Plots

     Conspiracy theories about secret alliances between European governments are flying, owing to recent developments in the “refugee crisis.” Substantial numbers of persons – ironically, more here in the U.S. than in Europe, where the problem is at its worst – have adopted the thesis that the political elites of the First World find the Islamic tide useful: a stick with which to beat us cranky types into submission to the Omnipotent State. Those recent developments, and the wildly irrational behavior of highly placed public officials in response, make the notion more credible than not, though we must concede that in such matters proof is always elusive.

     I wrote earlier this year:

     If we can be induced to fear others, particularly those nearest to us, the more credulous among us will be more likely to look to the government for “protection.” The government is quite amenable to such developments. In fact, it strives to help them along:

Crime stats published by the FBI and relied upon by the media distort the gun violence and leave the public with the impression "mass shooting" incidents are a much bigger threat than they really are, according to a criminologist and Second Amendment scholar.

The bureau's annual reports tabulating and classifying a wide range of crime throughout the nation have been historically free of politics, but John Lott, president of the Crime Prevention Research Center, said the latest statistics contain numbers that are misleading at best and deliberately fudged at worst. Lott believes the numbers may have been presented to overstate for political purposes the true risk of being a victim of random gun crimes.

“The FBI put out a clearly incorrect set of numbers on public shootings shortly before the November election last year,” said Lott, a frequent opinion writer for FoxNews.com and author of "More Guns, Less Crime." “I have been reading FBI reports for 30 years and I have never seen anything like this. It is one thing for the Bureau of Justice Statistics or the National Institute of Justice to put out politically biased studies, but there has always been a Chinese wall separating the FBI raw data collection from political pressures.”

     Also, I wrote several years ago at Eternity Road:

     There's a lot of entertainment value in a good thumping conspiracy theory. Your Curmudgeon is particularly fond of the ones that involve aliens, subterranean civilizations, and the control of the president by radio signals tuned to the resonant frequency of his fillings. Mel Gibson's marvelous movie Conspiracy Theory puts the subject to excellent use. But the significance of the growing frequency of conspiracy theories with political coloring must not be overlooked. They're not just a way to cast one's ideological adversaries as devils intent upon despotism, death, and destruction. A conspiracy is invariably rooted in the perception or construction of a plausible common motive.

     And also:

     Political conspiracy-theorizing that garners a significant number of participants is possible only when the power structure becomes remote -- that is, when those who wield power are sufficiently detached from “ordinary folks” that we groundlings cannot see them as ethically or emotionally comparable to us.

     By my assessment, all the prerequisite conditions are in place.

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     A conspiracy is a variety of widely shared but difficult-or-impossible-to-prove belief. Needless to say, there are many other such beliefs that don’t bear the conspiracy label:

• Religious creeds;
• Political / economic ideologies;
• Confidence in the virtues of “statesmen;”
• Convictions about the fidelity of one’s spouse;
• Confidence that “he really will leave his wife for me;”

     ...and many more. Of course, that a belief is widely shared doesn’t guarantee its veracity. Neither does the impossibility of proving it guarantee its falsity, as various supposedly smart persons such as Richard Dawkins and Sam Harris really ought to know.

     The impact of a belief flows from the behavior it impels, among both assenters and dissenters. A belief that aliens control the president’s brain by sending radio commands through his fillings isn’t likely to stimulate a lot of action. A belief that our political class has decided to subjugate us thoroughly by importing predators while simultaneously stripping us of our weapons is the sort of conviction that breaks kingdoms.

     At this time, there are many in Europe who have opened their minds to that latter idea. The majority may not yet be convinced, but they’ve started the necessary search for evidence and are trying to measure it against their political masters’ statements and behavior. It doesn’t take a lot of raped mothers, daughters, sisters, and wives to get a people accustomed to public safety wondering what the Hell the forces of order are doing instead of rounding up the savages and deporting them.

     America is not and will not be exempt. The Obamunist plan to import the very same savages currently despoiling Europe, on the grounds of “compassion,” will reap the same fruit here as it has there. Already Muslims are disproportionately represented in rape statistics – as the perpetrators. And of course, while their mouthpiece groups scream “Racism! Bigotry! Islamophobia!” the miserable excuse for a human being the electorate was persuaded to install as president – twice! – is Dutch-uncling us about our fears, telling is that all will be well. Why will all be well? How can anyone be confident that all will be well here when all plainly isn’t well in Europe? No answer.

     The sovereign attraction of high office is power over others. The avidity of those who lust for it exceeds all their other desires. More, once they have it, their every word and deed is bent toward keeping it, or gaining more of it. Fear and envy are their principal tools.

     We might not be looking at a conspiracy of men in high places. It might be more of a Hive effect: that is, persons with comparable characters and highly similar motives, responding to a common set of incentives, are merely acting in a fashion that resembles a secret, malevolent plan among them. But as I said above, the impact of a belief is in the behavior it impels – and the millions, both here and in Europe, who are gradually coming to believe that their rulers have leagued against them have already begun to act on it.

     Stay tuned.