We wouldn’t normally advise you to go anywhere near a YouTube video’s comment section, but humour us for a moment. Head over there and look up literally any pop video from the last five years. Bonus points if you go for something involving Rihanna or Beyonce. Amongst all the people exclaiming their undying love for the singers in question – or else the hipper-than-thou types exclaiming their undying distaste for this “manufactured” trash, you sheeple – you’ll find something much, much stranger. Rants that go on for thousands of words, talking about the anti-Christ, the new world order, and a lot of stuff about pyramids. Wait, was has this got to do with that one Jay-Z and Kanye song about Paris?
That, friends, is the work of the Illuminati. Or, rather, it’s people pointing out the work of the Illuminati. A shadowy group of powerful world leaders, businessmen and celebrities, this cabal are apparently the ones who control everything that happens in modern society. Sure, everything seems to happen organically (people being elected, natural disasters, the recession), but in fact ever major event that’s occurred in the world since the modern age has been down to these lot pulling the strings. At least, that’s what the conspiracy theorists tell us. And since when have they ever been wrong, eh? Except, well, all the times they have been.
Careful, though, because you dismiss claims of the Illuminati at your peril. Unlike some of the other more bonkers conspiracy theories we’ve heard in our time, there’s actually a fair amount of proof that this New World Order (or at least something like it) really does exist. And it’s not necessarily as anti-Semitic as some of these nutballs claim. Historical precedents, reliable witnesses, the existence of extraterrestrials…all of these play into our ten most compelling pieces of evidence that prove the Illuminati are real.
9. And Descendants Still Exist
The Bavarian Illuminati may have ceased to be as soon as Karl Theodor passed that royal decree in 1777, with many of the original members fleeing the country or else being exposed by the new laws, but that didn’t mean that confirmed secret societies of a similar nature stopped existing. Far from it, in fact. It’s just that some of their priorities got lost amongst people wishing to copy the clandestine movements of the original Illuminati, rather than upholding any of their goals. Between 1797 and 1798, Augustin Barruel’s Memoirs Illustrating The History Of Jacobinism and John Robison’s Proofs Of A Conspiracy tried to make out that the Bavarians still controlled things, being behind (amongst other things) the French Revolution. People got all excited and paranoid for a little while after, but soon calmed down when it turned out to be hogwash.
Several recent and present-day fraternal organisations claim to be descended from the original Bavarian Illuminati, however, and continue to operate to this day. One group which kept the Illuminati Order title was nothing more than a chance for secretive rich people to hang out and get drunk, and they retired the name after (apparently) 250 years thanks to negative associations with conspiracy theories and the like. Another group, that is actually in existence, falls more in line with the modern Illuminati we’ve all come to know and fear: they want to control the world, have us all share a common language and currency, control the population through mandatory birth control, and end taxes. Sounds like they’re worse than the bloomin’ EU, eh, eh.
8. People Have Been Talking About Them For Centuries
We doubt that the latter Order Of The Illuminati actually have all that much pull in modern society – if they did, you’d think they could afford a better web designer – but the fact that they’ve managed to survive so long is a testament to…well, something. As is the fact that the original Illuminati supposedly stopped existing sometime towards the end of the 18th century, and yet we’re still talking about them. In fact we’ve never really stopped talking about them, ever since the first group were exposed and everyone learned that conspiracy theories were sometimes actually true. Not only were the Bavarians blamed for the French Revolution but, throughout the centuries, a whole bunch of political changes, revolutions, scandals, and world events have been attributed to the Illuminati.
The Satanic sexual abuse panic of the seventies and eighties, the Battle Of Waterloo, the JFK assassination, the Red Scare in America (and specifically Hollywood) are all things that have been said to be the creation of the Illuminati, both from people looking back and particularly sharp individuals at the time. We get that there’s a lot of evidence that they don’t exist – and, really, they wouldn’t be much of a secret society if we’re talking about them this much – but the fact that the theories persisted for over three centuries at this point perhaps suggests that there’s something to this whole “New World Order” thing besides a bunch of lunatics writing stuff on YouTube videos. Why would we spend so long on something that isn’t real? Putting aside the Star Trek Wikipedia articles, anyway…
7. They’re All Over Pop Culture
Here’s another thing: we’ve been talking about the Illuminati for centuries, but we’ve spent even more time inserting them into our popular culture. The idea of the New World Order has provided plenty of fodder for books, films, TV shows and games over the years, from those Barruel and Robison tracts to the plot of Dan Brown’s Angels & Demons to a recurring characters in the Deus Ex titles. Robert Shea and Robert Anton Wilson even wrote a trilogy of novels called The Illuminatus! Trilogy in the late seventies, a cult classic (especially amongst hacker culture of the period) which weaved together a dense set of conspiracies and spiritual mumbo jumbo which, whilst mostly intended as satire, inspired a whole new generation of believers looking for clues of the Illuminati everywhere they went.
