Thursday
GATE
The Pink Drink and the Missing Years: Was Your 'Gifted' Program an MK Ultra Spinoff?
Were you ever pulled out of your regular class in elementary school for a special program? One for the “gifted and talented” kids? If so, try to recall what you actually did there. If your memories are surprisingly vague, a hazy fog punctuated by a few bizarrely specific images, you're not alone. In fact, you're part of a massive, growing online phenomenon.
This shared experience of collective amnesia is the subject of a viral TikTok series by investigator Jake Matthews (“JakeKnowsNothing”), which has prompted thousands to re-examine their own pasts. The response has been overwhelming, and troublingly, many who have come forward to corroborate these strange experiences are from the military, CIA, NSA, and special operations. What many remember as a simple, if slightly odd, school program is beginning to look like something far stranger. It's a mystery that an entire generation is now trying to piece together, one fragmented memory at a time.
A Generation's Worth of Missing Memories
The single most consistent trait among former students of these programs is not high intelligence, but a significant, inexplicable gap in their memory. On "The Launchpad Podcast," both host Gabriel Hardie and guest Jake Matthews describe the same pattern: a clear memory of being selected and pulled out of class, followed by years of fragmented, dreamlike, or even "out of body" recollections of what happened next.
This collective fog is the core of the investigation. It isn't just that the details are fuzzy with time; for many, it feels like a deliberate and unnerving blank space where years of their childhood education should be. This shared void is what has led so many to believe that something more than just advanced math was taking place in those classrooms.
...this huge gap in memory that almost everyone has who went into the program and that was what stuck out for like that was the thing that I've been Clinging On to for my entire life...
The Selection Process Wasn't About Grades
One of the first red flags for many former students was the selection criteria itself. These were "gifted and talented" programs, yet many participants recall having perfectly average grades. They weren't academic prodigies or speed-readers; they were just regular kids.
Jake Matthews describes looking around the room at the other children selected with him and having a distinct thought: "None of us have the grades to reflect this." This realization made him question the program's true purpose from the very beginning. If selection wasn't based on IQ, what other traits were they screening for? Research and anecdotes suggest a disturbing set of criteria, including neurodivergence and, more conspiratorially, genetics, bloodlines, and even ties to secret organizations like Freemasonry.
"Learning" Was a Series of Bizarre Psychological Tests
When former GATE students share the few activities they do remember, a pattern of strange psychological exercises emerges. These "lessons" often felt more like tests disguised as games, creating a portfolio of unsettlingly common experiences.
- Old, Clunky Headphones: Participants vividly recall wearing large, grayish-green headphones for hours. This wasn't just for a standard hearing test. Some exercises involved predicting which ear a tone would play in—a test of predictive ability, not auditory function.
- Psychic Screening: The "games" often involved direct tests for extrasensory perception (ESP). This included exercises with Dr. Rhine's ESP cards (predicting the next card in a sequence) and even attempts to determine "whether or not they could see an aura through the box."
- Abstract Reasoning Tasks: Timed tasks were a constant. These included the Stroop test (reading the names of colors printed in a different color) and tangrams (arranging geometric shapes to form specific images), both of which measure cognitive flexibility and processing speed under pressure.
- The Mysterious Pink Drink: Most disturbingly, an insider source with family ties to the program's administration has come forward, alleging that the common memory of a mysterious pink or purplish liquid in a Dixie cup was part of an "extension or end result of MK Ultra." He claims the drink was used in combination with hypnotherapy administered via the headphones to embed programming deep in the subconscious while compartmentalizing and suppressing the memories of the sessions.
- Unusual Field Trips: While some field trips were normal, many recall strange, small-group excursions to specific types of locations: planetariums, aquariums, and even cemeteries.
Crucially, these activities were designed with a perfect cover. A child telling their parents they wore headphones and listened to beeps would naturally be interpreted as having a "hearing test." This mundane disguise could have easily masked a program with a dual, and potentially much darker, purpose.
