Why Conspiracy Theories Are Embraced

[Pottapaug1938]

Since my mother's family is from Worcester, Massachusetts, and I have known that city well since (literally) infancy, and since I both went to college there and got married there, I joined two Facebook groups dealing with that city. However, I had to leave one of those groups because it was essentially hijacked by political extremists and paranoid conspiracists so that they could spout rants which had nothing to do with Worcester.

One of those conspiracists went on and on, at exhaustive length, about the poisonous "chemtrails" in our skies. I tried offering facts to him, such as the visible contrails in views of Battle of Britain combat (pointing out the extreme unlikelihood that aircraft in combat would be unlikely to impair their performance by spraying chemicals), and pointed out that a chemtrail conspiracy would require the total cooperation of every airplane pilot and crew, everyone connected with the servicing of those aircraft, everyone connected with the manufacture, transportation and distribution of the chemicals in question, and so on; but all he could do was reply with unhinged rants such as "OPEN YOUR EYES AND LOOK AROUND YOU! THOSE CHEMTRAILS WERE NEVER AROUND WHEN I WAS YOUNG (well, actually, the contrails were around in Worcester, back then, because I remember them)! YOU'RE TOO NAIVE TO UNDERSTAND THAT THE NEW WORLD ORDER CONTROLS EVERY ASPECT OF OUR LIVES!" and so on. He demanded that I look at each and every scrap of evidence and factoid that he sent my way; but he had a ready explanation away for everything I sent to him. He screamed about my closed mind; but he reacted like a cornered rat when I tried to ask that he open his mind to what I had to show him.

As has happened here, with people the ones who inhabit Planet Merrill, the intense need to cling to a particular set of fantasies and to feel like they are Warriors for the Truth override anything which risks destroying the fantasies. For PD, his intense need to believe in a 9/11 conspiracy by our own government and his hidden/known allies overrides the facts which show that the only conspiracy was the one which is already known to us.

[The Observer]

Or the people who saw it live on TV?

I was one of those. I was watching the live feed of the burning first tower and saw the second plane go into tower #2. The first words out of my mouth was to the effect that this was not a simple accident, it was on purpose, and the US was under attack. It was not a missile, it was a passenger jet airliner and it had the paint job of an United Airlines jet.

But in order for DP to believe that this was all a government conspiracy, we would have to believe that:

(1) the government somehow contrived to gain control of 4 passenger jets with pilots who would agree to kill themselves and US citizens purposely, and con Al-Quaeda into accepting responsibility for the crime, or

(2) if they weren't jets but missiles made up to look like jets, the government had to fabricate passengers with extensive life backgrounds (educational records, economic footprints, etc.) so that they would stand up to scrutiny, and hire actors to portray a vast crowd of grieving relatives and friends, and then to get the mass media to go along with the whole shtick in order to give it an air of legitimacy.

But that is typical of conspiracy theories - the more contrived, complicated and time-consuming they are, the more believable they become to the Troops of The Tinfoil Cap Brigade.

[Pottapaug1938]

Most people look at facts and draw conclusions from them. Conspiracists (and their sovrun, Planet Merrill and similar counterparts) start with a firmly-held conclusion; and then they cherry-pick "evidence" to support their conclusions and ignore, dismiss or explain away anything to the contrary.

[JamesVincent]

As I mentioned in another thread I, like Obs, watched the second plane hit on TV. I had just gotten home from work, was going through my morning routine, when my wife told me to see the TV. While watching I saw the second plane hit. I described pretty much all of my thoughts and actions somewhere else from that day. Unlike Gregg I did not see the plane hit the Pentagon but I did see the damage done to the building and the area near the strike while I was down there helping out and do know another person who saw it hit. I also know several people who went to NY to help out there and they saw the devastation first hand, including one who was there when the towers collapsed. The stupidity of some of the conspiracy theories of that day are mind-boggling. The theory that it was an inside job, involving just about every agency in the government, is absurd. Not only would it have to involve the CIA and some other alphabet soup agencies, but it would have had to involve the FAA, the co-operation of air traffic controllers, first responders, so many different people and agencies that it would not have worked.

And to even suggest that the government had any reason to do that is absurd. Any of the outcomes that have been suggested as reasoning could have been done a multitude of other ways, without all the co-operation, intrigue and loss of life and worked out the same.

My friend and resident sov'run/ conspiracy theorist posted the other day about how the police officers murdered in NY was a false flag operation being used to implement martial law. This is something else I have seen time and time again, after just about every single thing that happens. Didn't implement martial law after 9/11, why would we do it after two LEOs being killed? Same thing with all the riots and protests, all false flags being used to justify martial law. Every single thing that happens is a false flag, you would think there was an entire government agency being used to do nothing but think up all these operations. Even then there wouldn't be enough time in the day to think them, plan them and implement them. They're not even good ones either.

edit: Wanted to add that a good friend of mine at the time was the senior Air Force communications specialist on board Cheney's plane when the planes hit WTC. We didn't hear from him for two months and, no, I can't say where he was or where he went. He couldn't tell me since I didn't have a clearance at the time. I just know that within 5 minutes of the first strike they weren't heading there anymore and they landed somewhere safe, after picking up a fighter escort. So add in the Air Force in within the agencies involved in the cover-up.

[DailyPlanet]

Patience ... and restraint are needed by me now.

All I am going to say now is: The Official story is Nonsense.

