September 26, 2022 • 58 mins
A conman in Kansas has just been sent to prison for a long series of illegal autopsy schemes. Self-appointed technocrats float the idea of poor people functioning as NPCs online. The Pentagon, in a stunning damage control initiative, pledges to conduct a 'sweeping review' of their own, ongoing psyop activities -- spoiler, this last story affects you directly. All this and more in this week's Strange News. They don’t want you to read our book. They don’t want you to see us on tour.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
From UFOs to psychic powers and government conspiracies. History is
riddled with unexplained events. You can turn back now or
learn the stuff they don't want you to know. A
production of My Heart Radio. Hello, welcome back to the show.
(00:25):
My name is Matt, my name is no They call
me Ben. We're joined as always with our super producer
Alexis code named dot Holiday Jackson. Most importantly, you are you.
You are here, and that makes this the stuff they
don't want you to know. It's the top of the week.
There's a lot of news, a lot of it's strange. Uh.
(00:48):
We're recording this about a uh a few days before
this comes out to you, fellow conspiracy realists, and I
hope that I am not the only one among us
who spent a heroine afternoon waiting for Vladimir Putin to
show up on time to his own speech, which he didn't,
(01:10):
but the speech was the speech was dangerous. You have
heard a lot about it. At this point, things are escalating,
But that although it is strange news, it's not exactly
what we mean when we say strange news. We're talking
about things that should be explored in further depth. We're
often talking about things that either don't make it above
(01:34):
the fold, to quote the old newspaper terb or things
that are just sort of tossed around and everybody everybody
agrees with a thing, or increasingly these days, you just
don't have enough time to pay attention to a lot
of it. Let us not forget that mid pandemic, the
US government came out and said UFOs are real, and
(01:57):
literally everyone said, I mean sure, Should I get vaccinated?
Is my main concern? Uh, Today we're going to talk
about We're gonna talk about the inequality burgeoning in the
world of n f T s and the so called metaverse,
so opposit Uh, We're going to talk about We're gonna
(02:20):
talk about the Pentagon doing something really funny with psy
ops that have done you know, I don't like psy ops,
but they've done a lot for our show in terms
of in terms of things to explore. But maybe maybe Matt,
we start with, uh, we start with a story that
(02:40):
didn't get a ton of national coverage, much less international coverage.
It's a true crime story and hopefully it's a story
with a little bit of closure for the survivors. What
do you think, Oh, yeah, survivors say it's it's more
like the DEFRA did I think really? But it is
(03:02):
a It is one man pulling a psychological operation on
a whole bunch of people, around three and fifty clients
of his of the company that he ran and owned.
So let's talk about this. There's a man we're gonna
name because he just got indicted, a man named Seawan
s h A W N parcels P A R C
(03:23):
E L l S. If you want to look it up. Uh.
He he's forty two year old man from Topeka, Kansas
and he, uh, he did some messed up things. He
had a company has A company I suppose I should
say maybe had is better called National Autopsy Services l
(03:44):
l C. National Autopsy Services. It's kind of a weird name,
don't you think, guys. It sounds like a generic autopsy
like shop. Definitely sounds more governmental than it actually is. That's,
you know, that's that's one of the clever things. It's
just like how you can put all natural, unsereal boxes
(04:07):
and make it sound very, very different from the reality
of the ingredients. You see this in privatized insurance companies.
Put national in front of something you'll be associated with
a nation or a federal government when that is not
the case. It's also like, autopsy isn't really something I
think of as a thing that we have to like
be individually worried about. Ah yeah, I mean, like you know,
(04:28):
funeral arrangements and cremation and all that. Yes, that is
something we have to take care of for our loved ones.
But an autopsy usually comes with the death. Yeah, depending
on what the circumstances are, right, and if there's ever
anything anything puzzling about the death at all, then an
autopsy where will generally be ordered by the law enforcement
(04:49):
that's involved taking care of that case. Right. It's not
something you imagine you right on your calendar, like, oh yeah,
I can need to get a couple of autopsy has
done this month. I'm just gonna go ahead and pencil
that in, you know, my calendar. You're right now, You're right.
But it's it's I guess for many of us listening
seems like an odd thing, right that even that there
(05:10):
would be three hundred and fifty clients of this company
called National Autopsy LLC. I'll give you the better business
bureau spiel on it. It's it's pretty short. Um, there's
a little alert if you find them, it says, current
alerts for this business. BBB investigation results. A Better Business
Bureau investigation found that the website for National Autopsy Services
(05:33):
at www dot National Autopsy Services dot com identifies a
corporate office location in Topeka, Kansas, as well as one
in another location, and then it says there are a
pattern of complaints you guys. BBB records indicate a pattern
of unanswered complaints, wherein customers alleged providing payment for autopsies
(05:54):
and not receiving a copy of the final report. I'll
just I'm gonna finish this out, guys. I'm sorry, I
know it's a little long. Um. In addition, consumers alleged
making numerous attempts to contact the company National Autopsy Services
via phone and emails and receive no response. BBB has
received no response from the business regarding the alleged complaints.
(06:17):
So not great if you are, uh, you know, an
amateur autopsy seeker or even a law enforcement agency that's
looking to I don't know, get a third party for
some of your autopsy has done. That wouldn't be great
if you saw that on the BBB website, which many
of us used to vet companies. Yeah, also shout out
(06:37):
just to interject here as people who are generally skeptical
of trade organizations. Uh, and nonprofits also have their share
of sketch. I do have to point out that here
in the US, the Better Business Bureau does good work
(06:58):
and actually contacting the Better Business Bureau shout out to
Clark Howard there can get you results when customer service
does not. This. Uh, there's something interesting, Matt. This says
not BBB accredited. So for anybody looking at the website
and the top left, when you see that, when you
(07:20):
see that thumbnail, that means that the Better Business Bureau
is telling you we don't trust them. Implication being you
shouldn't either go somewhere else for your autopsies, try other autopsies.
Uh with the it's just the Kansas Autopsies Incorporated or whatever.
(07:43):
I don't know, just making up names here. Okay, So
let's talk about what Seawan did with this company and
the reason why it has that BBB rating or and
or the complaints as it stated. So, this guy Sean
has been in the autopsy game for a while. A
why guys um back in CBS did a little bit
(08:05):
of an investigation on this fellow's a CBS for investigation, uh,
where they were looking at the company and Shawn in particular,
because there were complaints and individuals who would say, Hey,
I paid this outfit for an autopsy and I've been
trying to get in touch with him to get a
final report. I can't get in touch with him. Then
(08:27):
I think it's CBS. I'm pretty sure this is correct.
CBS actually got in touch with the guy and he's saying, oh, well,
I don't have the correct you know, contact information for
this particular client. I've been trying to send this report.
I've had it for months. And then they find out
through the person they're interviewing the client that they signed
(08:49):
a contract which included all of their contact information, the
client's contact information. Uh So it was just it was
just a lie that was told. And this guy, Sean
Park was arrested back in twenty nineteen and charged with
theft and criminal desecration. Guys, do you think that just
means he was performing autopsies when he wasn't supposed to be. Well, yeah,
(09:11):
I also begs the question, is there a lesser form
of desecration that is not criminal? Is there misdemeanor desecrat
Desecration is in and of itself, just sounds pretty bad news.
It sounds like the there is intent in the act
of desecrating something. Well, that that is the case. I'm
gonna just gonna give you one example. You can go
to CBS news dot com and you can find an
(09:33):
article from titled Littleton woman still seeking answers in husband's death,
and you can read about a man, a man named
David Evans, and a woman named Patty Evans. David passed
away and it was, you know, just suddenly in the home.
So Patty wanted answers, and she she just stumbled upon
(09:56):
National Autopsy Services online and thought, well, hey, bee, I
can get this independent autopsy done and I can just
find out how he died, why he died. Um. So
she she ended up contacting them, and she ended up
paying three thousand, five hundred and fifty dollars to National
Autopsy Services to get this done. It it must have
been a lot to her, right, you can imagine to
(10:18):
to pay that much money for something. And she signed
a contract back in December, sent it off, and you know,
paid for it all in that time, right around Christmas
and nothing was happening. She wasn't getting any results, wasn't
getting a final report, She was attempting to contact the company,
and she couldn't get through. This is the person I
(10:39):
was mentioning at the top. She got ghosted. And also
just just for a watermark here, folks, A private autopsy,
if I recall correctly, will typically run between three to
five grand. So this is not especially egregious. But i'll
band an en a person who has paid you for
(11:02):
the autopsy. UH, does seem agregious. Criminal desecration if we're
being completely objective about it means treatment of the body
in an illegal manner right away. That's outside of the law.
Just like the guy here in Georgia who was caught
charging people for cremation when he was in fact just
(11:26):
throwing human remains into the nearby woods. You remember nestory.
I mean, I think it's especially egregious. When any kind
of deception is egregious, is obviously horrible. But when you
are capitalizing on someone's grief and need for answers or
some sort of spiritual connection and or closure. So I
(11:48):
think those two things, I think it's a great UH.
Analog Ben the fake you know, um cremations or whatever,
because they both are capitalizing on someone's very deep personal
you know pain, absolutely as well. Said No, I guys,
I just I want to jump to now two. Why
we're even talking about this right now, because that was
(12:09):
back this past Monday, September nineteen. He was sentenced to
six years in prison for wire fraud, not for bad
autopsy ng or you know, conducting autopsies. Well, not a doctor, right,
it's not the fact that you're a terrible person. You
(12:31):
lied about being a doctor, and you were a predatory
toward people the most vulnerable moment of of their lives
is that you've messed with the money. Oh yeah, dude,
we didn't even get to that yet. Ben. This let's
tell let's talk about it. This guy was not a pathologist.
He was not somebody who should be or had any
(12:51):
business conducting autopsies. He was a pathological liar in that way.
He was a pathologist. He was an assistant, a pathology assistant.
He had no formal education. He didn't go to school
for this thing. You didn't have a degree. Uh. He
was an assistant that was charging three to five thousand
dollars for autopsies and he made. Guess how much money
(13:15):
he made doing this, guys over the course of years.