The Program Was Born from Cold War Paranoia
To understand the potential "why" behind GATE, you have to look at when it became widespread. The programs exploded across the American public school system in the decades following the Soviet Union's successful launch of the Sputnik satellite. This event caused mass panic in the United States, sparking fears that the nation was falling behind technologically and intellectually.
In direct response, the U.S. government passed the National Defense Education Act, explicitly tying the education of children to national security. The timeline of GATE's expansion runs parallel to known CIA projects like MK Ultra (mind control experiments) and Project Stargate (research into psychic abilities like remote viewing). Seen in this light, the bizarre "games"—testing for predictive ability, ESP, and abstract thinking—begin to look less like education and more like a mass screening protocol for these psychic espionage projects.
...very simple terms we are linking education of children to National Defense so this to to me this this all seems very logical... I want you know the country that I live in to be secure and run by very intelligent people...
The Strange Commonalities Continue Into Adulthood
The eerie similarities don't stop with childhood memories. Former GATE students have discovered a number of shared, unusual experiences that have followed them into adulthood.
- Hearing Voices: A significant number report a distinct childhood memory of hearing disembodied voices, especially in the quiet moments before falling asleep. The experience is often described as hearing "a group of men mumbling about me in the distance." For many, it was a terrifying secret they kept for fear of being labeled schizophrenic.
- Near-Death Experiences (NDEs): An unnervingly high number of former members report having had a near-death experience, with drowning being a strikingly common theme. Podcast host Gabriel Hardie shared his own story of nearly drowning at age 11, and Jake Matthews recalled his own near-drowning during a summer camp swim test where he blacked out underwater, reinforcing the frequency of this specific trauma.
- Gravitating Towards Each Other: Perhaps one of the strangest phenomena is the tendency for former GATE members to find one another in adult life. Many report that, without realizing it at first, the vast majority of their close friends and even romantic partners are also alumni of a gifted program. The leading theory is that this may be a result of shared neurodivergence, drawing like minds together.
What Were They Looking For?
When you piece the evidence together—the missing memories, the psychic tests, the MK Ultra connection, and the shared adult traumas—the picture that emerges is deeply unsettling. The GATE system, presented as a vehicle for advanced learning, may have also functioned as a "Westernized... form of shamanic recruiting."
This concept, proposed by Matthews, draws a parallel to indigenous cultures where children who display unique abilities are identified early. Instead of a traditional path, they are trained by elders to cultivate their gifts—be it healing, foresight, or spiritual insight—to serve the collective. The GATE program, in its darker form, may have been a cold, digitized, and militarized version of this ancient practice: a sprawling dragnet to find children with specific psychospiritual aptitudes and mold them for national defense.
While countless gifted programs were likely legitimate, the evidence of a dual purpose operating within the system is too widespread to ignore. This leaves us with a final, chilling question: If these programs were designed to identify and cultivate certain abilities in children, what were those abilities—and did they succeed?
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An Analysis of Recalled Experiences in Gifted and Talented Education (GATE) Programs: A Comparative Case Study
1.0 Introduction: The Phenomenon of Fragmented Memory in GATE Alumni
For decades, Gifted and Talented Education (GATE) programs have functioned as a nationwide initiative within the American public school system, ostensibly to provide enriched instruction for advanced learners. Beneath this benign public-facing purpose, however, a consistent pattern of fragmented autobiographical memory and shared anomalous experiences has emerged from a significant cohort of former participants. The strategic importance of this analysis is to transform these scattered anecdotes into a structured case study for psychological and sociological review, investigating the peculiar commonalities that bridge individual recollection with a potential collective phenomenon.
The central problem, as articulated by researcher and former participant Jake Matthews, is the presence of significant periods of dissociative amnesia that former participants report regarding their time in these programs. This memory fragmentation is particularly pronounced given that their recall of other contemporaneous elementary school experiences often remains intact. The core objective of this document is therefore to compile and analyze the firsthand accounts of two former GATE participants, identify recurring themes within their experiences, and explore the potential long-term psychological and social sequelae as reported. The specific experiences of these two individuals, Jake Matthews and Gabriel Hardie, form the basis of this comparative case study.
