How much power do Masons have?

Originally posted by Schrödinger
Also there is over a page of you picking it up, and continuing the derailment.

I just noticed that comment.

I made ONE reply to Luxus and then had two posts directly after that related to the topic so to claim that there is over a page of me making off-topic comments and thread derailing is absurd.

Show the off topic comments. I think you are exagerating significantly.

reply to post by AugustusMasonicus


You = the homogeneous mass of Freemasons on the board of ATS.

The free-masonic institutions have power and they use it.
Stating that this power is the same as the one the average man holds, is a lie.

I am not saying you are devil worshipers, I am not saying you are misusing this power collectevely. I am just stating that it is there.
And it is obvious that it is there. I have been in several lodges, I have several people in my network who are in lodges. They all hold positions of power, they all use their network. (Same as everyone else would do, difference being the size and magnitude of the network)

Originally posted by Schrödinger
reply to post by wiggy

 

Have you ever heard of "poisoning the well"?
Or COINTELPRO?

They have indeed power, and they are using it on a daily basis all over the world. To state otherwise is either deliberately misleading or at the worst outright lying.

In Denmark, most if not all prominent figures, in business and politics are tied to different lodges. Some are not directly free-masonic in their name, but have the same esoteric teachings and symbolism.

While business and politics are probably not discussed in the lodge, it surely is elsewhere.

Since this was ignored, I am bringing it forward again!

Examples of bullying:

Originally posted by network dude
reply to post by Schrödinger

 

Are you seriously upset at a few jokes in an 8 year old thread?

I think someone needs a hug.

Originally posted by KSigMason
reply to post by Schrödinger

 

Take a chill pill dude.

Example of shifting blame:

Originally posted by AugustusMasonicus

Originally posted by Schrödinger
Keep derailing the thread!
You are doing exactly as expected.
Ridicule any criticism, then turn the thread into a circle-jerk of back padding masons!

So Luxus, who made the inital toilet paper comment, is a Mason?

"Freemasons" are not evil.

Like all large organisations, it's only a handful of people at the top that are.

Example of mistating the facts:

Originally posted by Schrödinger
Keep derailing the thread!
You are doing exactly as expected.
Ridicule any criticism, then turn the thread into a circle-jerk of back padding masons!

Reminder, Luxus is NOT a Mason.

reply to post by AugustusMasonicus

Originally posted by Panic2k11 By most part because it is not an informed, voluntary and equal participation.

That is a mammoth jump to conclusions. How can you possibly know what everyone else besides yourself is either informed or not informed or whether they participate in group activites voluntarily?

If you read what I said I specifically avoided over-generalization. People always fall into 2 categories, two states of belonging to any and all power structures.This is not a fixed state but as society is general is a pyramidal structure (other types can exist but never were implemented socially). There is a very close similitude to networks if you understand communications networks you understand the duality of servers vs clients and how peer to peer has revolutionized network organizations (even so rarely are the peers strictly equal), this is in the simpler context of information distribution). Society has more complexities and interrelations than simpler information networks but the principles required to maintain functionality (order, in distributed systems) are the same, that is, the coordination of participation.

I take that you agree that you are not omniscient (and that no one is) and that you agree that information (among other things is power). So those that know more and wish to retain power have to restrict access to it from others or be positionally challenged in the "power" structure. This is extremely basic deduction and I will gladly discuss any exceptions that you can provide to prove this wrong.

I'm confident that even any voluntary participation that you may think you see in any system is not voluntary at all, it is a system's demand or a way to advance the participants position. Society evolved to address needs all types of participation that grant rights also demands obligations. There are very very few exceptional examples (factual and verifiable) and they occur only on the fringes of the system(s) or in face of exceptional circumstances, but all with time are co-opted into the system (examples Madre Teresa, Che Guevara, Vasili Arkhipov or Hugh Thompson, Jr.).

reply to post by Schrödinger

Mass? Currently on ATS there is roughly only 7 of us on that are active. Many like Masonic_Light or JoshNorton have left from sheer exhaustion with dealing with people who throw insults at us all day long.

Versus the entirety of non-Masons and anti-Masons we are a small percentage of the ATS population.

reply to post by Schrödinger

How do Masonic institutions "use it"?

