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The Reptoid Hypothesis: Utopian and Dystopian RepresentationalMotifs in David Ickes
Alien Conspiracy Theory 1
TYSON LEWIS AND RICHARD KAHN
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subjectivity.
While those unfamiliar with Icke and reptoid discussions maywonder if this is a
discussion worthy of the non-lunatic, we want to caution againstrelegating Ickes work to
merely fringe status. Rather, Icke is representative of a majorcounter-cultural trend that is
indeed global in proportions. For instance, Ickes web pagepurportedly received over 600,000
hits in its first year alone, and for over four years he hasbeen invited to lecture in at least 25
countries (Cowley). Ickes most recognized publication--themassive 533-page Rosetta stone for
conspiracy junkies, The Biggest Secret --has already gonethrough six re-printings since its
release date in 1999, and his latest conspiracy/ufologytestament, Alice in Wonderland and theWorld Trade Center Disaster ,passes for vogue amongst American, British, and Canadian
audiences as well as in non-Anglo international cultural arenassuch as South Africa (where the
book has been an enduring Top 5 seller). The demographicbreakdown of his audience is, in and
of itself, an interesting phenomenon. Icke appeals equally tobohemian hipsters and right-wing
reactionary fanatics. As regards the latter, in England theBritish Nazi Group Combat 18 supports
his writings, and in America the ultra right-wing conservativegroup Christian Patriots often
attends his lectures (Taylor; Crumey). But they are just aslikely to be sitting next to a 60-
something UFO buff, a Nuwaubian, a Posad*st, a Ralian, or NewAge earth goddess. 2 Thus,
Icke has an expansive popular appeal that cuts across political,economic, and religious divides,
uniting a wide spectrum of left and right groups and individualsunder his prolific and all-
embracing meta-conspiracy theory.
Ickes rise to international fame is not in and of itself ananomaly. In fact, his theory is
part of a larger alien conspiracy culture that began itsascendancy as a post-WWII Cold War
phenomenon (Jung, Flying Saucers ; Peebles), and with the recentsuccess of X-Files , asserted
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itself as a popular aspect of a global media culture (Pritchardet al.; Kellner, Media Spectacle
126). Following an alleged crash of a UFO craft in Roswell, NMin 1947, a new genus of so-
called contactee literature sprang up, and newspaper reportsthrilled to the idea that aliens
filled the skies (Dean 40). While many associated the alieninvasion with the Communist threat
(Mars the red planet equaling the Soviet Red Army), those incontact with the aliens reported
differently, finding instead that the aliens were in fact hereto help humankind survive global
crises like world war and nuclear weapons (Clark 133-35).However, by the 1970s, with scandals
such as Watergate and the Vietnam War suggesting to anincreasingly paranoid public that
governments can act in defense of their own powerful and secretinterests, numerous reports of alien abduction made it clear thatintruding aliens might very well have their own (potentially
harmful) agenda as well (Keel 290). While television shows suchas Star Trek , Outer Limits , and
The Twilight Zone , and films such as Star Wars, Alien, andClose Encounters of the Third Kind ,
all helped to cement the connection between aliens, politics,and entertainment in the popular
imagination of the 1960s and 1970s, the 1980s continued thealien craze with the creation of a
new set of narratives that began to continue alien themes withconspiratorial ideas. The year
1982 brought The Thing , which--like 1979s Alien --suggested theanalogy to political conspiracy
through its portrayal of an alien life form that infects andgestates within its human hosts; and in
1983, the GenX television miniseries V offered a compelling,literal version of the Reptoid
Hypothesis for Reagans trickle down America, with imperialistreptiles plotting the take-over
of the top 50 world capitals. V was quickly followed in 1985 bythe immensely popular Enemy
Mine , a movie in which all-American fighter pilot Dennis Quaidfirst hates and then learns to
love his Draconian lizard counterpart Louis Gossett, Jr.; and in1988, They Live dramatized how
a new optic (literally: sun glasses) could help a humanresistance movement to perceive that
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freedom was a lie created by a highly managerialized society runsolely for alien domination and
exploitation. Meanwhile, Whitley Strieber arguably inauguratedcontemporary alien fandom in
literature with a series of books detailing his own abductionstory, and in 1989 Striebers best
selling autobiographical novel Communion was also made into aHollywood movie.
With alien conspiracy already at a fever pitch, the rise of apotential New World Order on
the socio-political stage in the 1990s appeared only tointensify such thoughts in the publics
imagination. Hollywood released a steady stream of blockbustermovies that focused on the
topic, with Fire in the Sky (1993), Independence Day (1996), Menin Black (1997), Contact
(1997), Alien Resurrection (1997) and The Faculty (1998) as justsome of the films that sparkedthe collective alien craze during thedecade. On TV, unprecedented audiences tuned in to watch
the series Dark Skies (1996-1997), and the widely popular,award-winning, extremely ambitious
television opus X-Files (1993-2002). This is not even to mentionthe innumerable alien-themed
pseudo-documentaries--including the now debunked alienautopsy--that were broadcast on
stations ranging from Fox to the Discovery Channel. On theradio, 15 million listeners were
tuning in every night to listen to alien abductees, ufologists,and crop-circle conspiracy theorists
on Art Bells Coast to Coast AM program. While aliens flourishedon the big screen, small
screen, and radio, the evolving Internet in fact became the mostsignificant arena for cultivating
and expanding alien conspiracy subcultures. Scattered throughoutthe Net, an unfathomable
number of alien conspiracy sites arose, including UFOU: EarthsFirst UFO University
, the Alien Press , and of
course, Ickes own .
All told, then, as Robert Goldberg has aptly stated, the alienicon truly became the
smiley face of the 1990s (223). Jodi Dean likewise hascharacterized millennial America as an
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alien nation (179), and Mark Dery has written of this alienfever as a manifestation of the
postmodern zeitgeist (13). Thus, while our intention here is toexplore the particulars
concerning the utopian and dystopian potentials of Ickes ReptoidHypothesis and not the
intricate varieties of the myriad competing visions of alienlife and conspiratorial intrigue that
now exist worldwide, we want to make clear that our interest inIcke is primarily in interpreting
his work as an iconic representation of a ubiquitous globalexoculture. 3 Dery argues that alien
conspiracy theories are at once a symptom of millennial angstand a home remedy for it (12). It
is our belief that the current exoculture can be read as asocial symptom of the tempestuous
period of transition and metamorphosis that is bestcharacterized as a postmodern adventure(Best and Kellner 5-11); andwe hope to illuminate some of the ways in which the figures of
global conspiracy and the alien-- qua reptile (i.e.,animal)--signify important contemporary hopes
and fears about alterity and animals generally. Thus, utilizingcritical theorist Douglas Kellners
method of diagnostic critique, this paper uses history to readtexts and texts to read history,
with the end goal of grasping contemporary utopian yearningsabout the future so that
progressives will be challenged to develop representations,political alternatives, and practices
and movements which address these predispositions ( MediaCulture , 116-17).
