Posts Tagged ‘Ken O’Keefe’

Assessing Ken O’Keefe’s World Citizen Solution as at October 2019

Posted: 10/07/2019 by editormary in Activists and Activism, Ken O'Keefe
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Written by Mary Rizzo, long-time Ken-skeptic, and only cheated out of money for the “Ferry to Gaza” that never saw the light of day.

It’s been over three and a half years since Ken O’Keefe announced (and started asking for money) the World Citizen Solution. In the meantime, he’s often announced he’d actually announce what this whole Solution actually was, but all he’s pretty much come up with was that he paid a lawyer a lot of other people’s money to look into the solution, the time of which to properly announce has not yet arrived.

He must have over-estimated his followers’ patience, because he’s been dumped by almost all of his supporters and those involved in the “solution” and even been dumped by many of those who promoted him, allowing him to gain more followers, and most importantly, get a lot of donors, using their “reputations” in the “alternative news”, anarcho-capitalist “investment”, “truther” and conspiracy theorist movements (such as David Icke and those whose income were derived from association with him).

He bitterly fights (or insults or blocks) whoever has actually questioned him, but the one thing they’ll never get from him is ACCOUNTABILITY.

Well, if Ken won’t come up with the goods, somebody better. It’s time for some research, and since his former followers are laying low, I guess that means I’ll do some digging.

I’ve searched for anything I could find about the World Citizen Solution in the past six months. I’ve come up with almost nothing.

Almost.

Then, it hit me, clear as the light of the new day. I suppose people weren’t paying attention. It was there in front of their eye(s) all the time.

Now, before I get ahead of myself, I have to make a premise. In the beginning, Ken was about ecology. He was about burning passports. Then he was about anti-war. Then he was about Palestine. Then he was about Banksters. Then he had some spiritual-ish place in a tropical island decorated by his girlfriend. Then he was about TSA. Then he was about going to Thailand and doing who knows what and being arrested for not updating his visa, which is required by every foreigner who is prolonging their presence in the country. Almost all of these campaigns had him asking people to give him money so that he could do these things and make videos about them. He claimed again and again that he was risking his life, that people were trying to kill him. Wait… he actually said he DID die and that he came back to life, so the Ken we are seeing has also been resurrected from the dead. Usually that brings an epiphany, when people have near death experiences, it makes them want to make peace with the universe and since he is a believer in God, the common response is to live life to the fullest, but also to make amends with those he may have hurt (or cheated). But rather than just answer all of his donors when they asked either if they could have their money back or know EXACTLY how it was spent, he spewed more nastiness at them and did it from a tropical swimming pool (again, those tropical zones!) where he repeatedly said that he was fearing “they” would kill him. (Well, his donors were angry, but he doesn’t mean them. He means the PTB (“Powers That Be”). It seems that currently he’s living a nomadic life of being the guest at the homes of his followers in many different countries. Apparently, he has ZERO interest in revealing either what the money was spent on (other than generic “expenses” and the famous report from the famous lawyer), so people…. It’s no use to keep asking. You are not going to get an answer NOR are you going to get your money back. EVER. End of. You should  have listened to our warnings years ago.

But, if you look through the evolution of Ken over the years, you find that there are some strange things, and I’m going to put on my tin hat right now and tell you that he might even be “one of them”! An Operative or an Infiltrate into all of your movements.

Ken joins movements (that already exist), gives them a twist where he assumes a sort of “leadership” role, while at the same time, stressing that it’s a true movement of a HUGE group of people. He doesn’t abide anyone shifting him out of leadership position, though. Once he’s pretty much gotten what he could out of the movement (or some within it have grown wise to him) he shifts to another movement. He completely dominates in the same way whatever it is that the movement is doing/discussing and challenged anyone else in it for the leadership of it. He’s not got his heart in all of it, probably, he wasn’t the Star of a White Nationalism and Guns convention (Free your Minds) in some American backwoods, nor was he the key draw in the Alt Guru event called, with incredibly originality, “Open Minds” and, sad to say, he didn’t outshine turbo-libertarian Jeff Berwick or right-wing Milo Yiannopoulos in the Anarcho-Capitalist conference held in a five-star hotel in Mexico, but he does enjoy the limelight and the special perks of these events and caters whatever his speech is to the feelings of those attending, because all of them have wallets and all of them can recruit other people to following Ken. Following his trajectory, you can see how, in 12 easy steps, he went from the One State Solution to the World Citizen Solution, losing almost all the original followers and requiring him to start a new group of them each and every time. Aloha indeed.

The strange thing, though, is that most of the movements he enjoys the greatest popularity in can be considered along the “conspiracy theory” spectrum. If you look at this video, where he talks about finance, you can see it was picked up because of one of the lines he says as a message to his followers (who discuss whether it’s the Freemasons, Illuminati, Jesuits or Reptilians who control the world, though lately, he’s added Jews, feeling emboldened by the zeitgeist).