With the logic of this post, I can say that non-Masons misuse power more than Masons. Sheer numbers and statistics of it all.

reply to post by Schrödinger

Asking you to take a chill pill is an example of bullying? Wow.

AM also pointed out the fact that the original derail post was by Luxus. Did I along with others make a joke as well sure, but AM just pointed out that Luxus is not a Mason. It wasn't shifting blame, just pointing out a fact.

reply to post by NuclearPaul

Who are these top Masons? You mean our elected leaders?

Are you saying that Ted Harrison, David Goodwin, Larry Weaver, Ronald Seale, John McNaughton, Kenneth Fischer, Bill Koon, Melvyn Cross, Gerald Ford (not the US President), William Hinton, Gary Hermann, Ron Wood, and the countless number of Grand Lodge Grand Masters are evil?

Looking at this thread has made me both laugh and shake my head. I come from a long line of Masons and I can tell you that we have no more power then any regular person. I mean sure you can make the argument that that a group of people have more power then a single person however from a political stand point or whatever else you want to call it, we are just regular group of people.

Sure we have some secrets but nothing that would make anybodies heart start beating out of control. Everybody has secrets. However, our secret are more about our finances lol.

reply to post by KSigMason


Have you heard the term; "the vocal minority"?

I do not care to speculate, postulate or document on how they misuse their power.
And if you read my statement, I never said anything about misusing it.
But *your* (Read: Masons) involvement in this thread, is an obvious example of how it can be misused.

Asking someone to self-medicate because they show emotional instability is a bullying tactic, yes!
(It is also a fallacy, but you already know that)

I have acknowledged that Lexus started. I have also made the argument that it was an invalid method of reasoning.

The top members of secret societies, that I had in mind was danish people in power. (I am not from the US)
But I know of several influential and powerful foreign ones as well !

I never said anything about them being evil.
I said explicitly:

I am not saying you are devil worshipers, I am not saying you are misusing this power collectevely. I am just stating that it is there.

What I am stating; "is there", is their power.

Originally posted by Schrödinger
The free-masonic institutions have power and they use it.
Stating that this power is the same as the one the average man holds, is a lie.

I am not saying you are devil worshipers, I am not saying you are misusing this power collectevely. I am just stating that it is there.
And it is obvious that it is there. I have been in several lodges, I have several people in my network who are in lodges. They all hold positions of power, they all use their network. (Same as everyone else would do, difference being the size and magnitude of the network)

edit on 10-5-2013 by Schrödinger because: grammar

So, without ANY concrete evidence, you're going to cling to that, huh?.

Sir, with all due respect, it is YOU who are wrong. First, your claim to have been in "several lodges" is at least dubious, and more likely an outright lie. You may well have been inside the building, but if you are a non-Mason, you have never been to a Lodge (you wouldn't be allowed to be there if a Lodge was open), and if you ARE a Mason, then you know better than to make such ridiculous false claims.

My father is a Mason, I am (now) a Mason, many members of my extended family are or have been members of the Lodge. NONE of us hold, or have ever held, any power. We're all just "regular guys". Some of us have been financially strapped, gone broke even. Show me the "power" in that.

I'm not saying there aren't Masons who have power, there most certainly are. But there are also Lions and Kinsmen and Rotarians in positions of power too - probably more than Masons. But any power andor status they have achieved did NOT, I repeat NOT, come to them because of their association with the Fraternity. I'm willing to conceed that nepotism CAN occur, but it is the rare case. The fact is that people who happen to be Masons or Lions or Rotarians simply rise to the top based on their merits.

Do Masons tend to lean towards dealing with other Masons in business? Probably. So do Lions and Rotarians and Kinsmen. And let's not forget those uber-powerful flower shop owners who are members of the local Chamber of Commerce - they deal with each other all the time... The point is that ALL of those networks are extensive, and members tend to use them. It's natural to prefer to deal with someone you know and can trust. It happens no more in Masonry that in the Lions Club.