How much money it was one I've seen it in
a couple of places. One point one million dollars or
one point one six six million dollars, which it's you know,
that's a whole extra year's salary there, that point six
six It depends on how good and that's a lucky
(13:37):
year for that to be a one year's salary. But
also it depends really on how adaptive would have been
hiding he's all gotten games. And wire fraud would be
as simple as just illegally transferring ill gotten gains, right I,
I don't know. In this case, it's because he charged
a client five grand to get an autopsy done and
(14:01):
then no report. Wire fraud is essentially a reference to
the format of the fraud. Right, you can you can fraud,
you can pull, you can pull some cons and frauds
in person all the live long day. That's not wire
fraud until it's over UM electronic communication or via telephone.
(14:24):
So it doesn't even necessarily mean transferring funds. It can
just be using UM telecommunications or the Internet. I'm sorry,
I that's that's good to clarify. I always thought it
was heavy to do with money or bank transfers. I
think have a wire I think of like a wire
transfer for for money. Yeah, you know what, I think
the same. It's it's pretty much it's um. It's structured
(14:45):
or framed as a way to define where the crime happens.
And they're saying it doesn't happen in a physical location.
It's yeah, so it's out there somewhere inside the people
with like fake you know, calls and such that would
be considered wire fraud. Yeah, it's way less cool than
(15:07):
you know, the literal definition, which is not a real thing,
which should be you know, fraud using the fraud via
the use of wires, like physical wires. You know, like
in martial arts movies where where they're you know, jumping
from the trees and doing really crazy crouching tiger, hidden
dragon stuff. You know, they're not really jumping. That could
(15:30):
be considered wire fraud. Not inport. That's really funny, but
thank you, thank you. Joke landing is when someone looks
at you and says, that's really funny. Well, I had
to paint the picture first, Like in my mind, I
had to see the actors fraudulently jumping really far because
(15:51):
they had wires attached. Rochelle Yo could do it. I
bet she can do it in real life. I think so, guys.
I wanted to just and right here, so I want
to read this from the CBS article from September two,
Kansas man sentenced nearly six years in prison for illegal
autopsy scheme. The scheme is the important part here. Uh,
(16:14):
I'm just gonna read this verbatim. It was that five
thousand dollars that a client was persuaded to pay for
an autopsy. Um, the client did receive an emailed autopsy report,
and it appeared to be authored by Sean Parcels, the
this gentleman who's been arrested and sentenced to six years. However,
no pathologist, actual pathologist was involved in the examination report comma,
(16:39):
which is illegal. Uh So if there's no actual pathologist,
the autopsy report not legal, not real, not binding, not
a thing. And it says here in this article that
back in twenty nineteen, Kansas Attorney General Derek Schmidt also
charged Parcels for conducting illegal autopsies, so him actually conducting autopsies,
(17:04):
but again not being allowed to do so, uh, dude,
he had another conviction in November. Geez, this guy, this
guy has just been getting into it. Uh, and he
apparently was running three companies. He's got a thing, you
know what I mean? At two points, the money is
maybe not the sole primary passion project. Yeah. Yeah, I'm
(17:29):
gonna read you the last sentence of this because I
think it'll just stay in our dreams. Uh tonight as
we all go to sleep, as you are now probably
falling asleep, as this episode has been on for over
fifteen minutes, I'm just joking. Okay, here's the last sentence
from the CBS article. Prosecutors discovered that Parcels collected more
than one thousand, six hundred biological samples, mostly human tissue,
(17:55):
as part of the scheme. The Kansas Department of Health
and Environment a custody of the samples, and victims have
until October six to claim them. That is such a
short window of time. Yeah wow, So if you had
an autopsy done by the National Autopsy schemers, Uh, get
(18:18):
out there and get those samples. That's really awful and gross,
and I'm sorry, I hope you don't have to deal
with that anyway. Just be careful as in any business
you're gonna be you know, associating with or paying money to,
just do a little research before you enter into a
contract with them, seriously, because that's it's just wrong. What
this guy did is just wrong. And just be careful
(18:40):
who you pay money to and who you sign a
contract with. Al Right, guys, And with that, uh, we're
gonna hear from a sponsor, hopefully not an autopsy service,
and we'll be right back with more strange news. And
we're back with more or strange. This one's super strange.
(19:02):
It's like dystopian, uh metaverse kind of computer stiff. Remember
those movies from the nineties that tried to depict the
Internet and did a really bad job, like Hackers or
The lawnmower Man, where they don't know it's kind of
just a bunch of like, you know, polygons and and
kind of like cubes and you know, you're flying through
quote unquote cyberspace kind of looked a lot like Minecraft
(19:23):
in a weird way now that I think about it.
And it's funny because you know games like Minecraft and
Roadblocks that really have become the most trafficked you know,
parts of the quote unquote metaverse are really low five.
And that's because obviously you can create a larger world,
in a more um customizable world if you kind of
(19:43):
dumbed down the graphics a little bit, and that sort
of becomes part of the fun. There's a retro quality
to it. And also the possibilities are kind of limitless
in terms of what you can create using squares, using cubes,
using these these polygons um. So you know, it's kind
of crazy how the Internet of today or this metaverse
looks a hell of a like the lawnmower Man that
sort of flowers for Aldredon esque story about the the
(20:04):
yard the yard man who you know, pierced Proson and
hooks up to VR machine and makes men do an
evil genius when he wasn't so bright to start with. Um,
which is kind of crazy because the real story that
was based on, by the way, and I know, Ben,
you know this, uh, was a short story by Stephen
King where it's literally just a dude that that drops
trou clock, gets on all fours and starts eating grass
(20:26):
and that's the story. And then he eventually I think
he eats a mole, and then I think he eats
the guy who's just like observed spoiler for a very
very strange, coked up Stephen King's story. Um, but yeah
movie or something like that. And then I think there
was a really bad sequel to also Virtuosity that was
another one of those kind of golden era uh internet
depiction movies. I digress. I just think it's really interesting
and really even occur to me until now that the
(20:47):
roadblocks at Bynecraft really do kind of bear striking resemblance
to those uh depictions of the past, maybe we should
give them a little more credit where credit is due. Uh.
So this is a story about the metaverse, is a
story about Minecraft in particular, and it is a story
about how U n f t s have have somehow
managed to get even grosser and stupider, or at least
(21:10):
the concept of them. You know, again, we know that
n f t s aren't just dumb JPEG's of monkeys
that you spend thousands of dollars on and then have
stolen from you, uh and then you know, proceed to
beg for the thief to give them back on Twitter,
only to be mocked openly by by the Internet at large. Um,
there are things you can do with them that are interesting.
(21:31):
You know, you can make sample packs of music and
you know, have them tied to a smart contract that
allows someone to use them in whatever medium they want,
whether it be commercial or television or some other kind
of project remixing them. All of that, there are interesting
uses for n f T s that don't cost gazillions
of dollars and just act as some sort of weird
badge of you know, Internet opulence. This story starts off
(21:54):
with some reporting from PC Gamer. Actually I was read
you the headline n f T expert. Iagine it's a
hopeful future where poor people serve as real life in
PCs in games. Um, yeah, anyone who's not gamer out there. Um,
NPCs nonplayer characters, you know the whole uh got an
(22:14):
arrow in the knee guy you know from from sky Rim,
or just any character that you interact with. Uh. There
are more directly you know, interactive NPCs, and there are
ones that are just kind of in the background doing stuff. Um. So,
the idea here started with an n f T based
Minecraft game called Critters, where essentially it's sort of like
(22:37):
gold mining, you know, in in in um in m
m O RPGs where you literally can get people to
do the boring parts for you, so you can amass
all of this like virtual wealth, only since his n
f T s it's based in real wealth. And this
guy who goes by the name Big Chief, he has
this team and apparently it's mainly made up of children
(23:00):
in the Philippines. You go around in Minecraft and collect
materials so that he can build a casino, which once
they have collected enough materials, he then pays quote professional
Minecraft builders to create. Um, Big Chief does not Yeah, yeah, please,
let's yeah. Hold on, I just don't understand. Minecraft has
(23:24):
a setting called Creative where when when you're in that setting,
you can generate as many blocks as you want of
whatever type of block or ab that's right, Why why
would you have to do it in survival notes? Sorry, guys,
I love Minecraft was place. There's a good question. I
don't it's this is a an in game sub game
(23:45):
that has since essentially been outlawed by Minecraft. So I'm
just gonna read you the quote. Let's see. Um, the
bulk of the story about the nonprofit journalism organizations about
a Minecraft based an FT game called Critters, which enjoyed
an of success in it's early days that, some players
began hiring others to help build their in game ownings
in exchange for a cut of the profits. One such
(24:08):
high roller, who goes by the name Big Chief, had
his team made up mainly of kids in the Philippines,
collect building materials for a casino, which he then paid
professional Minecraft builders ten thousand dollars to actually create. So
it's a good question because I know, I know Minecraft
doesn't work the same way Roadblocks does exactly where you
have like these kind of micro games or these little
(24:28):
like sub game which sort of the whole deal with Roadblocks.
So I'm a little confused about that too. Um. Any
listeners out there that can that can elaborate on how
this is done, let us know. But we're gonna get
to how essentially Mojang, you know, said no, we're not,
We're not We're not going to support this. Um. But
here's the guy's quote, just to give you a sense
of the machinery that he's working with in terms of
like his uh, his empathy cogs. Um. He says this,
(24:52):
I have a lot of kids that play for me,
and they play because they want to make extra money
in a country that's really just locking them down. Um uh.
He's says he wouldn't go on to say exactly how
much he was paying them. Um, but he said that
I couldn't tell you what the hourly rate comes to,
but I could tell you that people make very little
money and the cost of living is very low in
(25:12):
the Philippines. Um. So, essentially, Critters, you know, as we know,
any n f T s or you know, crypto or
whatever often revolves. It revolves around these tokens. And tokens
have a market value. So if you go to Critters
n f T or Critters dot x y Z, it's
(25:32):
called it's billing itself as the most active and entertaining
metaverse ever. Essentially, you are buying and owning your n
f T s are like plots of land twenty two thousand,
five hundred Genesis plots to claim, each plot of land
is a permanent membership into the Critters metaverse. Plots are
infinitely customizable one to one n f T s that
(25:54):
you fully own. You can turn plots into an attraction,
a mini game, or an operation to earn earn uh
dollar sign block. So that's that's the token. So it's anyway,
it's that's the deal. So there's this. You use the
token to buy the plots. You earn the tokens by
I guess mining material within the within this like many games.
