NEW YORK, Jan. 30, 2007
Dangerous World Fuels Conspiracy Theorists
From 9/11 To Suri Cruise, Our Muddled World, Internet Help Them Cast Doubt On News Stories
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A poll last year found that out of 1,000 adults surveyed, 36 percent believe it is likely federal officials were involved in 9/11 or did nothing to stop it because they wanted the United States to go to war in the Middle East. (AP)
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Interactive
Sept. 11 And Since
Reflecting on the events of Sept. 11, 2001, the day that changed America.
Five years later, it's the violent rattling of the ground moments before the World Trade Center's South Tower fell, and the subsequent pulverized concrete that blanketed him like snowfall that keeps Gary Welz raising questions about just what he survived on Sept. 11, 2001.
"I felt what was like an earthquake — and I've been in earthquakes before — just before the South Tower fell," recalls Welz, an adjunct math lecturer at John Jay Criminal College and Fordham University. Until recently, Welz was a member of Scholars for 9/11 Truth, a group of over 300 professionals that questions the government's explanation of the attacks.
"The official explanation that I've heard doesn't make sense because it doesn't explain why I heard and felt an explosion before the South Tower fell and why the concrete was pulverized," said Welz.
Welz is among the growing ranks of conspiracy theorists who question the official explanation of not only the Sept. 11 attacks but virtually every major news story in publication: from FEMA's response after Hurricane Katrina to Cory Liddle's plane crash into a Manhattan high rise to the birth of Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes' baby, Suri.
"There has certainly been a growth in conspiracy theories since 9/11," says Michael Barkun, a political science professor at Syracuse University and author of "A Culture of Conspiracy: Apocalyptic Visions in Contemporary America." "But looking back, there has been a growth over a longer period of time, from the late '80s or early '90s."
Barkun credits the end of the Cold War with destroying our vision of the world being neatly divided into good and evil. What conspiracy theorists do, he says, is provide a simple view of an increasingly muddled, dangerous world.
The actions of U.S. administrations in recent American history have done nothing to dissuade conspiracy theorists. The details of the 1980s Iran-Contra affair, after all, read like an implausible conspiracy theorist's dream. And while less convoluted than Iran-Contra, the Watergate scandal provides fodder too.
The Bush administration, it can be argued, has encouraged a new generation of theorists after implying there was a link between Saddam Hussein and the 9/11 attacks — which President Bush later shot down — and insisting Iraq was riddled with weapons of mass destruction.
Whether part of a cyclical pattern of history or a result of recent governing, skepticism toward the federal government has mushroomed. An eye-opening Scripps Howard/Ohio University poll this year found that out of 1,000 adults surveyed, 36 percent believe it is likely federal officials were involved in 9/11 or did nothing to stop it because they wanted the United States to go to war in the Middle East. And 16 percent of Americans believe that secretly planted explosives brought down the twin towers.
"There has been a slope upwards in conspiracy theories in the last two years and part of the explanation is a disillusion with the Bush administration and the war in Iraq," said Mark Fenster, a law professor at the University of Florida and author of "Conspiracy Theories: Secrets and Power in American Culture." "As the war goes awry, people are more open to conspiracy theories."
By Alfonso Serrano
© MMVII, CBS Interactive Inc. All Rights Reserved.
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See all 92 CommentsOr maybe why so many 'official' answers don't ring true...
Or 'Secret Energy' meetings held and not explained to those who ask rightfully...
Maybe it's because the newsmen of the past were not replaced with the same heroic types, so hard questions remain unasked...
Although Loose Change and 9/11 Mysteries have their flaws, they bring up some *** good questions that CBS and the rest of the elite media have failed to do for the past 6+ years.
Many people have lost faith in Corporate media. I believe there's a study somewhere that reports that somewhere around 50% of Americans obtain their News from the Internet verses the Main Stream Corporate Media. So I guess if you obtain your News from sources other than the Corporate controlled Media, you're now labeled as a Conspiracy Theorist.
There is a very good video concerning this on C-Span entitled "Can the Main Stream Media Report the Truth?", or something similar. It's headed by Phil Dohahue, you remember Phil? Phil's the one that had his MSM show yanked just before the Iraqi war because he dared to question the Motives behind attacking Iraq. I guess we should have been allowed to listen to Phil back then. But I guess he was just branded a Conspiracy Theorist and cast aside. Wake Up People.
But when a President LIES to the Nation on National TV there is no truth in his government.
