Wednesday, August 18, 2010

No God, and the Old Elm Tree

Recently, someone named nogod on a message board www.oldelmtree.com, linked to a blog of mine about two 9/11 researchers who post at the Reality Shack forum, Max Konrardy & Simon Hytten. nogod explains why:
Since Simon Hytten has repeatedly refused to answer my questions I was forced to search elsewhere for the answers. What I came across was a blog by another truther. (the link is below)

I guess I have to take this guys word for it since Simon chooses to ignore my direct questions. Be sure to read Simons reaction below the article in the link. Enjoy!
nogod's putting "truther" in italics leads me to believe he is in the opposing camp---what is generally known as a "skeptic." I don't know what questions he'd previously asked of Simon that had remained unanswered until he discovered my blog. I read through the ten-page thread and found nothing that was pertinent. The sections of my blog he quotes speak to the authenticity of authorship of the work attributed to Simon Shack and hoi poloi, but I quite clearly make no claims one way or the other.

nogod downloaded from my blog and reupped to his thread a photograph I'd posted of Max and Simon, which I'd taken in Rome. This caused Simon Shack to break his OldElmTree silence, and he posted a request to the thread:
Dear administrators,

I ask you to remove the above picture. It was copied-and-pasted by member 'nogod' from the blog of Steven Welch (aka "Steven Warran"). Steven was my guest in Rome for 2 weeks, during the 6-month span in which my fellow researcher Hoi Polloi and I were working on the "Vicsim" research.

We both let Steven snap pictures of us all along - asking him specifically NOT to publish them on the internet - for obvious privacy reasons. As soon as Steven returned to the USA, he posted pictures he had snapped of both of us on his blog.

Thanks for removing the above picture - besides, it's a very unflattering one: I have no such beer-belly ...hehe...that's a gust of wind filling up my T-shirt !
Within 15 minutes an administrator of the board, "Andrea," wrote "I will remove the picture," and she did so, but nogod got the last word in, saying
"Sorry that wasnt called for to post his photo. But non the less it was fair, but still not proper."
Whatever "questions" nogod had of Simon must not have been very important, because the thread died at this point.

All of this does call into question the issues of fairness, propriety, and the "obviousness" of privacy, but it also speaks to a larger issue of public identity, which lies at the heart of the 9/11 conspiracy, and hence our search for truth.

Any number of prominent 9/11 researchers, such as Richard Gage, Judy Wood, Dick Eastman, Paul Thompson, Jim Hoffman, Aldo Marquis, and Phil Jahan, are publicly known by their names and images, both online and in "real world" gathering places, such as research symposium.

A different class of players has operated anonymously online in blogs, web sites, and message boards.

Max Konrardy & Simon Hytten were working anonymously online under the nicknames Simon Shack and hoi poloi until just before I posted the first of two blogs about them. Both of their names were already "outed" on a blog called killtownsecretarchive, which focuses on policing an entity known as "Killtown," who is a 9/11 research colleague of Simon and Max's.

The saga between the online 9/11 archivist called Killtown, and its equally anonymous nemesis, Killtown's Secret Archive, ran a course over the past year, and the central issue there was also the public identification of "personas," or the outing of covert agents/actors/players who figure in the 9/11 narrative, for the "real" underlying human beings. Killtown had identified individuals like Val McClatchey, and Mark Humphrey as somehow being illegitimate. Apparently this was a major breach of covert etiquette, but even amid their rancorous infighting, the Secret Archive never dared to out Killtown himself/herself, singular or plural.

It is interesting to note that Simon and Hoi are aligned with others such as Killtown, where they apparently must wear masks to hide some covert reality behind "obvious" rationals.

In my own 9/11 work I've found no need for the privacy that Simon feels is so necessary. My home address, and telephone number, are as easy to locate online as they once were through a telephone book. Even though I have espoused some pretty radical positions, which were sure to alienate and arouse many different factions involved in 9/11, only once in the past five years have I received an annoyance phone call, and that was from somebody who was charmingly drunk.

I address all of this for a specific reason, and that is the same reason I posted images of Simon and Hoi in the first place---the construction and maintenance of an overt public record.

Simon makes two serious errors of fact in his request to the administrators of the OldElmTree board.

First, I was only a guest at Simon's house outside of Rome for one week, not two. I spent a second week at an hotel in Rome, and Simon and a friend came into town on my last night there to have dinner with me. I don't mean to minimize his hospitality, but it is interesting to note that Simon seems to have experienced the visit through my eyes, and not his own.

Secondly, Simon says that as soon as I returned to the U.S. I published photographs of the both of them, and this statement is wrong on two points. First, it wasn't until I was banned from participating on the Reality Shack forum, which Simon and Hoi administrate, that on October 29, I posted the blog Reality Shack 9/11: The Famous hoi polloi, aka Max Konrardy at Work, which was my attempt at explicating the strange interpersonal dynamics I found myself confronted with vis-a-vis Simon and his research collective. (And I only posted a single, obscured image of Max/Hoi then--not of the both of them.)

