Thread by @SteB777

1) What if our system of governance was not what it seems? That in fact our leaders were in fact confidence tricksters ruthlessly exploiting the public for their own ends, and the benefit of others in their cabal. That it was an intergenerational scam?
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confidenc…

2) I have played with this idea for decades. At first it seems a preposterous proposition. That I am quite mad for even contemplating it. But bear with me.

3) Let's go with the Wikipedia description.

"A confidence trick is an attempt to defraud a person or group after first gaining their trust. Confidence tricks exploit victims using their credulity, naïveté, compassion, vanity, irresponsibility, and greed. ..."

4) How would we know if we were living in a gigantic intergenerational scam, where we were being ruthlessly exploited by a cabal of ruthless confidence tricksters, only pretending to be our leaders, protectors and benefactors - for the purpose of exploiting ourselves?

5) We'd know if we faced a crisis and possible multiple crises, which threatened the public, and instead of protecting the public, our so called leaders completely failed to protect the public, and sought only to enrich themselves, and exploit this crisis for their own ends.

6) It just so happens that for the last 50 years we have known we faced an ecological crisis, where our whole economic model and mode of over-exploiting the natural environment was totally unsustainable and we were systematically destroying what sustained our lives.

7) You don't have to take my word for it that we knew about this 50 years ago (well 49 to be precise), just read the report of the 1972 UN Conference on the Human Environment in Stockholm.
un.org/en/conferences…

8) Even better read the more recent UN report "Our Common Future" (1987), which was completed because the UN were alarmed about the lack of action on the 1972 plan, and which formed the basis for the 1992 Rio Earth Summit (OCF covers climate change).
sustainabledevelopment.un.org/content/docume…

9) I provide this as background to prove that the unsustainability of our current system was known back then, and it was known we had to completely change direction to avoid catastrophe.

10) If the leaders of our governance i.e. politicians who lead our governments, were genuine leaders, and not confidence tricksters exploiting us all for their own ends, and that of their rich friends, they would act to protect the public.

11) For the last 50-30 years these leaders they would have been gradually changing our system to avert the climate and ecological emergency, which threatened humanity. Remember, that is what they tell us they are there for, to protect the public.

12) However, if these politicians as government were actually confidence tricksters, just pretending to be our protectors, to ruthlessly exploit us on behalf of their billionaire and other very rich friends, they'd have been busy exploiting us and not protecting us.

13) What would have happened, is that instead of making the changes necessary to protect the public, the very rich, the billionaires etc, would have got much, much richer, and no action would have been taken to change the system to protect the public.

14) By some strange coincidence, that is exactly what has happened over the last 50 years, and especially in the last 30 years. Instead of addressing the climate and ecological emergency, our leaders have cut taxes for the very rich and enabled them to get much, much richer.

15) In fact, over half of all carbon emissions since the start of the industrial revolution have been emitted since 1990, when world leaders knew about the climate crisis, and were supposed to be working to reduce carbon emissions.
ieep.eu/news/more-than…

16) Whilst the proposition that our leaders are in fact confidence tricksters ruthlessly exploiting the public, their victims, for their own ends, and the ends of their super-rich paymasters - might seem preposterous - the actual pattern is consistent with this.

17) Of course, many are likely to be outraged that I suggest that our leaders who so many are loyal to, are in fact nothing but a bunch of con-artists exploiting us for own ends.

18) However, we are in the midst of a pandemic, where huge numbers of people have needlessly died, as so many leaders of countries have delayed taking action to stop the spread of the virus, to protect the income of their billionaire backers.

19) So successful have our leaders been at protecting the interests of the richest people in the world during the pandemic, that the wealth of the richest billionaires in the would have risen massively during the pandemic.
oxfam.org/en/press-relea…

20) Therefore, there is a massive amount of evidence to suggest that our leaders are confidence tricksters exploiting the public for their own ends, and the benefit of the very rich who bankroll these politicians. But strangely, no evidence to the contrary.

21) Ironically, the laws and ideas that say people who exploit others like this, are conmen, criminal fraudsters, actually come from the self-appointed* leaders of our societies. But then gangsters have never liked other crooks muscling in on their territory.

22) * I say self-appointed, because the whole idea we should be ruled over by all powerful rulers, who attend to the needs of the rich, whilst the public at large get the dirty end of the stick, came long before everyone or anyone had a vote in it.

23) Anyway it occurred to me that it might be a good time to air this thought experiment I've played with for a long time, at a time when the world is beset by extreme weather events predicted by climate scientists 30 years ago.

24) For clarity I am not a cynic, a subversive. I believe we could have the sort of leadership we deserve and should have, if only people were far more aware of how leadership should really be.

25) This scam started so many generations ago, that the wealthy and the powerful probably believe their own propaganda about them representing the public. They expect to be able to benefit like this as their divine right.

26) However, as the "justice system" imposed on us by the powerful likes to tell us, ignorance of the law, ignorance of the criminal action, is not a defence. So even if they are ignorant of what they are doing, they are still doing it.

27) It's for us the people to hold them accountable. To say, you claim to be our leaders, to represent our interests. Either start behaving like the leader you claim to be, or we will hold you to account.

@GeorgeMonbiot @ClimateHuman @GretaThunberg @ProfSteveKeen

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