2.0 Case Profiles: Gabriel Hardie and Jake Matthews
This section provides a detailed profile of the two primary subjects whose recollections form the core of this investigation. By outlining their individual recruitment, fragmented memories, and motivations for examining this topic, we establish the foundational context for the subsequent thematic analysis of their shared experiences and the broader psychological patterns they represent.
2.1 Profile: Jake Matthews
Jake Matthews reports being selected for his local GATE program along with a "handful of really random kids," noting his immediate observation that the selection criteria did not appear correlated with academic performance. This discrepancy fueled a lifelong sense of confusion and contributed to a persistent, fragmented memory of his elementary school years. His motivation for investigating the program is twofold: a personal imperative to reconstruct his own childhood experiences and, more urgently, his concern as a parent of a school-aged child who might be selected for a similar program. Matthews initiated a broader public discourse on the topic through a popular TikTok series, which elicited an overwhelming response from other alumni reporting strikingly similar recollections and long-term effects.
2.2 Profile: Gabriel Hardie
Gabriel Hardie’s entry into his GATE program was characterized by initial excitement, exemplified by the anecdote of proudly telling his mother, "I'm in a special program." This pride was soon supplanted by feelings of confusion and a persistent sense that he was being subjected to tests without his full understanding or consent. In his adult life, Hardie has observed a distinct sociological pattern: the vast majority of his social circle, including his fiancΓ©e, are also former GATE participants. His observation that "we all gravitate towards each other" is a profound data point. Does this suggest a form of subconscious social sorting based on shared, unarticulated trauma? Or does it point to enduring neurological modifications that result in similar cognitive or affective profiles, leading to natural affinity? These individual profiles set the stage for a deeper analysis of the common experiential threads that connect them and a wider community of GATE alumni.
3.0 Analysis of Recurring Experiential Themes
This section deconstructs the subjects' fragmented recollections to identify and analyze distinct, recurring themes. The analysis categorizes these recollections along a continuum, from activities mirroring known pedagogical techniques to procedural anomalies that align more closely with protocols for psychological conditioning or dissociative state induction. This thematic categorization is crucial for distinguishing between potentially benign educational activities and those that suggest a more anomalous or covert purpose.
3.1 Program Environment and Pedagogical Methods
Participants consistently recall being physically segregated from the main student body, often in trailers or other temporary structures located outside the primary school building. Within these isolated settings, a variety of activities were conducted that, while presented as games, were uniformly perceived as cognitive tests.
- Computer-based tasks: Participants remember using computers for games like
Oregon Trail. However, they recall the experience not as entertainment but as a "weird test" designed to assess skill or cognition under performance pressure. - Cognitive and Abstract Reasoning Tests: Specific, timed tests were frequently administered. These included
Tangrams(high-speed geometric shape puzzles) and theStroop test, a classic neuropsychological test designed to measure executive functions such as cognitive flexibility and interference processing by requiring participants to name the ink color of a printed word rather than read the word itself. - Construction and Spatial Tasks: Another common activity involved building 3D objects from basic arts and craft supplies, particularly construction paper. This appears to have been a test of spatial reasoning and abstract problem-solving capabilities.
3.2 Anomalous Procedures and Activities
Beyond unconventional pedagogical methods, participants report procedures and activities that deviate significantly from conventional education and suggest protocols for psychological conditioning.
- Auditory Stimuli and "Headphone" Sessions: A powerful, widely shared memory involves the prolonged use of "old clunky grayish green headphones." While a mundane explanation is standard school hearing tests, participants report using them for hours at a time for tasks that included predicting which ear a tone would originate from or participating in guided meditation and hypnosis sessions.
