Georgia Guidestones

The Georgia Guidestones were a granite monument created in 1980 in Elberton, Georgia, and demolished following vandalism via explosives in 2022.Georgia Guidestones monument is destroyed after explosion: The monument, dubbed "America's Stonehenge," was demolished after an explosive device was detonated at the site, authorities said. by Tim Stelloh (July 6, 2022, 11:39 PM PDT / Updated July 7, 2022, 1:00 AM PDT) NBC News. The monument consisted of four astronomically-aligned granite slabs, surrounding a central column, and topped by a capstone. Written on the four slabs were ten "guiding thoughts" left by the monument's anonymous sponsors. The monument was ordered by a pseudonymous Robert C. Christian, representing "a small group of loyal Americans",American Stonehenge: Monumental Instructions for the Post-Apocalypse by Randall Sullivan (Apr 20, 2009 12:00 PM) Wired. who referred to themselves only as "a small group of Americans who seek the age of reason" (referring to Thomas Paine's book on the Age of Enlightenment, The Age of Reason[https://www.ushistory.org/Paine/reason/ Age of Reason by Thomas Paine (1790s) UShisory.org.).
Despite being designed to withstand most catastrophic events, the stones could not withstand the wrath of an irate conspiracy nut's bomb in 2022.
==Inscriptions==
On each side of each of the four vertical slabs was an inscription of the ten "thoughts" in a different language, for a total of eight translations. Clockwise, from the northern stone, the languages were English, Spanish, Swahili, Hindi, Hebrew, Arabic, Chinese, and Russian.
The "guiding thoughts" were as follows:
From the information available on Robert C. Christian, one could surmise that he was a deist:
*He told the Guidestones' principle builder, John H. Fendley, Sr., that he represented "a small group of loyal Americans who believe in God.""Let These Be Guidestones To an Age of Reason" When Man Reawakens Let Him Behold… The Georgia Guidestones (1981) Elbert Granite Finishing Co.
*He acknowledged Thomas Paine, a deist.
*He did not include text specific to any religion.
*He appealed to reason as a guiding principle.
==Crank bonanza==
Some conspiracy theorists (namely Alex Jones, who covers it in his movies) and miscellaneous religious folk demanded that the Guidestones be taken down, claiming that they were the blueprints for the New World Order. Because helping to cover up the warning of the impending NWO takeover would certainly stop the NWO (?). (Alas, these nutjobs finally got their wish after 40+ years of trying.) To be fair, the monument was kind of strange, but strange ≠ NWO conspiracy.
Van Smith is supposedly a "computer benchmarking expert, computer industry analyst and physicist".#1159: Van Smith (September 21, 2014) Encyclopedia of American Loons.Van Smith Van's Hardware Journal. Smith is also an Arkansas Christian convinced that the Guidestones expressed totalitarian messages and intentionally foreshadowed the arrival of the Islamic Mahdi as an Antichrist figure. He also believed the Georgia Guidestones were linked through encoded numerological information to the Burj Khalifa, the tallest building in the world, which he viewed as a new Tower of Babel.Researcher Van Smith Exposes New Data on "America's Stonehenge," and Its Relevance to Current Worldwide Activities and Waiting for the End of the World: Georgia's 30-year Stone Mystery and A Georgia Guidestones Update
Similarly, conservative Christian conspiracy theorist Mark Dice mentioned the Georgia Guidestones in his 2005 book The Resistance Manifesto and argued for their destruction. He believes the Rosicrucian society — an alleged European "Satanic" Gnostic society originating in the 1600s — were responsible for the Georgia Guidestones, and that their aims were to leak these Satanic ideas written on the Guidestones into mainstream society.The Guidestones of Georgia: Conspiracy Theories Abound by Joelle Rock (May 7, 2008) Yahoo (archived from July 29, 2014).. Dice also claimed that the "author" of the Georgia Guidestones text openly admitted to being a representative of the New World Order.Man Behind the Georgia Guidestones Speaks Out by Mark Dice (Nov 6, 2012) Youtube.
The main source of contention is with the first guiding thought. While most people at a fourth grade reading level know the word "maintain" doesn't mean the same as "cull", the NWO faithful claim it's a sure sign of their intent to kill 80 percent of the world's population. Because it's not likelier that the number chosen is just arbitrary — you know, like in much poetry and on much random art? Because it's far more likely that the entire monument was just one big, intentional surface-to-crank information missile, sent straight from the puppet masters.
In 2008, the Guidestones were vandalized by conspiracy theorists, who splattered it with polyurethane and painted on messages that read, among other things, "Jesus Will Prevail", "9/11 Inside Job", "Obama Iz a Muslim", "Fuck the NWO", "Skull and Bones Sucs Dick" and "The Elite Want 80% of Us Dead".Sullivan, Randall. "American Stonehenge: Monumental Instructions for the Post-Apocalypse." Wired, April 20, 2009.Georgia Guidestones Vandalized (December 12, 2008) Prison Planet (archived from March 9, 2017).
