Possible Wikileaks Smear Campaign on ATS?

In April 2010, this post was written by serbsta here on ATS and got some attention:


=== WikiLeaks Founder, Julian Assange: International Man of Mystery ===


It was a good post, talking about the mystery man behind Wikileaks and a little bit about his background as a computer hacker and general upbringing. People posted in the thread that now Julian Assange would become a target of the government and would probably get the usual treatment of character assassination and ridicule. So lets see...



Some recent threads on ATS sorted chronologically:


= Wikileaks may not be what you think it is...
April 6:th, by Fractured.Facade. Message being that Fractured Facade tells a story that he attempted to upload documents to wikileaks, his computer froze and now he thinks wikileaks is a trap.


= Something Smells Funny and Its Not Wikileaks
June 16:th, by serbsta. Message being that Wikileaks is a False Flag operation.


= WikiLeaks will NOT be abandoned
July 11:th, by xX aFTeRm4Th Xx. About wikileaks account on twitter with 90k followers.


= Reuters Busted with Disinfo over Wikileaks
July 26:th, by ExPostFacto. Talks about how Reuters are twisting the words of Wikileaks.


= The Wikileaks it is all disinformation,
July 26:th, by Jane_Rogers. Message obvious by title.


= Wikileaks: Disinfo? ,
July 28:th, by antonia. Message being that you cant trust Wikileaks and its dangerous to be a informer for Wikileaks.


= The Pentagon speculates that Wikileaks.org is supported by CIA
July 29:th, by MarkusMaximus. Message obvious from title.







Is this the latest disinformation campaign on ATS? Could this be about attempting to turn attention away from Wikileaks and erode the trust because its getting so much attention?

I guess what I would like is for everybody to stay sharp. When someone says something in a thread, be aware that it may just be a story designed to make you buy whatever they are selling. Be aware of whats going on and make sure to ask yourself "who profits from me believing this?" whenever you come across new information.

Thank you.

I wouldn't say it is an intentional group smear campaign against wikileaks, ATS members tend to latch on to idea's and thread after thread will be posted discussing the same topic. Plus many ATS members have a natural tendency to think of everything as a false flag or give 'elites' some deity like status where they control absolutely anything and everything.

I don't know about a smear campaign against wikileaks, but my thoughts are as follows...

The government wants to crack down on the internet because information is so widely available... but they have no way to do it yet.

How did they infringe on all our other rights so far? National security.

So I think they purposely let Manning leak documents to wikileaks, nothing too important, just enough to cause a stir. Combine that with the "Shirley Sherrod" story, and suddenly you have the mainstream media rambling on about how we need internet regulations and non-anonymity to prevent 'hate speech', 'slander' and protect 'national security'.

I think wikileaks was used as a tool to further the Military Industrial Complex and NWO's aims...

reply to post by Copernicus


You cant be further away from truth. There is definitely smear campaign going on ATS against wikileaks and the fight for truth. I don't participate those threads because I find them waste of time, they offer no proof just redundant "theories" by people who want everything hidden from people..the lies, the corruption, the illegal acts. You will also note that in all the threads you posted there are 2-3 users in each of them who are on forefront of running this propaganda campaign. One has to wonder why, right?

Originally posted by Solomons
I wouldn't say it is an intentional group smear campaign against wikileaks, ATS members tend to latch on to idea's and thread after thread will be posted discussing the same topic. Plus many ATS members have a natural tendency to think of everything as a false flag or give 'elites' some deity like status where they control absolutely anything and everything.

Very true.

This is also important to have in mind. They dont have unlimited power and people are starting to wake up. Do you remember what the world was like 20 years ago? People were completely asleep, including myself. Its almost funny to think about just how asleep I was.

Then 9/11 happened and me and others suddenly woke up. What the heck just happened here? Why did it happen? How could it happen? Whats going on in the world?

From then on, its been a very interesting learning experience for a lot of people, and today there are tons of people who realize we have lost the power to decide where we are heading. So its time to get that power back.