Two weeks prior, on October 15, I had posted a blog Jeannieann Maffeo and Ruth Magdaline, which was my first effort working under the new research paradigm of the Vicsim report (and let it be said that none of our interpersonal conflict impacts on the validity of that insight.)

Simon left friendly comments on that blog praising my work, and four days later, he came out with a YouTube video on the same subject. I may have fed him some information concerning inconsistencies in a BBC interview, but if so, he certainly didn't give me any credit. However, shortly thereafter, a message board that opposes the work of Simon, Hoi and myself, PumpItOut, came out with an attempt at minimizing the damage of the news report we'd highlighted.

It wasn't until six months later, after Simon had been impressed with my subsequent work on the phenomena of false victim identity that he asked me to rejoin the Reality Shack forum, but where I was summarily dismissed for a second time, that I chose to publish what I thought was an important, and not gratuitous, photograph of the pair for the historical record.




"Thus (through perspective) every sort of confusion is revealed within us; and this is that weakness of the human mind on which the art of conjuring and of deceiving by light and shadow and other ingenious devices imposes, having an effect upon us like magic... And the arts of measuring and numbering and weighing come to the rescue of the human understanding-there is the beauty of them --and the apparent greater or less, or more or heavier, no longer have the mastery over us, but give way before calculation and measure and weight?"[7]
Plato's Republic, Book X, 602d.

7 comments:

  1. Dear Steven,

    I’d like to address your seemingly sincere concern for ‘people hiding behind false identities’. I’ll start with the case of “Steven Warran” which, before I took a better look at your blog, I long thought was your real name. As I realized it was just your “nom d’inconnu pornographique” I wasn’t in the least disappointed nor did I feel you were a murky character for having a nom de plume. I even believe that if you’d kept on to ‘Dusty Bobeche’ you might have an even greater following as a blogger than you have today – people just love catchy-sounding names. Did you know that David Bowie’s real name is David Robert Jones? Chubby Checker’s is Ernest Evans? Bob Dylan’s is Robert Zimmerman? Have you ever heard of Eunice Waymon? That’s Nina Simone! And so on and so forth. Now, if Bowie started a 9/11 blog signing himself as David Robert Jones, wouldn’t that be seen as ‘hiding behind a mask’?

    As for myself, I’ve been Simon ‘Shack’ ever since circa 1993 when I played in a 10-piece band in which everyone had a stage name. It was coined by a Colorado jazzman who wondered what Hytten meant, complaining it was tough to pronounce. I told him it means ‘small hut’ in Norwegian, so he quipped “ a small hut? Kinda like a shack? Gee, I shall just call you ‘Shack’ then!” In 1996 I registered with the Swedish musicians’ union who asked me if I had a nom d’artiste so I said yeah.They told me that ‘Simon Shack’ would be their official record for their tracking of my albums, royalty matters and so forth – they strongly advised me to use that name for all future referencing. Since then, I have been known as Shack to everyone including all music reviews, interviews and articles. Thus, publicly, no one has ever heard of Simon Hytten and hence, my ‘public figure’, so to speak, and my least anonymous surname is in fact “Shack”! Moreover, as I published September Clues, I had several pictures of myself on my band’s website, “The Social Service”. At the time I actually added some more which are now on my contact page of Septemberclues.info. As for my address and whereabouts, a simple search on Google Earth would have transported you with a huge arrow right on top of my house in Italy which you’ve been visiting – including full address, phone number, Hytten surname and all.

    Let me remind you that you’re but one of 8-9 ‘anonymous people met on the internet’(from all over the world) which I have gladly - and ‘fearlessly’- invited to my home. I have to wonder if that is something that people like Jim Hoffman, Richard Gage, Paul Thompson, Judy Wood - or even yourself would ever do. As for my phone number, please know that my home line has been cut off since May 2010 – in a most peculiar manner: I can call out – but can receive no incoming calls. Endless complaints with my phone company(ies) have been to no avail. So I have, for the first time in my life, got myself a cell phone which I hope you’ll let me keep private without writing further inanities such as : “Simon and Hoi are aligned with others such as Killtown, where they apparently must wear masks to hide some covert reality behind "obvious" rationals.” Did I wear a mask when I picked you up at the Rome airport, Steven? Did I wear a mask as I tour-guided you around the, Castelli Romani, the Colosseum and the splendors of the Eternal City? Did Max? Come on, Stevie boy - get real. And find a way to forward some friendly apologies (for your double-faced behavior) to Max - I don’t demand any: I’m satisfied this letter published on your blog will put all these matters at rest - unless you respond to it in the vitriolic style which I otherwise relish in your corrosive essays dissecting the 9/11 gangsters.

    sincerely

    Simon Shack

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  2. Oh, and a last thing: You lament that, in my 911 PROPAGANDA video, I failed to give you credit for a BBC article that you'd mentioned on your blog. Well, that video was a long time in the making (as I researched all the actors involved)and I had in fact saved that BBC article earlier on in my favorites. I thank you for pointing out some interesting parts of that article - maybe I should have posted a link to your blog in my video? Ok, let's say I should have - sorry.

