Jul
11th
2020
I will now disprove the "Wayfair is involved in human trafficking" conspiracy theory · 6:15pm Jul 11th, 2020
The end goal of human trafficking is as follows: that on the receiving end, the buyer shall be delivered an intact, completely-undamaged human, of the exact model which was ordered, with all parts present and attached, precisely on time.
And that's something you're going to trust to Wayfair?
I put more thought into shutting that down than an entire subReddit placed into starting it up.
The flaw in every conspiracy is that it assumes competent actors at all levels of its operation, thus ignoring the fact that those actors are human.
Ah geeze, are these the same peeps who thought comet pizza had a non-existent human trafficking basement?
5306133
Conspiracy Theories are comfort food. If the world is being controlled by shadowy forces just out of our sight, well then, at least somebody's in control.
Not much more I can add to that, Estee. Some people just enjoy stirring the pot.
I mean. "No we don't" is pretty much what you'd expect from someone doing that in the first place!
Seriously though, what a weird world we live in.
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And yet, as Roseluck manages to believe a low-tech variant thereon, a conspiracy which controls the way people think, act, believe and exist is somehow completely helpless against the one completely isolated person who openly declares they've figured everything out.
This declaration is made online.
You know. That place where everything you do is tracked and sophisticated programs can pin a real name and location within seconds.
The conspiracy can't do anything about that guy at all.
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Most conspiracy theorists operate under a 'Heads I win, tails you lose' system. If the targeted company ignores them, then they're trying not to call attention to themselves because the theory is true. If they deny it, then of course that's what they would do when they're involved in human trafficking! And openly admitting to everything using a tone dripping sarcasm into an acid-etched lectern? It's a genius move! Whatever the target does is further proof of whatever you'd already decided, which is in fact as close to 'proof' as this thing is ever going to get.
It's a little too easy to picture Luna going directly for Option #3.
"In spite of what now appear to be your most fervent wishes, the palace does not use Moon to spy on everything you do."
"PROVE IT!"
"Moon's standard travel path, when measured against your residence, provides it with a viewing window of seventy minutes. Additionally, as with the vast majority of ponies, you live indoors and that would require a line of sight on any glass, along with you being active within a body length or two of such. Furthermore, when comparing the effort and sheer risk which observing you would require to the information gained, there is simply no equation where additional direct observations of your idiocy turn out to be worth it. Guards, please escort her to the Moonset Gate. Good night to you."
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Mmm, Hanlon’s Razor. My favorite.
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reminds me of that scene in "a total eclipse of the fun" where Luna challenged someone to prove they could NOT "enthrall" someone else.
The biggest problem with reality vs fantasy is that fantasy requires certain rules to operate.
Reality...doesn't.
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yep, reminds me of a flat-earther who claimed, "everyone on earth has been brainwashed by The Conspiracy."
"including YOU?" i retorted.
he had nothing but swear words after that. typical.
that was on "the flat earth society org".
they CONSTANTLY babbled about how "The Conspiracy" has faked EVERYTHING, but say it in an absurdly self-contradictory way:
"all books have been faked by The Conspiracy this book proves earth flat." (zetetic astronomy by Robotham)
"all photographs have been faked by The Conspiracy this photograph proves earth flat."
and my personal favorite...get your face-palm protection ready...
"everything on the Internet has been faked by The Conspiracy." that's VERBATIM from their WEBSITE.
and if you try to point out how absurd that is, they invariably resort to Plan C: FLOODS of PROFANITY.
to end on a high note, i'd like to recommend a funny video about how absurd Flat Earth is:
(part one of a series)
I'm not familiar with sex-trafficking, but don't the people in charge normally want to be certain that the victim ends up with someone who actually wants them? Wouldn't this alleged method mean that someone else could inadvertently purchase some person, believing they actually were purchasing the product that is being advertised?
Seems like it would be a problem for everyone -- company included -- if someone ordered a cabinet, and wound up with a human intended for sex slavery instead.
5306207
But y'see, the irony is that you would then be dealing with the way Wayfair normally operates. You order a bed, you get a curio stand. You pay for a cabinet and you get a sex slave. It's Wayfair. No one would actually be surprised.
https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/wayfair-trafficking-children/
5306182
Never mind atmospheric turbulence, diffraction, and haze diffusion. We can see the moon in stark detail from orbit around Earth, but not from the ground.