- "Nap Times" and Hypnotherapy: Structured "nap times" are another recurring memory, reported not as periods of rest but as sessions involving listening to specific music or noises. One detailed account involves a class chanting "your mind your body is a temple your mind is a soul" while being instructed to visualize a pyramid, a practice strongly indicative of a hypnotherapeutic or programming technique.
- The "Pink Drink": Perhaps the most vivid shared memory is that of consuming a pink or purplish liquid from Dixie cups. The official narrative was that of a fluoride or plaque-disclosing treatment for dental hygiene. However, the reported frequency far exceeds that of a typical dental lesson. An alternative hypothesis, posited by an alleged insider, suggests this liquid was an agent used in combination with hypnotherapy to suppress and compartmentalize memories, potentially as an extension of MK Ultra research.
- Atypical Field Trips: Participants commonly recall field trips to destinations that felt odd or purposeless. The three most frequently reported locations were planetariums, aquariums, and cemeteries.
3.3 Reported Long-Term Commonalities and After-Effects
A significant component of this analysis involves the correlation between GATE participation and subsequent anomalous life events, suggesting potential long-term psychological impacts.
- Childhood-Onset Auditory Hallucinations: Many former participants, including Hardie, report the distinct experience of hearing voices as children. These were often perceived as "a group of men mumbling" distantly, though at times the voices would speak directly, using profanity. This phenomenon is qualitatively different from typical schizophreniform hallucinations and may suggest an induced perception of being monitored, causing significant fear and confusion.
- Near-Death Experiences (NDEs): A statistically anomalous frequency of NDEs, particularly those involving drowning, is reported among former participants, including both subjects in this study. This pattern warrants deep analysis, raising the question of whether early experiences of psychological disorientation and lack of agency within the program could prime individuals for dissociative states when under extreme physical duress.
- Anomalous Perceptual Experiences: A subset of alumni report ongoing anomalous perceptions, such as communicating with non-human intelligences. A recurring shared visual is that of a "flying pyramid with eyeballs." This specific entity directly links back to the hypnotherapeutic "nap time" exercise involving pyramid visualization, suggesting the later perception may be a direct, long-term result of an earlier psychological implant or induced thoughtform.
The analysis of these anomalous experiences bridges directly to the exploration of theoretical frameworks that might explain their origin and purpose.
4.0 Proposed Theoretical Frameworks
This section explores the hypotheses put forth by the subjects to make sense of their fragmented and unsettling experiences. Considering these frameworks—ranging from national security initiatives to sophisticated psychological manipulation—is essential for contextualizing the potential motivations behind the GATE program's more unusual aspects.
4.1 The Dual-Purpose Hypothesis: Education as a Cover for Talent Identification
The central theory posits that some GATE programs operated with a dual purpose: a public-facing, benign goal of advanced education, and a covert objective of identifying and cultivating children with specific cognitive or parapsychological abilities for future government, military, or intelligence roles. This hypothesis is grounded in a clear historical context of government interest in leveraging citizen talent for strategic advantage.
Historical Precedent | Alleged Application in GATE Programs |
Sputnik & The National Defense Education Act | Explicitly linked childhood education to national defense, establishing a government incentive to cultivate talent for strategic purposes. |
Project Stargate & MK Ultra | CIA research into psychic abilities (remote viewing) and mind control, suggesting a government interest in the very aptitudes allegedly being tested in some GATE programs. |
Ancient Empires | Historical practice of identifying intelligent or gifted children to be trained for service to the state, particularly in military and defense roles. |
4.2 The Psychological Manipulation Hypothesis
An alternative, though not mutually exclusive, hypothesis is that the anomalous experiences are the result of sophisticated psychological manipulation rather than the identification of innate abilities. This framework suggests the programs were designed to induce phenomena for study.