(26:18):
So again it's a little convoluted. Point being is that
the price of this token started to plummet because Mojing
came out and said, yeah, we're not going to support this.
We do not feel as though um n f T
integration into Minecraft is something that we would like to allow.
So the value of this token, which already took a
(26:39):
pretty big hit, uh, was cut in half. Um Also,
by the way, another thing that cut the price of
the token is that that you know, this guy was
paying these these these kids in the Philippines with this token,
and again by his very own justification presumably you know,
to help help with expenses and to like feed their
families and stuff. And this guy goes onto really, oh gosh,
(27:01):
he's such a martyr and such a virtuous fellow, and
so what are they gonna do. They're gonna sell it.
And that's the thing. That's what happens when you have
like any kind of project, whether it's like a you know,
a crypto project of some kind. If people who own
a bunch of the tokens sell it. That's called a
rug pool, and then all of a sudden, the you know,
the value goes down. The value goes down significantly. And
again there would be plenty of other people with these tokens.
(27:23):
But if enough, if this guy is hiring enough of
these kids and they all sell them every time, then
that's going to affect the price. So now he's looking
for other ways of going about this UM based around
this same model, the same idea of crowdsourcing, uh, he says,
um using another kind of blockchain gaming you know model. Potentially,
(27:47):
what if we figured out how to take advantage of
this cheap labor and developing countries and actually use people
in the Philippines for example, as NPCs um real life
pecs in your game. So you would know that if
someone was just dicking around in the background, you know,
doing some task, some wrote whatever set of actions, that's
(28:12):
actually some person. Remember Ben the paying the yard gnomes
and weird historical flexes on ridiculous history, Yes, guarding your
hermits they were called Yeah, that's it. Yeah, you would
pay somebody uh to hang out in your yard for
your own amusement. And this is essentially just like a
(28:33):
digital version of that. Uh he says they would quote
just populate the world maybe, or do a random job,
or just walk back and forth fishing, telling stories a shopkeeper.
Anything is really possible. This is some black mirror again,
like when we started doing this with like prisoners or something.
I mean, it's just bizarre the idea. This is like
(28:55):
some squid game type stuff, like what do we just
like take people that are less fortunate and for a pittance,
you know, let them dance around for our for our amusement. Question.
Is McKai Kosar the same person as Big Chief? I
don't think so, now, okay, kaik Star is the consult
(29:16):
is a consultant that was talked to in this situation, right,
that's right, and yeah, I'm sorry, thank you. They are
different people. The story started with Big Chief and his
you know kind of exploitation of folks in the Philippines
and then yes, McKay co star, thank you. Ben is
this other gentleman with very similar uh similar designs on
(29:36):
the Philippines or other developing countries that have access to
it to gaming, but maybe not like you know, running
water all the time or like food stability. Yeah, he
has ah Cosar is an accountant and a member of
an outfit called Wolves Dow Wolves d a O. And
he uh, he is as you said, ten toes down
(29:58):
on this uh and he also is specifically looking at
the Philippines. But this, this brings up I appreciate the
mentioned the anthology series Black Mirror, because this brings up
the new realm of inequality. You know, imagine if you
are able, if you're growing up, and say, and you're
(30:21):
able to play your favorite online game, right, but the
only way you can play it for free is to
essentially walk through and do task in the premium version
of premium iteration of this game that is enjoyed and
owned by a much more privileged player. I don't know,
(30:45):
you know, it becomes a rain inhell, serve in Heaven
sort of situation in an incredibly unfair way. But if
it is a way for people to have access, then
a lot of people are gonna say yes to it.
With the ethical quandaries and deep profound problems of it
(31:05):
cast aside and bracketed away, because we can already see
Big Chief and co. S are very much rationalizing somewhat
similar arguably to them. The perspective of Thomas Friedman in
the world is flat, And that's that's a guy who
is arguing in his book that ultimately the global interconnectivity
(31:32):
of communication and trade will be better for everyone. It's
very very very smart man, very persuasive writer, just happens
to be woefully incorrect because, in my opinion, why should
you be able to drive a McLaren in a virtual
world if you can't afford to drive one in this world? Huh,
(31:55):
come on, then it's not special anymore. You're you're joking.
But that's sort of what and f t s are, right,
that's sort of the concept of them is that you
don't get to have this thing if you can't actually
afford it. You know, you don't get to you know,
way of this sign of opulence around in the in
the you know, virtual world unless you actually paid for
(32:16):
and we can damn well you know, verify that on
the blockchain. Um, it's a bastardization of what online life
and and and and escapism actually is. In a lot
of ways, why do we turn to video games. It's
because we can't actually be wizards and sword fighters and
and you know, race car drivers. But to that end,
(32:38):
why why do people turn to books, you know, why
do people turn to oral traditions and stories that a
theater through which one can encounter similar catharsis right? This
uh the I hate to say it. I don't want
to sound too cynical, but it feels like a natural
(32:58):
iteration of an existing trend. To be quite honest, the
ideas of accelerating hierarchy and uh and inequality a scary
truth of the world, and I really wish this didn't
feel so true. Scary truth of the world seems to
(33:19):
be that human beings defining happiness in relative external terms,
don't find it satisfactory to be internally satisfied, to be
happy with one's own life. It is more important to
know that there are people who are less than and
(33:40):
that is terrifying and it's one of the things that
holds humanity back. So I like with with this story
with Cosar and Big Chief. I don't when I get
that wrong Big Chief. Uh. The the issue seems that
it's it's the same story in in another reboot, you know,
(34:05):
And I'm sure then you get to play every character
that you're reading. Does that make sense? Like you kind
of in a way get to play every character and
you have to just or a library card, which I
think is why people who are against knowledge are so
mad that libraries still exist in the United States. You
(34:27):
can go to one today. It's sadly not going to
be crowded. But but but I interrupted your point, Matt, Uh, Well, yeah,
I'm just thinking about how video games do present this
very specific experience, and they do seem to be the
thing that's sticking around, like as an industry, the thing
the entertainment industry that continues to make money, uh pretty reliably,
(34:54):
even as like big budget films are only functioning, as
we've talked about on previous episodes because of their becoming global, right,
but video games have been largely global for a long time. Um,
I just I think there's a I think we're thinking
about it as a black mirror, as a future thing,
as something that's coming. It does really feel like it's
(35:17):
going to have to become this separated out because not
everybody was going to be able to afford the levels
with all the game the micro transactions that exist everywhere
in every game all the time. Now or at least
it's increasingly so that way. Um, there's just gonna be
these tears of experience. By the way, I completely agree,
(35:39):
and I think to your point, Ben, this is, you know,
an escalation of something that we're already seeing and with
with things like an f d S and with things
like cryptocurrency and all of that stuff, and it's probably
gonna get worse before it gets better. But um, just
really quickly this is separate topic. But did you guys
see the insane grand theft auto leaks that took place
(36:05):
in terms of just like another like you know metaversus
kind of you know that that's the game that's like
it's online version has stayed pretty relevant up until recently.
I mean it appears to be like unprecedented in terms of,
you know, the level of invasion that they experienced, what happened,
just like hundreds of videos of of of develop underdeveloped
(36:26):
you know um in game footage with like dbug code
on the screen and just like you know, major plot spoilers,
you know, with like really under um incomplete you know
gameplay footage, and it's just an absolute catastrophe. It's just
fascinating the way that you know, one one hacker without
(36:48):
even hacking apparently it was an act access more just
through like fishing kind of expeditions using like WhatsApp to
message employees rather than some sort of you know, actual Anyway,
I just wanted to ask if you guys I've heard
about it. It's it's interesting stuff, um, especially for a
company like that where they have such a reputation of
like a really really bad crunch time um treatment of
(37:11):
their employees. Uh, and they have been trying to kind
of get away from that image. And this apparently the
game's taken so long to come out because they say
they're trying to avoid crunch time. And now all this
does make the kind of spoil everything that the employees
have been working their butts off on. So I just
don't see what the point is, Like, why what what
these uh hackers are after? But irrelevant, unconnected to this story.
(37:33):
I think that we've we've we've bandied this one about
long enough. Let's take a little break and then we're
back with a third piece of strange news. Welcome back,
fellow conspiracy realist. Yes we have one more piece of
strange news. Now, this is one that you may have
(37:56):
heard of if you are in the game, and in
a number of games, but this story has the distinction
of being one that caused some of my sources to
proactively reach out to me saying that heads will roll.
We've talked about propaganda in the past. It is a
(38:17):
very real thing. It is quite effective, uh, And it's
one of those things that is so audience specific at
times that it's almost like, um, it's almost like regional food.
You know, like if you grew up in an environment
where there was no such thing as cheese, you would
think cheese is gross, and you know, you would have
(38:40):
a point. It's it's a weird process. It's a weird thing.
It's just so tasty if you're familiar with it, and
likewise with any other number of regional food stuff. So propaganda,
by that comparison can seem completely believable, rational, and fact
supported if you are the intended audience, right, if we
(39:04):
can just say, oh, you're already, you're already sorted down
with this. Let me let me get you a little
more down. Pretty soon you're ten toes down. And that's
how the manipulation works. A lot of times in the West,
this is portrayed as something that is beneath the good guys, right,
(39:24):
it's beneath the Allied forces. A k the West and
five eyes and all that slow jazz, but not really totally,
not really right, UH. A lot of the same tactics
that have been used by the Russian government or by
the Chinese government information control UH, and used by cults
(39:47):
on lower levels. Uncle Sam has done the same things.
And recently there was a Washington Post article by Ellen
Nakashima that I want us to pay some particular attention to. Today,
the Pentagon has opened up what it is calling a
sweeping review of clandestine psy ops psychological operations, and this
(40:12):
is due to a request from multiple other federal agencies
as well as the White House. UH. And these agencies
are complaining about the US military's influence operations. I like
that phrase, influence operations using Facebook and Twitter in particular.
