Happy Birthday, Illuminati!

That's right, kids -- the Illuminati was theoretically established 234 years ago today by that wacky Bavarian Adam Weishaupt.

There are two main points of view floating in the realm of esoteric/conspiracy lore regarding the Illuminati & Weishaupt's goals.

#1: The Illuminati sought/seeks to enlighten humankind through the encouragement of rational thought and breaking the chains of religious superstition. Their ultimate goal is the liberation, unification and continual evolvement of humanity.

#2 The Illuminati sought/seeks to destroy the Church and break down the traditional structure of society by a series of covert terrorist/subliminal acts. Their ultimate goal is the abolishment of religion and the installation of a totalitarian New World Order run by elites.

The bulk of the conspiracy theories out there rely on one of these two viewpoints. Whether one believes Weishaupt to be a saint or a satan depends on which "side" one's on. Similarly, something like the song "Imagine" can either be seen as an anthem for world peace or a dangerous call for an atheistic one-world government...or a figure like Mr. Rogers being regarded as a benevolent kiddie TV host or an "evil man" who "destroyed an entire generation."

Mr. Rogers: Illuminati operative? Master of the world? Commie?

We at the Daily 23 adopt a third point of view (if that is indeed possible and not just a self-righteous deluded masturbatory pipe dream on our part), a skepti-believey point of view, a wishy-washy point of view, a "we'll take it as it comes" point of view. As the great Robert Anton Wilson remarked in the Illuminatus! Trilogy: "only the madman is absolutely sure."

To us, the point isn't whether or not Mr. Rogers was an evil man. It's that a conspiracy theory claiming that Mr. Rogers is in the employ of the Antichrist is not only as funny as hell, not only momentarily alleviates the drudgery of our day with a thimble-full of intriguing effluvia, but pushes the boundaries of our accepted reality just enough slight-of-center to make the whole fact of existence an exciting and mysterious adventure. No, ICP's awe of magnets are not enough for us. We want Jesus showing up on Google Maps, we want secret codes embedded in our Spongebob Squarepants. And bent spoons, bent with good ol' fashioned MIND POWER, baby!!!

Why do we want these things? Why are we so interested in the tales of the Illuminati? What business is it of ours?

Maybe part of it is knowing that whether or not the big conspiracy meta-theories are true -- the massive world-wide cover-ups, cabals, and plans for world domination -- a thousand smaller conspiracies happen every day. The pharmacological giant who knew their drug could maim or kill but put it on the market anyway, suppressing the data. The major TV network who killed an investigative story so as not to piss off a big corporation. The church that purposely covered-up the massive sex scandals within its midst, reassigning pedophile priests to brand-new areas in which to defile youth. These are not the fever-dreams of a crazed conspiratologist, the ramblings of a rabid anti-Mason, the drug-addled hallucinations of a "gonzo" journalist. These are our headlines.

Where was I?

Oh, happy birthday Illuminati! Thanks for 234 years of intriguing (if sometimes utterly batshit)theories and keeping Lady Gaga music videos interesting

Lady Gaga minus Illuminati references = only Ke$ha or maybe one of the Spice Girls