Many fictional monsters are a metaphor for other issues. Godzilla is a personification of the horrors of nuclear weapons. Vampires are fascists. Werewolves are the unbridled beast hiding inside. And so on. So what would be a perfect metaphor, or more likely a close metaphor, for some of your top Internet grifter personalities like a Hubbard or Alex Jones.
During that journey I reminded myself that The Beast/Leviathan, Thomas Hobbes greatest work, is a metaphor for an all powerful Beast. A social contract where freedom is deliberately surrendered to stop mankind from destroying itself by its own stupidity. A perfectly natural tangent for someone recognizing authoritarian takeover while indulging in constant random baseless accusations of someone being the literal Antichrist. Therefore, the next perfectly logical tangent was to check the gematria of Hobbes and I found that HOBBES = 111 in reverse. Which of course means that in the cheap cheat of multiplying by 6 in Sumerian:
The tangents weren’t finished, and since I’d already been investigating monsters as allegories, the greedy goblins had already crossed my mind. And HOBBES + GOBLINS meant HOBGOBLINS which did not equal 666. But without the HOB:
A tidy little perfect match. So like a 15 year old first discovering conspiracy gematria and not realizing it’s confirmation bias based nonsense, I knew I was on to something and continued doing more research on goblins and greed. Because attention and money is really what it’s all about. But the obligatory gematria tie in satisfied I performed what qualifies as actual research and I found - Gibbelins.
(After a brief side trip for the unfortunate Litiz, Pa based insurance company that had purchased the domain name for Gibbel Insurance - gibbelins.com).
Gibbelins do not hoard wealth like Ferengi or Dungeons & Dragons monsters because they love the money and attention a lot of money gets them. It is a tool, it is bait for a trap just to lure foolish people to their lair to eat them. Although there’s no doubt internet grifters live the money purely for the sake of having money, so far we have no reports of actual cannibalism. Not yet.
But to understand the story properly, you need to examine the “hero” Alderic. The hero stops the dragons reign of terror, but it’s implied that once Alderic has finished his mission that he really doesn’t care if the dragon goes back to eating princesses. Alderic is a toxic narcissist, more interested in projecting his image as a savior and noble person and the bestest knight that ever knighted in any night. He may be competent enough to get to the Gibbelins lair, but even he alone is not prepared to fight the final battle. Sometimes real friends can help a lot. Being the bestest knight ever implies that you have a lifetime of assuming that nobody matters but yourself. And when somebody doesn’t care about how wealthy you are, including raising that wealth by fraudulent means - they’re going to eat you. Especially if they have more friends than you, which they will, Mr. Toxic Narcissist Knight.
The story is only lengthy enough to address the tale of Alderic. But there are lots of other Alderics in that fictional world. Lots of petty burglars and lesser knights consumed with avarice falling for the trap the Gibbelins have set. The top names in the grifting economy and GOP are not Gibbelins, they are Alderics. Fake heroes doing 24/7 image projection and having fun on the side by getting the attention a real hero should be getting. Bullies in appearance, but losers in end results. Fighting with each other more than generating any true sense of community. If you want to impress us, stop gathering new members to a sports betting Patreon and raise money and food for food banks.
If there’s another NO KINGS protest I may participate with my NO ALDERICS OR KINGS sign, just to amuse myself on being pretty much the only person who understands the reference.
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