Yes, Peter Thiel is an anagram of The Reptile. No, he isn’t literally a lizard man, any more biolgically related to a literal reptile than any other human. Unfortunately, his behavior is human. Psychopaths are human.
I suspect that at least some of the conspiracy theorists saw a lot of “cold-blooded” looking people in in power. Those without empathy, and the mirror neurons needed to produce normal body language and responses that look like candid and emotion- tinted, socially normal human movements.
It’s a known thing that sociopaths and psychopaths can rise to the top in corporate structures. A lot of our “leaders” in politics etc, seem to lack empathy and this could easily be symbolized in someone mind as being lizard-like. The collective hints would be more obvious and disturbing to more sensitive people, causing their minds to do the pattern recognition and symbolisms needed to create reptilian conspiracies.
So maybe the conspiracy theorists were an early warning for the nonsense we are seeing now in politics.
This rant reminded me of a book, The Wisdom of Psychopaths. It was a humanistic look at the inner workings of such people and their fundamentally limited experience of human emotion.
The job of a CEO might be difficult for someone like me. Long hours, high stakes, endless political intrigues, systematically exploiting labourers - but to a psychopath, all they see is big opportunities, excitement, and cruel delights. The position is one that seems oddly suited for one who lacks pity, remorse, or a need for emotionally substantive experiences.
And now we see where that road leads. We never should have given them this much power.
I could do a spiel about how capitalism systematically favours psychopathy, but we can skip it this time, as a treat