they will be able to get on with their lives, in comfort and without being sabotaged. They will be able to live free from the fear of burglars, murderers and other anti-social evildoers.
They are mistaken.
It is not long before there are just as many thieves etc. as there were before the big purge. People adapt to fill the gaps. It is as if subtle forces work to ensure that there is a quota of criminals in society.
So, assuming that conspiracy theorists are right about a genetic engineering agenda, it may not be as easy to remove certain races or intelligent people as 'they' think.
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Post by Avacyn on Oct 19, 2017 22:57:42 GMT
Personally, I've always considered the Star Wars Prequel Trilogy to be about the rise of Communism, subverting and supplanting Capitalism. It's a very good way to explain why there was a war involving a Trade Federation, Commerce Guild, a Techno Union... mind you, there is also the case of the Jedi, who had clearly fallen from the light. Mace Windu was desperate to keep the power they had gained through the Clone War. Lots of elements and aspects to consider, in my view.
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Post by UnseenI on Oct 21, 2017 5:59:40 GMT
Conan Doyle’s anti-German propaganda
There is a connection between Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and people such as Miley Cyrus. I learned from celebrity postings that some young girls are promoted by Disney etc. as wholesome teenagers and good role models - while they are building a large fan-base. Then, they change their lifestyles and appearance for the worse and many of their followers do the same. If these young women make pro-immigration speeches, their fans will adopt their views. It is nothing new for influential people to be used as pied pipers and propagandists Huge numbers of people read Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes stories in the Strand Magazine. He was a great public figure and favoured by the royal family. This would have made him an ideal person to promote the government’s pro-war, anti-German messages to a captive audience. He wrote a short story to do just that: “ Danger! Being the log of Captain John Sirius appeared in the July 1914 issue of The Strand magazine. It envisaged Britain being starved into submission by eight enemy submarines. The underwater menace came from the fictional country of Norland but was a thinly veiled reference to Germany's naval power. 'In the great towns starving crowds clamoured for bread before the municipal offices, and public officials everywhere were attacked and often murdered by frantic mobs, composed largely of desperate women who had seen their infants perish before their eyes,' Sirius narrates. In a matter of weeks, the British have agreed to an armistice. Sirius has won, the submarine has arrived.” www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-28954510The story was pure propaganda, designed to shock and alarm readers and force them to demand action from their leaders. This sounds just like the Problem-Reaction-Solution mind-manipulation technique that David Icke has described.
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Post by UnseenI on Oct 21, 2017 6:05:32 GMT
Conan Doyle and the destruction of the Lusitania
Conan Doyle’s prophetic propaganda story Danger! Being the log of Captain John Sirius was published in July 1914. It predicted the destruction by enemy submarines of British merchant ships and a subsequent severe shortage of food. Here is the cover:  Conan Doyle’s disturbing vision came true. On 18 February 1915 Germany announced that every British merchant ship entering British waters would be destroyed. That approach widened to take in neutral ships. In May 1915, the transatlantic liner Lusitania was torpedoed on its way to Britain. Almost 1,200 people died, 128 of them American, causing outrage. In February 1917 Germany once again began attacking all merchant ships headed for Britain. People were extremely worried in April 1917 that Britain would be forced out of the war…There were estimates of only a few weeks' worth of food left. Here is a depiction of the sinking of the Lusitania: 
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Post by Avacyn on Oct 21, 2017 23:33:25 GMT
Yes... that ship could have a thread dedicated to her. It was very definitely not a simple case of accidental sinking. Something more was going on there.
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Post by UnseenI on Oct 26, 2017 17:19:00 GMT
Sherlock Holmes and the uncanny coincidences
The strange case of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and the Baker Street Robbery.
There are connections between two of Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes stories and a serious crime that happened in real life and was later made into a film. In summary: A Scandal in Bohemia features compromising correspondence from the King of Bohemia to Irene Adler that Sherlock Holmes is employed to retrieve, and The Read-Headed League features a bank robbery in which the criminals tunnel underground to reach the bank vaults.
These two elements came together in the bizarre, real life case of The Baker Street Robbery:
The Baker Street robbery was the burglary of the safe deposit boxes at the Baker Street, London branch of Lloyds Bank on the night of 11th September 1971.