In other words, we feel that a diagnostic critique of a newlyemergent global phenomenon
like David Icke is itself part of a larger utopian project--aproject that utilizes theory to illuminate
both the positive and negative aspects of contemporary culture.We believe that utopia inheres
itself as a desire within popular culture (Bloch) and, followingHerbert Marcuse, we think that all
culture--be it mainstream or fringe--presents itself as anobjective ambiguity (Marcuse, One-
Dimensional Man 225). Thus it is a utopian task to radicalizethis ambiguity through the
application of new theories and practices so that oppressivecultural features are negated even as
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progressive tendencies within everyday life are articulated andre-affirmed. Utopianism, then, in
this respect, is neither simply a fictional nowhere nor anexplicit blueprint for how to plan an
ideal polity (Davis), but rather something that is immediatelypresent and yet ideologically,
normatively, or otherwise blocked from achieving its fullrealization in its service to society
(Marcuse, Essay on Liberation 13; Moylan 1-2). 4 In sum, asutopian archeologists, we will have
to, at times, read Icke against himself in order to excavate theutopian impulse that lies buried
deep within the ideologically reactionary sediment of theReptoid Hypothesis.
In speaking about utopias, Terry Eagleton has remarked that thefunction of utopia is to
make us reflect on the contradictions of current society(Eagleton). We agree that utopian work involves itself in acritical understanding of the present (Kumar 87-88), and while wewill remark
later on how the narrative device of critical (Kumar) orcognitive (Suvin) estrangement in Icke
may in fact serve the ends of reflective social critique,Eagleton is incorrect in downplaying the
future-orientation involved in the utopianism that concerns ushere. In our understanding, such
utopianism is a process (Bammer) that encourages a creativechange in paradigm and perspective
(Sargisson, Utopian Bodies ) such that a critical mass (Moylan)can be achieved. More so, a
utopianism like Ickes is primarily transgressive at the level ofform and content, while
emphasizing a transformative function (Sargisson, Utopian Bodies, 1-12). We believe that David
Ickes work is probably best understood as a quintessentiallydystopian literature concerned with
providing pathways towards a less repressive future. As LymanTower Sargent has shown, such
dystopianism is best characterized as enacting the three modesof map, warn, and hope (7-9), a
schema which we also believe, in many respects, mirrors our ownproject here. Thus in order to
map the utopian and dystopian elements within Ickes project,this paper will focus on three
dominant themes within his work: conspiracy theory as cognitivemapping; media spectacle as a
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contested terrain of capitalist complacency and opposition; andposthuman critiques of the liberal
humanist tradition.
The Tale Behind the Tail: Towards a Reptoid History
The fool doth think he is wise, but the wise man knows himselfto be a fool.
William Shakespeare
As You Like It , 1623 (1998)
Before we begin to explore the utopian relationship that webelieve exists between alien-
conspiracy theory, such as Ickes Reptoid Hypothesis, and thepostmodern imagination, it isimportant to chart David Ickesoverarching project. 5 Ickes greatest strength is not so muchas
an innovator of any particular strain of alien or conspiracytheory but rather in his totalizing
ambition to weave numerous sub-theories into an extraordinarynarrative that is both all-
inclusive and all-accounting. Much of his writing on aliensreveals an homage to the ancient
astronomer literature--founded by the controversial cuneiformtranslator Zecharia Sitchin--that
finds in the text of the oldest extant creation story, theMesopotamian Enuma Elish, reasons for
suspecting that extraterrestrial beings created humanity as asort of primordial biotechnology
experiment. According to both Sitchin and Icke, rather thanhaving evolved on their own
according to Darwinian natural selection, humans are in fact theresult of a genetic experiment
carried out by a race of reptilian aliens called Anunnaki (Icke,Biggest Secret 1-17). In short, it is
claimed that the Anunnaki produced humans as a slave race byinter-splicing their genetic
material with that of hom*o Erectus ( Biggest Secret 7). WhileIcke draws upon Sitchins ancient
astronomer theory, he develops it in favor of his own New Ageand conspiratorial agenda.
Whereas Sitchin had hypothesized that the Anunnaki of the 12 thplanet came to Earth in order to
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mine its rich mineral base of gold and other precious metals(Sitchin 22), Icke believes that the
Anunnaki reptoids desired to mine mono-atomic gold ( BiggestSecret 30-38). This mineral
supposedly has the ability to increase the carrying capacity ofthe nervous system by ten
thousand times and so, when ingested, the Anunnaki would be ableto process vast amounts of
information and accelerate trans-dimensional travel. Icke alsopostulates that the Anunnaki live
off human fear and anxiety. They are, in a sense, emotionalvampires. 6 Down though the ages,
Icke believes, such Anunnaki have initiated numerous bloodrituals and human sacrifices. During
these rituals, human victims release large amounts of negativeenergy, which is then absorbed by
Anunnaki waiting in the fourth-dimension, their preferredstomping ground. To quote Icke:Thus we have the encouragement ofwars, human genocide, the mass slaughter of animals,
sexual perversions which create highly charged negative energy,and black magic ritual and
sacrifice which takes place on a scale that will stagger thosewho have not studied the subject
( Biggest Secret 40).
With a satisfactory labor force accounted for, then, Icke claimsthat the Annunaki still
faced the problem of who would rule on Earth as overseers oftheir human slaves. Thus, Icke
imagines that the Anunnaki interbred with another alien race toproduce earthling slave masters.
