Editor's Comment: Even in the incredible age of live-streaming and millions of sources of digital reports that bypass the mainstream media, there is still no substitute for personal experience. Jon Rappoport is my senior by several years, and by several revolutions in the cycle of mainstream thought, which means, essentially, millions of miles traveled; nonetheless, his experiences remind me of my own, and the quality of tough lessons learned, the effect of hypocrisy is shattering things and institutions that once made sense.

At times it occurs to me that what is worst about the media, megacorporations and Fortune 100 companies whose box stores make of the contents of our lives in so many ways, and whose ideas and products infiltrate and replace real things in our lives, and put in their place false, ersatz novelties and stand-ins with toxic by-products and cancerous side-effects – what is worst about this, before the rest of it – is the thoughtless exercise, and yet conscious choice, that we all made to accept ready-made and pre-packaged ideas about what to do; about what we should do; about what the appropriate tool or thing is that we need for the thing.

Before we've even learned to develop our own intuition, innate abilities, and acquire skill, knowledge – and especially perspective, we have learned to accept someone else's short-cut version of it. We learn to recognize, interact with or obey the dictates of countless devices and positions of authority that merely match-up preordained concepts of what should be.

The vast majority of the population have shut down their own creative centers, and agreed to rubber stamp reality. This is true solidly, and throughout, and even in institutions which should do some good, like church or government, and in counter-culture institutions which should be exposing the evils but eventually take part in them, like punk bands, third parties and alternative media outlets.

As for my own memories of the fake news business… you'll have to use your own imagination.

——

My memories from the fake news business

by Jon Rappoport, No More Fake News

"The true job of a reporter is using facts to overturn reality. Things are already upside down, and his job is to show that. In his work, he has to be relentless. This inevitably leads him to publishing his own words, on his own, because entrenched press outlets are in the business of propping up the very reality he aims to expose. He can't go to them for publication. Once he learns that, he's launched, and his life is never the same. It improves exponentially." (The Underground, Jon Rappoport)

There was the time a newspaper publisher inserted his own paragraph at the top of my story, under my name, as if I wrote it. He didn't tell me. I found out later when the paper came out. I called him up. He was clueless. To him, his intrusion meant nothing. It was my story, but it was his newspaper. I learned something. If you want your own words, and only your words, to stand, publish them yourself.

There was the time I wrote a story about a dubious drug/supplement people were selling under the counter at health food stores. I took the supplement for a week and folded my experiences into the article, which was mainly about the unfounded "scientific background" in the package insert. The editor couldn't fathom how a story could contain "two separate threads." He axed half my story. I learned something. If you want your own words to stand, publish them yourself.

There was the time I wrote a piece about widespread fraud in psychiatric diagnosis. The editor claimed I had employed "too much logic" and not enough "expert opinion." He said "original research" was "out." To no avail, I pointed out that logic was in the public domain, and therefore my "original research" could be checked. I learned something. If you want your own words to stand, publish them yourself.