[Editorial] Conspiracy Theories Suddenly Popular Again, Still not Correct

By Nor Farri, Volus Financial Biannual

It looks like it’s that time of year again, folks. The universe has quieted down, there aren’t any major conflicts going on, politics has achieved a quiet murmur in the background, and the crazies are suddenly looking for stuff to rant and rave about. That’s right, tribesmen; it’s conspiracy theory time.

The latest conspiracy of the day (or du jour, as the earthlings seem to say) is of that old volus standby, the Volanti. That’s right, folks, the Volanti have returned. Well, so says Strange Matters Blog, Voice of Omega Radio, Bizarre Universe, and every other crazy person with an extranet radioblog account and a two-credit transmitter. So convert your credits into local precious metals, lock up your valuables, and keep an eye open for the secret cephalopodian servants of the Volanti, the octopoids!

In case you’re a primitive species, such as a vorcha or a fan of Johnny Horrorshow, that was sarcasm. Seriously, the local yogurt salesman is more dangerous than the ‘Volanti.’

For those of you who haven’t been obsessed about paranoid delusions, the Volanti is supposedly a secret order of very rich volus bankers who controls the conversion rates of credits in the known galaxy and use the immense amount of money at their fingers to control the universe and blah blah blah, you’ve heard it before. It’s a standard paranoid delusion, once common across many cultures. The humans had their version with the Illuminati, the asari with the Protheanites, the turians with the Zeroth Legion, etcetra etc. Why the Volanti has persisted all these years when all these other delusions have been disproven time and time again is anyone’s guess. I guess there are certain individuals who think my species - which, I may remind you, is a client race - is in charge of the universe. I would like to point out that right now, the Vol Protectorate is going through our third civil recession since the damned rebuilding, that we’ve had to restructure the credit layout limits twice in favor of other species, and that we’re living largely off of mining subsidies right now. Doesn’t sound like a nation of secret rulers to me.

So the next time someone comes to you at the ammonia cooler and asks you if you’ve heard of the Volanti - or, even worse, if they ask you if you ARE a member of the Volanti - just show them this article, tell them to go back to the Xela Enosj show, and remind them that if there is some superior organization in charge of the universe, they’re doing a piss-poor job.

VFB Editor,

Nor Farri

FLAK THINK VORCHA POISONING DRINKING WATER!!

MAKE VORCHA STUPID!!

I've heard a lot of people say that.

Seriously though, even if there isn't a 'Volanti' organization, do you seriously expect me to believe that these insanely rich and powerful bankers don't try to rearrange the galaxy to suit their interests?

Everyone with money and power tries to rearrange some portion of the galaxy to suit their interests. That's the entire point of having such resources.

I'm willing to believe that those secret groups exist, they just don't control much. Maybe they have some influence about some stuff, maybe they just meet once in a while in a remote location to say "just as planned!", but at the end of the day the galaxy is too big and too messy to control.

Those aren't bad points, really. Take Cerberus for example. They were arguably one of the greatest actual examples of this sort of conspiracy, and they couldn't control the whole Alliance, much less the greater galaxy. Food for thought, I guess... I still stand by my original sentiment though. I'll pay more attention when there's something to do besides mutter to oneself in safe houses or lurk on shadow nets.

Never bought into the Voltani thing. Always seemed more racist than anything. Just cause they're good with money suddenly they're able to control the economy of the Galaxy. Please. That's like saying every Batarian is a slaver/terrorist, something even I didn't believe in. I was never one to fall into race baiting when I had issues.

I remember just thinking that the five richest corporations in the Galaxy controlled most of the money and all that through the banks, but it was never specifically the volus or the Voltani.

Now a days, I'm a bit more realistic. No singular person controls the galactic economy, but that doesn't stop people from trying whether they're corpies or governments.

I still remember how everyone made fun of "Failberus" right up until they raided the Citadel, then they weren't nearly as funny as people had thought (of course i don't want to get into how idiotic said attack was in terms of tactics and abuse of resources). This Volanti crap sounds like a bunch of tin-foil hat nonsense, probably started by some idiot who couldn't run his business well.

Problem with conspiracies, most of them are complete fantasy, but the one that turns out being true usually has some absolutely terrible consequences.