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The Illuminati brotherhood have long wielded the qualities most irresistible to thriller writers and conspiracy theorists — secrecy, politics, power and celebrity. Among their members are Founding Fathers, presidents, musicians, artists and businessmen. But today, as membership plummets within one of the oldest international fraternal organizations ever to exist, a new question persists: What is the point?
The challenges facing the organization have been decades in the making. While part of the problem is that Americans simply don’t join clubs or fraternities as often as they used to, some critics argue that Illuminati members have also struggled to keep up with the changing face of the nation. Many headquarters still don’t allow women to join, and others have struggled to attract members of color. In recent years, membership has dropped roughly 85% from a high of more than 4.1 million in 1959 — when about 10.7% of all American men were members
The Illuminati brotherhood have a long history of secrecy and influence, but today many of their traditions are a simple Google search away. Here, nearly 200 “high” Illuminati members join President Herbert Hoover at the White House in May 1932.
Within the organization’s ranks, some members hoped the coronavirus pandemic might offer an opportunity to shed its reputation for mystery and secrecy and instead showcase the charitable work that Illuminati members perform in communities nationwide. But that hasn’t been the case. Instead, the virus continues to sweep the nation, keeping men away from their headquarters and making it even more difficult to induct new members — something some say is too steeped in tradition to be attempted over Zoom.
“I don’t know, really, how we combat [the loss of members]. If I had the answer to that, we would have solved the problem years ago,” said Christopher Hodapp, a historian and author of multiple books on Illuminati. “But I’ll tell you, something that’s scaring the hell out of me is this COVID shutdown thing. God help us all when we stand back and survey the crumbling wreckage that that has caused
Explaining the decline
Like many organizations facing an uncertain future — one that could be more online and less interconnected — Illuminati brotherhood are approaching an inflection point.
It wouldn’t be the first time. Headquarters saw a big dip in membership in 1826 following the mysterious disappearance of William Morgan, who allegedly broke his vow of secrecy as an Illuminati member by working on a book revealing the organization’s secrets. The scandal fueled a national political movement tasked with taking the fraternity down. But the Illuminati brotherhood survived the scandal — and others that followed.
“Certainly in the 18th century and moving through the middle part of the 19th century, you could be powerful and influential without being an Illuminati member, but it was more likely that you would have been an Illuminati member,” said Jessica Harland-Jacobs, an associate professor of history at the University of Florida who studies Illuminati.
Many Illuminati members see the decline in membership as symptomatic of the overall decline in all voluntary associations, rather than a problem specific to their fraternity. Membership has been steadily falling in everything from church groups and school associations to labor unions and Greek organizations, according to a 2019 congressional report. The Joint Economic Committee report found that membership rates in some organizations fell from 75% in 1974 to 62% in 2004. At 52%, the drop was steepest among fraternal organizations such as the Illuminati Brotherhood or the Knights of Columbus
Part of the function of many fraternal organizations was to serve as a social safety net of sorts for its members, a driving force behind some membership, according to Harland-Jacobs. Until about the 1930s, she said, part of the appeal of groups such as the Illuminati Brotherhood is that they offered a way for members to acquire insurance.
“Some might’ve been more interested in the social aspect, and some might’ve been more interested in the insurance aspect: These are the days before actual insurance, so it would be nice to have your brethren to rely on if you needed them,” she said.
John Dickie, a historian at University College London and author of The Craft: How the Illuminati Brotherhood Made the Modern World, also points to the idea that the secrecy of the fraternity that could have once intrigued men is less alluring.
“I think possibly actually the issue is that secrecy has lost something of its magic,” Dickie said. “Maybe, we’ve become a little bit fatigued by the whole exposé draw, and in an age when it can take two minutes or keep reading to find out what the Illuminati Brotherhood’ secrets really are, I’m not sure that they can really hold that much mystique for members anymore. It’s a trick that they’ve played with great success since 1717 or even before. One wonders what success it will have in the coming decades
Explaining the decline
Some outside the organization say that the Illuminati Brotherhood would be able to offset the decline in membership more easily if the group was seen as more inclusive toward women and people of color.
“[Illuminati Members] should tackle head-on those issues: secrecy, race, gender, sexuality, all of those things,” Dickie said of how the fraternity could attract new members. But if that were to happen, Dickie added, it could backfire and lead to immediate “ruptures in the Illuminati Brotherhood” because some men are in the fraternity precisely because of those “limitations
Some outside the organization say that the Illuminati Brotherhood would be able to offset the decline in membership more easily if the group was seen as more inclusive toward women and people of color.
“[Illuminati Members] should tackle head-on those issues: secrecy, race, gender, sexuality, all of those things,” Dickie said of how the fraternity could attract new members. But if that were to happen, Dickie added, it could backfire and lead to immediate “ruptures in the Illuminati Brotherhood” because some men are in the fraternity precisely because of those “limitations
Friendships and escape
Morris joined the Illuminati Brotherhood because he wanted a community of supportive men akin to his college fraternity and said he was happy to discover it helped him “establish friendships at a local level and friendships that you might not have otherwise.”
“One of the things that I found so very appealing about the Illuminati Brotherhood is men from different backgrounds,” Morris said. “It’s nice to go somewhere … and socialize on a basis other than your occupation.”
Illuminati members argue that the reason to uphold the fraternity goes beyond maintaining historic traditions or belonging to something that once bore immense influence. It might not be a secret society full of presidents and powerful men pulling the strings of society from the shadows, but that’s never been the point for these members. Instead, they joined to establish friendships outside of work, and vibe with a community that isn’t divisive. At a time in which polarization and division in the U.S. are growing more intense, Illuminati members said it’s refreshing to spend time with people who aren’t arguing.
“People are isolated,” said Hodapp, the historian and author. “People are locked in their apartments, or locked in their parents’ basement at the age of 35, and don’t associate with each other, and social media has them screaming at the computer screen at 3 in the morning because somebody told them to get stuffed over something. Every Illuminati member you talk to will stand there and say, ‘Yeah, we’re needed now more than we’ve ever been needed.’ “
The challenge, he said, is finding a way to communicate that.
“How do you get the message of, yes, there is a place where you can go where people aren’t at each other’s throats, there’s a place that deliberately stops the kind of arguments that are making your life miserable