(40:35):
Now we know that Twitter is riddled with bots. We
know that Facebook turns a blind eye to active disinformation
campaigns and propaganda. In both cases, it's because they're you know,
they're motivated by profit. They're not really you know, they're
not really chasing some larger philosophical idea past two three
(40:58):
or Q four. So the Pentagon said, all right, we
need to we need to get ahold of our online
fake accounts, and we need to clean the skeletons from
the closet of our clandestine information warfare. That's right. The
(41:19):
Pentagond has been doing psy ops for for quite a
long time. Last month to uh to Internet research outfits
Graphica and the Stanford Internet Observatory. You like that Observatory
for the Internet. I think it's clever. Yeah. They they
(41:42):
disclosed that there were more than one and fifty bogus
personas and media sites that were active. Now, these researchers
did not this is important. They did not explicitly attribute
these face accounts to the US military. But uh, but
(42:07):
it's pretty obvious, you know what I mean. Like, it's
it's pretty obvious. Right. It's like if you saw Frankenstein's
monster loitering around the body of Victor Frankenstein and had
blood on one of his you know, reanimated hands, and
he was standing next to some you know, bloody graffiti
(42:28):
that said the creator has been uncreated. You know what
I mean. You don't have proof yet, but you like,
it's walked up on this. It's just like it's like
the sketch and I think you should leave where he's
like the hot dog costume, yeah and yeah, and he's like,
we gotta find out who did this is it's a
(42:48):
hot dog mobile and that's crashed into this. Everyone's like
terrified and he comes sauntering up. We have to find
out who did this. The master stroke there is one
of the guys, unfortunately, is wearing a a suit that
has hot dog colors, like a suit and tie. That's
one of the that's one of the writers. And I
think you should leave down. They do great work. Uh.
(43:10):
Do check out that show if you have time, And
if you work for cent Com US Central Command, you
may well not have time because people are about to
start going through your stuff. Uh. These this thing appears
to have been triggered by an investigation running for several
(43:31):
years or diving into propagandistic bought and fake accounts and
AstroTurf whatever you wanna call it, for quite a while.
And people went on record responding to this. Well, people
in the US government, the spokespeople for Facebook and Twitter, Uh,
(43:52):
their lips are sealed. Mom's the word. Uh. The Air
Force Brigadier General Patrick Ryder, who was the current Pentagon
Press Secretary, said that these again information operations quote, support
our national security priorities and that they're totally going to
enforce these safeguards. It's not the Ekadas. We we were
(44:16):
totally we were totally gonna do this. Um And I
think this opens up the question. You know, we mentioned
it on GOSH. I was talking with Jordan Harbinger. We're
talking with the good folks at Macro dosing uh, the
way that the propaganda game has changed in the United States.
(44:37):
If you're listening and you are in the US, then yeah,
of course, obviously you're being targeted for propaganda. Right every
time a YouTube bad plays with a political message, that's
propaganda towards you. Every time, you know what, every time
an advertisement for fast food franchise comes on, that's arguably propaganda.
(45:02):
But for a long time, the idea was that the
United States was above using state level militaristic propaganda on
its own people domestically. That would turn out not to
be the case. Also, just for the record, coin telpro
never ended. I'm just gonna put that out there. Just
(45:24):
have fun with that one. If you are listening. Yeah,
you know, it's perfect, man. It sounds familiar to the
Russia spending three million dollars thing right. Well, on influencing
elections and politics in other countries. It feels like like
like a donut whole version of that crueler or whatever.
(45:47):
What am I saying? I don't know, No, you nailed it,
and I love a good pastry reference man, thank you
and this. So there are things like um our International listeners.
You're doubtless be familiar with this. Uh. There are things
like the Voice of America Right, which is stationed abroad
and is pro US. Right enforces geopolitical or tries to
(46:12):
popularize geopolitical goals of the US and its owner corporations. Uh.
There are places like Radio Free Europe, which does the
same thing. And just to give us a sense of
the kind of things they're saying, right, it's not as
simple as um North Korean propaganda like DPRK propaganda. If
(46:36):
you go to the news site is pretty orwellian, it's
pretty easy to see what the spin is and you
also know the providence, right, you know the source. But
for example, and this again is due to the great
work by the journalists at the Washington Post, you'll see
examples of a fake account right purporting to be something
(47:01):
it is not, posting tweets saying stuff like relatives of
off GHOne refugees who have died are reporting that their
bodies are returning from Iran with their organs stolen. And
this this tweet links to an article. Right, Especially if
(47:24):
you're fake, you always want to say, oh, here, right,
and here's my research. The this tweet goes to an
article that is based on a website that is low
key totally and Uncle Sam's site. And then we get
to the business of contractors. Just like you were saying, Matt,
it's brilliant, right, China does it, Russia does it? The
(47:48):
uh the fifty cent army, right, or or a bunch
of like concerned Russian hackers. Guys, we can't control them.
Their opinions are are their own. They just happened to
be our unions because we are super correct. And so
that's that's what's happening. Uh US outfits aren't commenting on
(48:09):
who created these accounts. Is it direct like, is it
someone in a skiff out in sentcom or is it
a contractor? It is just working on their free time, right,
So this is uh, this is dangerous territory and it's
muddy water. And I just felt like as important as
(48:30):
it was for us to point out the proof that
Russia is messing under the hood of dozens, dozens of governments.
It's also key to note that the United States is
doing the same. Now, knowing all that, knowing that the
Pentagon has said we're gonna look into this, they're essentially saying,
(48:53):
we're going to conduct our search of ourselves ourselves. I
have to ask you, guys, you, Matt, Unial, you doc,
everybody listening. Is this going to be a good faith search? Oh? Yeah,
hands down, is gonna go by smooth. We're gonna get
a special what's the thing that's happening right now? Special master?
(49:15):
A special Master? That feels like that feels like a
sequel to beast Master, doesn't it be Master to special Masters? Yeah? No,
I I don't know. It doesn't feel good. I think
we should have the Russian counterparts investigate this thing on
(49:36):
our side, and then we'll investigate the Russian side and
we'll just both do Uh. It'll be a way to
bring each other together. We'll investigate each other simultaneously on
a double date, that mutual investigation, you know what I mean. Yeah, yeah,
I've been on a couple of those. Glad you're on
(49:59):
the same No, no, no, your mind readers. So um again,
There's something else we mentioned in a previous Strange News segment,
which is the where was an episode? I can't remember
there was a there's this specific nomenclature used when someone
(50:23):
in the intelligence or military or otherwise governmental apparatus has
the green light to speak, but not to go on record.
It's like we pointed this language out a defense official
close to the matter, or a source close to the
Pentagon or who could not be named but definitely knows
what they're talking about. That kind of stuff that happens
(50:45):
in this article, that happens in this research. There's been
a lot of fallout from this already. One senior defense
official I want to quote raises a point that I
think we should we should all chew over just a
little bit. And the quote is this, our adversaries are
absolutely operated the information domain. There's some think we shouldn't
(51:09):
do anything clandestine in that space. Saving an entire domain
to an adversary would be unwise, but we need stronger
policy guard rails. So he said, everybody else is doing it,
why can't we? What's gonna happen if you don't, right,
It's dangerous if we don't. And also we need more money,
(51:32):
and also we should turn that into a sallenge here
at some point, and also we need more money. Uh.
The NSC National Security Council part of the White House,
they're not commenting on it. But also here's what they're
looking for in this sweeping inventory. They want to know
(51:53):
what types of operations have been carried out, because that's
not official knowledge, right, it'll ruin the bit. Uh. They
also want to know who is being targeted. That's where
it gets spooky. They also want to know what tools
are being used and why those tools were chosen, and
then of course how effective they've been. The idea is
(52:14):
that one would have to justify. I don't even know
if they're technically illegal now they're certainly unethical. But the
idea is like these are shenanigans. These are shenanigans that
the US publicly claimed it was above committing right for
years and that's not the case. You know, Ben, you
and I talked about this, you know, in the in
(52:37):
the civilian world the other night. If you playing dirty,
if your opponents are playing dirty, or your your adversaries
are playing dirty, i e. You know, doing these kinds
of activities, these kinds of actions to influence policy and
the elections and any number of things. Isn't it kind
of are Aren't you sort of required to get down
there in the mud with them, even if you say
(52:59):
you're not openly mean. There's really no way to fight
fire with anything but fire. I guess you can fight
with water. Actually that's a stupid analogy. But my point is,
you know, if if you've got people that are using
these tactics against you, and your quote unquote above using
it against them, even if you're end goals are virtuous. Again,
I don't necessarily even believe that's the case. Don't you
(53:21):
kind of have to do that? Don't you kind of
have to write? The best way to catch a monster
is to learn its habits, And it's some threshold that
gets very close to becoming something like the monster you're
trying to catch, you're trying to combat. Yeah, and you know,
to play real politic for a second, I'm at odds here.
(53:43):
Manipulating people without their knowledge or consent is it's a dirty,
dirty game. It's a huge game, but easy to necessary game.
Does the US apparatus have to be in this space?
You know. Um. Check out our episodes on military propaganda
in sports games and in your favorite blockbuster films for more.
(54:06):
For now, we're going to call it a day. Will
be back tomorrow with a classic episode, I think, but
stay tuned because there are several surprises on the way.
In the meantime, we can't wait to hear your thoughts,
especially if you are close with these stories. Do you
live in the Philippines, you're active in the n f
(54:28):
T space. Uh? Do you have experience with unethical autopsy
or funeral services? Uh? If so, uh, do check out
our episode on the funeral industry right. And if you
happen to be uh, if you happen to be involved
(54:48):
in psy ops knowingly, if you're in the driver's seat
at some point and you feel comfortable sharing your story,
we will, of course do our best to keep you anonymous.
Everybody in the puzzle Palace just laughed at that, But
here's the takeaway. We try to be easy to find online.
See you get how like how it's weird to say
(55:09):
that right after the right after the n s A
stuff whatever, M easy and eth Indeed, you can find
us on Twitter and YouTube and Facebook under the handle
conspiracy stuff on Instagram or conspiracy stuff show. Guess what.
