In recent years we’ve looked at the stone carver’s art as Halloween approaches — both tombstones and mausoleums. This year we’ll look at something much, much, creepier…

Just over forty years ago, a large monument comprised of giant granite slabs was erected in a pasture in rural northeastern Georgia, seven miles outside the town of Elberton.

By now, most people have at least heard of the Georgia Guidestones, even if they don’t know much about them. Briefly, for those not familiar with the history, a man using the pseudonym of R. C. Christian contracted with a monument company in Elberton to erect a large monument for which he had precise specifications.

Christian stated that he represented “a small group of loyal Americans” who desired anonymity and who had been planning the monument for two decades. The purpose, ostensibly, was to usher in an “age of reason”. Included in the design are three apertures, one of which harnesses the sun each noon to mark the day of the year. Another hole is aligned with the North Star while the third notes the summer and winter solstices.

The most prominent and controversial features, however, are the ten “guides” carved into the faces of the monolithic slabs. They appear in eight different languages and read as follows:

1. Maintain humanity under 500,000,000 in perpetual balance with nature.
2. Guide reproduction wisely – improving fitness and diversity.
3. Unite humanity with a living new language.
4. Rule passion – faith – tradition – and all things with tempered reason.
5. Protect people and nations with fair laws and just courts.
6. Let all nations rule internally resolving external disputes in a world court.
7. Avoid petty laws and useless officials.
8. Balance personal rights with social duties.
9. Prize truth – beauty – love – seeking harmony with the infinite.
10.Be not a cancer on the earth – Leave room for nature – Leave room for nature.

Not surprisingly, many have noted an eerie similarity with these to the Ten Commandments of the Bible. Some of the suggestions seem innocuous until examined more closely. Keep the population under 500 million? With a current world population of 7.8 billion, about ninety percent of us are going to have to exit. How is that supposed to happen? Improve fitness and diversity? Who gets to decide what constitutes fit and diverse? Unite humanity with a living new language? How does that contribute to the diversity sought in the preceding dictate? Tempered reason? Who gets to decide what is reasonable? I could go on, but you get the idea. The last one shouldn’t be a problem; there will be plenty of room for nature if ninety percent of us are dead. What is anticipated… or planned?

In researching the monument online I found countless sites purporting to explain its meaning and origins. Perspectives as to the motives of those who financed this project range from the utterly benign to a psychopathically genocidal plot and satanic desire to seek total global domination — and pretty much everything in between. The site attracts thousands of visitors each year. An image search yielded numerous acts of vandalism but no happy families with big smiles posing for the camera.

If nothing else, the monument is decidedly creepy. The murky story leads down a rabbit hole of incalculable, perhaps infinite, depth. What do you think of the Georgia Guidestones? Have you ever visited them? Are they evil or innocuous? Brilliant or delusional? Arrogant or compassionate? Please share any thoughts you may have below, and have a happy Halloween!

Update 2/4/23

Just ran across this interesting video from AJ and Hecklefish of The Why Files which appears to reveal the real name of “R. C. Christian”:

Satire for our present day: