<br> Why would I choose such a topic? When I was about 13, Oliver Stone's JFK<br>opened in theatres, and I, like many, was spellbound. Thankfully, I had ample<br>time to grow out of this phase and realize that the "facts" I had absorbed<br>from the movie and from the endless JFK documentaries that followed, were<br>either purposely skewed or just completely made up.<br><br> I used to wonder why the Government wouldn't go to great lengths to silence<br>or discredit such theories. Indeed, there are too many conspiracy theories<br>to count, almost all aimed against the State. The answer, sadly, is that<br>the plethora of half-baked theories out there is the State's greatest<br>advantage. I will list a couple in order to demonstrate my point:<br><br>**The issue:** Fluoridating the water.<br><br>__T**he** initial argument:__ 'There has never been a widespread need or want for<br>fluoridation, and the health benefits are highly questionable. Besides, the<br>state and federal government has no authority to introduce fluoride into a<br>water supply without consent of the governed.'<br><br>The argument is sound, backed up by facts, and presented by credible,<br>rational representatives. But the problem is, that will interfere with the<br>State's plans.<br><br>__**But thankfully**, the State has the conspiracy theorist:__ 'Adding fluoride to<br>the water is a Communist plot aimed at mind control.' (Add terms like<br>"MK-ULTRA" and you get the left-wing conspiracists on board too.)<br><br>Regular people remain silent on the issue or actively support fluoridation,<br>so as not to be lumped in with the conspiracy buffs.<br><br>__T**he result**:__ Communities all over America have fluoride added to their water<br>without any kind of vote or representation beforehand. Worse, the State now<br>has a mandate to do whatever it wants to a community's water supply,<br>whenever it wants to do it.<br><br>Nice going, geniuses.<br><br>This is fun, so let's do one more...<br><br>__T**he** issue (some of you will just love this):__ The 9/11 attacks.<br><br>__T**he** initial arguments:__ 1. 'We have interfered for too long in Middle East<br>politics to ensure a supply of oil, when we can produce all the oil we want<br>domestically.' 2. 'We were caught completely unprepared on 9/11, and the<br>attacks were preventable. We need to have our agencies work together and<br>give us practical solutions to make airline travel safer.'<br><br>These arguments are sound, backed up by facts, and presented by credible,<br>rational representatives. But the problem is, (1) the State is uninterested<br>in rethinking policy, and (2) it wants to do much, much more.<br><br>__B**ut thankfully**, the State has-- Charlie Sheen (?):__ '9/11 was engineered by<br>our own government as an excuse to start a war. In fact, there was no<br>airplane that hit the Pentagon... George Bush is a drooling idiot who also<br>masterminded 9/11 down to the smallest detail.' (I'm paraphrasing,<br>naturally-- don't sue me, Charlie.)<br><br>Celebrities and conspiracy nuts unite in their unbridled hatred or Bush and<br>Cheney. They attach their names and causes to every anti-war movement they<br>can find, which has the effect of stigmatizing every anti-war protester as a<br>"Truther" (which many, indeed, become). Most of the public falls in line by<br>means of pure embarrassment.<br><br>__T**he** result:__ Airline travel worldwide is now like walking through an Orwell<br>novel. America is more involved in the Middle East than ever. Even the<br>'anti-war' candidates seem to do nothing but escalate the war once elected,<br>and even start looking for new wars to fight. Homeland Security is a<br>virtual police state and is growing all the time.<br><br> In conclusion, the irrational arguments of the conspiracist are the ones<br>heard and endlessly repeated. These drive out the rational arguments. I<br>certainly do believe there are actual conspiracies out there, but most of<br>these involve keeping the public in line by misdirection, not by action.<br>I'm sure this will have little effect on the number of crackpot theories<br>that emerge, but the next time you hear one, ask yourself who is benefiting<br>most.<br><br> |
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An interesting thesis and entirely plausible. Why claim the well doesn’t exist when it is far easier to poison it?
Gresham’s Law of Gossip Currency: Paying the village idiot to confirm the emperor’s nakedness works better than paying the village elder to deny it.