The concept of a "tulpa"—a thoughtform brought into existence through intense, collective focus—is introduced as a potential explanation. Shared visions, such as the "flying pyramid with eyeballs," could be the direct outcome of a psychological operation in which susceptible children were guided through visualization exercises (as described in section 3.2) designed to create and study such a phenomenon. Furthermore, the potential for implanting false memories is a significant concern. Jake Matthews explicitly notes this risk, stating his deliberate effort to avoid using leading questions in his own research to prevent the inadvertent creation of memories in others.
These theoretical frameworks, born from fragmented adult memory, gain a disturbing immediacy when evidence suggests the underlying programmatic structures persist, raising profound questions for the children of former participants.
5.0 Generational Persistence and Contemporary Concerns
This section examines evidence suggesting the anomalous phenomena associated with gifted and talented programs may not be a historical artifact but an ongoing concern. This analysis is critical for determining whether the unusual methods reported have persisted, posing questions for current students and parents.
The case of Gabriel Hardie's seven-year-old son, recently enrolled in a gifted program, provides a compelling contemporary data point that suggests a generational persistence of these methods.
- Recruitment: The son was recruited in the second grade, a common entry point for the previous generation.
- Activities: The son describes program activities not as advanced academic work but as "Icebreaker psychological type games," a description that echoes the "games-as-tests" model recalled by his father.
- Behavioral Changes: Most notably, the son has displayed a notable emotional reticence and affective blunting specifically concerning program activities, which contrasts sharply with his otherwise open disposition. This mirrors the feelings of confusion his father reported, suggesting a similar inability or unwillingness to articulate the experience.
This modern case illustrates the dilemma faced by alumni who are now parents. Hardie has adopted a strategy of cautious inquiry, while Matthews is considering homeschooling as a preventative measure. These contemporary examples demonstrate the enduring relevance and unresolved questions surrounding these specialized programs.
6.0 Conclusion and Avenues for Further Research
This comparative case study synthesizes firsthand accounts that reveal a significant paradox: the existence of a widespread public education program that has left a notable number of alumni with fragmented memories and a collection of shared, anomalous experiences. The recollections of Jake Matthews and Gabriel Hardie, corroborated by a larger community, suggest a consistent pattern of activity that falls well outside the bounds of conventional pedagogy.
The most critical takeaways from this analysis are as follows:
- A Pattern of Anomalous Experience: A consistent pattern of reported activities within some GATE programs (e.g., hypnotic headphone sessions, cognitive tests disguised as games, the "pink drink") falls outside the scope of conventional education and aligns more closely with protocols for psychological conditioning.
- Significant Long-Term Commonalities: A notable correlation appears to exist between GATE participation and subsequent anomalous life events, including childhood-onset auditory hallucinations and a statistically anomalous incidence of near-death experiences.
- Plausible Explanatory Frameworks: The experiences, while unusual, can be contextualized within historical government initiatives related to national security and psychological research, suggesting a potential "dual purpose" that warrants further, more formal investigation.
While anecdotal evidence has inherent limitations, the consistency and specificity of these accounts provide a compelling foundation for structured inquiry. This analysis serves as a call for formal, academic research into the long-term psychological and sociological impact of these specialized education programs, a step advocated for by former participants seeking to understand the true nature of their childhood experiences.
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The GATE Program: Piecing Together My Lost Childhood
Introduction: The Fog
For my entire life, I’ve carried the unsettling feeling of a huge gap in my memory. It’s a specific blank spot, a fog that rolls in right around second or third grade and hangs there for years. The source of this fog has always been the so-called Gifted and Talented program, or GATE.
I have a crystal-clear memory of being pulled out of my regular classroom with a handful of other kids. I remember sitting in this other room, being told I’d been selected, and looking around at the other students. My brain is good at pattern recognition, and something didn’t track. I thought, None of us have the grades to reflect this. I was sitting there like, this has got to be a joke, right? Or maybe they were putting me into some special ed and just giving it a fancy name to not hurt my feelings.
But beyond that initial moment of selection, the subsequent years are a vague, hazy blur. For most of my life, I buried the thought, but the central mystery remained: What happened to me in that program? Why can't I remember?