The things you need to focus on, to see that:

+ The controlled demolition of Building 7, and its apparent pre-announcement
+ Why did Silverstein double insurance, and not go to WOTW that morning?
+ Why was there a "drill" that day, and why was Bush placed in such a school with kids?
+ Why were Susan Lindauer's repeated warnings of an attack ignored?
+ Can guys with boxcutter's really hijack two jetliners and fly them in the Towers?
(How easy is that?)
+ Why did Cheney (reportedly) ignore reports he was given about aircraft flying towards the tower
+ Why was all the key evidence removed so quickly?
+ How do buildings like that just dustify, from fires in the Towers?
(BTW, I used to work for two years on the 47th fl. of the WTC, so I know something of the place)

The smugness here is pretty stifling, so I shall stay away for a while

[Pottapaug1938]

Patience ... and restraint are needed by me now.

All I am going to say now is: The Official story is Nonsense.

The things you need to focus on, to see that:

+ The controlled demolition of Building 7, and its apparent pre-announcement
+ Why did Silverstein double insurance, and not go to WOTW that morning?
+ Why was there a "drill" that day, and why was Bush placed in such a school with kids?
+ Why were Susan Lindauer's repeated warnings of an attack ignored?
+ Can guys with boxcutter's really hijack two jetliners and fly them in the Towers?
(How easy is that?)
+ Why did Cheney (reportedly) ignore reports he was given about aircraft flying towards the tower
+ Why was all the key evidence removed so quickly?
+ How do buildings like that just dustify, from fires in the Towers?
(BTW, I used to work for two years on the 47th fl. of the WTC, so I know something of the place)

The smugness here is pretty stifling, so I shall stay away for a while

Stay away. If this is the best you have to offer, we don't need you here.

I'm not going to dignify all of your bullshit with a response, but here are three:

Regarding the so-called "controlled demolition of Building 7", I'll quote from pages 45 and 46 of Bullspotting, by Loren Collins. He is talking about the picture of WTC 7 that show it to be apparently undamaged:

"What they don't show in their arguments is that photos and videos from other angles plainly show the building to be quite damaged." If there was truly a "pre-announcement", it was probably born of a knowledge that WTC 7 was severely damaged and in danger of collapse.

Regarding your question about "can guys with boxcutter's [sic] really hijack two jetliners and fly them in the Towers?

Easy. Go up to a flight attendant and threaten to slit his/her throat unless you are given access to the cockpit; and then if you know how to fly a large plane, the rest is indeed easy.

Finally, regarding your idiocy about "how do buildings like that just dustify":

In the early 70s, I saw an apartment building in Brighton, Massachusetts suffer a collapse similar to the collapse of the WTC buildings. The support columns of one corner of the building (then under construction) failed, making the top floor slam heavily on the floor beneath it. Those two floors then fell on the one beneath it, and so on until the ground floor was reached. You weaken the steel support columns of buildings like the WTC with a violent physical impact and then an intense fire; and eventually all of that dead weight above the impact area is going to come crashing down on whatever is beneath it.

Your fundamental problem is this: you are a sucker for every conspiracist theory to come down the pike. You have an intense need to believe that {insert your idiotic villain of choice] was the REAL force behind 9/11 that you will misrepresent or misremember the real evidence, and you will fall for any "evidence" which has just plain been manufactured out of whole cloth. You will hunt for anomalies; and if you identify one, whether or not it has any factual basis, you will pretend that it invalidates the "official story".

Please go peddle your fantasies on some other forum. Here, you just waste our time with verbose posts devoid of any real substance.

[wserra]

The smugness here is pretty stifling, so I shall stay away for a while

Quoth the flat-earther to the International Union of Geodesy and Geophysics.

[davids]

Patience ... and restraint are needed by me now.

All I am going to say now is: The Official story is Nonsense.

The things you need to focus on, to see that:

+ The controlled demolition of Building 7, and its apparent pre-announcement
+ Why did Silverstein double insurance, and not go to WOTW that morning?
+ Why was there a "drill" that day, and why was Bush placed in such a school with kids?
+ Why were Susan Lindauer's repeated warnings of an attack ignored?
+ Can guys with boxcutter's really hijack two jetliners and fly them in the Towers?
(How easy is that?)
+ Why did Cheney (reportedly) ignore reports he was given about aircraft flying towards the tower
+ Why was all the key evidence removed so quickly?
+ How do buildings like that just dustify, from fires in the Towers?
(BTW, I used to work for two years on the 47th fl. of the WTC, so I know something of the place)

The smugness here is pretty stifling, so I shall stay away for a while

I would encourage you to not stay away, but to actually listen to others the way you are suggesting they listen to you.

Some of what you post here is quickly and easily disposed of, without thinking too hard or doing a lick of research.

Can guys with box cutters hijack a plane? Why not? Is there something about box cutters that disables one's hijacking abilities? You need to ask yourself why you think this is even a point.

Why was "key evidence" removed? You mean like the rubble and concrete and twisted steel in a big heap? Do you think they should have just left it all there? Life they do in Iraq?

Why were someone's warnings not heeded? How about "government incompetence?" If you need proof of concept, go to your nearest federal building and strike up a conversation.

These are your points? Seriously?

[texino]

Howdy and Happy New Year to all. As to the question regarding box cutters and their use in taking control of a big plane flying through the air: a box cutter has a sharp blade shaped like a trapezoid. This design allows the blade to slide in and out,and when fully extended it becomes a knife capable of dealing fatal injury and if the person is really intent on carnage he would likely wrap the handle tightly with duct tape to keep the blade from retracting.

As to how the terrorists took the aircraft? I can only go back to the attitude of that time which was one of surrender. The bad guys just want the plane; this has happened before, so no reason to start anything n'est ce pas?

No doubt some terrorist is conspiring right now on how to hurt us again. If our Government is involved in a conspiracy it's most likely in aid to keep such things from happening .

Finally, when someone posts that it would foolish to bet against him, it surely sounds like Razzy talk to me.
Be well. Note this post has not been checked by my caregivers, so it might show the effects of a mangled mind.