Icke refers to these other extraterrestrials as the Nordicsbecause of their blond hair and blue
eyes. The resulting super-hybrids are none other than the Aryans(Icke, Children of the Matrix
251). This strain of alien hybrids retains many of the centralreptoid traits, including top-down
control, emotionless cold-blooded attitudes, an obsession withritualistic behavior, and so on
(Children 275). This reptilian state of consciousnesscharacteristic of the Aryans is, for Icke, a
lower level of development in spiritual evolution, and isdirectly related to fascist militarism,
technocratic rationalism, and racism ( Children 19, 251).Because of their close ties to the
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original Anunnaki, the Aryans can also shape-shift (transformthemselves back and forth
between human and animal bodies) and some can even controlweaker, human minds.
Mirroring a number of claims made by the political far-right,Icke asserts a standard
conspiracy-culture line that the pure Aryan bloodline has ruledthe planet throughout history,
though he is unique in developing it in an exoculturaldirection. In Ickes mind, Aryan lizards
have been Sumerian kings, Egyptian pharaohs, and, in more recenthistory, American presidents
and British prime ministers. According to Icke, 43 Americanpresidents, including George
Washington and George W. Bush, are direct reptoid-lineagedescendants, and the Queen Mother
herself was seriously reptilian ( Children 79). In fact, it isat this point that much of Ickes work has its most enduringinterest, by providing historical critique that is at oncetrenchant political
analysis mixed with what reads like an over-the-top satire inthe tradition of Jonathan Swift. 7 In
this respect, Ickes work includes any number of accountings ofhow world leaders and other
famous personalities, in order to satiate their reptilianbloodlust, take part in ritualistic sacrifices
and pedophilic activities that include kidnapping, hedonisticdrug parties, and brutal murder. Icke
himself theorizes that such obscene acts as these typify thedifference between alien-kind and
humanity and that they are necessary else the Aryan-reptilianslose their temporary human form
and revert to their original reptoid physiognomy. Againfollowing the prevailing exocultural
explanation, Icke claims that in order to maintain theirposition of world domination down
through the centuries, the Aryan lizards have created a secretsociety known as the Freemasons
or Illuminati. The Illuminati are the grand historical puppetmasters, presiding over all human
activities through indirect channels of control andmanipulation. From the innermost secretive
Round Table, a handful of reptilian masterminds directs thecourse of human events via a
network of international organizations such as the Council onForeign Relations, The Trilateral
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Commission, The Bilderberg Group, the IMF, World Bank, and theUnited Nations ( Children
See AlsoGoat Girl: Below The Waste - Album Review | Louder Than WarDave Gibbons: A Life in ComicsWhat's the story behind the boarded-up, windowless high-rise in downtown Houston?Journal articles: 'Respiratory system conductance' – Grafiati339). The plan is quite simply to complete their financialcontrol of the human race ( Children
345).
In order to maintain their anonymity and deflect attention awayfrom their ubiquitous
presence in international finance and politics, Icke believesthat the Illuminati are very interested
in mind control. The media and the Internet are two powerfultools that they have developed to
achieve mind control over the general populace. In Ickesconspiratorial schema, The media, in
turn, get their news and information overwhelmingly fromofficial sources, which, like the
media itself, are owned by the reptilian bloodline ( Children260). Commenting on the Internetconspiracy, Icke writes, TheInternet is an Illuminati creation and only exists because of
military technology. . . . It allows for the easiest possiblesurveillance of personal
communications through e-mails, and the websites visited byindividuals give the authorities the
opportunity to build a personality and knowledge profile ofeveryone. Its about control
(Children 415). The Internet, then, is just another step towardsperfect surveillance of the human
race. The most important goal of the Illuminati is, according toIcke, a micro-chipped
population ( Children 368). Once a microchip is inserted intothe human body, each individual
will be tracked using a global positioning satellite. Thus inthe 21 st century the reptoids have
gone digital, inventing and deploying new informationtechnologies that will further suppress the
truth, expand the scope of surveillance, and restrict individualfreedoms.
So what can humans do to liberate themselves from the tyranny ofour shared oppressors?
Icke ends each of his books with a kind of spiritual program foremancipation that can often be
found in all manner of New Age communities. As opposed to therational discourse of science,
which is a fascist club, Icke suggests that we realize andmanifest multiple, overlapping
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realities in our lives. These multiple, even contradictory,interpretations of the real are not simply
misunderstandings but the results of our differing positionswithin an overall energy field. Thus,
each narrative of reality is in fact united on a deeper level byour multi-dimensional infinity
(Children 406) or vibrational wholeness ( Children 399). Ratherthan subjectively fragmented
and biologically finite beings lost in a sea of cosmicaccidents, Icke asserts that we are all part
of a unifying, trans-dimensional force: love. This force unifiesall life in the galaxy. In fact, Icke
argues, We are the reptilians and the demons and, at the sametime, we are those they
manipulate because we are all the same I ( Children 424). In theend, therefore, it is not clear
whether Icke is in fact suggesting that reptoids are simplypsychic projections and that hisnumerous treatises are little morethan an elaborate allegory or if he actually believes that
reptoids do literally exist outside the human imagination.Things get even more complicated
when he states, If the reptilians and other astral manipulatorsdid not exist, we would have to
invent them. In fact we probably have. They are other levels ofourselves putting ourselves in our
face ( Children 423). Whatever the case may be, Icke is clearthat liberation consists of
understanding that humans and reptoids are ultimately one withina unified energy field, and that
we must learn to love the abject, horrific, and demonic other aspart of our own humanity.
Thus, his latest work ends by declaring that his future workwill no longer take on the air of
conspiratorial critique, but rather present solely a positivevision of multi-dimensional love
( Alice 479-86).
Mapping the Postmodern Times: Icke as Intergalactic Cartographerof Society and the Self
The only difference between myself and a madman, is that I amnot mad.
-- Salvador Dali
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Diary of a Genius , May 1952 (1966)
In an imaginative attempt to manage the disorientingcomplexities of present age
virtuality, the rise of a global media culture, the explosion ofnew information and bio-
technologies, and the seemingly infinite expansions oftransnational capital, conspiracy theory is
--as Fredric Jameson has argued--a populist form of cognitivemapping that attempts to represent
the un-representable totality of these seemingly disparate yetinterconnected social, political, and
economic transformations ( Geopolitical Aesthetic 1992).Expanding upon Jamesons theory,
Douglas Kellner argues that contemporary alien conspiracytheories represent a form of pop-
postmodernism that constructs new modes of representationsuitable to the uncertainty,
(dis)organization, and fragmentation that often characterize thecultural logic of the present age
(Kellner, Media Spectacle 156). While Jameson argues that mostconspiracy theories are in fact
degraded or ideologically mired products of an informationunderclass, such cartographic
attempts to trace the topography of the postmodern landscape areessential to a political project.
