At one time or another, most of us have experienced the feeling that things were going on that we were not being told about, that things were happening in the world, the government, in our own town and street, or out in the depths of the cosmos that might, sooner or later, directly affect or influence our lives. We could do nothing about this and we're also kept totally in the dark. The feeling of being at the mercy of unknown forces has to be as old as humanity itself, and we have never liked it. We humans are a curious, inquisitive bunch. By our very nature, we are the monkeys who can't stand not to know. We have climbed mountains, crossed deserts, and sailed across oceans for scarcely more reason that to see what was on the other side. We have gazed at the motion of the stars and planets and watched the tides roll in and out. We have recorded, as best we could, the times at which the sun and moon rose and set. We have mapped and measured and undertaken seemingly impossible journeys. Much of human history is the story of people constantly on the move and constantly looking for answers, and when those answers are not forthcoming, theories and scenarios are made up to fill that unbearable void of ignorance.
Our ancient ancestors wondered what caused the thunder, why the rains came when they did, why sometimes the crops flourished and at other times failed; they puzzled over the true nature of sickness and death. They wove fantastic stories of what lay beyond the limits of their consciousness and perception. When no ready explanations presented themselves for random occurrences and accidents of fate, our forebears turned to the supernatural for the comfort of reasons why. They attempted to give credit or attach blame to all manner of unseen gods, spirits, and demons who either operated a system of mysterious rewards and punishments, or who simply amused themselves - much in the manner of the gods of ancient Greece - by capriciously interfering in human affairs for their own amusement.
In a lot of respects, we are not all that unlike our ancestors. Most of the time we live in the world of normality - of the routine and the daily grind - where we profoundly hope that nothing weird or untoward is going to occur. Every so often, however, we find ourselves glancing over our shoulders into that other place, the larger, wider, and less manageable world where all manner of strangeness is possible, where much is not what it appears, and we believe something's happening, but we don't know what it is. With each new backward glance, that macro-world grows more complex and more threatening. We discover that systems that we barely understand are increasingly ruling the essential details of our lives, that previously unknown diseases threaten our future, that new technologies are thrust on us unrequested and often unwanted. Change occurs constantly and at a frightening rate, and although - here in the U.S.A. - we supposedly live in a democracy, we rarely seem to be consulted about the great majority of these changes. As Marshall McLuhan predicted some thirty years ago, "we are in the speed-up."
Unfortunately, the interests of national security were also used to cover a multitude of sins, and a good many of these sins were committed in those dark places where the machinations of politicians and generals interface with a vast and hugely profitable defense industry. This created serious doubts in the minds of many ordinary citizens and even in those of the more honorable in power. In his last act as president, Dwight Eisenhower warned the nation to beware of the military industrial complex and its war machine's potential for taking over the entire functioning of the country.
At one time, the jigsaw pieces with which we assembled our perception of the world had to be ferreted out one by one. We now live in a noisy marketplace where millions of bits of data, on even more millions of subjects, all jostle and vie for our attention, our trust, and our gullibility. An open market may represent the freedom to which we all aspire, but it can also be a raw, dirty, and sometimes dangerous place with its whores and con artists, its snakeoil salesmen, pickpockets, and false prophets. Everyone has either a secret agenda or the secret of an agenda, and a free market in information doesn't mean we are fundamentally any closer to the truth. Those in power still want to keep their secrets, but instead of merely brushing us off with a Warren Commission report or a Project Bluebook, the lies and disinformation become more flamboyant and seductive. Truth - real objective truth - is turned into a shell game of now you see it, now you don't.
Without getting into psychiatric technicalities, the pop definitions of paranoia are numerous and often closer to the money that the shrinks like to admit. "Just because you're paranoid, it doesn't mean they ain't out to get you." "The light at the end of the tunnel is an oncoming train." On a more thoughtful level of cliché, "Paranoia is one way of making sense of the non-sensical." These definitions attempt an explanation, no matter how spurious, of a world that seems to complicated to be understood and far beyond any individual control. Even though Mulder's combined maxim dictates, "the truth is out there, but trust no one," the danger is in going too far with the assumption that we are consistently and constantly subject to a conspiracy of deception and manipulation. The temptation is to look for a unifying factor, a way in which one person, one group, or one thing is responsible for all that makes the modern world so chaotic and potentially frightening.
Thus, if for no other reason than to avoid the sudden and mysterious demise of anyone connected with the publication of this website, no theories are presented or conspiracies speculated upon here. Just the facts, ma'am, as Joe Friday used to say on Dragnet. . . along with the secrets, the lies, the small horrors, and the big rumors. All the mutant frogs, the alien invasion plans, and the hidden plots of government that can be crammed into the allotted pages. I don't even suggest that every word is the gospel truth, although every entry has at some time been presented as gospel. What one believes or disbelieves is entirely up to oneself.
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