Our book and audio book are going to be available
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(55:32):
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on wherever you get your favorite audio books the day
it comes out. But getting it early would help the show.
So if you if you have a moment and you
got the inclination and ability, we'd love it if you
(55:53):
pre ordered. We actually just got the real copies of
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are still at my house, but I'm gonna get him. Yeah,
it happened. It happened. It was a surprise to us,
and we hope it is enjoyable surprise for you too.
When you get a copy, um personally like physical copies
(56:15):
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But the audiobook, the whole thing. We worked really hard
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(56:35):
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(57:21):
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(00:25):
My name is Matt, my name is no They call
me Ben. We're joined as always with our super producer
Alexis code named dot Holiday Jackson. Most importantly, you are you.
You are here, and that makes this the stuff they
don't want you to know. It's the top of the week.
There's a lot of news, a lot of it's strange. Uh.
(00:48):
We're recording this about a uh a few days before
this comes out to you, fellow conspiracy realists, and I
hope that I am not the only one among us
who spent a heroine afternoon waiting for Vladimir Putin to
show up on time to his own speech, which he didn't,
(01:10):
but the speech was the speech was dangerous. You have
heard a lot about it. At this point, things are escalating,
But that although it is strange news, it's not exactly
what we mean when we say strange news. We're talking
about things that should be explored in further depth. We're
often talking about things that either don't make it above
(01:34):
the fold, to quote the old newspaper terb or things
that are just sort of tossed around and everybody everybody
agrees with a thing, or increasingly these days, you just
don't have enough time to pay attention to a lot
of it. Let us not forget that mid pandemic, the
US government came out and said UFOs are real, and
(01:57):
literally everyone said, I mean sure, Should I get vaccinated?
Is my main concern? Uh, Today we're going to talk
about We're gonna talk about the inequality burgeoning in the
world of n f T s and the so called metaverse,
so opposit Uh, We're going to talk about We're gonna
(02:20):
talk about the Pentagon doing something really funny with psy
ops that have done you know, I don't like psy ops,
but they've done a lot for our show in terms
of in terms of things to explore. But maybe maybe Matt,
we start with, uh, we start with a story that
(02:40):
didn't get a ton of national coverage, much less international coverage.
It's a true crime story and hopefully it's a story
with a little bit of closure for the survivors. What
do you think, Oh, yeah, survivors say it's it's more
like the DEFRA did I think really? But it is
(03:02):
a It is one man pulling a psychological operation on
a whole bunch of people, around three and fifty clients
of his of the company that he ran and owned.
So let's talk about this. There's a man we're gonna
name because he just got indicted, a man named Seawan
s h A W N parcels P A R C
(03:23):
E L l S. If you want to look it up. Uh.
He he's forty two year old man from Topeka, Kansas
and he, uh, he did some messed up things. He
had a company has A company I suppose I should
say maybe had is better called National Autopsy Services l
(03:44):
l C. National Autopsy Services. It's kind of a weird name,
don't you think, guys. It sounds like a generic autopsy
like shop. Definitely sounds more governmental than it actually is. That's,
you know, that's that's one of the clever things. It's
just like how you can put all natural, unsereal boxes
(04:07):
and make it sound very, very different from the reality
of the ingredients. You see this in privatized insurance companies.
Put national in front of something you'll be associated with
a nation or a federal government when that is not
the case. It's also like, autopsy isn't really something I
think of as a thing that we have to like
be individually worried about. Ah yeah, I mean, like you know,
(04:28):
funeral arrangements and cremation and all that. Yes, that is
something we have to take care of for our loved ones.
But an autopsy usually comes with the death. Yeah, depending
on what the circumstances are, right, and if there's ever
anything anything puzzling about the death at all, then an
autopsy where will generally be ordered by the law enforcement
(04:49):
that's involved taking care of that case. Right. It's not
something you imagine you right on your calendar, like, oh yeah,
I can need to get a couple of autopsy has
done this month. I'm just gonna go ahead and pencil
that in, you know, my calendar. You're right now, You're right.
But it's it's I guess for many of us listening
seems like an odd thing, right that even that there
(05:10):
would be three hundred and fifty clients of this company
called National Autopsy LLC. I'll give you the better business
bureau spiel on it. It's it's pretty short. Um, there's
a little alert if you find them, it says, current
alerts for this business. BBB investigation results. A Better Business
Bureau investigation found that the website for National Autopsy Services
(05:33):
at www dot National Autopsy Services dot com identifies a
corporate office location in Topeka, Kansas, as well as one
in another location, and then it says there are a
pattern of complaints you guys. BBB records indicate a pattern
of unanswered complaints, wherein customers alleged providing payment for autopsies
(05:54):
and not receiving a copy of the final report. I'll
just I'm gonna finish this out, guys. I'm sorry, I
know it's a little long. Um. In addition, consumers alleged
making numerous attempts to contact the company National Autopsy Services
via phone and emails and receive no response. BBB has
received no response from the business regarding the alleged complaints.
(06:17):
So not great if you are, uh, you know, an
amateur autopsy seeker or even a law enforcement agency that's
looking to I don't know, get a third party for
some of your autopsy has done. That wouldn't be great
if you saw that on the BBB website, which many
of us used to vet companies. Yeah, also shout out
(06:37):
just to interject here as people who are generally skeptical
of trade organizations. Uh, and nonprofits also have their share
of sketch. I do have to point out that here
in the US, the Better Business Bureau does good work
(06:58):
and actually contacting the Better Business Bureau shout out to
Clark Howard there can get you results when customer service
does not. This. Uh, there's something interesting, Matt. This says
not BBB accredited. So for anybody looking at the website
and the top left, when you see that, when you
(07:20):
see that thumbnail, that means that the Better Business Bureau
is telling you we don't trust them. Implication being you
shouldn't either go somewhere else for your autopsies, try other autopsies.
Uh with the it's just the Kansas Autopsies Incorporated or whatever.
(07:43):
I don't know, just making up names here. Okay, So
let's talk about what Seawan did with this company and
the reason why it has that BBB rating or and
or the complaints as it stated. So, this guy Sean
has been in the autopsy game for a while. A
why guys um back in CBS did a little bit
(08:05):
of an investigation on this fellow's a CBS for investigation, uh,
where they were looking at the company and Shawn in particular,
because there were complaints and individuals who would say, Hey,
I paid this outfit for an autopsy and I've been
trying to get in touch with him to get a
final report. I can't get in touch with him. Then
(08:27):
I think it's CBS. I'm pretty sure this is correct.
CBS actually got in touch with the guy and he's saying, oh, well,
I don't have the correct you know, contact information for
this particular client. I've been trying to send this report.
I've had it for months. And then they find out
through the person they're interviewing the client that they signed
(08:49):
a contract which included all of their contact information, the
client's contact information. Uh So it was just it was
just a lie that was told. And this guy, Sean
Park was arrested back in twenty nineteen and charged with
theft and criminal desecration. Guys, do you think that just
means he was performing autopsies when he wasn't supposed to be. Well, yeah,
(09:11):
I also begs the question, is there a lesser form
of desecration that is not criminal? Is there misdemeanor desecrat
Desecration is in and of itself, just sounds pretty bad news.
It sounds like the there is intent in the act
of desecrating something. Well, that that is the case. I'm
gonna just gonna give you one example. You can go
to CBS news dot com and you can find an
(09:33):
article from titled Littleton woman still seeking answers in husband's death,
and you can read about a man, a man named
David Evans, and a woman named Patty Evans. David passed
away and it was, you know, just suddenly in the home.
So Patty wanted answers, and she she just stumbled upon
(09:56):
National Autopsy Services online and thought, well, hey, bee, I
can get this independent autopsy done and I can just
find out how he died, why he died. Um. So
she she ended up contacting them, and she ended up
paying three thousand, five hundred and fifty dollars to National
Autopsy Services to get this done. It it must have
been a lot to her, right, you can imagine to
(10:18):
to pay that much money for something. And she signed
a contract back in December, sent it off, and you know,
paid for it all in that time, right around Christmas
and nothing was happening. She wasn't getting any results, wasn't
getting a final report, She was attempting to contact the company,
and she couldn't get through. This is the person I
(10:39):
was mentioning at the top. She got ghosted. And also
just just for a watermark here, folks, A private autopsy,
if I recall correctly, will typically run between three to
five grand. So this is not especially egregious. But i'll
band an en a person who has paid you for
(11:02):
the autopsy. UH, does seem agregious. Criminal desecration if we're
being completely objective about it means treatment of the body
in an illegal manner right away. That's outside of the law.
Just like the guy here in Georgia who was caught
charging people for cremation when he was in fact just
(11:26):
throwing human remains into the nearby woods. You remember nestory.
I mean, I think it's especially egregious. When any kind
of deception is egregious, is obviously horrible. But when you
are capitalizing on someone's grief and need for answers or
some sort of spiritual connection and or closure. So I
(11:48):
think those two things, I think it's a great UH.
Analog Ben the fake you know, um cremations or whatever,
because they both are capitalizing on someone's very deep personal
you know pain, absolutely as well. Said No, I guys,
I just I want to jump to now two. Why
we're even talking about this right now, because that was
(12:09):
back this past Monday, September nineteen. He was sentenced to
six years in prison for wire fraud, not for bad
autopsy ng or you know, conducting autopsies. Well, not a doctor, right,
it's not the fact that you're a terrible person. You
(12:31):
lied about being a doctor, and you were a predatory
toward people the most vulnerable moment of of their lives
is that you've messed with the money. Oh yeah, dude,
we didn't even get to that yet. Ben. This let's
tell let's talk about it. This guy was not a pathologist.
He was not somebody who should be or had any
(12:51):
business conducting autopsies. He was a pathological liar in that way.
He was a pathologist. He was an assistant, a pathology assistant.
He had no formal education. He didn't go to school
for this thing. You didn't have a degree. Uh. He
was an assistant that was charging three to five thousand
dollars for autopsies and he made. Guess how much money
(13:15):
he made doing this, guys over the course of years.