Because postmodern society is often bewildering anddisorienting, it can, for Jameson, lead to
political paralysis and nihilistic confusion. Thus, in order toregain a sense of political agency, an
as yet unimaginable new mode of representation must beconstructed with the ability to grasp
our positioning as individuals and collective subjects [withinthe space of transnational capital]
and regain a capacity to act and struggle ( Postmodernism54).
Ickes massive conspiracy project is an attempt to imagine anaesthetic capable of
mapping the intersections between postmodern culture,capitalism, and transdimensional space.
His theory is a significant condensation of all conspiracytheories into one colossal narrative that,
for Icke, holds seemingly unlimited explanatory powers. There isan almost obsessive-
compulsive desire in Ickes writing to ferret out theconnections, produce narratives, and string
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together detailed minutiae to support his thesis. Hisarcheological method is equally
characterized by intricately molded and subtle analyses ofhistorical artifacts and by
disorganized, at times baffling, bricolage that allows him tointellectually pole vault from ancient
Sumer to contemporary America in a single--and yes,spectacular--bound that defies the laws of
academic gravity.
Postmodern paranoia fuels this bewildering archival methodology.In his book Media
Spectacle , Douglas Kellner makes the distinction between areactionary clinical paranoia--a
mindset that has dissociated itself from a reality principle andretreated into a persecutorial world
of occult fantasy--and a much-needed, progressive criticalparanoia that is suspicious andinquiring of the politics of mediaculture (140). To the degree that one interprets Ickescognitive
map literally, it would be classified as clinically paranoid andthus symptomatically dystopian.
And yet Ickes analyses of events like the dubious mediaportrayals surrounding the Gulf War
and 9/11 and his overall critique of our growing hi-techsurveillance society would appear to
qualify as critical paranoia as well. Ickes framework is,therefore, ambiguous and contains
both progressive and reactionary elements. Yet, we would arguethat Kellners positive
conception of paranoia must be read so as to include the type ofnovel syntheses and imaginative
perceptions that characterize Salvador Dalis technique ofparanoiac-critical activity. In Best
and Kellners own discussion of the paranoid imagination at workin the literature of Thomas
Pynchon, they have written of a creative paranoia (27, 55) thatwe believe is much akin to the
sense given by Dali. Furthermore, it is interesting to note thatErnst Bloch, the progenitor of
contemporary utopian theory, argues that paranoia reacts to thetraditional powers with
querulousness and persecution mania, but breaks them at the sametime with adventurous
inventions, social recipes, heavenly roads and more besides(93). Consequently, it appears to us
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that Ickes conspiratorial cognitive mapping could be analyzed asa form of pop-Pynchonism that
is not dissociated from a reality principle so much as it isworking to produce an entirely new
one. It is thus important to recognize how Ickes work attemptsto cobble together a matrix of
meanings that unites our fragmented perspectives and providesintergalactic guideposts for
navigation through space, even as it remains essentially open tothe fact that this space may be
curved and endlessly expanding. This postmodernmetanarrative--if there can be such a thing--
contains within it a utopian desire to reconfigure meaningwithin a discombobulated world where
linearity, rationality, and causality have fallen into apostmodern black hole leaving citizens to
fend for themselves in an often times perplexing cacophony ofmedia simulations, culturalimplosions, and political fluctuations.Rather than Jamesons dismissive categorization of
conspiracy theory, we see such narratives, when read asimaginary allusions/illusions to material
relations, as constructing novel and evolving networks ofsignifying chains that can in fact
contain within them a potentially empowering form of politicalagency. Thus as Jodi Dean
posits, the distortions and imaginative leaps of conspiracytheory may be helpful tools for
coding politics in virtual realities of the techno-globalinformation age (144).
Yet, the grand scale of Ickes narrative, its drama, and itspop-cultural sci-fi appeal, not to
mention the cult of celebrity that has blossomed around Ickehimself, problematically associate
his conspiracy theory with capitalist media spectacle. 8 GuyDebord pejoratively referred to such
spectacle as the common ground of the deceived gaze and of falseconsciousness (139) thus
linking up spectacle with the pessimistic evaluation leveledagainst the culture industry by
critical theorists such as Horkheimer and Adorno. Connectingspectacle with the cultural logic
of techno-capitalism, Douglas Kellner further argues thatDebords analysis of spectacle is more
pertinent now in the media-ted information age than ever before( Media Spectacle ). In Ickes
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case, he is certainly drawing upon other popular mediaspectacles like the X-Files and The
Matrix in order to widen his audience and piggyback on theirfinancial success. The sensational
overabundance, intensity, and gratuitous hyperrealism ofcommercial spectacle are all important
elements of Ickes aesthetic. Therefore, it is unclear whetherIcke successfully manages to
valorize particular consumer products (e.g.; films and booksthat center on ideas of conspiracy
and alien domination) while delivering a crippling assessment ofthe larger culture industry that
is in many respects responsible for them.
Even though spectacle is part of the consumer ideology ofcontemporary capitalism, Icke
does manage to find a utopian kernel buried beneath its Teflonouter shell. A radical form of identity politics that could bedescribed as extraterrestrial subjectivity (Dean 138) emerges
from Ickes dystopian conspiratorial map and his indulgence inover-the-top celebrity. To this
end, by rigidifying and commodifying it he rejects the idea thatcapitalism serves as a final limit
or ground to contemporary subjectivity, and thus he presents hisreaders with a new
configuration of the self predicated upon spiritual notions ofvibrational wholeness or multi-
dimensional infinity ( Alice 456). There is a utopian longing inIcke, then, for the reconstruction
of individualism and community outside of the currentideological confines of the present age.