In early 2022, fringe GOP primary candidate for Governor of Georgia Kandiss Taylor made the demolishing of the Georgia Guidestones a foundational plank of her campaign, including it in her list of 10 Executive Orders she intended to pass as soon as she was electedSommer, Will. "Georgia Guv Candidate Builds Campaign on Demolition of ‘Satanic’ Tablets." The Daily Beast, May 13, 2022. (alongside banning furries from Georgia schools). Unfortunately for her, Taylor ended up finishing a distant third behind incumbent Brian Kemp and Trump-backed David Purdue, earning only 41,027 (3.4%) votes. Petrizzo, Zachary. "She Lost the GA Guv Race by 70 Points. She Still Won’t Concede." The Daily Beast, May 27,2022.
In July 2022, someone managed to destroy at least one of the four slabs using an explosive.Moore, Stephanie. "Part of Georgia Guidestones damaged by explosion, GBI says." WYFF4, July 6, 2022. Witnesses reported hearing an explosion or loud noise of some sort at approximately 4 AM local time, and aerial footage has shown one of the slabs reduced to rubble. The monument was subsequently demolished by authorities for "safety reasons".BBC "Georgia Guidestones: 'America's Stonehenge' demolished after blast" Memes of Trump blowing up the Guidestones appeared days and weeks before they were actually destroyed.Images of Trump bombing Georgia Guidestones spread on Truth Social weeks before they were destroyed by Mikael Thalen (Jul 7, 2022) Daily Dot.
==Identity of Robert C. Christian==
The true identity of "Robert C. Christian" — the anonymous head of the supposed like-minded individuals — has never been revealed, and is purported to be only known by the owner of the quarry where the granite was taken from and built, and the banker who made the transaction. Many Elberton locals claim that it's most likely Ted Turner, a rich Georgian who's into New Age-type things,Georgia Guidestones: 10 Weird Things You've Got to Know 365 Atlanta Traveler. but we may never know. 
A 2015 Christian documentary Dark Clouds Over Elberton: The True Story of the Georgia Guidestones managed to film a case filled with alleged correspondence between one of the contractors and "Robert C. Christian" which suggest that the stones were commissioned by a Dr. Herbert Kersten The Des Moines Register 13 Jun 2005 of Fort Dodge, Iowa. Kersten apparently had interests in conservation and population issues, but also wrote letters to newspapers praising none other than David Duke. 
A 2024 investigation of the Georgia Guidestones by CNN interviewed two people who claimed that they knew Kersten; according to one of them, William Doan, Kersten used to brag about his friendship with transistor inventor (and notorious eugenicist) "Two mysteries surrounded the Georgia Guidestones. One may have finally been solved." by Thomas Lake, CNN, 2024 February 16 The CNN report also uncovered a rare book purportedly written by the same "Robert Christian" that created the Georgia Guidestones. The book was similarly very concerned about overpopulation like the Guidestones were, but also took some dark turns advocating a caste system due to Robert Christian's fear of For instance, he advocated testing voters for knowledge and "evidence of economic productivity" before they were allowed to vote. He also advocated "rationing" health care to favor "those indivudals whose continuing lives are more valuable to society at large".
If the above is true, this gives the stone's second point of "guide reproduction wisely" rather unfortunate implications of either purely race-based eugenics, or something more akin to Shockley's IQ-and-race based eugenic babbles (what we would now call hereditarianism)."Rocks: Last Week Tonight with John Oliver (Web Exclusive)," YouTube.Dark Clouds Over Elberton (2015) YouTube."Controversial Nobel Laureate Shockley Dies" by Edward J. Boyer, Los Angeles Times, 1989 August 14 Though if the eugenics allegation is true, why then write the inscriptions in Russian (spoken primarily by Europeans) and Swahili (spoken primarily by East Africans)?
==Gallery==
File:Georgia Guidestones in Elbert County, GA.jpg|Before the bombing, May 14, 2022
File:Capstone Languages.jpg|"Let these capstones be a guide to an age of reason"
File:Georgia Guidestones 04.jpg|Astronomical features of the stones
==External links==
*"Let These Be Guidestones To an Age of Reason" When Man Reawakens Let Him Behold… The Georgia Guidestones — pamphlet by the Elbert Granite Finishing Co. (1981)
*The Georgia Guidestones: Elberton's Most Unusual Granite Monument — pamphlet by the Elberton Granite Finishing Corporation (1987)
*The Georgia Guidestones Movie — 2012 documentary
==See also==
*Overpopulation
==Notes==
==References==
Category:Conspiracy theories
Category:Rationalism