Controlled Opposition and the Truth Movement
By Bernhard Guenther, February 15, 2022
As more people have taken “the red pill” over the past couple of years, I’ve seen these “controlled opposition/shill/psy-op” accusations being thrown around like candy by people in the so-called “truther community.” I’ve heard statements like:
“The Trucker convoy is a psy-op/controlled op”
“Joe Rogan is a shill/controlled op”
“Russel Brand is controlled op”
“David Icke is controlled op”
“Michael Tsarion is controlled op”
“Dr. Robert Malone is a shill/controlled op”
“Jordan Peterson is controlled op”
“Tucker Carlson is controlled op”
“Elon Musk is controlled op”
“JP Sears is controlled op”
“Trump/Q is controlled op”
“Bitcoin is a psy-op”
“YOU are controlled op.”
….etc, etc.
I’ve been in this “game” since the ’90s and went deep down the rabbit hole, including many dead ends, detours, and distractions. There is a lot of nonsense out there in the “conspiracy world” as well, not just the MSM and official cult-ure. Many truth seekers are stuck in over-simplified black-and-white thinking – out of body, disassociated, glued to the computer screen. Or they claim that their “intuition” and “feelings” tell them that this person or that event is a “psy-op,” “controlled opposition,” or “shill” without any concrete evidence other than most often appealing to the “guilt by association” fallacy.
Feelings and perceptions can be very deceptive, and people tend to mistake all kinds of impressions, feelings, perceptions [unconscious shadow projections], and thoughts for their “intuition” or “gut feeling.”
I’m not taking myself out of the equation. I had done it too at times, primarily when I was only focused on external information and not engaged in any sincere self-work. I still have my subjective blind spots because I’m not enlightened, i.e., awake – in the true meaning of the word.
In this day and age of global upheaval, it is also important to zoom out and understand the greater cosmic forces at work in light of the evolution of consciousness: diving deeper into esoteric work, understanding occult/divine laws, esoteric evolutionary astrology, the cycles of the ages, the different levels of being within humanity, the process of soul evolution, and most important understating your own mind, psyche with all its [shadow] projections and unconscious behaviors, i.e., to truly know yourself. Learning never stops; the mind can become a prison in this information war.
Many “red-pilled” folks tend to project their unconscious shadow and unresolved unconscious stuff externally. They claim to know precisely what is going on with very rigid ideas of what is “true” and what are “lies,” who are the “good guys,” and who is a “shill” and “controlled op” or “psy-op.” Sometimes things can be self-evident, but often, it is not as simple, far from it.
I have had to eat humble cake many times to realize that truth is a much more delicate process and way more nuanced, deep, subtle, and complex [going way beyond what the mind can comprehend] than these superficial labels and accusations that are thrown around by the social media conspiracy “red-pilled” community these days – especially over the past two years since the p[l]andemic started.
Moreover, seeking the truth is an internal job, first and foremost. Yet, most people are mostly externally focused with a very superficial level of information gathering, not realizing how they are getting trapped in their minds. In its essence, the matrix is a mind program working through us/you.
Don’t get me wrong; there are definitely “controlled ops,” “psy-ops” and COINTELPRO (Counter Intelligence Programs) in the 3D matrix, as I’ve written about many times as well [even back in the 90s]. However, these terms are highly abused these days by overly paranoid “everything-is-a-trap” fringe conspiracy folks who have not done much self-work at all to be aware of their psyche, mind, conditioning/programming, shadow, projections, trauma responses, and childhood wounds which we ALL have.
Ironically, as Neil Kramer once said, “the matrix has them” too; they are caught in the “2nd matrix,” as he coined it, prisoners of their own paranoid minds.
I’ve seen this mind trap a lot in the past 25 years of digging down the rabbit hole and increasingly even more so now. That’s how an awakening impulse can get hijacked by hyperdimensional occult forces as well. Not through any cabal psy-op/controlled op “out there” but through your own disassociated paranoid mind. It also attracts these forces like in a self-inflicting thought loop feeding on it and feeding it.
If we do not engage in this important and often times very difficult inner work with full commitment, sincerity, and super-efforts, then our actions and perceptions will always be “polluted” by unconscious material and resulting mechanical reactions under the illusion of “free will,” and we are much easier manipulated by occult forces pulling our strings.