Loosed from the constraints of historically conditioneddeterminates such as class, gender, and
race, differences flourish in Ickes imagination. His utopianvision of quirky oddities and
idiosyncrasies living together in harmony is well summarized inthe following quote: We must
let go of the fear of what other people think of us and startliving and expressing our own
uniqueness of lifestyle, view, and reality. When we do this westep out of the herd and if enough
of us do it, there is no herd. . . .We allow everyone else thefreedom and respect to express their
uniqueness without the fear of ridicule and condemnation. . ..No one seeks to impose their
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beliefs or reality on anyone else, so always respecting thefreedom of others to make different
choices ( Children 426).
Within an Ickean utopia of trans-cosmic diversity, oppressiveideologies buttressed by
mainstream, commodified, and normalized self-images will beunable to restrain burgeoning
permutations of existence from expressing themselves inincreasingly multiple and hybridized
formations. According to Icke, these re-productions of selfhood,in tune with a vibrational
wholeness above and beyond the cultural and political statusquo, will no longer be judged as
deviant or abnormal but rather simply as concrete expressions ofour collective awareness of an
ever-present universalizing strong force: love. Clearly, this isa world well beyond Marxs perception of oppressive class structuresand Foucaults revelations concerning disciplinary
power. This Ickean utopia might be considered as an example ofwhat Gilles Deleuze and Felix
Guattari have written of as a deterritorialized zone, a place ofpure libidinal production that
unleashes the primal forces of desire and life ( Anti-Oedipus319-22). Ickes imaginative utopian
vision receives its best political reading as a form of populistarticulation of a Deleuze and
Guattarian nomadism, wherein the schizo-subject becomesliberated through its self-involvement
with an endless creative process that effects new valences ofdifference (Deleuze and Guattari,
Thousand Plateaus 381-84). As Icke states, each individual is infact many people ( Children
423), and this internal multiplicity is accomplished--as withGuattaris concept of
heterogenesis (Guattari 69)--through the pulverization of thecentered, unified, Oedipalized
ego, a process by which the contradiction between thelibertarian self and its relationship to the
larger community begins to disappear. Indirectly, there isreason not to dismiss Icke when he
asserts that in his utopia of free-thinkers and actors we areall one, united across differences by
love itself--love of our collective joy in the very productionof singular novelty ( Children 423).
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Therefore, while it is true that Ickes conspiracy theory issensationalistic, not above
capitalistic opportunism, and lacking in a complex critique ofsubjectivity, it could also be
argued that he is exploring the more emancipatory aspects of apostmodern subjectivity and
contemporary cultural spectacle. In our own dialectical approachto socio-political spectacle, we
want to argue that transgressive popular theories such as Ickesmay also exploit the utopian
possibilities inherent in capitalism and media culturethemselves in order to quickly reach a
global audience that would otherwise remain unaffected by thesphere of revolutionary
political/cultural action and avant-garde counter culturalideals. In other words, despite the many
reactionary or unsophisticated ways in which Ickes ReptoidHypothesis signifies only theideological constraints imposed bycapitalist life, the very excesses of such life are also re-
networked and detoured through Ickes narrative so thatoppositional motifs remain real, vital,
and prominent.
Capitalist spectacle is, therefore, both an integral aspect ofIckes successful postmodern
aesthetic and its ultimate demise, as he mixes fresh approachesto political and cultural critique
with baroque indulgence in occult history, less than rigorouscritique of a consumer/normalized
society, and spiritual mysticism. As such, Ickes utopia is atonce unleashed and encaged by the
global capitalist spectacle that is his object of analysis.While we believe that his work must be
read as an attempt at a radical symbolic intervention into thechecks made by hegemonic power,
we also find that Ickes alien conspiracy theory reveals--inJamesons words--the inevitable
miring of our imaginations in the mode of production itself, themud of the present age in which
the winged Utopian shoes stick (Jameson, Seeds of Time 75). Inother words, Ickes utopian
desires should not be considered as being ideologically neutral;his yearnings are ultimately
ambivalent. Even as Icke promotes the sort of cosmicmulti-dimensionality that he believes
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prefigures an experience of the Absolute, he serves to exposethe very limitations of our own
utopian imaginations to represent radical alternativesubjectivities outside of ideologically
inscribed conventions.
Identity Implosions: Alien/Human/Reptilian Hybridity
Man is an enigma to himself. . . .The possibility of comparisonand hence of self-knowledge
would arise only if he could establish relations withquasi-human mammals inhabiting other
stars.
Carl G. JungThe Undiscovered Self (1990)
Research involving contemporary representations ofalien/human/animal hybridity is
related to large-scale changes being affected by newtechnologies and capital--post-World War II
technocapital--and are part of a growing transdisciplinaryscholarship concerned with what has
come to be called posthumanism (Best and Kellner 149-200). Suchliterature points in two
directions: historically, towards the analysis of a pastdiscourse of primarily Western humanism,
and, imaginatively, towards a reconstructed future in which theoppositions and hierarchies that
characterize such humanism are overcome in either a utopian ordystopian manner. There has
been a bevy of writing that problematizes the hallmark ofWestern humanism--an
anthropocentric liberal subjectivity--by demonstrating thevariety of ways in which it is
predicated upon the dichotomous notion of self and imaginaryother (Sargisson, Contemporary
Feminist Utopianism 117-27), culture and nature (Horkheimer andAdorno), and human and
animal (Noske; Bleakley). While some science fiction writerslike William Gibson represent the
absolute abolition of nature and the animal, reducing them tothe binary zeros of a technocultural
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hallucination, other SF writers from H.G. Wells (Best andKellner 164-71) to Octavia Butler
(Sands; Stillman) have centered the dystopic threat representedby the alien figure of non-
anthropocentric human/animal hybrids. As a sort of allegory forimmediate political concerns
like the explosion of biotechnology as a primary future economicdirection for world markets,
dystopic SF hybridity symbolizes that new technologicallyproduced life forms in lab test-tubes
destabilize traditional notions about humanity through theirtransgression of boundaries.
Furthermore, such narratives challenge existing animalcommunities and the ecosystems that
support them in a rather violent and unsolicited manner. Bycontrast, theorists like Donna
Haraway, Gilles Deleuze and Felix Guattari celebrate thepossible utopian dimensions of undermining what Jacques Derrida hascalled the liberal subject of carnophallogocentrism
(112). In this respect, Haraway has called for the significantotherness of companion species
(Companion Species Manifest 6-7), a defense of the free-play ofbiological difference in the
prehensile lives of living beings. Likewise Deleuze and Guattarihave called for the politics of a
becoming-animal, in which a new aesthetics of multiplicity andthe ecology of difference is
practiced and in which the history of humanisms hierarchical andself-valorizing theory of
evolution must give way to a theory of creative involution (Thousand 233-39).