[edit on 31-7-2010 by Copernicus]

Originally posted by Sheol
You will also note that in all the threads you posted there are 2-3 users in each of them who are on forefront of running this propaganda campaign. One has to wonder why, right?

Absolutely. And talk about it.

reply to post by Copernicus


I have wondered about this, but what intrigues me more is the lack of data integration by ATS members. Post after post in numerous threads call out the rights and wrongs for such a leak, but a thorough analysis of the material garners very little thread time. Here we have some 75,000 (approx. 15,000 being held back by Wikileaks) documents detailing one of the biggest events in our life time. We often call out for this kind of information so we can pour over it, digest and discuss for ourselves, yet the overriding subject matter seem to be the legitimacy of Wikileaks. While I agree that the nature of ATS is conspiratorial, I am bemused by the lack of interest in the content of the leaked documents.

reply to post by LarryLove


Its very time consuming to go through all that data unfortunately, but I hope some of the people who spend entire days here on ATS will do it at some point. Im sure you have your own reasons for not going through it yourself, and they are probably just like my own reasons.

People have become very lazy and apathetic. Maybe its because we see the panic button flash every day so we have gotten used to it, much like Pavlovs dogs or the boiling frog. Or maybe we dont really care as much as we think about Afghanistan. Or maybe we care, but we feel we are powerless to stop it. I dont know. I just see most people doing nothing and Im like that myself as well.


[edit on 31-7-2010 by Copernicus]

reply to post by Copernicus


Just the opposite, because I am one of those who tends to spend an unhealthy number of hours on ATS! I went through it searching for terms like: Informant, nuclear, chemical, biological, al-Qaeda, CIA, PSYOPS etc. to see what would come up and have started a thread or two detailing my findings. Fascinating stuff.

However, back to your assertion about a small faction on ATS running an anti-Wikileaks propaganda machine, the more I see threads and the posts that they contain like those you mention, the more my suspicions are heightened.

reply to post by LarryLove


Im going to look up your threads and I salute you for being one of the people who do take the time to go through things like this.

reply to post by Copernicus


I have more stuff on the way, but you are right it takes hours of searching and reading. The intelligence reports makes for interesting reading regarding power struggles in the region.

The real benefit of doing it is you get an idea of what really is going down out there. Put civilian deaths, IEDs alike to one side and read the reports detailing everyday intelligence gathering and military operations and you begin to see how unwinnable the war is. In simple terms it reads like a mess where no one can trust each other and everyone has hidden agendas.

well I feel left out cuz u didn't mention
my thread

www.abovetopsecret.com...

As far as a grand conspiracy to discredit wikileaks.
I am not part of any such scheme. However,
I do post threads of what I believe to be the
truth just as you are now.

If Assange is what he portrayed himself to be,
then he would have been suicided long before
those cables were released. We all know just
how good Mossad and CIA are at making people
and data disappear on command. So if he's still alive
then he's an asset.

There may be some truth to what the OP says, but here is my major problem with this whole wikileaks thing.
If a member of ATS comes out and says I have information on an Alex Jones Panic scale,
I expect to see GWbush dancing around a fire pit sacrificing kittens.
Mr Assange said he had (I cannot remember the exact text but,) huge evidence on a major scale.
Then he releases numbers, there is a whole list of things that were done but the only thing that I saw that was even partly damming was the civilian loss numbers.
This is very comparable to a beautiful woman sitting on your lap scantily clad telling you of all of the nasty things she was going to do to you and how many egg beaters were going to be broken in the process as she then kisses you on the forehead and leaves.
The advertising just didn’t hold up to the product specs.
Now if Mr. Assange wishes to reconcile this I will need real proof of something BIG, otherwise he was just a hypester.
Simple as that for me.
But the OP sees what he believes is an accurate angle and he has voiced his/her opinion and good for him/her.
The truth is all that is important.

In case anyone is interested, Justin Raimondo, of AntiWar.com will appear on Fox Business Channel, Freedom Watch with Judge Napolitano airs four times this weekend:.