And it’s not like they have to look hard, since they really are everywhere. Besides the obvious references – the group themselves have shown up in the first Tomb Raider film, an episode of Gargoyles, Grand Theft Auto V, and the lyrics of an Immortal Technique song – little nods to the group’s iconography (such as the floating eye in the triangle above a pyramid) have appeared in Disney films, the kid’s TV show Gravity Falls, and are allegedly what Jay-Z’s trademark “diamond” hand gesture is supposed to symbolise. Something which has been imitated by wife Beyonce and proteges Kanye West and Rihanna. The latter of which is probably a load of bullhockey, but the aforementioned appearances of old triangle eye? Absolutely deliberate, and once you see them in one place, you start to see them in every single place you look. See? That’s the Illuminati controlling your thoughts! Sort of!
6. HG Wells Says So
HG Wells was a smart man. A science fiction author writing all the way back in Victorian times, he nonetheless managed to accurately predict the invention of nuclear weapons, the Moon landing, genetic engineering, and lasers. Then again he also thought we’d have had time travel capabilities and been invaded by Martians with a lethal aversion to the common cold by now, too, so we guess he wasn’t perfect. He managed to be on the money more often than Nostradamus, so we’re willing to give old Wellsy the benefit of the doubt. Which is also why we tend to give more credibility to his claims that there’s a secret society controlling all of existence from behind the scenes than, say, a fifteen year old writing illegibly about the brainwashing powers of the Big Bang Theory on his Tumblr.
Back in the day, the New World Order was a nice, fun term for a return to a balanced power and new ways of political thinking after the two world wars. Wells decided to re-appropriate the phrase and used it to describe the establishment of a technocratic world state and planned economy in his homonymous book which he hoped would bring about such a revolution of the state of the globe, with his plans catching on in some Socialist circles. Unfortunately Wells didn’t have the proper time to commit to his plan of radically changing the world by starting up a shadowy behind-the-scenes cabal with a bunch of his influential mates, but it’s further proof that people have taken the idea seriously in the past. And since Wells prefigured so many future developments by a good few decades, wouldn’t now be right around the time that actual New World Order should be taking place…?
5. Pyramids Are Everywhere
Not only do symbols of the Illuminati permeate through into our pop culture, but they’re all around is on our everyday lives, too. That all-seeing eye we keep mentioning, the one that likes floating above pyramids and looking menacing? That thing appears in sculptures, frescos and furnishings across the globe (especially in churches and cathedrals), and even appears in a bass relief on the front of the Philadelphia mint. The all-seeing eye definitely lives up to its name. And that’s before you start looking deeper into the alleged “mythology” of the Illuminati and become familiar with all the other symbols and iconography that have become synonymous with the New World Order, depending on whether or not you believe they may also be paving the way for the coming of the anti-Christ.
If you do, then you’re in luck! Or, well, you’re not, because that just provides even more proof that the Illuminati are all around us, controlling everything. How about that classically Satanic symbol of the pentagram? Again, it appears in lots of buildings across the world (a lot of churches also, surprisingly), the US Army Congressional Medal Of Honour, various other foreign medals and coats of arms, and oh yeah – the Pentagon. It’s a pentagram! Washington’s particularly susceptible to Illuminati influence and so, apparently, is its environs. We’re not sure why the New World Order would place clues as to their existence and whereabouts, but never mind that: the Washington monument is clearly an example of the obelisks the group use to mark their territory in places of power, since they also appear in London, Rome, Helsinki and, erm, Minsk. So that’s not just a place in Friends, huh?
4. Cash Rules Everything Around Us
Things started getting a little wacky and open to interpretation there but, we assure you, this is a piece of evidence that you can’t possibly deny. Because, if you’re reading this in America, there’s a good chance you’re carrying it about with you in your pocket at this very moment! The standard US dollar bill includes, amongst other things, an illustration of that most pervasive and insidious of Illuminati symbols: the all-seeing eye and the pyramid. It’s right there, hidden in plain sight! Honestly, it’s like they’re not even trying to be a secret society. Of course the pyramid could just be hearkening to another great human achievement and the eye might just be the eye of god, but hush, we’re in too deep to turn back now.