The iconic drama of the reptoid versus human battle for the fateof the planet in the work
of David Icke speaks directly to these critiques of the liberalhumanist tradition, though we want
to argue that it does so ambiguously, containing both positiveand negative elements of
signification. In his figure of the Aryan/reptoid nobility, Ickeconjures an image of the
alien/human/animal hybrid as the ultimate representation ofmodern evil--global leaders are
lizards, then, in the same manner that Dr. Jekylls madness forpower resulted in his being
revealed as the hardly human and troglodytic quasi-animal namedMr. Hyde (Skal 68-69). In
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combination with this image, Icke further describes the enslavedrest of humanity as a passive
herd of sheeple, or sheep people ( Alice 13-17). In thisrespect, Ickes portrayal of the
carnivorous alien lizards, who rule cruelly and mightily over akingdom of domesticated human-
sheep, is both complex and contradictory in its over-coding anduniversal application of the
animal image to denote the radical difference of afourth-dimensional species of space
colonialists. As with similar science fiction narratives likeThe Planet of the Apes , Ickes theory
utilizes the textual device of critical (Kumar), or cognitive(Suvin), estrangement, in which the
image of the alien-animal-other serves to create the necessarydistance by which we can criticize
and examine current human norms vis--vis their relationship toOtherness generally. In thissense the representation of the reptoidcould be considered progressive, as it associates evil with
contemporaneous notions of fascism, imperialism, assimilativecapitalism, hierarchy, war, and
carnivorousness. Yet the castigation of thesehuman-all-too-human behaviors comes at the
expense of the vilification of reptiles (and other animals), andso the animal image in Icke
becomes an icon upon which human vice can be projected and sosacrificed and cleansed. 9
Additionally, in a similar manner, Icke decries the definingimage of herbivorous and pastoral
animals, which serves here to represent under-realized humanpotentials ( Alice 14-15). The
representation of the animal in Ickes work, then, becomes anambiguous code that represents
human over (and under) development on all sides. Lacking anypossibility of a positive
valorization in and for itself, the image of the animal servesonly to underwrite a critical, but
ultimately heroic, narrative about distinctively humanpossibilities and futures. In other words,
Ickes use of animal symbolism to describe various states ofhuman evolution is merely an
anthropomorphized imaginative turn upon which human foibles andfears are projected onto the
UFOther, which acts as a phantasmatic screen for humandesires.
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His call for a holistic conception of unlimited cosmic Othernessbased on the unlocked
potentials of human love also seems too anthropocentric. As suchIcke appears to move in the
utopian tradition of other theorists of universal love likeCharles Fourier, who thought that
cosmic harmony would necessitate the development of a newrelationship between humans and
nature such that novel animalities would arise. However, whereFourier imagined the possible
existence of antilions, antisharks, and antiseals that would befriendly to humanity, he
didnt imagine a correlative problem with the astronomer Lalandespeculiar desire to eat live
spiders in the new amorous world (Geoghegan 20-21). This need tonegate an image of radical
animal differences--while simply expanding human liberty--speaksto the implicit inequalities of such a vision, and we believe asimilar mistake occurs in the work of David Icke.
Through his decisively anthropocentric projections, a deepanxiety is revealed in Ickes
writing concerning the unknowable and unsymbolizableUFOtherness, signified by the figure of
the reptoid. Ickes reptoid is ultimately a reactionary andconservative icon, one not allowing for
the free-play of differences, and its seems to represent afuture characterized by the fifth
discontinuity (Best and Kellner 164-65), in which a superiorspecies enslaves and perhaps
destroys humanity. Hence, the reptoid can be read as an emblemof dystopian warning about
limit transgression, and while the Ickean universe is one inwhich hybridity reigns, his final
message ironically appears to be a caveat about courtingOtherness unabashedly. While
superficially embracing the rhetoric of love as a unifyingstrong force, which crosses species and
other boundaries, Icke is reluctant to truly engage the radicalambiguity posed by difference on
its own terms. Thus, the reptoid, as the figure of irreducibleUFOtherness outside our decisively
human symbolic order, is conveniently domesticated in the end. Areal ethic of reptoid difference
would have to face the terrifying possibility that a closeencounter with alien love--if we can
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even call it such--may disgust, baffle, or horrify our humansensibilities. Interestingly, UFO
folklorist Thomas Bullard notes that such a conception ispresently gaining favor amongst UFO
abductees, who are advancing a notion of The Change: a time whenhybrids and normal
humans coexist in a world of extraordinary beauty. Yet thiscoexistence will be altogether on
alien terms. Their paradise is a soulless alien realm thatsnuffs out the uniqueness of humanity
and leaves little hope that we can avert its coming (182).
Therefore, Ickes final utopian call to love the reptoid-withindoes not go far enough,
though against Bullards abductees we would assert that they infact go too far still. The reptoid-
within must be allowed to transform or, as the case may be,mutate the very parameters of loveas such, otherwise the reptoidbecomes a trained alter-ego that crushes the transgressive and
revolutionary power in seeking new hybrid horizons in the firstplace. And yet, such becomings
are a central part of the human domain and society-at-large aswell, and so we believe that
hybridic icons like the reptoid should ultimately serve tosuggest how a critical and emancipatory
posthumanism reconstructs the future interconnectedness ofhumans, animals, and the difference
symbolized by the UFOther in an egalitarian and non-totalizingmanner. While Icke approaches
this plateau, he ultimately regresses back to a much moreanthropocentric perspective that
negates his own utopian turn.