KOK is it the illuminati

 

Clearly, these are the discussions of those who follow him. So, it would stand to reason that he’d KNOW that they were very tuned-in to the related symbolism. He’d HAVE to be, right? He’d have to just KNOW you would not put this picture of yourself up as the symbol of your campaigns on one of the sites you use to ask for money, because it would be a red flag to whoever is donating to you.

KOK illuminati

 

Then, let’s look at the campaign, the one that probably spelled the definitive downfall of Ken as the (One) World (!!!) Citizen (Final) Solution. Here it is, with the money collected ONLY through the Indiegogo site of that campaign. This site does not include any other way that money was donated to it. So, raised by Ken’s followers and paid exclusively to Ken from this one means of collection was $113, 470. Not a huge amount, but certainly, a lot of money that was going to something people believed in and wanted answers concerning how their donations would specifically stop the perpetual cycle of war.

kok money

Yes, that was what the purpose of WCS was, at least, that was the one in black on white. It might be hard to do much of ANYTHING with a shiny silver coin that has no value as currency, but maybe in time will become some hot little collector’s item.

 

But wait… the coin was just one of the perks. There were others, including a t-shirt. Let’s see how that got distributed:

KOK sticker

JJ Alexander, a donor (only donors could comment) as recently as three months ago (that is, three years and three months after he donated) said that he felt Ken scammed them. JJ got the sticker, BUT NO SHIRT! Oh, and where are the other actions he promised, while we are at it?

KOK shirt no

I believe it’s reasonable to say that everyone can stop waiting for the solution Ken will give you (with money he asks for to do it) to end the perpetual cycle of war, you can probably also stop waiting for the T-shirt promoting him and “his Solution”.

At this point, I feel it is safe to say that the World Citizen Solution, the source of disappointment to so many believers has revealed itself as being nothing more than a sticker. People who donated (maybe not even all of them, but at least most of them) have something to stick on their luggage, when they go to tropical islands and exotic places, or to five-star hotels and retreats in Bali.

You got a sticker. Hope the glue at least does what you expect it to.

KOK sticker 2

 

Ken O’Keefe in the missionary position

Posted: 06/07/2016 by editormary in Activists and Activism, Uncategorized
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In the never-ending saga that is “how much money is Ken O’Keefe asking for today and where did it go?” this blog presents yet another chapter. As anyone who regularly follows this blog knows, Ken O’Keefe is really good at one thing especially, asking other people to financially support him. We’ve simply stopped counting the amount of times he’s opened some kind of Indiegogo or other online form of begging, because there are so many of them. There was Trade for Aid, Tahrir for Gaza, Ferry to Gaza, Aloha Palestine, the Samouni Project, the Gaza Ten and many more, most of them can only be defined as a flop, though the money was sent. However, while one is happy to (and should) give what they can to help the unfortunate, the poor, the victims of oppression and war, which is at least the subterfuge used in some of the “charity” campaigns, one probably should have a little less willingness to “shell out” (Ken’s own words – see photo below – when he started asking for donations/investments for the failed David Icke project he was part of, The People’s Voice, which some refer to as a two million dollar scam) when they don’t know what the money is used for. Obviously, Ken gives them an idea… it’s for the “mission” and as a missionary, he claims that he needs the money to pay his bills, because they won’t get paid by themselves (never mind finding a JOB or actually working!) He considers what he does highly valuable, actually, calls it an investment, and that he makes no bones about his right to also get people’s money for it. Quite clearly, for Ken, Charity, as they say, begins at home.

kek

But, this time, differently from TPV, the project isn’t clear, and he doesn’t really talk about paying the bills, he’s put forward that he’s going to absolutely save the world with what is referred to (in the most amazing misuse of hashtags in the history of the punctuation) as a #solutionary #speech #visionary #artist #worldcitizensolutions #kenokeefe #inspiring #microcosm #macrocosm #bethechange #gamechanger #movershaker #dreambeliever #infinitecreator #standup #stopfundingwar #endwarcrimes #startpeace #samanthabachman #sachastone. You get the idea… it’s the stuff dreams are made of! It’s about peace! It’s about change! It’s a GAME CHANGER of both the macrocosm and the microcosm. Make no mistake.

But why in the world does the game always remain the same! When our great missionary went “on the road” to the dreaded USA to promote himself, as we documented in the post: Would you Like some Cheese with that Whine, Ken?, during the time that the plans for this great and amazing “World Citizen Solution” were supposed to be unveiled to the waiting masses who shelled out (his words!) despite the promise that he would put most of it into his salary, that he’d tell them as soon as the goal was reached just what they were throwing money at, and work would start at the creation of videos talking about the plan. They would have to be patient, they’d have to TRUST HIM because HE is the man with the plan.

kok sopHis tour brought about some new fruit, such as his new relationship, announced as any love-struck teen does on facebook, with the (very) young lady in the photo. Thank goodness for his wife, to have already been relieved of the role as “Mother” in the defunct Aloha Palestine C.I.C. (yes, that’s the role she is registered as in the Companies House), because it could get sloppy, as much as a “come to yer uncle” picture hints at.