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1. The Cracks in the Wall
That dormant mystery cracked open a few years ago. I was listening to a podcast that listed a myriad of characteristics shared by kids who went through these programs. Listening to that description, I realized I fit it almost perfectly. It really freaked me out, but I buried the thought again, not quite ready to confront the weirdness.
The real trigger came more recently. I was scrolling through TikTok and saw a video of someone talking about their own GATE experience. They held up a box set of cards they were tested on—something called "Dr. Ryan's ESP test." Seeing those cards sparked a concrete memory, a visceral flashback that I couldn’t ignore.
I realized then that I had to do something. I have a small platform with my channel, "Jake knows nothing," and I felt a responsibility to contribute. I wanted to be careful not to instill false memories in people, so I mixed my own experiences with a weird set of physical characteristics I found were common—things you can’t fake, like having RH-negative blood, an unaccounted-for forehead scar, or a prominent occipital bun. If we, as a community, were trying to trigger memories in each other and get to the bottom of this, then I needed to help, and that decision unleashed an overwhelming response I never could have imagined.
2. The Overwhelming Echo
When I posted my first videos about the GATE program, I was braced for the worst. I figured I’d get a flood of comments from people calling me insane, schizophrenic, or a conspiracy theorist. Instead, the opposite happened. About 95% of the feedback—the comments, the DMs—was a chorus of validation.
"You hit the nail on the head... you described my whole experience... it's freaking me out too."
The relief was immense. There is a profound comfort in discovering that these weird, fragmented, and often disturbing experiences were not unique to me. I wasn’t alone. Suddenly, this personal investigation became a shared journey with thousands of other people who were also trying to piece together their lost childhoods, which gave me the confidence to dive deeper into my own surfacing memories.
3. Fragments of a Forgotten Classroom
As I researched more, my own memories started to re-emerge, not as a clear timeline, but as disjointed fragments and gut feelings. It was like recalling a dream—more intuitive knowing than visual recollection.
The Setting
I remember the classes didn't take place in the main school building but in a temporary trailer on campus. Sometimes it felt normal, with other kids and my friends. But other times, it was not normal. On those days, the windows would be covered with tan or blue paper, and I would be alone or with only one or two other kids. The atmosphere was completely different.
The "Games"
The core activities were always presented as fun games, but I remember this gut feeling that this wasn't fun. It felt like a weird test, and I don't like the feeling of not being clued into what's going on. I hate that. I didn't like being lied to. It felt like they were trying to see what my brain could do in these weird conditions. Many of these "games" were timed, adding a constant sense of pressure.
- Old Computers: We would play games on very old computers. I specifically remember Oregon Trail, but it wasn't a game to me. It felt like a test.
- Timed Tests: We were constantly being timed on abstract tasks. I vividly recall two of them:
- Tangrams: These were colorful, geometric shape blocks that we had to use to rapidly assemble different objects.
- Stroop Test: This involved reading a list of color names (like "blue," "red," "green") where each word was printed in a different color. The test was to say the color of the ink, not the word itself, as quickly and accurately as possible.
- The Headphones: I have a distinct memory of old, clunky, grayish-green headphones. We used them for listening to meditation tapes and performing mental gymnastics that felt like self-hypnosis. I also remember weird nap times associated with them.
The Pink Drink
One of the most vivid and common memories shared by others is the "pink drink." I distinctly remember frequently having to drink a pink, purplish liquid out of a small Dixie cup. The official narrative is that this was a fluoride treatment, but the frequency with which we had it felt off.
The Field Trip
My memory of field trips is a huge gap, but one stands out as particularly odd. A very small group of us were taken to a planetarium. The whole experience felt pointless. I couldn't understand why just a handful of us were there, and it left me with a deep sense of strangeness. These personal recollections were unsettling enough, but they were nothing compared to the profoundly disturbing commonalities I discovered from others.
