I have noted for some time the inauthentic nature of many of the so-called movements and causes we see today. Unnaturally borne. Poorly thought out and, to me at least, so plainly manufactured. Inorganic I have called them, wondering why people are so easily persuaded and convinced.

We find ourselves today in the midst of a bedeviled herd of sheep, their madness manifesting itself in multiple ways: the neuroses of wearing masks, hysteria over a ‘pandemic’ which has a survivability rate of almost 99.99%, seeing ‘racism’ or ‘white supremacy’ everywhere one looks, the deification of a political actor or party – on both sides.  It is the same mob mentality that screams “democracy” without knowing what it even means. It is a mindset that unwittingly worships the chains of its own enslavement.

George Will once said, “The only thing that never changes is the avant-garde.” Amen. There is nothing truly new under the sun. Ego loves a cause, and perhaps there have been do-gooders since the world began. The problem is that the do-gooders will create the very conditions necessary to fulfill their righteous vision. It is actually kind of backwards, perverse even. Said another way, they will create the very problems they propose to solve. This is their raison d’etre, and they cannot help themselves.

T.S. Eliot said it this way: “Half the harm that is done in this world is due to people who want to feel important. They don’t mean to do harm – but the harm does not interest them. Or they do not see it, or they justify it because they are absorbed in the endless struggle to think well of themselves.”

The need to feel important is a powerful motivator, and few ever realize that they are often only pawns in a larger game. A game whose agenda is very different than what they believe it to be. Even after learning the truth, most still stay the course, so ingrained has their cause become with their own sense of self.

The reason for this post is that after many months I recently learned what “astroturfing” is. Although I had heard the expression many times I had never stopped to look it up. The definition follows.

Definition of astroturfing
: organized activity that is intended to create a false impression of a widespread, spontaneously arising, grassroots movement in support of or in opposition to something (such as a political policy) but that is in reality initiated and controlled by a concealed group or organization (such as a corporation)

• Classic astroturfing is the practice of disguising an orchestrated campaign as a spontaneous upwelling of public opinion. … The term itself appears to have been coined in 1985 by then Texas Senator Lloyd Bentsen, who noted that the mountains of letters he received about legislation on insurance originated with insurers.
— New Scientist, 10 Feb. 2007

• The modern form of astroturfing uses the Internet, and corporations, religious groups with a social agenda, and public interest groups can flood an in-box in an hour with e-mails that may come from a single source using many accounts.
— Alan Boraas, Anchorage Daily News, 4 Apr. 2009

Astroturfing | Definition of Astroturfing by Merriam-Webster