Dear Saints,
With the hacking attempts against the Parables blog-site still ongoing, it was a curious thing to experience yet another ‘technical oddity’ after posting our latest blog article.
By all accounts, readers were unable to view the latest blog post ‘Leaving Babylon – A Testimony by Jeff & Mary Higdon’, when they clicked on the link from the email sent to them.
Which is strange, because the post worked perfectly for myself, even after being tested on three different web browsers, and also displayed correctly for my wife on her own laptop and on her phone. How it can work for us, but not for others, is a question I cannot answer.
However, this particular issue – as these ‘technical issues’ so often do – was able to ‘fix itself’ at some point during last week, so that the link and article finally began to display correctly for readers.
So if you happened to miss this remarkable testimony, ‘Leaving Babylon‘, due to this, please do have a read!
Also, for future reference, I will keep readers updated on news such as this – and any other ministry news – in the Ministry News section of our new forum. So if you do encounter any difficulties with reading or receiving the blog, I may well have posted some news on the matter there:
https://parables.blog/forum/forum/ministry-news/
War On The Saints
A trusted brother, who has also witnessed some of the hacking against the Parables site first-hand, has suggested I should keep readers informed of the ongoing hacking against the ministry. After the latest ‘technical oddity’ with the previous blog posting – and regardless of whether the explanation is a wholly innocent one or not – I feel that he is right and that I should continue to keep readers updated on these matters, even if they fall far from the mission of this ministry. Besides, it is much too interesting to keep it all to myself!
I first wrote about these ongoing hacking attacks here:
Yes, the same log-in attacks as mentioned in the article above have not stopped all Summer, and are still ongoing on a daily basis. As an active defence, I continue to maintain regular backups and to change passwords often.
Who or what lies behind these attempts to gain access to the website remains to be seen.
However, the log-in attacks are in fact only one aspect of the ‘technical oddities’ – the gremlins – that I have been experiencing since assuming Joseph’s ministry. There have been so many issues that they are actually beyond recounting. Truly It has been a fascinating thing to witness; eye-opening too, in regards to the rest of the internet, and why it has so radically changed in recent years.
Shadow banning is one such method that has been employed to silently censor vast swathes of the internet, and individuals trying to use the internet. Shadow Banning is largely when your webpages or Youtube channel or whatever are silently censored so that they do not show up in search listings. Shadow banning means silently suppressing websites or users in an unseen and deniable way, and it is achieved through many other methods too, particularly in relation to emails – blocking emails, flagging emails as spam when they are clearly not, and flagging entire email accounts as spam accounts when they are likewise not spam accounts. Since assuming Joseph’s ministry, I have experienced all of these things regarding emails. It has been particularly challenging trying to ensure that the blog posts do not go straight into reader’s spam boxes.
This is why I urge readers of the blog to check in on the website from time to time if you have not received any emails for a while. The blogs are still going out on a regular basis – normally every two weeks at present. But the emails themselves are not wholly reliable.
A fellow saint and friend of the ministry has just remarked upon Shadow Banning, and made reference to his own experiences with the Parable’s blog:
‘Regarding shadow banning, while Joseph still had the blog I noticed blog posts going to the spam folder. I made the Parables blog address and also Joseph’s personal email address both VIP emails to make sure I never missed one. Sometimes they STILL went to the spam folder. These were the ONLY email addresses that were VIP email addresses that ever went to the spam folder, so I’m quite sure it was being shadow banned. I get emails constantly from permies.com and they never go to spam.’
In my own experience, since assuming the ministry I have had emails sent to me by readers which never reached my inbox. I do not mean they went into the spam box. I mean I never received them at all. The worst instance of this was a reader who wished to make contact with me so they could send a generous gift to the ministry. Finally they had to reach me through Joseph (by sending him a letter in the mail). I have also sent emails from my own ministry email address to another of my personal email addresses – and watched as the email was flagged as ‘spam or potentially harmful’ at the receiving end, and discarded (not even placed into the Spam folder). My own ministry address was being flagged as a ‘possible spam’ account. I have never experienced this before taking on the ministry.
Upon investigation, I discovered that all the major email providers (google, hotmail, yahoo etc) are now using their ‘spam filters’ to scan for much more than mere spam. Certain ‘keywords’ in the content of emails now flag them as being ‘potentially harmful’. Some of these keywords appear to be anything anti-woke or anti-LGBT – in other words their fabled ‘hate speech’. (Email addresses are also being blacklisted, seemingly, through the use of ‘spam filters’).
This is the main reason why I changed the blog emails so that they no longer contain the entire article in the body of the email itself, but rather an intro and a link to the entire article on Parables. It is one way to minimise any shadow banning, by removing the content that can be scanned for ‘hate speech’ from the emails.
Ultimately, these technical gremlins I am speaking of are usually so subtle and cunning that it is difficult to prove anything at all. Everything is deniable. Each issue could simply be some unknowable technical problem you cannot fathom. Yet after a while, you realise that you are engulfed in a swarm of these oddities, these assumed coincidences, and that the swarm is ongoing and strangely intelligent. Always they cause disruption and take time away from actual real ministry work. Often, the timing seems aimed at demoralising you – just like those spiritual attacks in real life we have all experienced.
Of course I do not share all of this in order to discourage others. In scripture we are promised that we will be persecuted for our faith in Christ, and we are instructed to find joy even in times of adversary.
I find that not being an excitable person, not full of hopes and expectations but trying only to follow the Holy Spirit in all things, is a vital defence against such attempted barbs – and indeed the same can be said for demonic attacks in our everyday lives. If we leave the important things in the hands of Yahweh and simply get on with the next immediate step of our mission in lightness and spirit, these arrows bounce off us like rain.
And to be perfectly frank with you, I am almost delighted that we are under fire in this way. Not only does it liven up the battlefield tremendously, but much more importantly, when the shadow forces turn their might against you in such a manner, branding you their enemy, it shows that you are doing something right, that you are considered a threat to the Kingdom of the Self, to Mystery Babylon’s workings. The flak is fiercest over the target, as some wise fellow once remarked. Anyone reading this who has also been experiencing their own online targeting – and I know you are out there, many of you, unable to share your suspicions because they sound so far out and wacky to the uninitiated – should always keep this in mind. We are called to be soldier’s in this war between truth and lies, good and evil, God Almighty and the wickedness of self and the devil. And what kind of soldiers would we be if we were not under fire in any way?
We should rejoice that we are being so effective, that we are actively advancing the Kingdom even against the relentless press of the Enemy.
Again I call for your prayers and support. A spirited spiritual defence is what we should be relying upon. We are firmly in the hands of the Father, and we have nothing to fear or be anxious for concerning this world.
A Little Housekeeping
Today, I have largely been writing a blog article entitled ‘War On Our Children’, concerning the horrible tragedy in Minneapolis. But having just finished Part 1 of the article, which I was intending to post today, a few interesting emails in my inbox prompted a sudden change in tack – the wind changes and so we follow.
Instead, I am posting only this article for now. Next Friday I will post Part 1 of ‘War On Our Children’, and the second part the following week. Perhaps it is better to have a slight delay before focusing on this particular tragedy anyway. I have much to disclose but It is still very raw for many of us, even just watching from afar.
I pray you will be blessed with peace and understanding in these last days.
Colin Buchanan
thiswisefool@protonmail.com
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