posted on Mar, 16 2014 @ 04:39 PM
Excellent thread.
I daresay that I have seen a fair amount of this through the years. I learned the hard way, it took a while, that once they latch on to you, the
subject matter they wish to drown out is best let go.
They are unrelenting, unmerciful, and wierd things start to happen. In real life. Am I paranoid? You betcha. Did things happen in real life? You
betcha! Were they connected? I can swear so, because, only when I backed off, so did they.
Can I prove it? Only circumstantially. But, once I backed off, so did they. It was frightening enough that it reached into real life, to make me
withdraw, stop posting for months, and made me have real, palpable fear of my government.
Once I backed off, stopped posting, and made it appear I was no longer a threat, had actually even "changed my opinion", the posters
"disappeared", got banned, though some are back under other pseudonyms. I didn't care so much, because they left me alone in real life.
I am not, however, hysterical, but, it is also very easily testable, provable, and if it didn't represent a real life effect to me, also proveable
and repeatable, and has been tested to prove to someone else, I would do it again.
When someone starts reaching into your real life over forum postings, it tends to make you rethink not only your need to reach out, but just exactly
where you live. You have to decide what is more important, trying to get "truth" out, or, the perceived threat they try to make you feel.
And, admittedly, that's what it was. Perceieved threat, but it was very real. Very intense, and enough to give one pause. The first thing I had to
ask was how they knew who I was. I know it wasn't ATS that was involved, so once revealtions came out about government spying capabilities, those
questions answered themselves. I had always heard 'paranoid stories' about the government, but that was how I had always treated them. It's very
different when it happens to you. You have to say, wow, all those stories had some truth behind them afterall. But, you also know if you say anything,
everyone will think you are crazy, like probably most everyone reading this, right now. And, I don't care.
I had never made any real effort to hide my identity, my fault. Now, I don't bother. It doesn't matter. If they want to find you, they will, and ATS
doesn't have to do a thing to aid them. I trust ATS, I don't trust our government.
Who was I that made me think I was so important? No one, except I was very verbal, very vocal, insistant on certain topics, ones that hit nerves
apparently. Enough so, that it even surprises me. At first, I almost enjoyed it. I toyed qith them. Then, I realized the reality of it. Now, I kind of
don't care. I don't wish to reinflame it, and won't, but I also won't hold back, ether, if I want to discuss anything. There are only two topics I
will no longer discuss online, and I won't even name them.
You just have to decide what is more important to you. Trying to convince a bunch of people, against the governments' wishes, you may be onto
something, or, your peace of mind. In the end, what do you really stand to gain from it? Smug satisfaction? That's about it, because, you will soon
be forgotten when the next cool story comes along anyhow.
I deduced it was't worth it. So, you could say the shills won. In the end, that's all it is about, winning or losing what looks like to the casual
observer, an online "argument". But, when it touches real life, it becomes much, much more.
And the reality is, no one on ATS or any other forums will care about the real life stuff, aside from some morbid momentary fascination. After that,
you are on your own. You quickly find out you have NO friends.