    However, I have since praised and promoted your work on the "MISSING PERSONS" fliers - as you well know. Yet, let me ask you: would you ever have gone in that direction if it weren't for our (Max and my) groundbreaking work on the 9/11 VicSims? Remember your skepticism on that front when we discussed it while you visited me in Rome? Are you soon going to claim that this line of research is originally of your own making - and that Max and I are plagiarizing you? I dearly hope not - and frankly don't suppose you will...

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  3. nogod here!

    Lol I did not download anything I only linked it. And skepticism is a virtue of a good researcher. So dont do like simon and equate skepticism with the official story.

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  4. Steve, this is bull shit. So you flew all the way to Rome, Simon picked you up from the airport. Showed you around Rome. And even was kind enough to let you stay at his house... And when you took photos of them and they (Simon And Max) let you take them "PROVIDING YOU DO NO PUBLISH THEM ON THE INTERNET".
    So what do you go and do? You went and published them???? That is a Dog of an act. That made you look like a really untrustworthy person.It does not have ANYTHING to do with being banned from the forum. You should have respected his wishes, espicially considering he knew you only from the internet. And was a guest at his house. There is nothing you can do too change that... THAT WAS THE WRONG THING TO DO.
    Show him that you are not a shit stirrer and take the photos of the Net.
    Secondly... What is it with you and writing hit pieces on conspircy 9/11 researchers???
    You did the same to Phil Jahan as well. You went onto the lets roll forum and tried to talk No Planes. And absoultly killed the thread.
    And after you got banned from lets roll, You ALSO wrote a hit piece on Phil...
    What is it with you??? What your a great blogger who can construct awsome articles up. But when it comes to talking about this stuff in Forums you have no people skills whats so ever. So when you get banned from being distrespectful and rude.(Dont say your not rude coz I saw you write Go fuck youself in the Ass too someone) You cannot handle it and Need to go write another hit piece?? Such things you do give you no credit Steve, And quite Frankly... dont do 9/11 much favours either.

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  5. Well, Anonymous, I won't disagree with your basic point---that publishing images of Simon and Max online was an abuse of the rules of hospitality---only, may I say, I'm willing to offend Estia, the Goddess of Hospitality, in service to Apollo, the God of Truth. And I stick to my explanation of what motivated me as being my own, very painful, truth. Take it or leave it.

    But I've learned my lesson, even if others haven't picked up on the fact that I'm "a really untrustworthy person." I was contacted several weeks ago by another member of the Reality Shack circle, who was planning a trip to New York City corresponding to this year's September 11th anniversary, suggesting that the two of us meet up in the city. I agreed at first, but as this commentary developed, at the last minute I declined to meet with him lest, given my bad seed, I risked exposing still further identities. I believe he leaves for home today. This would constitute yet another breach of hospitality on my part, but only in reverse. Oy vay.

    However, you lose all credibility Anonymous, when you declare I wrote a "hit piece" on Phil Jahan. I simply reposted a brief exchange we had from a thread on his board, which I assume is also still up at Let's Roll, (I wouldn't know. I've been banned for eternity from that forum.) Maybe any "disagreement" between us (I would characterize us as engaging in a simple discussion,) can be said to have been won or lost based on the tone of our arguments, in which case, I believe I have nothing further to apologize for!

    Put "Phil Jahan" into Google, and my blog will come up at number one, so you can decide for yourself.

    I do recall having said publicly "Go fuck yourself in the ass," to at least one fellow correspondent, but it wasn't Phil Jahan. So oops! Me bad! I get angry sometimes!

    If anyone, even at this late date, were to inform me that there was some sort of risk, or danger, or any kind of threat to Max or Simon, relevant to my photographs of them remaining posted online, I would, of course, remove the images post haste.

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  6. That was a warranted fair reply, Good Stuff. Im happy with that. I eprsonally would still take the pics down. Thats just me though.

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  7. Killtown's Secret Archive always said they wouldn't publish his full name. Killtown is Craig Lazo. It's not hard to find online now.

    http://killtownsecretwordpress.blogspot.com/

    Or Google Craig Lazo. Word is even his old girlfriend Jennifer Wynhausen sold him out. Maybe that's how they caught him.

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