For the record, I don’t identify myself with nor am I part of any “truth community.” I love community, but no thanks to the identification, attachment, and label. The idea of “like-mindedness” can also easily be abused. While it is essential to have similar values and aims and be “like-minded” to a degree [obviously] as in “looking in the same direction” in community, intimate relationships, and friendships, I’m not so much interested in being around “like-minded” people based on purely intellectual information.
“Like-mindedness” can easily mean indulging in the same shadow projections based on trauma bonding and paranoia, justifying each other’s pathologies and triggers without self-awareness, which also most often results in gossip and slandering on baseless assumptions like in a group hive-mind shadow dance.
I’m not interested in the mental noise out there, for it is impossible to understand “the matrix” intellectually and by the information alone, nor will you defeat it, transcend or escape via your mind, and resulting mechanical action alone.
I’m more interested in people engaged in the Great Work, going to the “root” of it all [which is within yourself], and who are sincere in the inner process. I’ve also realized over the years that not many people are sincere. They may dabble in “shadow work” a bit here and there [without really understanding what it all entails], but the real work is extremely confronting, messy, and very painful for you need to face the lies you tell yourself and everything you have suppressed not only since childhood but for lifetimes which is way harder than pointing out the lies “out there.” It takes a level of self-responsibility and humility that most people are not ready for.
As Gurdjieff once said, “In order to understand the interrelation of truth and falsehood in life, a man must understand falsehood in himself, the constant, incessant lies he tells himself.”
It is also necessary now to “unite the clans,” as David Whitehead says [and we talked about it in our podcast chats], even if we don’t agree on everything. Can you be around people who don’t necessarily agree with you on everything [as long as they don’t attack you personally for your views], nor do they necessarily need to agree with all of your views/perceptions, but they have the same aim in light of the Great Work? – to truly awaken and understand that seeking the truth is a process. It never stops. It changes. There are vastly different levels of being and soul lessons within 8 billion people. Everyone plays their role on both sides of the spectrum, from “evil” to “good,” and BOTH is within you too.
So before carelessly calling others “shill” or “controlled op,” look into the mirror first. Most people branded as controlled op/shill are simply playing their part on their level of Being and consciousness. That is not to say that there are charlatans spreading lies knowingly to deceive people on purpose. However, the moment you see yourself as better, you’ve fallen into the trap of superiority and “the matrix has you,” regardless of how much knowledge you may pride yourself with to rationalize your perceptions.
I have “changed” my views a few times over the past 25 years, which made some people upset [based on their projected perceptions of who they “think” I am with all the distortions, black-and-white thinking, and straw man arguments], and hence they started branding me as controlled op and agent (I’m still waiting for my paycheck form the CIA) or shill or that I work for the “Illuminati” (not kidding), slandering, backstabbing, and gossiping. Even some of my long-time friends and colleagues, such as David Whitehead, Tom Montalk, Paul Levy, and others, have been branded as “controlled op” over the past two years by some lost souls in the peanut gallery of the conspiracy community.
Why did my views change [well, some didn’t change but became more nuanced]? Because it is the whole point of the process of truth-seeking within [shadow work, self-remembering/soul integration] and without and the continuing inner work which cleanses my perceptions and it’s ongoing….over lifetimes and lifetimes. As above, so below. As within, so without.
It’s like a new thing in the truther/red-pilled/conspiracy community: “Anyone who doesn’t agree with me or I don’t agree with is controlled op and a shill.”
I realize more and more how everything is way more nuanced and beyond the superficial black-and-white thinking I see in the “truth community.” Personally speaking, getting deeper into the work of Integral Yoga over the past six years and reading Sri Aurobindo’s “The Life Divine” has been quite an eye-opener and extremely humbling to read and digest. It’s not easy reading [for it goes beyond taking it in intellectually], and I’m not saying everyone “should” read it. Still, in my life, it has put everything into a much bigger picture context without getting lost in the shadows on the wall, like in Plato’s allegory in the cave.
