"The proper cure for bad information is more information, not secrecy or censorship."Author Unknown
The "Illuminati" was/is a case of Fake Masonry.Fake Masons? Counterfeit Freemasonry. What's THAT all about anyway? People don't really just 'pretend' to be Masons, do they? They wouldn't just start a group and call themselves something they aren't....
Well, yes - in some cases they do! Even at the formation of the very first Grand Lodge there were rival groups, imitators, dissenters, and merely idle 'troublemakers'. Why? A variety of reasons but usually spite, a strong desire for self-aggrandizement and/or personal greed seem to top the list.
All three are strong motivators, particularly when someone feels that they can bring themselves greater personal recognition and reward. Today, they can use the internet to create what appears to be 'the real deal' - but better - so that the unsuspecting who want to actually become Masons will wind up giving them money (and praise) instead. There are also those who create such organizations as a 'front' for other nefarious deeds, usually criminal. Long before telemarketing and telephones, Masonic degree peddling was a VERY lucrative business, making scam artists a pretty penny. Today with the internet, such scams grow and flourish! As with telemarketing, these spurious groups do LOTS of dancing around trying to claim "We are legitimate!" while regular, 'recognized' Grand Lodges merely go about their business.
Oh, what the heck....
The 'not bothering to notice' attitude taken by regular/recognized Grand Lodges and the general tenor of today's society seems to be the cause of some Masons taking what they would regard as a 'live and let live' attitude. They'll assert, for example, that these groups have just as much right to be regarded as Freemasons as those who are regular/recognized and who have historical roots to the foundation of the organization. Sadly, though, their logic is based on a flawed assumption: they presume that because someone has gotten a ritual from somewhere and has decided that they can call themselves Masons (or Free-Masons, or whatever), then they actually are. It would be as foolish as my claiming to be a woman, or a car, or a hippopotamus and expecting everyone to recognize me as such. Just because someone CLAIMS to be something, doesn't make it so! I can claim to be Italian - but I'm not. I can claim to be a Doctor of Engineering - but I'm not. Why should someone CLAIM to be a Mason when all they've done is read from a ritual that they bought in a grocery store?
From the pages under 'Related Topics' on the right side of this page you can see some examples of just WHY anyone who stands up to proclaim that they're a Mason should NEVER be regarded as such.In Freemasonry today, if someone is particularly friendly or seems quite intelligent, many of those online will easily succumb to the rhetoric that 'they're a Mason even if my Grand Lodge doesn't accept them as such'. They'll tell you that they're a "different obedience" as if they were somehow quasi-legitimate. Tired arguments, sometimes dragging Prince Hall Freemasonry into the picture, blur the matter and ignore the fact that these counterfeit groups simply appear out of thin air and now use the internet (as well as ignorance about the many differences from Grand Lodge to Grand Lodge) to claim their legitimacy. 'Dumbed down' arguments ("It's like comparing which of two rock bands are better." or "It's the difference between strawberry ice cream and coffee ice cream.") completely overlook a several hundred year old structure which assures a certain degree of uniformity in behavior that, in their case is non-existent and is subject only to the whims of the creator-leader, regardless of his (her) benign motives or criminal intent.
The moniker 'fake' seems harsh, particularly to those who bear that label from this website, but what else can one call a group that solicits membership using the symbols of an organization to which they have no formal connection, save the use of the same ritual - perhaps from a book bought in a grocery store? Because a tractor uses gasoline, can it be called a motorcycle and driven around on a freeway? These groups will also make claims of being the legacy heir of some fanciful legend and their websites may show the leadership in fancy Masonic trappings (sometimes looking like parodies of a jewelry store mannequin) all designed - again - to obfuscate their illegitimacy. They want you to believe that if you join with them you'll be "a Mason" in all respects (and, it's intimated, a far BETTER one than that old, stodgy 300+ year old group with the several million members) when, in fact, you're only a member of their own small group of miscreants, governed by a not-always benevolent dictatorship. You will certainly NOT be accepted as a Freemason nor can you - as is said in Masonic ritual - "travel in foreign countries, work, and receive Master's pay".
Run this by me again: isn't all Masonry the same thing?
No, not really.... There are many organizations/groups and individuals who try to present themselves as 'Masonic' (or pretend that they're 'Masonry') when they are only so in their own minds. While theymay consider themselves to be Masons, no one else in the world does - and therein lies the rub. Because the words 'Mason', 'Masonry', 'Freemasonry', and the like are not protected by copyright, trademark or in any other enforceable way, their free use is found everywhere in the world. You yourself could start "Joe's Masonic Lodge" tomorrow if you wished. Would any Mason recognize you as being a legitimate Mason or Masonic entity? No - although you yourself might feel to your very core that you and your organization were, indeed, 'Masonic'.
