Syed Farook and the new world of emotional “triggers”

Warning: this article is an emotional trigger about emotional triggers…

by Jon Rappoport

December 5, 2015

(Jon has a new work of fiction at his other blog, Outside The Reality Machine. If you want to take a wild ride, read it.)

“Conceive of it this way. Far up in the sky you have people, individuals, who are inventing the fulfillment of their most profound desires, making them fact in the world, no matter what—and way down below, miles under the earth, you have other individuals who could be doing what the sky dwellers are, but they’ve bamboozled themselves into thinking they can’t. Instead, they think they’re trapped in every little response they might have to any old stimulus that comes along. Both groups of people are creative, but they’ve channeled their imaginations and creativity in vastly different ways. Waking up may be hard to do, but you either do or you don’t.” (Notes for Exit From The Matrix, Jon Rappoport)

Some brilliant media pundits are now suggesting that the accused San Bernardino shooter, Syed Farook, may have been “triggered” by the Xmas party at the building he later attacked.

You know, the existence of Xmas contributed to setting him off because his religious faith was of a different type. Xmas was a grave insult.

There will be people, believe it or not, who think this “analysis” has merit.

“Well, sure, I can see that. Given the nature of his faith, it’s understandable that he would have left the party in a disturbed state, gone home, put on military gear, picked up a few auto weapons, a ton of ammo, and pipe bombs, waited for his wife to do the same, and then, on the spur of the moment, returned to the building…he was triggered.”

“Triggered” is the new reality. It’s mainly for the young and naïve, especially those who are looking for a way to become known at colleges. “Wow, I can get a few minutes of attention if I say I was triggered. I’ll go for it. It’s easy. I don’t have to do anything. I don’t have to achieve anything. This is all about not achieving anything. It’s a perfect excuse. I’m paralyzed. And the reason is, let’s see, I wasn’t warned by my professor that he was going to discuss a subject that had triggers in it. Yeah, I like it.”

Apparently, there is no bottom for idiocy. You think you’ve seen the worst, but no.

Yesterday, I included this quote from a New Yorker article. It’s worth re-reading:

“Individual [Harvard law] students often ask teachers not to include the law of rape on exams for fear that the material would cause them to perform less well. One teacher I know was recently asked by a student not to use the word “violate” in class—as in “Does this conduct violate the law?”—because the word was triggering. Some students have even suggested that rape law should not be taught because of its potential to cause distress.” (Jeannie Suk, The New Yorker, 12/15/14)

There are several underlying principles at work here. One is: If you give people an out, an excuse for not doing anything, a way to become a victim, a significant number who aren’t genuinely disabled in any way will reach for it and grab it.

And they’ll invent a back-story full of grievances. And traumas. And whatever it takes.

This is a form of art. Theater. It may be bad art and bad theater, but there it is.

“I wish I could write a play, a novel. Mostly, I wish I could create the future I really want. But it doesn’t look like I can. So I’ll do something different. I’ll cast myself in a play that’s already gaining steam. I’ll take on the role of victim. I’ll be the person who is in danger of being triggered every time I get out of bed in the morning. If I put everything I have into that role, I might garner a few good reviews.”

There is a larger point here. The whole business of promoting “triggering” is a propaganda operation. Its goal is to convince people that they live in a stimulus-response world—and that means a locked-up world. Stimuli appear…and inevitable responses follow. Period. End of story.

Freedom? A myth. Individual choice? Impossible. The human being? Merely a biological machine programmed to deliver x, y, or z, depending on the external provocations of the moment.

Individual power? No such thing.

This is the Pavlovian wet dream.

Since the dawn of time, leaders and the men behind and above the leaders have tried to install stimulus-response as the only form of human activity, and for obvious reasons.

Stimulus-response is the essence of mind control.

The perversely clever thing about promoting “triggering” as a valid and universal concern is: you will get people to program themselves. They’ll reach out for, and invent, any excuse to pretend they’re being negatively stimulated—and they’ll demand protection, which in the long run amounts to a fantasy about “safe spaces” they can inhabit—vacuums where no adverse content can set off little emotional time-bombs.

Another underlying principle at work: never consider raising up people so they can express and fulfill their deepest desires; no, instead take everyone to the bottom, where the incurably injured live. That’s the goal.

And if you can’t see the consequences of that program, you need a stirring wake-up call.

The Individual is endlessly creative. If, for whatever reason, he decides and believes he can’t consciously express that power in a way that meshes with his deep desires, he’ll invent his reality in a different direction—and that is his problem, it’s not someone else’s. The proof of the pudding? No one else can invent his desired reality for him. It’s his job. And it’s also, if he would see it, his joy.

This is not a matter of what’s fair or unfair, just or unjust. It’s a matter of fact.

The individual has freedom and power. The range of these capacities is endless.

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What I’m writing about here is in no way a prescription for allowing public corruption to flourish and then blaming the individual for the circumstances in which he finds himself. Quite the contrary. All those students who are currently programming themselves to be “triggered”? They could be creating an entirely different atmosphere at their colleges.

They could be investigating, for example, where all the grant monies come from. I’m talking about grants for research on highly toxic medical drugs. I’m talking about pharma influencing the content of science courses and medical training. I’m talking about government money for research on toxic pesticides and genetic meddling. I’m talking about money for research on “brain mapping,” which is really a prelude to efforts to re-program brains and thus control them. I’m talking about money for research on better methods of mass surveillance. And so forth and so on.

Create that drama. Create the drama of discovering the truth about what colleges are really doing, and expose it, and put the sold-out researchers in the glare of the spotlight for the right reasons.

Or, dilly dally about “triggering” and have that party instead.

There certain incontrovertible facts. They have nothing to with what already exists or what did exist or what will exist. They have to do with the individual and his power to imagine and create reality. He can fathom and access this power and consciously use it to achieve his own purposes, or he can subvert those purposes and instead invent himself into a dead-end, where the substance of his life appears to be entirely under the control of external forces, with no hope available.

Those are the immortal cards and that is the immortal hand dealt on the table. Play them as you will.

Jon Rappoport

The author of three explosive collections, THE MATRIX REVEALED, EXIT FROM THE MATRIX, and POWER OUTSIDE THE MATRIX, Jon was a candidate for a US Congressional seat in the 29^th District of California. He maintains a consulting practice for private clients, the purpose of which is the expansion of personal creative power. Nominated for a Pulitzer Prize, he has worked as an investigative reporter for 30 years, writing articles on politics, medicine, and health for CBS Healthwatch, LA Weekly, Spin Magazine, Stern, and other newspapers and magazines in the US and Europe. Jon has delivered lectures and seminars on global politics, health, logic, and creative power to audiences around the world. You can sign up for his free NoMoreFakeNews emails here or his free OutsideTheRealityMachine emails here.