It is YOU who are claiming that Masons, as a whole, have more "power" than non-Masons, but you show no evidence to support it, and are unwilling to do so. You instead simply delare certain things to be true, based only on conjecture and anecdote. If this was a court of law, your case would be thrown out before being heard. It is up to YOU, and you alone, as the accuser, to show supporting hard evidence of your claim that:

a) Masons have risen to positions of power by virtue of their membership in the Fraternity, and have done so more than members of any other service organization.
b) Rank-and-file Masons use their membership for personal professional and financial gain
c) And if a) or b) happen to be true, that they do so more than any other fraternity or service club.
d) That Masons are part of a world-wide conspiracy.

You have no hard evidence. All you offer is the usual tired lies and conjecture, observations, assumption, and innuendo. And please show evidence from a reliable and verifiable source.

Originally posted by Panic2k11
So those that know more and wish to retain power have to restrict access to it from others or be positionally challenged in the "power" structure. This is extremely basic deduction and I will gladly discuss any exceptions that you can provide to prove this wrong.

I'm confident that even any voluntary participation that you may think you see in any system is not voluntary at all, it is a system's demand or a way to advance the participants position.

So if someone goes to help at their local soup kitchen and participates there with a group of like-minded individuals what 'power' is being restricted and how is this involuntary?

reply to post by IslandMason


You have to change your tone, if you want any form of discourse with me.

Originally posted by Schrödinger
reply to post by KSigMason

 

Have you heard the term; "the vocal minority"?

I do not care to speculate, postulate or document on how they misuse their power.
And if you read my statement, I never said anything about misusing it.
But *your* (Read: Masons) involvement in this thread, is an obvious example of how it can be misused.

Asking someone to self-medicate because they show emotional instability is a bullying tactic, yes!
(It is also a fallacy, but you already know that)

I have acknowledged that Lexus started. I have also made the argument that it was an invalid method of reasoning.

The top members of secret societies, that I had in mind was danish people in power. (I am not from the US)
But I know of several influential and powerful foreign ones as well !

I never said anything about them being evil.
I said explicitly:

I am not saying you are devil worshipers, I am not saying you are misusing this power collectevely. I am just stating that it is there.

What I am stating; "is there", is their power.

Wow. Where to start?

Masons being here (in this thread, arguing with you) is not an abuse of power - it is simply a number of people who are being lied about, trying to defend themselves from an onslaught of wild and unfounded accusations.

I'm not saying there aren't INDIVIDUALS behaving as you claim in your area. There are bad apples in every barrel. What we ARE saying is that such behaviour isn't a concerted, conspiratorial thing. In fact, most Lodges will tell you that using the Fraternity for personal material gain is frowned upon.

And I reiterate: The Fraternity holds no more inherent "power" than any other organization, fraternity, or service club. Those who say otherwise are simply trying to find someone to blame for their own failings.

reply to post by IslandMason


You read my replies, like the devil reads the bible.
Please continue misunderstanding text book English, and alienating yourself, from the supposed person you are seeking to engage in discourse.

Originally posted by Schrödinger
reply to post by IslandMason

 

You have to change your tone, if you want any form of discourse with me.

I will not "change my tone" until you do the same. You offer no proof, only wild accusation. I am a Mason, and if you're going to lie about me, I WILL defend myself. I asked you to provide evidence. If being called out and asked to prove your assertions somehow hurts your feelings, too fricking bad.

Originally posted by Schrödinger
reply to post by IslandMason

 

You read my replies, like the devil reads the bible.
Please continue misunderstanding text book English, and alienating yourself, from the supposed person you are seeking to engage in discourse.

Would it be easier for you to understand if I provide your quotes and refute them one at a time?

Originally posted by IslandMason

Originally posted by Schrödinger
reply to post by IslandMason

 

You have to change your tone, if you want any form of discourse with me.

I will not "change my tone" until you do the same. You offer no proof, only wild accusation. I am a Mason, and if you're going to lie about me, I WILL defend myself. I asked you to provide evidence. If being called out and asked to prove your assertions somehow hurts your feelings, too fricking bad.

Where in your extreme fantasy, have I addressed you?
I have never tried to nor do i intend on engaging you in discourse.
You are the one that keeps addressing me!

I owe you nothing!
I have not made a single wild accusation!

I simply claimed that secret societies (and the persons inhabiting them) hold more power than the average man.

My mental state is irrelevant in this discussion.

reply to post by IslandMason


I will let you have the benefit of the doubt.
Please do that, if you think you are able to communicate with an obvious simpleton.