That's why I voted this up.

On the one hand, David Icke is a bad person who sadly garners a lot of attention.

On the other hand... really? Two and half hours to debunk a guy who thinks Mass Effect is real?

Well, why not? David Icke is a prolific author and has decades of work under his belt; any serious critique, let alone serious rebuttal, of Mr Icke's theories would require AT LEAST two and a half hours!

Chris White is a great guy, and it's to his credit, the fact that he's willing to take both the skeptical method and the subjects he investigates seriously.

Wasting this kind of effort on Icke is like wasting effort trying to convince people the earth is a sphere and not a flat disk.

It's not what you would call flawless critical thinking to dismiss either of these things out of hand based on the MOUNTAINS of complex special pleading you have to do to make them work and the fact that there's no credible evidence for them, but it's enough for people with better things to do like literally anything.

If you're a True Disbeliever with a tight schedule then of course this isn't going to matter much to you, but I think that's missing the point! Mr White's work is more for inquisitive skeptics, would-be debunkers, and people who either believe in, or are on the fence about, David Icke's reptilian theory.

For example, I had a lot of fun with Mr White's previous video re: Ancient Aliens. A number of my coworkers adore that show, and being as I don't have an academic background in all of the subjects which Mr CasanovaHair likes to discuss, it's proven quite useful to have a number of specific, well-sourced counter arguments at hand! And David Icke, my gal pal *loves* him, but thus far I haven't been able to say much except "show me evidence". -I- don't buy David Icke's theories, as I have never seen evidence to support them, but they contain enough kernels of truth (particularly in regards to his criticisms of the global power structure) that the reptilian theory can be incredibly persuasive to some people, and as such, incredibly difficult to argue against.

tl;dr I don't think it's ever "a waste" to engage in a thorough, skeptical analysis of something!

Also, given my track record and two and half hours, I'd most likely waste them on something even less important anyways.

It's probably better to see these things as metaphor than scientific truth, in which case they are pretty accurate and there is no need to debunk them. That would be my beef with the debunking, Homer. It's like debunking the bible. It presumes you're taking the stories to be factually accurate rather than instructive metaphor. From that basis, you'll never understand the text or it's wide appeal.

Does great wealth disconnect people from humanity and make them in to cold blooded killers? Often enough, it does. QED.

Well yes, I agree that it works as a metaphor, which is why I mentioned the "kernels of truth". There really is a ruling class, and the general public's perception of reality really is being distorted by the Dick Cheneys, George Soroses, and Jimmy Kimmels of the world. If you want to think of these cold-blooded villains as metaphorical reptiles, then I can't stop you.

The problem is, there ARE people who see the reptilian metaphor as more than just metaphor - people like Icke, for example, or even my coworkers. Worse, since the reptilians-as-scientific-fact meme is (for most "normal" people) so easy to dismiss, it very often winds up poisoning the well and discrediting the reptilians-as-metaphor meme, too! In fact, my own pet conspiracy theory is that this is precisely the point of David Icke - his work is promoted by the mainstream media *specifically so that* it can deflect criticism away from where criticism is needed, and to make dissidents easy to discredit. Icke is most likely part of the wider (provable, documented) effort by the ruling elites to sow disinformation and prevent the underclasses from mounting a rational, effective critique of the system.

Besides, even IF Icke's work was harmless, it would still be incumbent upon us to examine it critically, and if found lacking, debunk it. The truth is non-negotiable, and despite what the damn reptiles tell us, even a useful lie is still a lie.

Aren't these "debunkings" usually done by rival conspiracy theorists? There's a whole website "exposing" Alex Jones as an Illuminati/Zionist stooge. So they denouce his conspiracies with more conspiracies.

Well here's the thing. I'll bet if you tried to explain to your friend something about the actual power players and what they do ( starting with the Kochs say ) you'd get a lot of blank looks and shrugs. But your friend probably feels the effects of their action and tries to understand.

I wouldn't try to debunk the idea so much as try to tie it to more practical actions.

Well, I'll be damned. I just got home from work and started watching it. I never knew Icke was a disciple of Alice Bailey! It makes sense, though: see the Icke-as-disinformation-agent theory I proposed above. (unfortunately, my friends are also interested in theosophy, so that won't help my case)

Anyway, back to you, Mr Wildcat. So basically, what you're proposing is that we embrace the Alex Jone school of discourse - that is, you spend half the time telling people what they want to hear, the rest, telling them what they need to hear. That's all fine and good, and I respect your opinion on this matter, but... well, there are A LOT of problems with being Alex Jones! And since Mr Cena has already brought one up, we'll start there. If you act like Alex Jones, and people will eventually treat you like Alex Jones; that is, people from all sorts of backgrounds will find it difficult to trust what you say, and you'll alienate a lot of people on either side of the demographic you're trying to cultivate. Sure, you might do *some* good, but only for a little while, and only until people get sick of you crying ebola-wolf.

Cena - the fun thing about debunking is, anyone can debunk anything! My personal favorite debunkers are James Randi, Michael Shermer, and Lindybeige; you could get started with them, if you like! As for Mr Jones, *he* has claimed to have been approached by the DoD before (unsourced positioning statement, may actually be true) but I highly doubt he's "working" "for" "the Illuminati" (however you want to understand those three terms). I would NOT, however, be surprised if one day it comes out that he's been taking payments from the Russian Foreign Intelligence Service.

You need that much text to debunk fucking evilhomer?

Case in point: SolRo. SolRo has the attention span of a very small dog; words with more than three syllables and paragraphs of more than three sentences are beyond him. I therefore ask you: do we lower ourselves to SolRo level, or do we strive for something better?

Also, I really, REALLY recommend you guys watch this. It is not what I was expecting at all. It's basically Icke and friends spewing out a wall of theosophy and New Age gibberish. NONE of it is going to help me, sadly, but it really helps to flesh out David Icke's work.

So this thing about lying to get at the truth? We're doomed to it, Homer. Take the Bohr model of the atom, for example. Nice little solar system thing, electron ping pong balls orbiting sputnik like about the fat old neutron sun. Complete bollocks, that. Yet, it has good predictive power, despite such course approximations. What we know now about the atom is also a lie, albeit with a bit more shine. At some point you have to make your peace with analogy and metaphor and press forward.

You know what else had good predictive power, despite relying on approximations? The Ptolemaic system. Give me a Ptolemaic astronomical chart, and I could plot the positions of the stars just fine. "Telling people the earth is the center of the universe, well, that's just a metaphor. Make peace with the analogy, move on."

Yes. That is exactly the case. Both systems ( Ptolemaic and Galilean. ) are fine for terrestrial navigation. If we're trying to get people from point A to point B, why such a felt need to teach the whole of G. before explaining the star sightings necessary to get to point B?

I attended an Icke lecture, it went for eight hours. Classic mass hypnosis technique, fatigue the audience into submission. The eventual punch line (secret truth only the truly wise should hear) was that David embarked on his quest to be a famous rabble rouser after being told by a psychic lady in the 1980s that he would one day lead a great movement. Disappointed.