If in your Equestria ponykind has not discovered/invented carbon steel, they certainly won't have invented the means to make telescope lenses of sufficient quality to clearly discern a sub-square-meter speck of pony from space.
"Your theory of long distance imagery, like your mouth, is inclined to a surfeit of noise."
Edit: Perfectly balanced!đź‘Ťđź‘Ž Quotations mean it's dialogue. As in, a hypothetical quip from Luna directed toward whatever
lunaticwackjob would accuse her of spying with the moon.5306190
Ah, yes, proving a negative. Tricky, that.
Edit: To whomever is downvoting: You don't try to prove a negative. You try to prove a positive. Proving a negative is phenomenally difficult or impossible, most of the time, for many reasons, which is why the burden of proof in a trial is placed upon the accuser, not the accused. You completely missed the joke.
5306133
And the other flaw, as has been pointed out, is that it also requires them to have a blindspot large enough to accommodate the loud conspiracy theorists living long enough to blow the whistle on them.
(That said, the simulation hypothesis, among others, is polite enough to use nonhuman actors)
5306160
My psychiatrist one said that some people invent paranoid delusions for a simple reason.
If there is someone out there that is actually spending time to make them miserable, that means somebody actually cares and gives a damn about them. The idea that nobody gives a damn about them, even in a negative way, is worse and scarier than the massive paranoid conspiracy.
(It also explains the e-girl/findom/stripper thing-guys that are so desperate for positive attention that any source that provides it, they'll clamp onto with immense vigor.)
5306207
You would be amazed at how many hentai stories start out with that premise.
And, because at least 1% of them have to at least be not bad, you'd be amazed that it's possible to get a good story out of that.
(Up until Wayfair bills them for the inadvertently sent sex-slave, and brother, those are not cheap...)
5306315
You would have to have an amazing number of people that weren't blowing the whistle or having "accidents" because they wanted more or something from the people in charge of the conspiracy. And, the shipping issues alone...do you realize how much it would cost to even ship a fairly petite human girl on a reasonable time-frame from FedEx or UPS? Next day UPS Air is about $6,700 (assuming our girl is about 150 pounds, 5'5" and fits in a 6'x4'x4' box).
A friend of mine pointed out that to pull off the whole "fake moon landing" conspiracy, you would need at least 700-1000 people, minimum. And, the US government was unable to conceal a second-rate burglary, so how do you think that they would be able to conceal a fake moon landing?
(One joke that I heard was that the US government hired Stanley Kubrick to fake a moon landing. But, he was such a stickler for detail that they had to film it on the moon to satisfy him.)
5306209
Somebody posted the theory that what is actually going on is a form of money laundering/asset payment. Asset pays for something online using a payment code, Wayfair sends them a "item" that is actually cash or something similar. Very carefully packed so that it doesn't trip things like drug sniffing dogs or such.
...I think you would almost expect better customer service in this case, so that nobody would be suspicious of your incoming packages.
5306209
There's an anime or a porno plot in there somewhere.
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...I'm writing a novel for sale on Amazon right now.
5306479
"I Ordered a Cupboard, but Got a Catgirl Instead!"
5306390
Oh yeah, the moon landing. The Kubrick joke is pretty close to the truth; with the special effects technology that existed at the time, it would have been harder to fake the landing than to just do it for real. To say nothing of how, if there were any substance to the idea at all, Russia would have been pointing it out for the past fifty years.
5306516
I had seen this hour-long video where a SFX guy talks about the video and special effects technology available at the time and pointed out that it was technically possible, but sending three guys to the Moon was the cheaper and easier option. Wishing I could find it...
Sorry Estee, but I think you're wrong; the conspiracy OP is actually brilliant. Let me explain their plan:
1. Post a conspiracy theory about Wayfair's human trafficking activity.
2. Short Wayfair stock.
3. Wait for the inevitable crash. Use the profits from shorting to buy Wayfair stock at rock bottom prices.
4. Wayfair, now in dire financial straits, takes the only rational action available to them: human trafficking via overpriced cabinets.
5. Wait for Wayfair to inevitably completely screw everything up and accidentally ship the trafficking victims directly back home instead of to the purchasers.
