As a broke 24 year-old living abroad, I applied for a writing job on the internet, and had to pass a series of meticulous, timed tests that involved twisting various authoritative news articles and making it appear as though they were supporting a specific set of given theses, even if they had nothing to do with the subject of the article.
A few of these theses that I remember off hand:
- The environment is doomed
- Dangerous, contagious illnesses are on their way. (this was in 2018)
- Trans-humanism is the inevitable, utopian future, and we should be excited.
I worked for these anonymous individuals for two years. I don’t know their real names and have never seen their faces. All communication was via email.
The work involved creating dozens of accounts on digital platforms, (forums, social media) especially Reddit. I was to create an online persona for each account. (e.g. bald, 40-something divorced lawyer with 3 kids living in Toronto)
I would make controversial posts, interact with users in the comments sections of specified subreddits, and ultimately attempt to convince people to believe the required theses using various tactics.
In order to avoid getting banned by mods, I would also make non-theses-related posts in random subreddits to make it appear as though the account belonged to a real person.
In the comments section, I would use my other accounts to sock-puppet with myself to make it appear as though the second “random person” believed the same things. Sometimes, I would even argue with myself, and other people would join in.
Even if one person appears to genuinely believe in a given cause or idea, it immediately carries more weight and validity in people’s minds.
This was the ideology behind my ‘work’, anyways.
At the end of each day, I was to send a report with the post/comment quota (usually 50) and classify each post or comment.
I was instructed to follow a specific protocol, and after a while, I began to recognize other accounts following similar protocols, but with slightly different theses.
The majority of the other bot accounts I recognized were pushing the pharmaceutical industry.
If you post on Reddit that you’ve improved a health problem naturally, or promote real health food in any way, there is a good chance that the well-paid person behind that pharmaceutical bot account will discredit and gaslight you. I’m sure there are others for just about every lucrative business without a moral compass, especially governmental organizations.
Reddit users are also the easiest types of people to manipulate. They are dopamine addicts who look for approval and advice from faceless strangers who may or may not be genuine people.
It is far better to make your own mistakes and live your life in objective reality.
I spent two years of my life as a paid liar, and before that job, I never really questioned the media or society in general. I was too distracted with paying rent and trying to figure out how to remedy my own health problems to even contemplate this sort of thing.
Working for these people ultimately inspired me to create this website, so it wasn’t all bad. Had I not had that job, I probably would believe all of the politically correct theses currently being force fed to the public, and still have health problems.
The more I do the exact opposite of what is being promoted on a massive scale, the better my quality of life, especially when it comes to my health.
To wrap up, the people orchestrating this sort of thing aren’t necessarily bad people. This is just business. It’s nothing personal.
The road to hell is paved with good intentions, but I’d rather not be a construction worker on the road to hell.
‘ Hereby perhaps Stubb indirectly hinted, that though man loved his fellow, yet man is a money-making animal, which propensity too often interferes with his benevolence. ” Stubb reminds Pip that whatever price he brought in a slave state would pale in comparison to that of a whale.
-Moby Dick