The crazy conspiracies make the reasonable ones look nutty, because they get lumped in together. Alex Jones is really doing the government a favor.
Could Alex Jones be like that Alex Vinter guy?
See, there was one former CNN anchor who had also some experience in the government as well in some small capacity. This man later started VNN. Vanguard News Network. And it talks about nothing but the evils of the supposed “Jewry” who run the government and media. And yet, it was started by an inside man and if it considers those working in CNN to be culpable with the government’s evil deeds, then they would have to condemn their own man for the very same reason. How fun!
For this reason, many have wondered whether the entire American white supremacist movement was started by the government itself in order to distract and consolidate opposition. That itself is a conspiracy theory, but who knows?!
Then again, there was Hal Turner, oh wai-
Prateek-
I have read that the KKK was actually started by Democrats during reconstruction, but I’m not sure if that has been proven or if it’s more speculation, or an educated guess. Actually, what is said is that it was basically the terrorist branch of the Democratic party. Has anyone else heard this?
The words conspiracy theory is used a stigmatisation through association. So they make a certain theory sound as wacky as possible and keep repeating the term conspiracy theory to associate the wackiness with that term. The next time the government lies they associate the lie with the term conspiracy theory and automatically people stigmatise the theory and even when shown evidence, pictures, video, witness testimonies people still refuse to accept it as truth. This is the power of stigmatisation through association.
But this has a negative draw back for the government and the liars. When one conspiracy is proven and accepted within the mainstream as being actually true. Take moon landing conspiracy or 9/11 conspiracy as an example. When a theory like that becomes mainstream accepted as being true, then it throws in to doubt all the other theories that the mainstream has tried to negatively associate with the term conspiracy theory.
It’s sometimes easy for people to fall into the trap of assuming that the state plans disasters because it benefits from them. But I don’t think it’s that far-fetched of a belief to think that the US government has engaged in conspiracies to create situations where the likelihood of a disaster was increased. Such as the case with Pearl Harbor http://www.lewrockwell.com/orig2/denson8.html . It seems as if there is a least strong circumstantial evidence that FDR’s administration expected such an attack. There is a difference between believing that the US blew up the Twin Towers with mininukes and believing that the US possibly wanted an attack to happen to suit its own needs. It’s sometimes hard to differentiate between incompetence due to bureaucratic rivalries and calculated indifference to achieve a political end.
And Operation Northwoods may have not become reality, but it was signed off on by the Joint Chiefs of Staff. So it’s not as if the state is above doing dirty things.
So, there’s a conspiracy behind conspiracy theories? That’s just what the Jews want you to believe.
It is often not “the state” that is responsible. As we know the state is made of people and many different organisations etc. A certain group of people that the general population might not consider to be “the state” could be responsible for an act like 9/11. But that does not necessarily mean that “the state” is responsible. But when “the state” makes official statements that represent the opinion of the people within the state then we can say that “the state” is lying. That is something that we can disprove directly. People far too often have the tendency to blame “the state” for conspiracies and personally I think that gives far too much credit to “the state” because we all know how incompetent it is etc. If anything the state is guilty of wilfully lying and turning a blinds eye to the truth. But then you do get such things as compartmentalization and intelligence classifications, the whole “need to know”. When taking that into consideration, some one within the government might not have been directly involved in a conspiracy but by furthering the lie they are at the least complicit.
I wouldn’t say it was started by a party, but it’s founder, General Forrest, was a Democrat, as were almost all Southern legislators, and just about every single member up to the 1970’s. If anything, I would say that given their general intollerance and thuggish tactics masked in humanitarian efforts, the modern Democtats are a product of the KKK, not the other way around.
There is and always has been a difference between (northern) democrats and (southern) dixie crats. At around the turn of the century progressive republicans started moving into the Democratic party. And after the CRA (1964) dixiecrats began moving en masse into the Republican Party.
MK Ultra was real.
But yes, pseudo-historia (what you would call conspiracy theories) serve the interests of the state rather than harm it, imo.