So what does it all mean? Well, that the Freemasons were involved in the creation of modern America (which is actually true) and that they decided to place a little shout-out to themselves on their currency. Which is fair enough. We like little in-jokes like that. But then you consider the theory that the Freemasons are actually a front for a much more secretive and controlling group like the Illuminati, and it all becomes a little less fun. If you give it a try, you can find even more evidence of the New World Order’s control over the federal reserve on the dollar bill: there’s a hidden pentagram amongst the pyramid/eye thing, which takes in the text surrounding it and spells out A S M O N clockwise. An anagram of mason, see? Wait, where are you going? Okay, let’s quit messing around and get down to brass tacks.
3. The Round Table
So, the Bavarian Illuminati that started this whole sorry mess were definitely a real, confirmed historical truth. As was HG Well’s half-hearted attempted to get a similar attempt at a New World Order off the ground not long after the Second World War. Between those two and now, however, we haven’t got much concrete evidence that a secret society that was influencing world events from behind the scenes actually existed, or that any group with the Illuminati name and any real intentions besides making bad websites and getting smashed was operating, either. Well, hold onto your butts, because we totally do have proof that that thing existed! The ones controlling stuff from behind the scenes, we mean. We guess they could’ve been getting drunk as well, from time to time. Gotta unwind somehow after a long day of influencing governments.
They probably didn’t have a website, mind, since they got started at the turn of the 20th century. South African diamond baron Cecil Rhodes expressed an interest in setting up a secret society that would bring the United States back under British rule, reforming itself into an “Imperial Federation” to bring about a hyperpower and lasting world peace. This so-called Society Of The Elect is said to have existed behind a documented group called the Round Table movement, an association of organisations promoting closer union between Britain and its self-governing colonies lead by professor Lionel Curtis. Which obviously never happened but, look: here’s an actual, provable example of a bunch of rich dudes looking to bring together a one-world government in order to change global politics, which happened in secret. Sort of. That’s an Illuminati if we’ve ever seen one.
2. Aliens
And if that doesn’t convince you, we’re just gonna go all in with the aliens theory. We’ve already provided you with some pretty compelling evidence that not only do extraterrestrials exist, but they’ve almost certainly visited Earth before, and now we’re going to explain exactly why they dropped by in the first place. And we’re going to try and do it without sounding too much like David Icke, former sports presenter-turned-Second Messiah-turned-conspiracy theorist who claims all politicians and monarchies are actually seven-foot tall, shape shifting space lizards who feed on the blood of humans and are probably also paedophiles, because apparently being a seven-foot tall, shape shifting, bloodthirsty space lizard isn’t enough to mark you as a monster in the eyes of David Icke.
Slightly more convincing is the dovetailing of the New World Order conspiracy theories with existing ones to do with UFOs. You know the sort, Area 51 and Men In Black and government cover-ups. Why should the government be so interested in hiding their dealings with close encounters? It’s something that you can’t really answer, unless you maybe believe that aliens are in control of the world (or are else in cahoots with the ruling elite) and are slowly building to a full-scale invasion of Earth from the inside, taking control of all the major powers and then using this control to exert their will over humanity! To, er, work in acid mines or be eaten by them or just be evicted from our planet because they like the look of it, we suppose. Don’t blame us, we voted for Kodos. Look, it’s still better than reading the Protocols Of The Elders Of Zion and believing that the Illuminati is a Jewish conspiracy to rule the world.
1. Celebrities Do Kinda Rule The World
Okay, so we’re going to get a little more real with you now. More real than seven-foot tall, shape shifting space lizards who feed on the blood of humans and are probably also paedophiles? Yes, we’ll manage it somehow. Over the years the Illuminati have stood in for any number of cultural bogeymen from (sigh, yes) Jewish people to expanding government powers to the free market economy to aliens. Whilst there’s been a kernel of truth to at least some theories about a New World Order – and some confirmed examples of them existing in various forms, too – the most compelling piece of evidence may be happening right now.
Because right now, the most common targets for accusations of being members of the Illuminati and spreading their message are celebrities. There’s all the pop and rap stars we’ve already been through, but plenty of other big name public figures have been said to be part of the shadowy group that’s controlling the world, the puppet masters to our poor, naïve marionettes: TV presenters, Hollywood actors, celebrity chefs. You name them, there’s probably a place for them in the vast networked conspiracy of those that control our every move and affect the chance they want to see in the world.
And you know what? That’s something you can’t actually deny. TV stars frequently use their celebrity to campaign for presidential candidates, and spread their political views to a prime time audience. Hollywood actors become part of NATO peace envoys and visit over countries, hoping to change things. Celebrity endorsements will try and convince you into everything from who you vote for to what shampoo you use. Whether or not they’re part of a secret society like the Illuminati, there’s no denying that famous people do sort of have control of our minds. Which is terrifying even without the pyramids and stuff.
By Tom Baker, WhatCulture
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