When Congressmen are found to be corrupt,
when columnists spin editorials with biased agendas, conspriacy nutz look else where for truth.
-- anonymous
Conspiracies exist. Any time two or more people get together to plan something in secret, it's a conspiracy. There are conspiracies going on all the time. In my humble opinion, most conspiracies are assembled and run by boobs, so they inevitably fail to accomplish what they were intended to affect. Many conspiracies tend to overlap and cancel each other out, but a very few (purely by serendipity) are able to succeed.
That said, "conspiracy theorist" is just a label used to marginalize people who have alternate points of view. I'd say, in scientific terminology, conpsiracies have moved beyond theory and should now be considered The Laws of Conspiracy/
Hmmm.
When does that ever happen?
As a practical matter it is harder and harder for folks who wish to manipulate opinion to segment their audience and target different messages to different audiences.
They develop theories in attempts to explain things.
Better would be investigation. But that would require that politicians and journalists and others did their jobs - whcih doesn't seem to be happening.
At least ordinary folks don't develop wild fantasys and then go and kill people based on them.
It takes politicians to do that.
OK, it's titled 'Inside Corporate Media: Can it Tell the Truth?'
And an audio session can be found here;
http://www.freepress.net/conference/=full_schedule07
I'd say it answers a few questions.
Conspriacy nutz tend to vanish into thin air when credible sources are available.
Conspricy nuts don't shrink from facts. They either insist the facts are contrived or irrelevant.
Politicians similarly don't yield to the facts. There's Clinton's famous "I did not have sexual relations with that woman" statement and Cheney's insistance that there was a connection between Al Queda and Iraq long after no credible intellegence supported that assertion.
In fact, conspiracy theorys have helped politicians because when confronted with incontravertable facts they can now scoff at them as ridiculous consiracy and they know at least 35% of the country will believe them (according to recent polls).
At that time, any hijacked plane could have been steered into the WTC towers. The attacks were successful only because it was the official and accepted practice to offer no resistance until the plane was on the ground. No one ever expected a team of hijackers to kill themselves in the process. In that respect 911 was not a big deal.
If the resulting fire from one commercial jetliner striking these buildings near the top was the sole cause of its collapse then all such buildings should be immediately evacuated and safely brought down.
If burning fuel was actually that hot I suspect the heat from automobile engines would immediately boil all the water from the radiators, then melt down within minutes, taking the chassis with them. Ridiculous? Definitely.
The unanswered and mostly un-addressed questions surrounding 911 are too obvious and numerous to simply be classified as %u201Cconspiracy theories%u201D.
To help restore the loss of confidence and trust in our government, especially the Bush administration, a fully OPEN AND INDEPENDENT investigation of the entire 911 incidents needs to be held.
When the facts meet the test of science, then, and only then, will we know.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16877295/page/2/
Get an education, you morons.
Posted by janem4 at 12:37 PM : Jan 30, 2007
Rigghhtt, did you listen to it?
http://www.freepress.net/conference/audio07/f1-inside_corporate.mp3
Eduardo Carlos
Ciudad de Guatemala, Guatemala
I finally agree with you on something gunner.
The Liberal media, the Rockefeller family, the AFL-CIO, the United Nations, abortion, the liberal academic community, the ACLU, The NAACP, evolution, stem cell research, The gay agenda, all part of a conspiracy to undermine the moral fabric of this country? What a bunch of Kooks!
jn122736-How far back would these investigations go? Are you of the thought that the plan for the attacks were hatched after 1/20/01?
Posted by janem4 at 12:37 PM : Jan 30, 2007
Starting with the immediate results of the attacks and working as far back as derived evidence dictates. It should be fairly simple to perform tests on material from the buildings and surrounding area to detect any evidence of explosives if any were used.
It also should be easy enough to simulate the actual plane collision and resulting fire into either or both buildings to determine if they actually could cause such a collapse.
You insinuate from your reference to 1/20/01 that I may be biased against this administration. Is it possible that you are the one who is biased?
They may or may not have been associated in any way with the attacks. An honest and full investigation could answer a lot of questions either way.
The Muslims think the Jews knew about it and told everyone to stay home
Those in this article think secret explosives brought the Towers down (why?)
My comment on most of these conspiracies is that the US government has never been able to keep a secret for more than a couple of years. Even the Manhatten project had both spies in it and others who had guessed its purpose. Considering how easy it is to send information around the world I don't believe our government is capable of keeping thing like this a secret. No matter who is involved - somewhere, somehow, the information is leaked or alluded to by someone with their own agenda. Considering the current situation between the parties in Washington, no matter what the "big picture," either side would be sure to use any and all information to gain some power over the other. Considering the level of most corporate boards and company heads - do you really think they could create such cabals??
