If you like weird connections, how about a Cypherpunks-Heaven's Gate
link? If you like really weird connections, how about a Cypherpunks-
Heaven's Gate-Solar Temple link? If you like really, really weird
connections, how about a Cypherpunks-Heaven's Gate-Solar Temple-
Waco link?
Lest you think I jest, let me explain that what I am about to tell
you
is fairly easy to verify and document, and is not based on vague
allusions
to some psychic vibrations from the comet, which seem to be rather
commonplace lately.
In the early 1970's there was a small group in Canada, known as the
Bartonian Metaphysical Society. The group was joined by an individual
named C.J. Parker, who had just had his first experience of "the end of
the world" as a member of Herbert W. Armstrong's Worldwide Church
of God.
Parker became a teacher and leader in the group, which soon became
the Institute for Applied Metaphysics, with metaphysical retreats in
Saskatchewan, Ontario and Quebec. There were often UFO reports
surrounding the dates of their intensive seminars in Eastern Canada,
which received press coverage, I believe.
Parker was involved, according to both himself and many others,
in the founding of the New Covenant Club during his involvement
with IAM. This was centered around the belief that the "old
covenant" with God, which involved circumcision, had now been
replaced with a "new covenant," which involved vasectomies.
Later, some of the Eastern leaders began indicating that if
vasectomies were a good way of indicating one's dedication to
spirituality in the end-times, then castration was even better.
Parker was soon involved in a second "end of the world" when
Winifred Barton made her prediction in the mid-to-late 1970's.
After her prediction appeared (to some) not to come true, then many
left the group and quite a few migrated to other groups, including
the Solar Temple.
Parker migrated to Texas, where he was involved in the music
business, and in running clubs for mob interests. He managed clubs
in Waco and Killeen, Texas, where he apparently became involved
with David Koresh, although that might have been at a later date.
He was arrested and convicted in Bell County, Texas for assault
on police officers there, sometime around 1980.
Parker became a recording artist and soon afterward moved
to Tucson, Arizona, where he continued to dabble in music and
metaphysics, travelling across the SouthWestern U.S., as well as
up and down the west coast.
He started a computer company in Tucson, called "Pearl Harbor
Computers," which was based on the belief that computers were
the work of Satan, that Bill Gates and Microsoft were tenacles of
the Satan, and that those who wished to fight evil must dedicate
themselves to promoting other operating systems, UNIX in
particular.
Parker apparently fathered an organization called the "Circle of
Eunuchs" that was dedicated to recruiting individuals who had
the skills and the intelligence to develop systems and methodologies
which could serve to work against what he saw as the plans of
Satan to bring domination over the whole earth
At various times, he has had vehicles registered in the states which
were his main recruiting area: Texas, Arizona, California, New
Mexico, and Oregon. (He also made limited recruiting trips to
Germany, Poland, and, I believe, Russia.)
Parker spent time in California where he was in contact with Do,
who shared his fetish for mixing computers and spirituality, and it
was apparently Parker who introduced him to the concepts underlying
the New Covenant Club. Parker and Do also shared an affinity for
mixing spirituality and alien theories, and decided that the Internet
was going to be the battleground of the future in the fight between
good and evil.
Parker was also involved with a group in Berkeley, California,
Basis, Inc., which was heavily involved in a Unix time-sharing
enterprise and gave Parker access to a wide variety of young
students and programmers to introduce to his belief system.
Parker named the evil protagonist in the manuscript after the
login name for one of Basis' founders, "Gomez." Parker wrote
the book under the pseudonym of "son of gomez," as Basis'
Gomez was his mentor in the world of UNIX.
Parker was responsible for a manuscript titled "The Xenix
Chainsaw Massacre" that contained a character, Bubba Rom Dos,
which was loosely based on Do, including veiled references to
his sexual inclination toward youngsters. Among those in the
Circle of Eunuchs, it was also referred to as Part I of "The True
Story of the Internet," which they foresaw as the vehicle that
would prove the manuscript prophetic.
Parker and his tenacles used the Internet to quietly spread the
manuscript among those thought to be potential recruits, even as
Do's group began making their impact on the Internet.
Parker believed that Phil Zimmerman's troubles were a result
of his group using Zimmerman's PGP to spread the manuscript
secretly across the Internet. He apparently impressed upon Do
the need to use PGP to secure any communications which were
of a nature that they could cause undue trouble for groups which
were working against Satan and Gates.
Parker's second manuscript, Part II , began as "TV World" and
later was changed to "WebWorld and the Mythical Circle of Eunuchs."
This manuscript was apparently supposed to be converted to
hypertext, with complete graphics, by Higher Source, and several
chapters were in the works, but about a week before the El Rancho
suicides, Parker was told that he should go ahead and release it in
its present form, because Higher Source would not be in a position
to complete the work.
Parker began converting the second manuscript to hypertext himself
and has had members of his organization releasing it on the Cypherpunks
list. Chapters of the manuscript have been released from various points
in the U.S., Canada, the U.K., and Russia.
Although the manuscript had already been completed around a year
before this, Parker, after receiving word to begin its release, began
making _changes_ in the manuscript, apparently as a result of no longer
having a need to so heavily disguise the connection between the Circle
of Eunuchs and Do.
A prologue was written for "WebWorld," sent to the Cypherpunks list
on March 18, 1997, in which the opening strains contained the
quote, "Why didn't I _do_ something?" The word "do" was in bold
hypertext.
Then, the next word in bold format was the word _me_, indicating
that the first bold word should be pronounced as in the musical notes,
do, re, me.
The sentence containing the world _me_? It was a reference to Do
soon
being 'picked up,'
"This time, they are coming for _me_."
And the new opening sentence of the manuscript? A veiled reference
to the fact that those left behind had been warned of their last chance
to 'escape' the fate that awaits them.
"The great tragedy of it, is that it didn't have to happen. Not at
all...
we were warned."
The URL's of the manuscripts are:
http://bureau42.base.org/public/webworld/
http://bureau42.base.org/public/xenix/xenbody.html
They are apparently hosted by David E. Smith