Hardly any of us can see with the “eyes of the Divine,” but this Divine Will acts through our own lives and others in ways that we can, at best, only see in retrospect. And what we are seeing happening on the world stage right now, the result is yet to be seen. But most of us can at least agree that this is a time of epic change, a death/rebirth process. The world will indeed never be the same from this point forward. And what we align with decides the course of this journey. If we align with God or a higher power, we will align with the Divine plan.
“But here again we have to discover that from the point of view of God’s workings, whatever be our reactions or our experience on the surface, this fact of ignorance is itself an operation of knowledge and not a true ignorance. Its phenomenon of ignorance is a superficial movement; for behind it is an indivisible all-consciousness: the ignorance is a frontal power of that all- consciousness which limits itself in a certain field, within certain boundaries to a particular operation of knowledge, a particular mode of conscious working, and keeps back all the rest of its knowledge in waiting as a force behind it.
All that is thus hidden is an occult store of light and power for the All-Consciousness to draw upon for the evolution of our being in Nature; there is a secret working which fills up all the deficiencies of the frontal Ignorance, acts through its apparent stumblings, prevents them from leading to another final result than that which the All-Knowledge has decreed, helps the soul in the Ignorance to draw from its experience, even from the natural personality’s sufferings and errors, what is necessary for its evolution and to leave behind what is no longer utilisable.[…]
All this that seems to us incapacity, weakness, impotence, limitation of power, our will’s hampered struggle and fettered labour, takes from the point of view of the Divine in his self-workings the aspect of a just limitation of an omniscient power by the free will of that Power itself so that the surface energy shall be in exact correspondence with the work that it has to do, with its attempt, its allotted success or its destined because necessary failure, with the balance of the sum of forces in which it is a part and with the larger result of which its own results are an indivisible portion.”
– Sri Aurobindo, The Life Divine, Book Two, Part I, Chapter IV: The Divine and the Undivine
Lately, there has also been another deep dive – a necessary descent – into the darkest corners of my Being and psyche with more layers of shadow material to dig through and trauma to transmute that made me realize how I still engage in unconscious projections at times, act out of unconscious wounds and many parts of my Being are still far from spiritualized as I aspire to the Divine with as much surrender as I’m currently able to. It’s not easy work. It’s a battle for there all kinds of forces interfering with the process, including the resistance of the wounded ego itself – an internal war – yet at the same, all there is – are lessons.
There is no Ascent without Descent. It is Divine law for the collective and the individual. “None can reach heaven who has not walked through hell,” as Sri Aurobindo and all esoteric traditions conveyed in their own words, including Carl Jung….until all and everything is brought out of the shadows [within yourself too], made conscious of, and spiritualized. Matter, life, humanity, and nature – spiritualized, entirely, and completely – is the Will of the Divine in this adventure of consciousness. It’s a long process during this Time of Transition. We are still infants compared to what we are destined to become.
Until then, enjoy the show, and don’t forget to look within. Deep within. Beyond your likes and dislikes, your desires wants, and needs. As I said before and experienced myself – after all the “red-pilling” and rabbit-holing you do with all the mental information overload, distracting yourself from what really matters, you will hit a mirror and stare at yourself…and that’s when the real work begins.
There WILL be strong resistance within you to truly engage in it, for it is always more tempting to externalize. It’s not about hiding out or retreating within. It’s not about refraining from action and not standing up against the anti-Divine forces. Far from it, it is imperative to speak out and stand up, united, but inner and outer work need to go hand-in-hand. They can’t be separated but are interrelated. There can’t be conscious actions without self-awareness and knowing yourself.
Living from within is key, so conscious action can arise from essence and soul-being in alignment with Divine Will. It will ask you to engage in life more fully without blame or victimhood, taking full self-responsibility, which can be terrifying to the ego-personality caught in self-importance or self-pity – two sides of the same coin.
Until then, not much will change externally, just different disguises and manifestations of the same, for nothing truly changes [only the superficial appearance of change] if consciousness and your level of Being don’t change. And none of that changes by gathering information alone. You’ll just get trapped in the mind, and that’s exactly where the occult forces want you to get stuck in – the over-skeptical black-pilled paranoid mind. An interesting new “breed” of “truthers” hijacked by Wetiko.