There is a greater dilemma in Ickes corpus than a latentanthropomorphism or
anthropocentrism, however: capitalism--a dilemma which seemsalso to typify many other
utopian movements like animal rights or postmodern identitypolitics in their attempts to
reconstruct less oppressive social relations between groups. Aswe have argued earlier,
utopianism today simply must confront the growing reality oftransnational capitalism, and we
find Ickes utopian holism limited in its ability to recognizethe manner in which it may inform
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or be informed by capitalist logic and technique. To the degreethat Ickes Reptoid Hypothesis
can be read positively as a clarion call to reconfigure newhybrid selves that implode traditional
dualistic hierarchies like human/animal, human/alien, andself/other, we find that the lack of a
sufficient theory of capitalism in his work may only serve tolead practitioners down the
commodified road of New Age neo-shamanism (Noel). Further, whileIckes notion concerning
the infinite multiplicities of being contains kernels ofrevolutionary potential, such as is found in
Deleuze and Guattaris becoming-animal, we want to argue herethat these kinds of
superstructural shiftings in and of themselves can in fact bethe very fuel that feeds the voracious
appetite of present-day capitalism. As Slovoj Zizek contends,global capital constitutes a varietyof systems which clearly favorthe mode of subjectivity characterized by the multiple shifting
identifications ( Specter 25). From Zizeks perspective, atheorist such as Icke can only
overestimate the subversive potential of disturbing thefunctioning of the big Other through
symbolic tactics ( Ticklish Subject 264). Thus, as we haveshown, Ickes own utopian vision of an
alternative trans-dimensionality is itself sustained by themonocultural transnational capitalism
which functions as its disavowed anchoring point. To this end,Icke himself is at his worst when
he interprets his notion of the infinite I in a humanistdirection of liberal anthropocentrism
( Alice 483). By doing so, he thereby undermines the radicalimpact and political efficacy of his
liberatory vision by reducing the brutalities of human-inducedoppression to a mere game of the
consumer self. As Icke states, Its just a game. Its just a ride( Children 427). Such statements
wrongly serve to depoliticize the noxious material realitiesthat by and large comprise the
domination and exploitation of humans, animals, and differencein general that Icke himself sets
as the task to document, explain, and overcome.
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Conclusion: Reptoids of the World Unite?
Irresistible and bittersweet that loosener of limbs,
Love reptile-like strikes me down.
--Sappho
Qtd. in Barnard, Sappho (1986)
David Ickes project is two-fold: to provide a searching anddevastating critique of the
mainstream and then to offer an alternative, love, as a positivevision which might replace that
which he has previously annulled. In this way, Ickes work can besaid to be dialectical, and the
idea of a transcendent love that overcomes the fragmentation andinequity of the reality that he
calls the five sense prison ( Alice 462) is offered as theultimate sublation of the emerging
global fascist state, which he outlines. For Icke, the processof personal awakening unfolds, then,
as follows: fascism negated by nihilistic paranoia which is thendoubly negated by the personal
awareness of what the Upanishads refer to as Tat tvam asi --Thouart That ( Encyclopaedia
Britannica ). The love which Icke speaks of then extends beyondany single signification and so
would assert itself at a higher level than other conceptionssuch as eros , agape , or charitos .
Rather, Ickes love is akin to contemporary spiritual conceptionsthat stress the actualization of
holistic states of consciousness which transgress everydayawareness, and which incorporate an
invigorated spirituality that accords with so-called PerennialPhilosophy (Grof). In a manner that
much resembles Ickes thinking, the famed ufologist JacquesVallee has also remarked upon how
states of non-ordinary consciousness may be connected toexperiences of alien conspiracy:
I am going to be very disappointed if UFOs turn out to benothing more than visitors
from another planet. . . .I think the UFO phenomena [sic] isteaching us that we do not
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understand time and space. . . .At this level, it does notmatter whether or not UFOs are
real. If people believe that something is real, then it is realin its effects. . . .Could the
UFO phenomenon be manipulating us? Could it be a teaching systemof some sort?
Perhaps something that we are creating ourselves. . . .Or, couldit be manipulated
purposely by people who have the technology to simulate UFOsightings?. . . .There is
another way of thinking about this. We are at a time of crisison earth. We have the
means of destroying the planet, which we have never had beforein human history. It may
be that there is a collective unconscious. Perhaps we arecreating the visions we need to
survive, in order to transcend the crisis. Perhaps there are noUFOs in a manufacturedsense (Qtd. in Mishlove 184).
More recently, John Mack, the Harvard psychiatrist vilified forhis positive studies of
UFO abductee experiences, has spoken of the need to transcendthe dualistic mind that erupts
in self/other relations that underlie warfare and terrorism.Conclusions such as the following
accord perfectly with the utopian agenda outlined by Icke:
Humanity seems to be at a turning point. We are experiencing akind of race to the future
between the forces of destruction and creation. The preservationof our lives and
possibilities will come not from the strategies of terrorists,nor from the bombs of the
self-righteous. This can happen only through a great awakening,a worldwide shift in
consciousness that can transcend the habits of dualism, andenable the citizens of the
Earth to become a genuine family of people and peoples, in whicheach of us can come to
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feel a responsibility for the welfare of all. As Gandhi oncesaid, We must be the change
(Mack 17).
But, as is the fate of all attempts to represent theunrepresentable and imagine radical
difference--radical Otherness is, by definition, not our idea ofit (Badiou 18-23)--such utopian
visions ultimately collapse back upon themselves, stagnatingunder the invisible tractor beam of
contemporary ideological conventions. As we have shown, Ickesalien conspiracy theory is too
closely linked with capitalist media spectacle and theanthropocentric, liberal-humanist tradition
that has served as its foundation throughout modern times. Inpart, this link leads Icke to
mistakenly project onto the real culprits of world-wide murdercampaigns--armed
neoconservative extremists like George W. Bush--the image of theanimal, which is more
properly the image of global fascisms victim (Sax, Patterson).While it might be argued that in
calling for a redeemed version of love thy enemy Icke presentsan allegory that promotes a
necessary and renewed embrace of animality and Otherness--onethat would likewise serve as a
solution for global crises--Ickes stereotypical images of theanimal as unreasonable, emotionless
beyond fear, and concerned only with basic survival instinctsserve as reactionary themes within
his work. Indeed, upon reading his voluminous alien conspiracytheory as an allegory, one senses
that the reptoid serves at the level of narrative as little morethan a foil for a romance about the
potential heroism dormant in todays humanity--the largercommunity of liberal subjects. But
this use of the reptoid is actually a conservative streak thatruns as an undercurrent beneath
Ickes tapestry of cultish excess, and as such it is wrong.George W. Bush deserves to be
criticized, but not because he is either nonhuman or inhumane.Rather, a more exact critique
would focus on Bushs militarism, his status as the ultimateliberal subject, and the disastrous
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results of his brutal imperial ethics upon the nonhuman worldand the over 3 billion oppressed
people that Western speciesism codes as animal (Derrida 112;Wolfe 7-8). Thus, Ickes notion
of multi-dimensional subjectivity is ultimately a concept thatlacks an adequate representation,
and his politics of visionary love stands in requirement of amore thoroughly articulated
materialist praxis. Whereas a critical theorist such as DouglasKellner ends his analysis of the
conspiracy surrounding 9/11 with a lengthy Jaccuse of the entireBush administration ( From
9/11 to Terror War 255-59), for all his spiritual and mysticalinsight David Icke is left rather
embarrassingly in the opposite political register: I love youGeorge Bush, father and son; I love
you Cheney and Powell and Kissinger and Carlucci and theIlluminati High Council and thereptilian hierarchy in theinter-space plane. I love you. If I dont love you I dont lovemyself
( Alice 486).