But, one’s personal affairs are their own business and in no way should doing selfies with a woman half one’s age be seen as beneath heroic status. It’s all love. What instead DOES seem strange is that in the past few days, one of the supporters claimed that he was worried about the disappearance of Ken, because Ken (always the drama queen) insists that his very life is in danger and that people want to kill him. Evidently, he doesn’t think that anyone who has sent him MORE money and was again let down would do anything but hang a lei around his holy head, no… nobody’s running with a pitchfork in their hands… they shelled out because he asked them to. His murderers are all “the Powers that be” because he’s just SO on to their game. No one before him EVER said that the government lies to people and that bankers run the world and that taxes finance wars! Well, anyway, he thinks no one else ever said these things before he did, and his fans see this all as so illuminating. He had HIS deadlines for the plan to be financed, but now that he’s got the money, he doesn’t think he owes anyone any answers. And that is exactly how he reacted to the question of his whereabouts.

The typical knee-jerk claim that he’s laying low, his plan is being worked on and that NO ONE should question him because he is simply so important and what he is doing is so movershaker and so he should be TRUSTED, no questions asked, and none tolerated either in his typical passive-aggressive approach. And how did people react? Did they say, “actually, Ken, trust is good but you made a promise”. No. They back up his excuses for suckers. Ken is a good man, he is telling it always like it is so honest by default, brother Ken should not be questioned, and the classic to beat all classics, “those who attack him are paid shills”. Far as anyone could see, there were no attacks, there were simple questions, coated in layers of esteem and support. The only one PAID and quite copiously, is KEN HIMSELF. He’s the one that has other people’s money in HIS bank. He’s the one whose bills are being paid, who gets to go to restaurants instead of making do with whatever one can scrape together for dinner on little or no money. There are dozens of photos others have put up of his comfy lifestyle. It might not be in the nice townhouse in London (I guess the “Mother” of the company he closed gets that since she does have to raise two small kids alone), but it’s got fancy hotels with gorgeous sheets and wi-fi.kok sop2

“Make no mistake”, “Bank on it”… Ken is going to censor anyone who questions him, as he did the comments actually asking where Ken had been and what this famous plan that has already been financed is. Comments eliminated, the mobbing of the one asking questions commenced. All in a missionary’s work.

Would you like some cheese with that Whine, Ken?

Posted: 02/24/2016 by editormary in Activists and Activism, Internet and Communication, Rant / Musings / Discussion
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Ken showing just some of the skin decoration he has. Of coure tattoos are invasive and of course they are not always safe, but health issues don't need to be consistent. Please note the T Shirt advertising his "investment" that raised money for Gaza, but vanished into the thin air.. anyone ever see the Ferry to Gaza? Any donors get their money back? I thought not.

Ken showing just some of the skin decoration he has. Of course tattoos are invasive and of course they are not always safe, but health issues don’t need to be consistent. Please note the T Shirt advertising his “investment” that raised money for Gaza, but vanished into the thin air.. anyone ever see the Ferry to Gaza? Any donors (cough cough, I meant INVESTORS) get their money back? I thought not.

Ken O’Keefe is a man who don’t take no one telling him what to do! After arriving in a country he hates (the USA) in order to participate in a conference in Mexico and do local talks in the LA area, he found out that at LAX there are mandatory whole body scans when one boards a flight. The full body scans have been the source of a lot of controversy, mainly due to privacy issues, but his issue with them is that they put stuff in his body – and he doesn’t want that. Yes. The guy who subjected his body to injections of ink in almost every visible part is freaking out (this is putting it lightly) about having to be like everyone else and submit to the waves that pass through his body to produce the image adopted for assessing concealed items on passengers, devised for security purposes and to substitute in most cases the metal detector and the full pat-down.

But, let’s reflect upon a few claims Ken makes in his Tourettes-inspired video. Exhibiting his unique ability to put “the F word” in all possible contexts, his coprolalia is meant to impress, since it is going to be “broadcast” and is supposed to make him look like a tough guy who takes no shit, but instead just makes him look like he’s having an awfully hard time keeping the histrionics out of his discourse, as usual. And again, as usual, he burnishes his “hero” persona in front of his outstretched arm and uses it to define the rest of the argument. Although, every time he paints himself as a hero, he goes into an incredibly annoying and undignified whine that sounds like he’s laying the victim thing on strong.