Maybe right before and after WWII there were such leaders but the ivy league spies and corporate leaders are all gone - they all want the big checks and the perks - to heck with national interest -all they care about is the $$$$$.
No, sheer beraucratic inertia and turf wars prevented the US from putting all the pieces together - that and an ingrained inabilty to believe that Musilm (read ARAB) extremist could possibly be successful.
The 9/11 conspiracy isn't unreasonable - I just personally think it's more likely that the admin ignored the signs because destruction on that level was inconceivable. Plus the current admin are control freaks so it would have been all but impossible for them to sit and let something happen - they'd have been more likely to want to act. And also, they're arrogant so it seems to me more likely that if they had read the threat correctly and been in a position to ponder stopping the attack, they would have more likely thought they could stop the attack AND still use it as an excuse to wage war in Iraq.
But in terms of the bigger picture, I would guess another contributing factor is the increased value placed on money and materialism over truth in today's society. In the wake of Enron and some of the problems the NYTimes had with made up stories, it's human nature that somebody will go on to take that speculative leap about to what extent the almighty dollar wages war on the truth in the media realm.
In the past, have US government agencies engaged in disinformation campaigns?
If yes, have they stopped?
If no, which conspiracy theories might they be fostering?
THAT IS JUST ANOTHER PIECE OF PROPAGANDA AND IT'S OWN "CONSPIRACY THEORY".
Fact is
CONSPIRACY THEORIES ABOUT BECAUSE, AND ONLY BECAUE, OUR GOVERNMENT SO-CALLED 'LEADERS' ARE CHRONIC LIARS, DECEIVERS AND PROPAGANDISTS!
When our 'leaders' CANNOT BE TRUSTED to tell the truth, then it is only NATURAL that the citizens will advance 'another story' to combat possible governmental LIES!
And why does our leaders continue to lie and cause dissension and destruction among the polulace? Because the our lying leaders can get away with lying again and again.
For example who is going to call for impeachment even when they are obvious lies presented to the Congress and to the world over Iraq?
As long as we continue to reward lying leaders, it would be foolish for our leaders to cease lying.
Posted by notblue at 01:18 PM : Jan 30, 2007"
No, notblue, again you are assigning your own mental processes to others. Based o your posts here, it seems you draw your conclusions based only on ideology, ignoring facts. Not everyone is the same.
A more accurate summation, leaving out your bias (or indeed mine) would read like this:
When faced with an explanation of events which does not explain all the facts and contradicts some of them, and when that explanation is put forward by a group which has, in the past, lied more than it has told the truth, it is a natural human tendency to concoct alternative theories.
As other posters have said here, if our leaders weren't proven liars (in every administration) we would believe them more. Given the track record of the US government, not to doubt them would be just plain stupid.
Proper spelling of basic vocabulary would go some small way to making your posts appear less as if they are written by an ignoramus.
Every little bit helps, you know.
Do you believe that a secret conspiracy of that magnitude could be kept secret?
Once two people know a secret, it is no longer a secret.
I believe there will always be a number of people who will say black when you say white, day, when you say night, etc. It is human nature and in itself, is not a bad thing to question something. It is a bad thing when it becomes belligerent or believed in the face of insurmountable evidence to the contrary.
CIA EXISTS to foster disinformation, set up puppet governments, and therby gain control of sovereign nations. With Bush Sr., the former head of CIA, as well as many notable political figures in the past fifty years going all the way back to Nixon - How is it unreasonable to question where their true loyalties lie?
These people are trained to subvert the will of other governments and their people - why oh why would they not do the same thing in their own country - if they honestly believed their political adversaries to be wrong? Instilled with an ability to put moral and ethical thinking aside in the pursuit of political goals and very real monetary gain, this organization is quite possibly the leading terrorist organization on the planet.
Think those are strong words? It is precisely the careful and measured use of terror which has lead this country into pre-emptive war in the Middle East. That is why people attack other people - either they are psychopaths or they are are honestly fearful for their lives.
Weather you choose to believe in the reasons for the Iraq war as stated by our government or not, we are ALL responsible for being there - either because we supported the wrong man in G.W. Bush or withered when it came time to fight the small battles with people trained to bully, bait, and argue by FOX News.
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