Faith-Based Conspiracy

If you know me, you've probably been receiving an email or two a week about these 9/11 conspiracy theories floating around on The Great Soapbox of the Insane that clearly states my position on the whole matter. But for everyone else, here's a not-so-quick rundown to get you up to speed.

My first exposure to the conspiracy was a few years ago when a short Internet video was released. I don't know where to find it, and forgot a lot of the content, but it focused on the Pentagon crash and the lack of airplane wreckage there. Now, I like a conspiracy story as much as the next guy. But I'm not really a firm believer either way. It's fun to speculate, and interesting to see other opinions, but without hard evidence, I can't really believe anything. (It's the same way with me and ghost stories, religion, and JFK.)

But then a few months ago, this "Loose Change" made its way onto Google video and became one of the top-viewed Internet videos of all time. The video -- if you haven't seen it, do a search and 8 million links will show up -- provides a bunch of theories, eyewitness accounts, and speculation to help lead to the conclusion that: (a) the government -- or, was it the Jews? -- was behind 9/11; (b) the World Trade Center was brought down in a controlled demolition; (c) a missle was fired into the Pentagon; (d) the passengers are still alive; (e) the hijackers are still alive; (f) Flight 93 was shot down; (g) or it was a different plane; (h) or something like that.

I think.

The film makes all of those claims, without really making any of them. It hints that the above happened, but never provides substantial evidence or a solid single theory to plainly makes its case.

At first I thought, well, that's fair enough. All the filmmakers are doing is asking questions. And if one of them proves to be valid, then we might have a legitimate beef with the government for covering up something. At the very least, it'll get more people involved into researching the events. And research is never a bad thing.

With that last point in mind, I started doing some research on my own. I read the Commission Report, watched some documentaries, went to a bunch of websites, and so on. The more I read, the more I realized that "Loose Change" was absolute bullshit. In fact, it was more than just wacky conspiracies taken to the extreme. It was a piece of propaganda, skewing facts and quotes in order to trick viewers into believing their point of view. Kind of like "Fahrenheit 9/11", except a lot more menacing.

(There's some irony that the "Loose Change" folks are doing exactly what they accused the Bush administration of doing.)

And the dangerous part is that, since this video has been distributed free over Google, MySpace, and any other free link site you've heard of, the mass audience watching this (mostly teenagers with a chip on their shoulder about the government to begin with) are believing, word-for-word, the content of "Loose Change" without doing any of their own research. Instead of refusing to believe the lies of the government, they willingly believe everything these folks tell them.

But don't fret, ladies and gentlemen, there is good news.

Just as the Bush/Orwellian-named "9/11 Truth Movement" is starting to gain steam in the mainstream media, the debunkers are also coming out of the woodwork; people like the good folks over at Screw Loose Change, who are publishing daily debunkings of the video. It was them that led me to a debunking article over at Salon.com, and thusly, the reason for this much-too-long post. (Most likely you'll have to watch an ad to view it; trust me, it's worth it.)

The article goes over only a few of the accusations from the conspiracists; since it was written by Salon's "aviation expert", he takes on only the claims having to do with the flights themselves. It's strangely comforting when people deal with only their specialities.

Towards the end of it, the writer writes, what I believe, is the most concise explanation why there will always be conspiracists, no matter what evidence turns up.

It's distressing that so many people become married to a preposterous idea based on little more than erroneous interpretations of some pictures and selective, manipulative use of evidence. But in debating this stuff now and again, you learn that it can be a bit like arguing religion. Evidence, or lack of it, has little to do with what motivates many believers. At the heart of their convictions is something utterly unprovable. It's faith.

A healthy skeptism is a good thing, especially when this particular government has been anything but trusthworthy over the past 6 years. But a true skeptic is one who relies on facts and evidence rather than unvalidated theories and blind faith.

And the 9/11 conspiracy movement offers a whole lot more of the latter than the former.