The robbers had rented the leather goods shop Le Sac, two doors north of the bank, and tunnelled a distance of approximately 50 feet (15 m) passing under the intervening Chicken Inn restaurant. To avoid being overheard, they dug only during weekends…the thieves got away with £1.5m cash and valuables from over 260 safe deposit boxes. The total haul was believed to be near £3 million.
The robbers left a cheeky message on a wall: 'Let's see how Sherlock Holmes solves this one'.
The national newspapers featured this robbery for four days, after which, it is reported, a D-Notice or gagging order was issued requesting that such reporting be discontinued for reasons of national security. The story disappeared from the media.
Some of the safe deposit boxes are thought to have contained ‘sensitive’ material. It is alleged that compromising photographs of Princess Margaret were among the items stolen, and that MI5 arranged the robbery then stopped the reporting to protect the royal family. This may be an urban myth, but considering Princess Margaret’s scandalous lifestyle is quite possible.
The film The Bank Job, a heist/conspiracy thriller, was made about the robbery, and the recovery of the royal photographs was given as the real reason for the raid.
This certainly is a case for Sherlock Holmes - and note the 9/11 coincidence!
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Post by UnseenI on Oct 26, 2017 17:20:43 GMT
The Baker Street Robbery again
Were Arthur Conan Doyle’s stories descriptive, predictive, prescriptive or just plain coincidence? The Red-Headed League tells how Sherlock Holmes solves the mystery of why a red-headed man is offered a well-paid but make-work clerical job in a bare office: it is arranged to get him away from his shop so that burglars can dig a tunnel from the basement to a nearby bank vault and steal the French gold! Were the 1971 Baker Street tunnelling bank robbers inspired by this story? Did they decided to hit a Baker Street bank in tribute to Sherlock Holmes, or did they select this particular branch, one that just happened to be in Baker Street, for reasons of suitability and convenience? Maybe it was hit because of what was known to be contained in one particular safe-deposit box. Maybe they just chose the branch more or less at random. A Scandal in Bohemia involves compromising letters and photographs and a member of the Czech royal family: did the burglars read this too? Did Michael X, a criminal from the Caribbean, really have incriminating pictures of Princess Margaret that he put in the Baker Street bank for safe keeping? Did Conan Doyle see into the future? Did Conan Doyle predict – or even cause – the future bank raid? Maybe it was all just a coincidence. This picture shows the shop Le Sac that the criminals leased and started tunnelling from, and the branch of Lloyds Bank on the corner that was their destination: 
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Post by Achilles on Oct 26, 2017 17:36:01 GMT
Many Science Fiction writers were ahead of their time; some were prophetic. Many stories were written to answer the question, “What if…” Achilles I hope a few examples I created for the old board are not completely off-topic or not what you intended to discuss. Not at all - I just wanted to throw the concept out there and see where it ran. I agree that a lot of SF writers brought out and discussed concepts that were both ahead of their time and potentially not fully explored by reviewers / critics at the point of their release? |
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Post by Avacyn on Oct 26, 2017 23:31:37 GMT
Speaking of SF, there is a lot of talk surrounding the new series The Orville. I have yet to watch it myself, but it is... well, it has my full attention. Here is a video, showing how they are creating topics of discussion in the series. I would rate it as NSFW, as a precaution:
I'm blown away at how near the knuckles they're going with this!
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Post by UnseenI on Oct 27, 2017 6:10:44 GMT
I didn't know what NSFW meant! I will give this one a miss as I try to avoid anything like that.
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Post by Avacyn on Oct 27, 2017 21:42:27 GMT
I didn't know what NSFW meant! I will give this one a miss as I try to avoid anything like that. Sorry, Millennials use acronyms a lot. I did it as a precaution, and there was one occasion in the video, words used twice at 3:20 or so. The only time in it. Just went through it again. It's done by an Australian "Suit Yourself," so profanity could be expected. Still, its amazing just how near the knuckle they went! As I understand it, the next episode will focus on BLM and Antifa. This is amazingly bold, and something I feel compelled to watch! |
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Post by UnseenI on Oct 28, 2017 16:20:40 GMT
Achilles just in case you never look at the Monarchy Board, there is now another example of life imitating fiction in the Royal Façade thread, which seemed the best place for it.
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Post by Achilles on Oct 28, 2017 22:32:15 GMT
I shall have a look - thank you.