6. Wait for Wayfair's stock to soar on the back of the good press about their heroic battle against human trafficking.
7. Sell.
The OP has now both ended human trafficking forever and also gotten filthy rich. We should be lauding them for being the greatest hero-genius of, quite possibly, all time.
5306133
One of the core nuggets of inspiration in the initial planning scenarios for Skin Horse was my feeling in the waning years of the George W. Bush administration that could be summed up as follows:
Whenever I would hear someone claim that a group of hyper-competent Illuminated masters was secretly in control of everything and masterfully pulling the strings to manipulate all global interactions, my initial reaction would be to think about the people in power, give a little sigh of contentment, and say, "Gosh, that just made me feel a whole lot better."
Or, as They Might Be Giants said, much more succinctly: "Where's the Shadow Government when you need it?"
5306513
"And Boy! Is my wife Upset!"
5306209 Hello, Wayfair customer service? No, I am not going to hold again! I've been on hold ten hours so far!
Good. I've got a complaint about my recent order. One of your *ahem* special orders.
Yes, I ordered a girl online! Don't judge me! And don't hang up!
What's wrong with my order? You didn't ship me a girl! You shipped me a dude!
Yes, I know it's a dude! I checked!
No, I will not consider that additional equipment shipped as a free bonus!
That's enough! I want to talk to your manager!
What do you mean, he's the dude you shipped to me?
5306639 "The people who think the government can control every individual thing about our lives have never worked in government."
-- Me
(As an aside, the 'top people' in our particular organization have just mailed our shipment of PPE to our site yesterday: One box of anti-virus tissues, three sets of gloves (wrong size), and some paper masks... made in China. Yeah, fear us.)
5306376 Or you wind up with a robot cat.
So, there is a conspiracy theory about a major American company. Now for the question that would have been unthinkable five years ago...
Has President Trump given it credibility by Tweeting about it?
(What has the world come to?)
This is probably even dumber than the Adrenochrome conspiracy, and I didn't think that was possible.
5306513
I'd be interested to know what site.
Strictly for research purposes.
...(cough)
You know, considering some of the comments and reactions on here, there's potential for a story around Wayfair even without the trafficking allegation.
Just imagine: after an extra profitable period, a business pony (such as the Cakes, or Rarity) decides to make some updates and upgrades to the shop. Including some new furnishing, such as cabinets or such. Said pony (or ponies) then order the furnishing in question through Wayfair, or some equivalent.
And that's when the issues begin.
5306390
And the longer The Conspiracy goes on, the more likely it becomes that someone will decide that they can make more money writing a tell-all book and blowing the lid off things than The Conspiracy could possibly afford to continue paying them to shut them up. See, for example, the "Paul (McCartney) is Dead" conspiracy theory, which holds that he died in a car accident just before (or during) the recording of the Sgt. Pepper's album, and that everything was hushed up while he was secretly replaced by a surgically-altered double. (No, I'm not kidding, this is a real conspiracy theory.) Again, leaving aside the sheer number of people who would have to have been involved in the first place and the amount of money it would take to keep them all quiet, does anyone really believe that a secret like that could be kept for over fifty years without someone realizing how much more money they could make by breaking ranks and cashing in on it?
(For those not familiar with it, the "evidence" for this theory revolves around a list of supposed anomalies in the lyrics and album cover art for Sgt. Peppers and the following three albums, all of which appear to center around Paul McCartney. Paul is the only one with a black rose in his lapel; Paul is wearing the black walrus costume, which is supposedly a symbol of death in some Eskimo tribes; and so on. Arguably, there are too many to dismiss as sheer coincidence, but I suspect that the "conspiracy" was more along the lines of the four of them deciding to play a huge practical joke on their fan base by slipping all these things in and waiting to see if anyone noticed and what outrageous things they'd say about it if they did. Paul and Ringo are probably still giggling over it to this day.
)
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Plus, if someone does realise that the "package" is in fact not what as ordered, then the "receiver" can claim that there was an "error" in the "package" and point to the "reputation" of the "delivery company" as "proof". Which means that all of their "messed-up orders" are actually all part of the "plan"!
(It appears I have an excess of double-quotes in this post.)