How much money it was one I've seen it in
a couple of places. One point one million dollars or
one point one six six million dollars, which it's you know,
that's a whole extra year's salary there, that point six
six It depends on how good and that's a lucky
(13:37):
year for that to be a one year's salary. But
also it depends really on how adaptive would have been
hiding he's all gotten games. And wire fraud would be
as simple as just illegally transferring ill gotten gains, right I,
I don't know. In this case, it's because he charged
a client five grand to get an autopsy done and
(14:01):
then no report. Wire fraud is essentially a reference to
the format of the fraud. Right, you can you can fraud,
you can pull, you can pull some cons and frauds
in person all the live long day. That's not wire
fraud until it's over UM electronic communication or via telephone.
(14:24):
So it doesn't even necessarily mean transferring funds. It can
just be using UM telecommunications or the Internet. I'm sorry,
I that's that's good to clarify. I always thought it
was heavy to do with money or bank transfers. I
think have a wire I think of like a wire
transfer for for money. Yeah, you know what, I think
the same. It's it's pretty much it's um. It's structured
(14:45):
or framed as a way to define where the crime happens.
And they're saying it doesn't happen in a physical location.
It's yeah, so it's out there somewhere inside the people
with like fake you know, calls and such that would
be considered wire fraud. Yeah, it's way less cool than
(15:07):
you know, the literal definition, which is not a real thing,
which should be you know, fraud using the fraud via
the use of wires, like physical wires. You know, like
in martial arts movies where where they're you know, jumping
from the trees and doing really crazy crouching tiger, hidden
dragon stuff. You know, they're not really jumping. That could
(15:30):
be considered wire fraud. Not inport. That's really funny, but
thank you, thank you. Joke landing is when someone looks
at you and says, that's really funny. Well, I had
to paint the picture first, Like in my mind, I
had to see the actors fraudulently jumping really far because
(15:51):
they had wires attached. Rochelle Yo could do it. I
bet she can do it in real life. I think so, guys.
I wanted to just and right here, so I want
to read this from the CBS article from September two,
Kansas man sentenced nearly six years in prison for illegal
autopsy scheme. The scheme is the important part here. Uh,
(16:14):
I'm just gonna read this verbatim. It was that five
thousand dollars that a client was persuaded to pay for
an autopsy. Um, the client did receive an emailed autopsy report,
and it appeared to be authored by Sean Parcels, the
this gentleman who's been arrested and sentenced to six years. However,
no pathologist, actual pathologist was involved in the examination report comma,
(16:39):
which is illegal. Uh So if there's no actual pathologist,
the autopsy report not legal, not real, not binding, not
a thing. And it says here in this article that
back in twenty nineteen, Kansas Attorney General Derek Schmidt also
charged Parcels for conducting illegal autopsies, so him actually conducting autopsies,
(17:04):
but again not being allowed to do so, uh, dude,
he had another conviction in November. Geez, this guy, this
guy has just been getting into it. Uh, and he
apparently was running three companies. He's got a thing, you
know what I mean? At two points, the money is
maybe not the sole primary passion project. Yeah. Yeah, I'm
(17:29):
gonna read you the last sentence of this because I
think it'll just stay in our dreams. Uh tonight as
we all go to sleep, as you are now probably
falling asleep, as this episode has been on for over
fifteen minutes, I'm just joking. Okay, here's the last sentence
from the CBS article. Prosecutors discovered that Parcels collected more
than one thousand, six hundred biological samples, mostly human tissue,
(17:55):
as part of the scheme. The Kansas Department of Health
and Environment a custody of the samples, and victims have
until October six to claim them. That is such a
short window of time. Yeah wow, So if you had
an autopsy done by the National Autopsy schemers, Uh, get
(18:18):
out there and get those samples. That's really awful and gross,
and I'm sorry, I hope you don't have to deal
with that anyway. Just be careful as in any business
you're gonna be you know, associating with or paying money to,
just do a little research before you enter into a
contract with them, seriously, because that's it's just wrong. What
this guy did is just wrong. And just be careful
(18:40):
who you pay money to and who you sign a
contract with. Al Right, guys, And with that, uh, we're
gonna hear from a sponsor, hopefully not an autopsy service,
and we'll be right back with more strange news. And
we're back with more or strange. This one's super strange.
(19:02):
It's like dystopian, uh metaverse kind of computer stiff. Remember
those movies from the nineties that tried to depict the
Internet and did a really bad job, like Hackers or
The lawnmower Man, where they don't know it's kind of
just a bunch of like, you know, polygons and and
kind of like cubes and you know, you're flying through
quote unquote cyberspace kind of looked a lot like Minecraft
(19:23):
in a weird way now that I think about it.
And it's funny because you know games like Minecraft and
Roadblocks that really have become the most trafficked you know,
parts of the quote unquote metaverse are really low five.
And that's because obviously you can create a larger world,
in a more um customizable world if you kind of
(19:43):
dumbed down the graphics a little bit, and that sort
of becomes part of the fun. There's a retro quality
to it. And also the possibilities are kind of limitless
in terms of what you can create using squares, using cubes,
using these these polygons um. So you know, it's kind
of crazy how the Internet of today or this metaverse
looks a hell of a like the lawnmower Man that
sort of flowers for Aldredon esque story about the the
(20:04):
yard the yard man who you know, pierced Proson and
hooks up to VR machine and makes men do an
evil genius when he wasn't so bright to start with. Um,
which is kind of crazy because the real story that
was based on, by the way, and I know, Ben,
you know this, uh, was a short story by Stephen
King where it's literally just a dude that that drops
trou clock, gets on all fours and starts eating grass
(20:26):
and that's the story. And then he eventually I think
he eats a mole, and then I think he eats
the guy who's just like observed spoiler for a very
very strange, coked up Stephen King's story. Um, but yeah
movie or something like that. And then I think there
was a really bad sequel to also Virtuosity that was
another one of those kind of golden era uh internet
depiction movies. I digress. I just think it's really interesting
and really even occur to me until now that the
(20:47):
roadblocks at Bynecraft really do kind of bear striking resemblance
to those uh depictions of the past, maybe we should
give them a little more credit where credit is due. Uh.
So this is a story about the metaverse, is a
story about Minecraft in particular, and it is a story
about how U n f t s have have somehow
managed to get even grosser and stupider, or at least
(21:10):
the concept of them. You know, again, we know that
n f t s aren't just dumb JPEG's of monkeys
that you spend thousands of dollars on and then have
stolen from you, uh and then you know, proceed to
beg for the thief to give them back on Twitter,
only to be mocked openly by by the Internet at large. Um,
there are things you can do with them that are interesting.
(21:31):
You know, you can make sample packs of music and
you know, have them tied to a smart contract that
allows someone to use them in whatever medium they want,
whether it be commercial or television or some other kind
of project remixing them. All of that, there are interesting
uses for n f T s that don't cost gazillions
of dollars and just act as some sort of weird
badge of you know, Internet opulence. This story starts off
(21:54):
with some reporting from PC Gamer. Actually I was read
you the headline n f T expert. Iagine it's a
hopeful future where poor people serve as real life in
PCs in games. Um, yeah, anyone who's not gamer out there. Um,
NPCs nonplayer characters, you know the whole uh got an
(22:14):
arrow in the knee guy you know from from sky Rim,
or just any character that you interact with. Uh. There
are more directly you know, interactive NPCs, and there are
ones that are just kind of in the background doing stuff. Um. So,
the idea here started with an n f T based
Minecraft game called Critters, where essentially it's sort of like
(22:37):
gold mining, you know, in in in um in m
m O RPGs where you literally can get people to
do the boring parts for you, so you can amass
all of this like virtual wealth, only since his n
f T s it's based in real wealth. And this
guy who goes by the name Big Chief, he has
this team and apparently it's mainly made up of children
(23:00):
in the Philippines. You go around in Minecraft and collect
materials so that he can build a casino, which once
they have collected enough materials, he then pays quote professional
Minecraft builders to create. Um, Big Chief does not Yeah, yeah, please,
let's yeah. Hold on, I just don't understand. Minecraft has
(23:24):
a setting called Creative where when when you're in that setting,
you can generate as many blocks as you want of
whatever type of block or ab that's right, Why why
would you have to do it in survival notes? Sorry, guys,
I love Minecraft was place. There's a good question. I
don't it's this is a an in game sub game
(23:45):
that has since essentially been outlawed by Minecraft. So I'm
just gonna read you the quote. Let's see. Um, the
bulk of the story about the nonprofit journalism organizations about
a Minecraft based an FT game called Critters, which enjoyed
an of success in it's early days that, some players
began hiring others to help build their in game ownings
in exchange for a cut of the profits. One such
(24:08):
high roller, who goes by the name Big Chief, had
his team made up mainly of kids in the Philippines,
collect building materials for a casino, which he then paid
professional Minecraft builders ten thousand dollars to actually create. So
it's a good question because I know, I know Minecraft
doesn't work the same way Roadblocks does exactly where you
have like these kind of micro games or these little
(24:28):
like sub game which sort of the whole deal with Roadblocks.
So I'm a little confused about that too. Um. Any
listeners out there that can that can elaborate on how
this is done, let us know. But we're gonna get
to how essentially Mojang, you know, said no, we're not,
We're not We're not going to support this. Um. But
here's the guy's quote, just to give you a sense
of the machinery that he's working with in terms of
like his uh, his empathy cogs. Um. He says this,
(24:52):
I have a lot of kids that play for me,
and they play because they want to make extra money
in a country that's really just locking them down. Um uh.
He's says he wouldn't go on to say exactly how
much he was paying them. Um, but he said that
I couldn't tell you what the hourly rate comes to,
but I could tell you that people make very little
money and the cost of living is very low in
(25:12):
the Philippines. Um. So, essentially, Critters, you know, as we know,
any n f T s or you know, crypto or
whatever often revolves. It revolves around these tokens. And tokens
have a market value. So if you go to Critters
n f T or Critters dot x y Z, it's
(25:32):
called it's billing itself as the most active and entertaining
metaverse ever. Essentially, you are buying and owning your n
f T s are like plots of land twenty two thousand,
five hundred Genesis plots to claim, each plot of land
is a permanent membership into the Critters metaverse. Plots are
infinitely customizable one to one n f T s that
(25:54):
you fully own. You can turn plots into an attraction,
a mini game, or an operation to earn earn uh
dollar sign block. So that's that's the token. So it's anyway,
it's that's the deal. So there's this. You use the
token to buy the plots. You earn the tokens by
I guess mining material within the within this like many games.
