Deciphering the Betrayal of Cypher

Changes in our perception of reality usually arrive in small doses. Unexpected, tiny, bitter bites of truth offer us several choices. The vast majority of insouciant humans choose the route of denial, completely ignoring the possibility of an alternate version of what is real and what is not. Others cautiously taste the troubling morsels, then spit them out, trying desperately to forget them as nothing but irritating, nasty mistakes, then returning quickly to the sweet, familiar, satisfying flavor of the corporate matrix. Then there are those of us who, having once tasted the caustic flavor of truth, return for seconds and thirds with insatiable appetites. Although our taste buds may recoil in horror at first, it’s an acquired taste. A little like broccoli or asparagus…our first inclination is to expectorate, but we just can’t get over the likelihood that it’s going to be good for us in the long run. If the truth doesn’t kill you, it’ll make you stronger and set you free.

The simulated reality of “The Matrix”, from the 1999 Wachowski Brothers’ movie by the same name, closely parallels the perceived reality experienced by most humans who live their lives within the confines of the real-life corporate matrix. In the movie version, humans are used as an energy source by sentient machines who’ve taken control of life on earth. In the corporate matrix, humans are nothing more than a natural resource to be harvested by the Deep State at its discretion and leisure. In the movie version, people go about their daily routines, oblivious to the fact that they are nothing more than comatose human bodies, submerged in tanks, being drained of their vital energy, who are conscious only in the contrived reality of their dreams. The corporate matrix, and its mantra of the American Dream, is much the same. As George Carlin once told us, they call it a dream “because you have to be asleep to believe it”. You know the dream, of course. The one where every citizen has an equal chance at achieving prosperity and success through hard work and determination. Zzzzzzz.

Much like Morpheus, Trinity, and the Oracle in the film version of The Matrix, those of us who’ve managed to root out and taste the caustic flavor of truth within the corporate matrix are constantly on the lookout for “The One”. A real life version of Neo, who just might have a chance of saving mankind from the voracious machine of corporatism…with our help, of course. A handsome young athlete like Keanu Reeves, who’s able to dodge a barrage of bullets while fighting off a hundred assassins would be nice, but anyone would do. Someone, anyone…please!

Don’t get the idea that I have any delusions of being in possession of the whole truth and nothing but the truth. Although I constantly seek it, truth is an elusive beast, and within the misinformation maze of the corporate matrix, never easy to nail down. Based upon what I now think I believe that I might possibly know, I suspect that the whole bitter, ugly truth would be enough to stop my heart dead. Rule of thumb within the corporate matrix; it’s always worse than you can imagine. More frightening than your most disturbing nightmares and deadlier than cyanide.

My best guess is that fewer than 5% of humans living within the corporate matrix understand that life, as it appears, is an illusion. The vast majority believe whatever they’re instructed to believe by the corporate matrix media. They get lumps in their throats and tears in their eyes when The Star Spangled Banner is played, when they stand proudly to recite the Pledge of Allegiance, and when they encounter young men in U.S. Military uniforms. They cry for the victims of the Nazi Holocaust, while denying the Great American Holocaust, which resulted in the genocide of untold tens of millions of Native Americans…not to mention the theft of their homes and their continuing enslavement within open-air prisons called reservations.

The insouciant 95% haven’t a clue that the non-stop succession of U.S. wars have been fought simply to fuel the furnaces of corporate power. That it is largely the spoils of those wars which feed the economy of the most feared, hated, greedy empire in the history of the world. If you tell them that wars are waged to sell weapons, create chaos, steal resources, and to destroy civilizations, they look at you like you’re nuts. They don’t understand that the capitalist system which supports the lifestyles of exceptional Americans requires infinite growth within a finite ecosystem, that it is unsustainable, and is every day diminishing the ability of this planet to support future human life.

I don’t know who makes all the important decisions within the corporate matrix, nor exactly why all the seemingly idiotic choices are made, and will likely never understand the whole truth. However what is becoming ever-increasingly obvious is the fact that, to our overlords, our lives are cheap and meaningless. Human, animal, plant…it matters not…life is expendable to those who’ve assumed dominion over the earth. We’re all nothing but resources to be harvested. Whether it be through the mindless toil of economic wage-slavery, as victims of chemically-induced cancer to be treated (not cured) with toxic radiation and chemo-therapies, or as victims of the vulture banking/mortgage finance system, we are all being raised from childhood, to be used, abused, and processed like cattle in a corporate mega-meat farm. And the 95% walk innocently and ignorantly into the slaughterhouse. Smiling all the way.

Like Neo and the rest of the crew of the Nebuchadnezzar in The Matrix, you and I have chosen the red pill over the blue pill. Reality over the dream. But reality can be a hard pill to swallow. Within the corporate matrix, the insouciant 95% have good reasons for their denial of truth. They enjoy comfort in numbers. Truth is easy to ignore when all your friends are joining in the madness. Loyal supporters of the corporate matrix enjoy mutual praise and economic advantages. Those with the financial wherewithal to invest in Wall Street can make buckets of blood money by buying stock in the military-industrial-agro-petro-chemical-mortgage-banking-security-prison-arms-industry. Within the corporate matrix, doctors, research scientists, journalists, politicians, business owners…everyone who tows the line, has a better chance of getting a bigger piece of the pie. Or a tastier cut of steak perhaps.

Which brings us to Cypher. For nine years, a fellow operative of Neo, Morpheus, Trinity, and the rest of the rebels, Cypher deeply disappoints his crew members and film audiences everywhere by becoming a turncoat. By betraying the quest for truth and freedom, murdering fellow red pill poppers, and all for the false, contrived comfort of an dreamed existence. In the scene where he sells out his friends in exchange for a return to the easy life within The Matrix, Cypher devours an imaginary steak dinner in the company of ruthless Agent Smith.

“You know I know this steak doesn’t exist.” says Cypher. “I know when I put it in my mouth the Matrix is telling my brain that it is juicy and delicious. After nine years you know what I realize? Ignorance is bliss.”

The first time I watched “The Matrix”, it just didn’t seem a likely scenario that Cypher would sell out his comrades in exchange for a return to his dream life within the Matrix. But, looking around at my own friends, ex-friends, and acquaintances, I now realize that there is one line in the film which best describes the most universal human condition. That line being the three words uttered by Cypher as he thoroughly enjoys and savors a bite of delicious but imaginary steak. “Ignorance is bliss.”

John R. Hall, having finally realized that no human being in possession of normal perception has a snowball's chance in hell of changing the course of earth's ongoing trophic avalanche, now studies sorcery with the naguals don Juan Matus and don Carlos Castaneda in the second attention. If you're patient, you might just catch him at his new email address, but if his assemblage point happens to be displaced, it could take a while. That address is: drachman2358@outlook.com Read other articles by John R..