Elbert County, GA — According to the Elbert County sheriff, as many as 100 protesters attacked and then toppled the famous and mysterious Georgia Guidestones early Friday morning. According to the report, the group was a collection of anarchists loosely associated with Black Lives Matter, ANTIFA, and the Judean People’s Front.
“At approximately 4:20 am Friday, a large group dressed in black arrived in a caravan of Subarus and Toyota Matrixes at the Georgia Guidestone site and immediately disabled the 42 security cameras the county set up four years ago following suspicious activity,” said the official sheriff’s report. “Then, we believe, the group vandalized the monuments before pulling them down. Before departing, the suspects threw a party with keg IPA beer and wheatgrass smoothies.”
As the sheriff pointed out, this was not the first time “the Stones” have been tampered with.
The Controversial Guidestones
In June 1979, a man using the self-professed pseudonym Robert C. Christian approached the Elberton Granite Finishing company on behalf of “a small group of loyal Americans” and commissioned the structure. Mr. “Christian” explained that the stones would function as a compass, calendar, and clock and should be capable of withstanding catastrophic events.
A message consisting of ten guidelines or principles is engraved on the Georgia Guidestones in eight different languages, one language on each face of the four large upright stones. Unfortunately, each inscription is riddled with poor grammar. The ten messages say:
- Maintain humanity under 500,000,000 in perpetual balance with nature.
- Guide reproduction wisely, improving fitness and diversity.
- Unite humanity with a living new language.
- Rule passion faith, tradition, and all things with tempered reason.
- Protect people and nations with fair laws and just courts.
- Let all nations rule internally resolving external disputes in a world court.
- Avoid petty laws and useless officials.
- Balance personal rights with social duties.
- Prize truth, beauty, love, seeking harmony with the infinite.
- Be not a cancer on the earth. Leave room for nature, Leave room for nature.
Over the years, many have attempted to interpret the meaning and purpose of ‘the Stones.’ Yoko Ono has praised the inscribed messages as “a stirring call to rational thinking.” At the same time, Wired Magazine stated that unspecified opponents had labeled them as the “Ten Commandments of the Antichrist.” Conspiracy theorists like North San Juan’s Skyy Wolford have a different opinion about their meaning and why they stole four years ago, moved to a Derry, New Hampshire baseball field, and returned to Georgia within two weeks.
Late Sunday morning, the Jerusalem, Arkansas-based Anti-fascist Action (AFA) claimed responsibility via Twitter for its “resistance operation.” However, moments later, the Atlanta-based Georgia Resistance Network (GRN), loosely affiliated with the ANTIFA-connected Sacramento Workers Action Network (SacWAN), claimed full responsibility for the destruction, claiming that the AFA was “splitters” and “not a serious anti-fascist group.” AFA responded by calling GRN “amateur protesters” who “need more practice.”
It’s unclear why there is animosity between the groups or if either group participated in the vandalism.
Once Unlikely Allies?
For years since their appearance, the Georgia Guidestones have been the target of mostly Rightwing conspiracy groups who claimed that the many elite organizations are behind the monument. However, since the election of Donald Trump, whose rhetoric in many ways is similar to the apocalyptic warnings on the Stones, much of this reactionary cohort has embraced many of its ideas. This is particularly true of QAnon followers, who believe they are part of a righteous army.
“Yep, we used to be against the Georgia Guidestones until Trump and then QAnon came around,” said Damian Gender, who heads up the Dixie Patriot Fighters, Georgia’s 17th largest militia group based out of Macon. “But now we see the Stones as a prophecy fulfilled by American-loving patriots like the ‘Fighters. This is even more apparent after the ANTIFA pulled them down this week that we’re on the right side of history.”
The Elbert County sheriff says the Guidestones have been reinstalled, and the county is considering putting a fence around the perimeter. One county official suggested playing country music around the monument to discourage what she called “BLM communists from destroying our southern heritage.”
“We have to do something,” said Betsy Gibbons, who represents the people of Elbery County. “We can’t allow these socialists to take our way of life from us God-fearing Americans. And we will do whatever it takes to protect the Guidestones from these evil forces. And I figure, what better way to keep them away than with Alan Jackson blaring 24 hours a day?”