(26:18):
So again it's a little convoluted. Point being is that
the price of this token started to plummet because Mojing
came out and said, yeah, we're not going to support this.
We do not feel as though um n f T
integration into Minecraft is something that we would like to allow.
So the value of this token, which already took a
(26:39):
pretty big hit, uh, was cut in half. Um Also,
by the way, another thing that cut the price of
the token is that that you know, this guy was
paying these these these kids in the Philippines with this token,
and again by his very own justification presumably you know,
to help help with expenses and to like feed their
families and stuff. And this guy goes onto really, oh gosh,
(27:01):
he's such a martyr and such a virtuous fellow, and
so what are they gonna do. They're gonna sell it.
And that's the thing. That's what happens when you have
like any kind of project, whether it's like a you know,
a crypto project of some kind. If people who own
a bunch of the tokens sell it. That's called a
rug pool, and then all of a sudden, the you know,
the value goes down. The value goes down significantly. And
again there would be plenty of other people with these tokens.
(27:23):
But if enough, if this guy is hiring enough of
these kids and they all sell them every time, then
that's going to affect the price. So now he's looking
for other ways of going about this UM based around
this same model, the same idea of crowdsourcing, uh, he says,
um using another kind of blockchain gaming you know model. Potentially,
(27:47):
what if we figured out how to take advantage of
this cheap labor and developing countries and actually use people
in the Philippines for example, as NPCs um real life
pecs in your game. So you would know that if
someone was just dicking around in the background, you know,
doing some task, some wrote whatever set of actions, that's
(28:12):
actually some person. Remember Ben the paying the yard gnomes
and weird historical flexes on ridiculous history, Yes, guarding your
hermits they were called Yeah, that's it. Yeah, you would
pay somebody uh to hang out in your yard for
your own amusement. And this is essentially just like a
(28:33):
digital version of that. Uh he says they would quote
just populate the world maybe, or do a random job,
or just walk back and forth fishing, telling stories a shopkeeper.
Anything is really possible. This is some black mirror again,
like when we started doing this with like prisoners or something.
I mean, it's just bizarre the idea. This is like
(28:55):
some squid game type stuff, like what do we just
like take people that are less fortunate and for a pittance,
you know, let them dance around for our for our amusement. Question.
Is McKai Kosar the same person as Big Chief? I
don't think so, now, okay, kaik Star is the consult
(29:16):
is a consultant that was talked to in this situation, right,
that's right, and yeah, I'm sorry, thank you. They are
different people. The story started with Big Chief and his
you know kind of exploitation of folks in the Philippines
and then yes, McKay co star, thank you. Ben is
this other gentleman with very similar uh similar designs on
(29:36):
the Philippines or other developing countries that have access to
it to gaming, but maybe not like you know, running
water all the time or like food stability. Yeah, he
has ah Cosar is an accountant and a member of
an outfit called Wolves Dow Wolves d a O. And
he uh, he is as you said, ten toes down
(29:58):
on this uh and he also is specifically looking at
the Philippines. But this, this brings up I appreciate the
mentioned the anthology series Black Mirror, because this brings up
the new realm of inequality. You know, imagine if you
are able, if you're growing up, and say, and you're
(30:21):
able to play your favorite online game, right, but the
only way you can play it for free is to
essentially walk through and do task in the premium version
of premium iteration of this game that is enjoyed and
owned by a much more privileged player. I don't know,
(30:45):
you know, it becomes a rain inhell, serve in Heaven
sort of situation in an incredibly unfair way. But if
it is a way for people to have access, then
a lot of people are gonna say yes to it.
With the ethical quandaries and deep profound problems of it
(31:05):
cast aside and bracketed away, because we can already see
Big Chief and co. S are very much rationalizing somewhat
similar arguably to them. The perspective of Thomas Friedman in
the world is flat, And that's that's a guy who
is arguing in his book that ultimately the global interconnectivity
(31:32):
of communication and trade will be better for everyone. It's
very very very smart man, very persuasive writer, just happens
to be woefully incorrect because, in my opinion, why should
you be able to drive a McLaren in a virtual
world if you can't afford to drive one in this world? Huh,
(31:55):
come on, then it's not special anymore. You're you're joking.
But that's sort of what and f t s are, right,
that's sort of the concept of them is that you
don't get to have this thing if you can't actually
afford it. You know, you don't get to you know,
way of this sign of opulence around in the in
the you know, virtual world unless you actually paid for
(32:16):
and we can damn well you know, verify that on
the blockchain. Um, it's a bastardization of what online life
and and and and escapism actually is. In a lot
of ways, why do we turn to video games. It's
because we can't actually be wizards and sword fighters and
and you know, race car drivers. But to that end,
(32:38):
why why do people turn to books, you know, why
do people turn to oral traditions and stories that a
theater through which one can encounter similar catharsis right? This
uh the I hate to say it. I don't want
to sound too cynical, but it feels like a natural
(32:58):
iteration of an existing trend. To be quite honest, the
ideas of accelerating hierarchy and uh and inequality a scary
truth of the world, and I really wish this didn't
feel so true. Scary truth of the world seems to
(33:19):
be that human beings defining happiness in relative external terms,
don't find it satisfactory to be internally satisfied, to be
happy with one's own life. It is more important to
know that there are people who are less than and
(33:40):
that is terrifying and it's one of the things that
holds humanity back. So I like with with this story
with Cosar and Big Chief. I don't when I get
that wrong Big Chief. Uh. The the issue seems that
it's it's the same story in in another reboot, you know,
(34:05):
And I'm sure then you get to play every character
that you're reading. Does that make sense? Like you kind
of in a way get to play every character and
you have to just or a library card, which I
think is why people who are against knowledge are so
mad that libraries still exist in the United States. You
(34:27):
can go to one today. It's sadly not going to
be crowded. But but but I interrupted your point, Matt, Uh, Well, yeah,
I'm just thinking about how video games do present this
very specific experience, and they do seem to be the
thing that's sticking around, like as an industry, the thing
the entertainment industry that continues to make money, uh pretty reliably,
(34:54):
even as like big budget films are only functioning, as
we've talked about on previous episodes because of their becoming global, right,
but video games have been largely global for a long time. Um,
I just I think there's a I think we're thinking
about it as a black mirror, as a future thing,
as something that's coming. It does really feel like it's
(35:17):
going to have to become this separated out because not
everybody was going to be able to afford the levels
with all the game the micro transactions that exist everywhere
in every game all the time. Now or at least
it's increasingly so that way. Um, there's just gonna be
these tears of experience. By the way, I completely agree,
(35:39):
and I think to your point, Ben, this is, you know,
an escalation of something that we're already seeing and with
with things like an f d S and with things
like cryptocurrency and all of that stuff, and it's probably
gonna get worse before it gets better. But um, just
really quickly this is separate topic. But did you guys
see the insane grand theft auto leaks that took place
(36:05):
in terms of just like another like you know metaversus
kind of you know that that's the game that's like
it's online version has stayed pretty relevant up until recently.
I mean it appears to be like unprecedented in terms of,
you know, the level of invasion that they experienced, what happened,
just like hundreds of videos of of of develop underdeveloped
(36:26):
you know um in game footage with like dbug code
on the screen and just like you know, major plot spoilers,
you know, with like really under um incomplete you know
gameplay footage, and it's just an absolute catastrophe. It's just
fascinating the way that you know, one one hacker without
(36:48):
even hacking apparently it was an act access more just
through like fishing kind of expeditions using like WhatsApp to
message employees rather than some sort of you know, actual Anyway,
I just wanted to ask if you guys I've heard
about it. It's it's interesting stuff, um, especially for a
company like that where they have such a reputation of
like a really really bad crunch time um treatment of
(37:11):
their employees. Uh, and they have been trying to kind
of get away from that image. And this apparently the
game's taken so long to come out because they say
they're trying to avoid crunch time. And now all this
does make the kind of spoil everything that the employees
have been working their butts off on. So I just
don't see what the point is, Like, why what what
these uh hackers are after? But irrelevant, unconnected to this story.
(37:33):
I think that we've we've we've bandied this one about
long enough. Let's take a little break and then we're
back with a third piece of strange news. Welcome back,
fellow conspiracy realist. Yes we have one more piece of
strange news. Now, this is one that you may have
(37:56):
heard of if you are in the game, and in
a number of games, but this story has the distinction
of being one that caused some of my sources to
proactively reach out to me saying that heads will roll.
We've talked about propaganda in the past. It is a
(38:17):
very real thing. It is quite effective, uh, And it's
one of those things that is so audience specific at
times that it's almost like, um, it's almost like regional food.
You know, like if you grew up in an environment
where there was no such thing as cheese, you would
think cheese is gross, and you know, you would have
(38:40):
a point. It's it's a weird process. It's a weird thing.
It's just so tasty if you're familiar with it, and
likewise with any other number of regional food stuff. So propaganda,
by that comparison can seem completely believable, rational, and fact
supported if you are the intended audience, right, if we
(39:04):
can just say, oh, you're already, you're already sorted down
with this. Let me let me get you a little
more down. Pretty soon you're ten toes down. And that's
how the manipulation works. A lot of times in the West,
this is portrayed as something that is beneath the good guys, right,
(39:24):
it's beneath the Allied forces. A k the West and
five eyes and all that slow jazz, but not really totally,
not really right, UH. A lot of the same tactics
that have been used by the Russian government or by
the Chinese government information control UH, and used by cults
(39:47):
on lower levels. Uncle Sam has done the same things.
And recently there was a Washington Post article by Ellen
Nakashima that I want us to pay some particular attention to. Today,
the Pentagon has opened up what it is calling a
sweeping review of clandestine psy ops psychological operations, and this
(40:12):
is due to a request from multiple other federal agencies
as well as the White House. UH. And these agencies
are complaining about the US military's influence operations. I like
that phrase, influence operations using Facebook and Twitter in particular.