According to Ken, he is followed everywhere he goes by airport security, (as if suggesting he is on a no-fly list). It’s clear he isn’t on a no-fly list, because he would have flown out of LAX if only he spent his 15 seconds, (like the common passenger and the celebrity alike) is required to do simply by going through the scan box. He insists he opted out, subjecting himself (as he admits in his own colourful way) to a truly invasive and time-consuming and possibly humiliating full pat-down, but STILL, since he was on some special list, has to go through the scan and (dammit!) he shouldn’t have to do anything he doesn’t want to do! What is this special list he talks about?

Ken obtaining the "Key to Gaza" along with the symbolic passport. If you don't want to be seen as having any connection with someone in charge of what the US considers an FTO, you don't take your picture with them. Or else, you stop acting surprised that "they know" and have you on a "list".

Ken obtaining the “Key to Gaza” along with the symbolic passport. If you don’t want to be seen as having any connection with someone in charge of what the US considers an FTO, you don’t take your picture with them. Or else, you stop acting surprised that “they know” and have you on a “list”.

According to Ken, given that he was on the Mavi Marmara that was attacked by Israeli commandos as it was heading a flotilla to Gaza, he has been classified by Israel as “Terrorist operative of Hamas”. No one is denying the insanity of Israel to define anyone they want to as a terrorist operative, but let’s look at facts: in 2008 Ken O’Keefe entered Gaza on one of the boats of the Free Gaza Movement, and every passenger on those boats was granted an “honorary Palestinian passport” and was welcomed by the party that was governing Gaza, i.e., Hamas, and photographed next to Haniyeh. Ken of course should KNOW that in the USA Hamas is still on the FTO list (Foreign Terrorist Organisations). If someone met with a Hamas leader, that doesn’t even mean affiliation, much less being part of the group, but it certainly is going to be noted by immigration for a person who boasts about it as much as Ken O’Keefe does, and that means that he’s going to probably have to go through a body scan if he wants to travel in an airport where they are mandatory! No one arrested Ken, they merely informed him that he had to go through what 99% of the travellers at that airport go through on any given day, and if he didn’t have a choice to opt out, he simply would not be allowed to board the plane, probably on someone else’s dime anyway!! Cuz that’s how Ken ROLLS!

What is unusual, of course, is his that his protesting being subjected the scan has  nothing to do with privacy but with the refusal that his body be subjected to the waves produced by the scanner. It’s a health issue, as well as being forced to do something he doesn’t want, which is a Mommy issue. Many millions of people who actually DO have health issues wilfully and gladly subject themselves to these imaging devices for much longer periods of time in order to diagnose situations within their body. The safety of the devices of course can be an issue for someone, why not? But it’s merely comical coming from the illustrated man! We all KNOW how safe tattoos are, don’t we? He drags into his victim spiel also the “sons and daughters” of America who served as soldiers overseas, like he did. It could very well be that Marines have been used as subjects (without their knowledge) in coercive chemical/biological tests, but frankly, what’s that actually got to do with his actual complaint about the body scan and why does he start in on vaccines in the midst of this rant? It’s as if he’s just so MAD, he’s complaining about everything that pops into his head. Soon we might be hearing he had too many lumps in his oatmeal as a child, because KEN FORGETS NOTHING AND KEN FORGIVES NOTHING!

But one little thing to be clear on is that Ken has a strange sense of entitlement. He claims to be a Palestinian, which is untrue. Just because he has a diplomatic passport given to him in 2008, it turns out it is purely symbolic and does not confer citizenship rights or even travel rights. As Amira Hass points out:

Some of the participants were evidently unaware of the fact that there is no such thing as “Palestinian citizenship,” since there is no Palestinian state, and that receipt of a Palestinian passport would therefore not confer such citizenship. Nor would such a document actually allow its holder to enter the West Bank or Gaza, since Israel, the occupying power, still determines who is permitted to become a “new” resident of these areas.

Hamas granted “diplomatic passports” to participants of the first three flotillas to Gaza, in the summer of 2008, but the holders later discovered the documents had no value beyond the symbolic. Three years ago, the PA issued a Palestinian passport to Israeli conductor and pianist Daniel Barenboim as a gesture of appreciation, but this document, too, had only symbolic value.

So, Ken has a habit of stretching the truth a little bit and whining a whole lot. If he were truly Palestinian, he might not feel so damned entitled all the time, as if anyone daring to question him or make him go through clearance does it as a personal issue, all against him. Right or wrong, Ken feels so privileged he doesn’t bother to empathise with the millions who are subjected to daily checkpoints in their own country and in violation of their human rights… it’s all about HIM! Good thing for him he has a lot of people who don’t bother to fact check, don’t get irritated by his unbridled western white male privilege nor do they use some critical thinking whenever hearing his long-winded complaints and his “telling it like it is”. As long as he has his loyal following who believe he is going to “stop the endless cycle of war” by paying him to do so, “he’s good”!