In light of this paradox, perhaps it is appropriate to end thisessay with our own clarion
call for a new exo-revolution that re-incorporates--as part of alarger whole--Ickes reptoid ethos
into the ongoing struggle against the forces of globalcapitalism and imperialism. We are
unwilling to give up on the utopian aspects of Ickes postmodernimagination. Icke has tapped
into the utopian longings of the masses in a potentiallyliberatory way. Right-wing fanatics, 10
leftist conspiracy buffs, New Agers, college students, and anincreasingly dissatisfied and
questioning public the world over have found something deeplyprovocative in Icke that cannot
simply be explained away as manifestations of a collectivefalse-consciousness, clinical
paranoia, or, as Freud would say, group hypnosis. Ickes politicsare more complex than such
characterizations, as is his contradictory relationship withcapitalism and media spectacle. It is
our conclusion that theories such as Ickes can be utilized topoint us in a direction in which the
postmodern imagination envisions new co-constructed coalitionsbetween humans and animals,
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and between culture and nature--these coalitions nurturing thecreation of a world-wide ecotopia,
where new subjectivities could blossom like exotic rainforestfauna. With recent reports of ever-
increasing rain forest destruction--this despite over twodecades of global concern and education,
including the direct intervention of numerous nation states,NGOs, and other organizations--the
idea that the future hopes for existing endangered flora andfauna may in fact depend on our
ability to generate a global paradigm shift in how humanitythinks and acts in relation to its
terrestrial family seems less and less mystical indeed(Reuters).
In this respect, Ickes call to awaken to the greater cosmicsignificance of love and the
interconnectedness of all things--with his implied insistencethat the non-awakened shall becommitted to the spectral Hades of agrowing military-industrial complex purgatory framed by
dire poverty and extinction of hell, on the one hand, and theHollywood Hills of heaven, on the
other--strikes us as the right message for this time. Ickessense that we must dream the
impossible dream and actualize it in our everyday lives is soundwisdom in an age when
individuals and localities are threatened and controlled by theexpanding global forces of terror,
domination, and destruction. As transnational capitalismviolently transforms the world in
opposition to ecologies of place, the world stands in need of amassive transformation in a
counter-direction. Ickes notion that such transformation may beeffected through the emblem of
transgression, in which we signify our commitment both to thelocality we inhabit and to the
larger community of life through the invention and deployment ofnew counter-aesthetics,
represents a sort of utopia that moves beyond the merelyfanciful, and it is exactly this sort of
thinking and practice that is unfortunately missing within muchof the presently more secular and
materialist-oriented anti-war and anti-globalization scene.
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Endnotes
1 The authors want to thank Peter McLaren for the genesis of theidea of providing a critical
investigation into the revolutionary potential of David Icke,and for his friendship,
encouragement, and ongoing support of this project.
2 Nuwaubians are a group that mixes the politics of afrocentricblack nationalism with ideas
about the alien origin of humanity and an eschatological returnof alien civilization. Posad*sts are
followers of the once leading Latin American Trotskyite, JuanPosadas, who equate post-
revolutionary society with a Socialism brought to earth fromwhat they believe is an alien future.
Ralians recently grabbed headlines by claiming to be the firstto successfully clone human
beings (in fact their organization Clonaid claimed two!), butwhile the movement believes in the
humane and progressive use of science and technology to live inaccordance with the alien
powers that are its true origins, Ralians additionally believein sensualism and other doctrines
that give this group a unique agenda with wide popular appeal.We use New Age loosely here
as a signifier that points to a general class of post-1960sliterature and the spiritually-minded
people who have made a culture around it.
3 The prefix exo- denotes a state of being beyond, or not of,the Earth. Thus, theorizing about
alien practices is the study of an exoculture, and our work hereis in part exocultural studies.
4 Some utopias may in fact be fictive narratives about no placeor projects that lay out plans
and laws for a perfect world, but we do not take that up hereand it would be a mistake to
associate either David Icke or our own work with thesetraditions.
5 For a much more detailed description, refer to David Ickes TheBiggest Secret and Children of
the Matrix .
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6 This theory is an example of how Icke combines variousnarrative strains under one
signification, theorizing that the Anunnaki come from the Dracostar system, with connotations,
therefore, of dragon, draconian law, and Count Dracula. As thisarticle will later explore, the
signification of Dracula is itself choice as vampires themselvesare historically associated with a
variety of malignant human/animal cross-breedings.
7 Before becoming a full-time alien conspiracy expert, Icke hadserved as a UK Green party
spokesperson.
8 For instance, Ickes own name tends to outsize and dominateeven his own book titles and
conference fliers, sending the message that it is thestar-status of his personality that is ultimately being sold morethan the infotainment he provides--which is wholly in line with thelogic of
Hollywood spectacle and is a marketing technique often used bythe movie-trailer industry to
generate audience share.
9 In his work, Icke also makes much use of the analysis of thenegative imagery of the owl,
which he describes as a Freemasonic emblem signifying arelationship to Babylonian
Aryan/reptoid cults. In conclusion, along with UFO groups thatposit that alien dolphinoids have
arrived on earth in order to save humanity, Icke commonly usesthe representation of the dolphin
as signifying cosmic peace and justice.
10 It should be pointed out that in his most recent work Ickecritiques the Christian and far-right,
thereby distancing himself from that association.
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References
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- https://documents.pub/document/loudspeakers-buying-guide.html
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- https://hard-agree.castos.com/episodes/dave-gibbons
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