(40:35):
Now we know that Twitter is riddled with bots. We
know that Facebook turns a blind eye to active disinformation
campaigns and propaganda. In both cases, it's because they're you know,
they're motivated by profit. They're not really you know, they're
not really chasing some larger philosophical idea past two three
(40:58):
or Q four. So the Pentagon said, all right, we
need to we need to get ahold of our online
fake accounts, and we need to clean the skeletons from
the closet of our clandestine information warfare. That's right. The
(41:19):
Pentagond has been doing psy ops for for quite a
long time. Last month to uh to Internet research outfits
Graphica and the Stanford Internet Observatory. You like that Observatory
for the Internet. I think it's clever. Yeah. They they
(41:42):
disclosed that there were more than one and fifty bogus
personas and media sites that were active. Now, these researchers
did not this is important. They did not explicitly attribute
these face accounts to the US military. But uh, but
(42:07):
it's pretty obvious, you know what I mean. Like, it's
it's pretty obvious. Right. It's like if you saw Frankenstein's
monster loitering around the body of Victor Frankenstein and had
blood on one of his you know, reanimated hands, and
he was standing next to some you know, bloody graffiti
(42:28):
that said the creator has been uncreated. You know what
I mean. You don't have proof yet, but you like,
it's walked up on this. It's just like it's like
the sketch and I think you should leave where he's
like the hot dog costume, yeah and yeah, and he's like,
we gotta find out who did this is it's a
(42:48):
hot dog mobile and that's crashed into this. Everyone's like
terrified and he comes sauntering up. We have to find
out who did this. The master stroke there is one
of the guys, unfortunately, is wearing a a suit that
has hot dog colors, like a suit and tie. That's
one of the that's one of the writers. And I
think you should leave down. They do great work. Uh.
(43:10):
Do check out that show if you have time, And
if you work for cent Com US Central Command, you
may well not have time because people are about to
start going through your stuff. Uh. These this thing appears
to have been triggered by an investigation running for several
(43:31):
years or diving into propagandistic bought and fake accounts and
AstroTurf whatever you wanna call it, for quite a while.
And people went on record responding to this. Well, people
in the US government, the spokespeople for Facebook and Twitter, Uh,
(43:52):
their lips are sealed. Mom's the word. Uh. The Air
Force Brigadier General Patrick Ryder, who was the current Pentagon
Press Secretary, said that these again information operations quote, support
our national security priorities and that they're totally going to
enforce these safeguards. It's not the Ekadas. We we were
(44:16):
totally we were totally gonna do this. Um And I
think this opens up the question. You know, we mentioned
it on GOSH. I was talking with Jordan Harbinger. We're
talking with the good folks at Macro dosing uh, the
way that the propaganda game has changed in the United States.
(44:37):
If you're listening and you are in the US, then yeah,
of course, obviously you're being targeted for propaganda. Right every
time a YouTube bad plays with a political message, that's
propaganda towards you. Every time, you know what, every time
an advertisement for fast food franchise comes on, that's arguably propaganda.
(45:02):
But for a long time, the idea was that the
United States was above using state level militaristic propaganda on
its own people domestically. That would turn out not to
be the case. Also, just for the record, coin telpro
never ended. I'm just gonna put that out there. Just
(45:24):
have fun with that one. If you are listening. Yeah,
you know, it's perfect, man. It sounds familiar to the
Russia spending three million dollars thing right. Well, on influencing
elections and politics in other countries. It feels like like
like a donut whole version of that crueler or whatever.
(45:47):
What am I saying? I don't know, No, you nailed it,
and I love a good pastry reference man, thank you
and this. So there are things like um our International listeners.
You're doubtless be familiar with this. Uh. There are things
like the Voice of America Right, which is stationed abroad
and is pro US. Right enforces geopolitical or tries to
(46:12):
popularize geopolitical goals of the US and its owner corporations. Uh.
There are places like Radio Free Europe, which does the
same thing. And just to give us a sense of
the kind of things they're saying, right, it's not as
simple as um North Korean propaganda like DPRK propaganda. If
(46:36):
you go to the news site is pretty orwellian, it's
pretty easy to see what the spin is and you
also know the providence, right, you know the source. But
for example, and this again is due to the great
work by the journalists at the Washington Post, you'll see
examples of a fake account right purporting to be something
(47:01):
it is not, posting tweets saying stuff like relatives of
off GHOne refugees who have died are reporting that their
bodies are returning from Iran with their organs stolen. And
this this tweet links to an article. Right, Especially if
(47:24):
you're fake, you always want to say, oh, here, right,
and here's my research. The this tweet goes to an
article that is based on a website that is low
key totally and Uncle Sam's site. And then we get
to the business of contractors. Just like you were saying, Matt,
it's brilliant, right, China does it, Russia does it? The
(47:48):
uh the fifty cent army, right, or or a bunch
of like concerned Russian hackers. Guys, we can't control them.
Their opinions are are their own. They just happened to
be our unions because we are super correct. And so
that's that's what's happening. Uh US outfits aren't commenting on
(48:09):
who created these accounts. Is it direct like, is it
someone in a skiff out in sentcom or is it
a contractor? It is just working on their free time, right,
So this is uh, this is dangerous territory and it's
muddy water. And I just felt like as important as
(48:30):
it was for us to point out the proof that
Russia is messing under the hood of dozens, dozens of governments.
It's also key to note that the United States is
doing the same. Now, knowing all that, knowing that the
Pentagon has said we're gonna look into this, they're essentially saying,
(48:53):
we're going to conduct our search of ourselves ourselves. I
have to ask you, guys, you, Matt, Unial, you doc,
everybody listening. Is this going to be a good faith search? Oh? Yeah,
hands down, is gonna go by smooth. We're gonna get
a special what's the thing that's happening right now? Special master?
(49:15):
A special Master? That feels like that feels like a
sequel to beast Master, doesn't it be Master to special Masters? Yeah? No,
I I don't know. It doesn't feel good. I think
we should have the Russian counterparts investigate this thing on
(49:36):
our side, and then we'll investigate the Russian side and
we'll just both do Uh. It'll be a way to
bring each other together. We'll investigate each other simultaneously on
a double date, that mutual investigation, you know what I mean. Yeah, yeah,
I've been on a couple of those. Glad you're on
(49:59):
the same No, no, no, your mind readers. So um again,
There's something else we mentioned in a previous Strange News segment,
which is the where was an episode? I can't remember
there was a there's this specific nomenclature used when someone
(50:23):
in the intelligence or military or otherwise governmental apparatus has
the green light to speak, but not to go on record.
It's like we pointed this language out a defense official
close to the matter, or a source close to the
Pentagon or who could not be named but definitely knows
what they're talking about. That kind of stuff that happens
(50:45):
in this article, that happens in this research. There's been
a lot of fallout from this already. One senior defense
official I want to quote raises a point that I
think we should we should all chew over just a
little bit. And the quote is this, our adversaries are
absolutely operated the information domain. There's some think we shouldn't
(51:09):
do anything clandestine in that space. Saving an entire domain
to an adversary would be unwise, but we need stronger
policy guard rails. So he said, everybody else is doing it,
why can't we? What's gonna happen if you don't, right,
It's dangerous if we don't. And also we need more money,
(51:32):
and also we should turn that into a sallenge here
at some point, and also we need more money. Uh.
The NSC National Security Council part of the White House,
they're not commenting on it. But also here's what they're
looking for in this sweeping inventory. They want to know
(51:53):
what types of operations have been carried out, because that's
not official knowledge, right, it'll ruin the bit. Uh. They
also want to know who is being targeted. That's where
it gets spooky. They also want to know what tools
are being used and why those tools were chosen, and
then of course how effective they've been. The idea is
(52:14):
that one would have to justify. I don't even know
if they're technically illegal now they're certainly unethical. But the
idea is like these are shenanigans. These are shenanigans that
the US publicly claimed it was above committing right for
years and that's not the case. You know, Ben, you
and I talked about this, you know, in the in
(52:37):
the civilian world the other night. If you playing dirty,
if your opponents are playing dirty, or your your adversaries
are playing dirty, i e. You know, doing these kinds
of activities, these kinds of actions to influence policy and
the elections and any number of things. Isn't it kind
of are Aren't you sort of required to get down
there in the mud with them, even if you say
(52:59):
you're not openly mean. There's really no way to fight
fire with anything but fire. I guess you can fight
with water. Actually that's a stupid analogy. But my point is,
you know, if if you've got people that are using
these tactics against you, and your quote unquote above using
it against them, even if you're end goals are virtuous. Again,
I don't necessarily even believe that's the case. Don't you
(53:21):
kind of have to do that? Don't you kind of
have to write? The best way to catch a monster
is to learn its habits, And it's some threshold that
gets very close to becoming something like the monster you're
trying to catch, you're trying to combat. Yeah, and you know,
to play real politic for a second, I'm at odds here.
(53:43):
Manipulating people without their knowledge or consent is it's a dirty,
dirty game. It's a huge game, but easy to necessary game.
Does the US apparatus have to be in this space?
You know. Um. Check out our episodes on military propaganda
in sports games and in your favorite blockbuster films for more.
(54:06):
For now, we're going to call it a day. Will
be back tomorrow with a classic episode, I think, but
stay tuned because there are several surprises on the way.
In the meantime, we can't wait to hear your thoughts,
especially if you are close with these stories. Do you
live in the Philippines, you're active in the n f
(54:28):
T space. Uh? Do you have experience with unethical autopsy
or funeral services? Uh? If so, uh, do check out
our episode on the funeral industry right. And if you
happen to be uh, if you happen to be involved
(54:48):
in psy ops knowingly, if you're in the driver's seat
at some point and you feel comfortable sharing your story,
we will, of course do our best to keep you anonymous.
Everybody in the puzzle Palace just laughed at that, But
here's the takeaway. We try to be easy to find online.
See you get how like how it's weird to say
(55:09):
that right after the right after the n s A
stuff whatever, M easy and eth Indeed, you can find
us on Twitter and YouTube and Facebook under the handle
conspiracy stuff on Instagram or conspiracy stuff show. Guess what.
Our book and audio book are going to be available
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(55:32):
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(55:53):
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