But I refuse to call it “conspiracy theory.” THe whole of history is a conspiracy theory, just not in the pseuo-historical sense that we commonly associate the term with.
Or you could just say that marginalizing the credibility of an argument is an effective way the government uses to get what it wants, which is more power.
Add to this the use of disinformation in order to cover up bad behavior or whatever the government doesn’t want the public to know as truth.
Government of a people is most definitely a form of psychological warfare (not to mention direct warfare when they have the ability to seize you and throw you in prison if you don’t consent).
The best antidote is strong methodological individualism among an increasing number of people.
Behind closed doors, all politicians are the same. They change parties and voting patterns to keep the public polarized on issues, but the mentality is no different.
Never said it wasn’t. It was actually started when scientists discovered that certain bands of ELF could actually change a person’s mood. Ultimately, there was never any practical military application for any of it. It went on for so long, tough (in several forms), that sinister implications worked their way into the public perception of what were just a group of useless Army officers and parasitical scientists. In other words, just disregard everything about it you see on the History Channel.
In other words, just disregard everything about it you see on the History Channel.
Disregard anything on the History Channel. What utter crap they produce.
@OP:
Yes and no. There are two kinds of conspiracy theory… wild conspiracy theory, on the one hand, and good solid investigative journalism/skeptical historicism, on the other. Both involve questioning official stories, which may be coverups, but wild conspiracy theory does not apply critical thinking to the subject matter. Instead, the wild conspiracy theorist admits all evidence (irrespective of its quality) and all arguments (irrespective of their quality) which may support some aspect of his preconcluded narrative.
For instance, 9/11 conspiracy theories always tend to blame “George Bush/Dick Cheney” and claim “It was an Inside Job” meaning it was orchestrated - apparently exclusively - by elements within the official US government apparatus. This is highly unlikely since it’s really hard to cover your tracks in bureaucracies such as the CIA where the vast majority of most people’s time is spent tracking what other people in the organization are doing. The risks associated with being “caught” are also very high. But there are so many other possibilities - why can’t it be a group of private individuals with very high level contacts/pawns in the US government (perhaps even the President himself)? And there’s no reason these individuals couldn’t be foreign as well as domestic. Or, it could be a foreign government - the Israelis or the Russians or the Chinese, for example. Both the official story and the hyperbolic conspiracy theories fail to maintain a truly open mind regarding the actors behind the 9/11 attacks.
The existence of wild conspiracy theories on the part of individuals is no harm beyond raising the noise level. But governments - particularly the counter-intelligence elements within governments - well understand the value of encouraging, prodding or otherwise amplifying wild conspiracy theories to help drown out reasonable conspiracy hypotheses. Introducing drama - for example, the Pentagon’s buyup of all 10,000 first-run copies of Anthony Shaffer’s Operation Darkheart. This was clearly a calculated publicity stunt… the brass at the Pentagon did not rise to the top by being dull and unable to predict simple human behavior. The book must have sold many more copies than it otherwise would have with the free publicity from every major news source covering the Pentagon’s attempt to “cover up” a book. By blessing certain wild conspiracy theories and even providing “leaks” to help encourage them, governments can increase the noise level in the public discussion so that the vast, vast majority of people will never even hear reasonable conspiracy theories.
Clayton -
Well, I’m hoping that the examples from the first paragraph were meant only as examples and not as credible theories. Were Hollywood and the press not overrun with leftists, I’m sure they would jump on some of those theories too.
Usually, when “investigating” such events, people see what they want to see so that they can blame who they want to blame. George Bush, with all his many flaws, is hardly capable of orchestrating any kind of “false flag” event. The same Government agencies that have made huge SNAFU’s over the years, both legally and illegally, are not competent enough to keep it quiet, even with media compliance.
It is usually one small fact that people either consciously or unconsciously leave out, like the fact that the back seat in Kennedy’s limo was about a foot higher than the front, or that the Pentagon security on 9/11 was only designed to scan one frame every 3 seconds. The Oliver Stones, Michael Moores, and Alex Jones’ leave these things out to serve their own aims.