4. A Shared Shadow
As I connected with more people, two deeply specific and bizarre experiences emerged as startlingly common threads, cementing the feeling that something profound was going on.
The Voices
Throughout my childhood, I was terrified to fall asleep. Every time that I was in that state of about to fall asleep, I would hear what sounded like a group of men mumbling about me in the distance. Sometimes, they would curse directly at me. Growing up in a rigid religious environment, I was terrified that it was a demonic influence and never told my parents. To hear so many other former GATE kids describe this exact same phenomenon—the mumbling men, the profanity, the fear—was one of the most validating and chilling moments of this entire journey.
The Near-Death Experience (NDE)
I had a deeply repressed memory of nearly drowning during a swim test at summer camp. I wasn't a strong swimmer, my body gave out, and I remember going under the water and blacking out before a lifeguard woke me up at the side of the pool. That’s something I haven't thought about since summer camp; these are memories that I have repressed. The shocking revelation was the sheer frequency with which other former GATE kids reported having NDEs, with drowning being a recurring theme. The rate among this specific group feels like a statistical anomaly that is hard to ignore. Faced with these shared phenomena, I knew I had to search for a logical framework that could begin to explain the unthinkable.
5. The Logic of the Unthinkable
When you start connecting the dots, a disturbing but logical theory begins to emerge about the GATE program's potential dual purpose.
The Government's Incentive
The idea of a government taking an interest in gifted children isn't a far-fetched conspiracy; it's a historical precedent with a clear, logical motive.
- The Sputnik Catalyst: When the Soviets launched Sputnik in 1957, it created mass panic in the U.S. In direct response, the government passed the National Defense Education Act, explicitly linking the education of children to national defense.
- A History of Precedent: Throughout history, from ancient Chinese empires to modern nations, governments have sought out intelligent children to cultivate for military, defense, and intelligence roles. It is a logical strategy.
The Cover Story
If a government wanted to run a clandestine program, they would design it with plausible deniability. Many GATE activities mirrored mundane school exercises, providing a perfect cover.
Mundane Activity | Potential Real Purpose |
Standard school hearing tests. | Predictive tests (could you predict which ear a tone would come in?) and hypnotherapy. |
Fluoride "pink drink" for dental health. | The pink drinks, in combination with the hypnotherapy from the headphones, were designed to get programming deeper into our subconscious while also compartmentalizing and suppressing memories. |
Playing "fun games" in a separate class. | A battery of psychological, abstract thinking, and psychic aptitude tests (like ESP cards) disguised as educational enrichment. |
The Deeper Purpose
Look, this is some insane shit that I'm about to say, but I don't really know where else to go from here. This all leads to the most compelling and unsettling theory: that for at least a subset of children, the GATE program was a sanitized, public-facing continuation of infamous CIA research projects like MK Ultra (mind control) and Project Stargate (remote viewing). The goal was to identify and cultivate children who might possess psychic abilities for espionage.
It's like a very weird digitized Espionage type of shamanism.
This grand theory, however, doesn't just live in the abstract; it has a direct and profound impact on the choices I'm making in my life today.
6. A Father's Concern
One of the biggest motivating factors with this is my little son, who is sort of approaching school age. Reliving these experiences… it's concerning. It has forced me to seriously question the path forward for him. As of right now, we are leaning away from public school and considering homeschooling.
I just know in my heart that if he were put into a public school, he would most likely be selected for a similar program. And little kids are just defenseless. They don't have the ability to discern what's weird or normal, let alone communicate it effectively.
To be clear, I am not trying to attack the education system or cast shadows on the many legitimate programs designed to help intelligent children thrive. My goal is much simpler: I just want to know what happened to me. I want to know what happened to the countless others who share this strange and specific void in their past.
The core of this mystery remains the massive, inexplicable gap in my memory. The investigation is far from over, and I hope more people will keep digging into their own pasts, because somewhere in those forgotten classrooms lies a truth we all deserve to uncover.