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Post by UnseenI on Nov 14, 2017 7:45:02 GMT
Re The Orville, I see that this, like so many other programmes mentioned, is not available on Freeview. This means that even if I felt an inclination to see them, I wouldn't be able to. "SF authors are the new philosophers of our time? We have more interesting comments on culture, morality, ethics and civilisation from films, TV etc..." Achilles if this includes books then Citizen of the Galaxy by Robert A. Heinlein is one of the best examples I have ever seen. |
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Post by Avacyn on Nov 14, 2017 23:53:56 GMT
The Orville is going to be on a Sky chennel, if I'm right. I'm certain it will end up on DVD, though. If it helps, I'm wanting to watch it as well.
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Post by UnseenI on Jul 2, 2018 17:54:21 GMT
John Buchan’s Greenmantle again
I have posted about some of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s work that seems prophetic: T he Red-Headed League, A Scandal in Bohemia and a short story that looks like a prediction of the sinking of the Lusitania. Sometimes it seems that he was seeing into the future; it is also possible that he made these things happen! Descriptive or prescriptive? Who knows. John Buchan’s Greenmantle, first mentioned in the thread about the Sussexes, may also have some messages for us. It is set at the time of the First World War. The Germans are suspected of having a secret weapon, something connected with Islam, something that will enable them to win the war. Richard Hannay is appointed to find out what it is. He gets into Germany by pretending to be a Boer and a supporter of the Germans. He discovers that the weapon is actually a man, a Turkish seer known as Greenmantle. The Germans hope that Greenmantle will inspire Muslims, including Africans, to rise up and start a jihad, a holy war, against Britain and France. This story makes me think of Angela Merkel and the mass of Muslim immigrants that she has encouraged into Europe. Greenmantle dies and the German plan collapses. Could this be a prediction of an end to Germany’s supremacy in the EU and the end to huge numbers of Muslim immigrants? 
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Post by UnseenI on Jul 10, 2018 18:12:00 GMT
The Mother Hive by Rudyard Kipling
Rudyard Kipling’s story The Mother Hive describes symbolically how a society is destroyed when they let the wrong person in. The evil infiltrator and subverter corrupts almost everything and everyone she touches. It may have relevance today: "The Mother Hive is a short story or fable by Rudyard Kipling about the decline and destruction of a hive of bees. It was published first in Collier's Weekly in the US on 28 November 1908. Later in December of the same year, it was published in the Windsor Magazine in the UK with a title of the "Adventures of Melissa". Their downfall begins when, in a moment of carelessness, the guardians of the hive allow it to be infiltrated by a lesser wax moth, Achroia grisella. When her eggs hatch, the larvae devour honey and wax and undermine the structure of the hive, which leads to even worse problems. More and more bees are hatched with freakish deformities. Honoured traditions collapse. The only hope for salvation is hatching and rearing a secret clandestine princess.” From WiKi Is this yet another example of a fictional prediction or description of the future? It could be taken as a metaphorical warning about Communism, Political Correctness or Feminism of course, but the royal family is a possibility too. The old Queen dies in the story. You can read The Mother Hive at no cost here: www.gutenberg.org/files/2381/2381-h/2381-h.htm#link2H_4_0006
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Post by UnseenI on Jul 12, 2018 5:54:52 GMT
John Buchan, the Cotswolds and alternative history
For me, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Rudyard Kipling and John Buchan are the Holy Trinity. Some of their prophetic stories have been featured on here. Did John Buchan travel forward in time, read this forum then go back and write Greenmantle and a much lesser known historical novel called The Blanket of the Dark? The second book was written in 1931. It is set in the early part of the reign of Henry VIII, and explores the possible consequences had the Tudors been overthrown by a rightful descendant of Edward III. Unlike false claimant Lambert Simnel, who is mentioned in the book, Peter Pentecost the hero really is a Plantagenet. He is the legitimate son of one of the Dukes of Buckingham. People are plotting to put him on the throne. Although Rudyard Kipling was delighted with the book, I couldn’t get into it just for the story. The relevant references are another matter. The novel is set in the Cotswolds and mentions some of the places on interest - John Buchan did his homework well. I am not sure who drew the map, but there are some familiar names on it. Gloucester, Enstone and the Forest of Dean are mentioned in the Sussexes thread. 
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