"conspiracy theory"
it has become the modern test for perspicacity and accuracy. simply pay attention to how people now use the term “conspiracy theory” or its variants — most of them enmeshed in debate over the 9/11 attacks.
a conspiracy is the joint planning in secret, by two or more people, of an “unlawful” or wrongful act. the US government announced quickly after 9/11 its theory of conspiracy with regard to the attacks. it is a theory. it plainly and openly alleges a conspiracy.
yeah, i get it. i know that the term’s major origin as disparagement was dispute over the john kennedy assassination. if you believe the government theory of a single gunman planning and acting alone (hence, not a conspiracy), then you oppose any theory of conspiracy regarding the killing. if you hold that it was more than one person plotting the execution, then you are alleging a conspiracy. some of the desperate, often breathlessly silly claims of those alleging a conspiracy led to the pejorative use of the term. it gets into ridiculous territory, however, when the term “conspiracy theorist” is used to disparage somebody who proposes a different conspiracy theory.
don’t understand this? okay. keep using “conspiracy theorist” to describe one who doubts the government’s conspiracy theory. the very act makes you a conspiracy theorist, because you’re taunting someone in support of a conspiracy theory. the issue between the government buttmunchers and everybody else is not whether there was a conspiracy. according to the US government and most of the people bereting others as conspiracy theorists, foreign terrorists conspired to bring about the 9/11 attacks.
unless you believe one guy planned and executed 9/11, you are a conspiracy theorist.
May 8th, 2006 at 19:35
this is an ignorant blog and you’re not intelligent…
May 9th, 2006 at 19:22
Actually, I diagree with the previous comment. I think this is an informative and provocative blog worthy of greater readership. I hope you keep it going long enough so that it will have a chance to catch on with thoughtful readers willing to consider valid, albeit unconventional views.
By the way, I agree with the point of your “conspiracy theory” article: any way you slice it, the government-approved version is a conspiracy theory. I should add that the government version isn’t even the most believable.
May 9th, 2006 at 23:48
thanks. if this blog ever picked up significant traffic (other than random google hits, which are plentiful), i’d be even more worried than i am.
BTW, i have a feeling the first comment is a fake, for testing and manipulation.
May 15th, 2006 at 04:26
IMDB lead me here…
Keep posting there…
September 13th, 2010 at 02:47
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