Based on his latest two articles, which you may be interested anyway, He MAY discuss WikiLeaks. Not sure if he did this morning because I missed it. Anyone see it?

Saturday 7/31 10 a.m. ET
Saturday 7/31 8 p.m. ET
Sunday 8/1 7 p.m. ET
Sunday 8/1 11 p.m. ET

Here are two of Justin's latest articles:

Why We Need WikiLeaks

Bradley Manning's Gift

This is one of the problems some ATSter have. They are so paranoid about what is going on in the world, they fail to see the “real” conspiracies. They lose the ability to differentiate between conspiracy hypothesis, theory and fact. This has led to a small minority of people on ATS who are suspicious of everything despite the most extreme and outrageous conspiracies. I would not say that this is a coordinated effort to discredit Wikileaks, rather it is the coincidental collective mind of a group of people who suspect everything.

Remember, this is ATS where the gamut runs from fact-reporting to speculation to outright hallucination.

IF subject matter = "X" THEN threads =

X is true.

Anyone who questions the truth of X is a traitor / coward /dupe / disinfo agent.

Anyone who believes in the truth of X is a traitor / coward /dupe / disinfo agent.

X is false-flag

X is a gift from the benevolent alens

X is an attack from the evil aliens

Did X really happen?

I just arrived in this universe through a time-track slip; what does "X" mean?

The illuminati are behind X, and I have PROOF!

X is the Antichrist [Insert verses from Ezekiel, Daniel, or Revelation here]

X: Typical left-wing crap

X: Typical right-wing crap

There is no X, its an illusion that can be dispelled by raising our vibrational level together and projecting positive intentionality

I think that it is important to realize that whether this is a smear campaign or not, that one should ponder valid questions raised by some of the posts. I have posted in one of those threads, thinking that the entire situation is suspect to say the least. That doesn't mean that what I suspect is true, but it should at least be considered.

Isn't being open to questioning that which is around you being "awake?"

Originally posted by boondock-saint
well I feel left out cuz u didn't mention
my thread

www.abovetopsecret.com...

As far as a grand conspiracy to discredit wikileaks.
I am not part of any such scheme. However,
I do post threads of what I believe to be the
truth just as you are now.

If Assange is what he portrayed himself to be,
then he would have been suicided long before
those cables were released. We all know just
how good Mossad and CIA are at making people
and data disappear on command. So if he's still alive
then he's an asset.

But the ultimate irony is that Mossad seem to be falling short of their former glory when you consider the bungled assassination of a Hammas leader.

The truth about Mossad

Edit for typo and to ask just how good are these intelligence agencies now? Infighting between the Pentagon and the CIA and Mossad stealing passports. Makes you wonder.

[edit on 31-7-2010 by LarryLove]

Judge Napolitano's full interview with Assange (shown in part here) is this weekend too, isn't it?

If Raimondo talks about WikiLeaks too, this would be two people talking about it on Fox this weekend. What would we make of that? lol

I don't see a smear campaign. Assange took certain actions, there will be certain repercussions.

The problem ultimately with Wikileaks is none of the information "leaked" through them is vetted. Anyone, from anywhere, could leak secrets to that site. That means it could be a perfect disinfo site for the CIA, FBI, DoD, Mossad, etc., with any complicity on the part of Wikileaks or Assange.

Character assassins will point out Assange is not just a computer hacker, but a CONVICTED computer hacker. For all anyone here knows, Assange made a deal to avoid jail time and is working undercover. Then again, he might be just what he appears, some guy who put together a wiki-oriented site for whistleblowers.

He released classified docs from the DoD. Irresponsible? Yes. Especially since they contain informants names. Those people are walking dead men.

Do the docs contain possible evidence of war crimes? Then perhaps leaking them will bring about justice, and possibly end sooner an unjust war. It's a humane and conscientious thing to do.

Which outweighs the other, the irresponsible act or the conscientious?

Wikileaks isn't exactly original, Cryptome has been doing this forever, just not on as big a scale, it's still Web 1.0, Wikileaks latched onto the wiki craze (anyone can run a wiki script).