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The Aluminum Foil Hat Thread: Conspiracy Theories
Modern Man
Registered User regular
Registered User regular
The History Channel had an interesting documentary on a few nights ago about the 9/11 Truther movement.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/9/11_Truth_movement
Even going on 10 years after the event, there are a number of people who still cling to the belief that the government was either behind the 9/11 attacks, or at that it allowed them to happen for some nefarious reasons.
A more recent conspiracy theory movement is the so-called birther movement
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Birther
Which consists of people who believe that Barrack Obama is not Constitutionally qualified to be President, and that there is a conspiracy to hide this fact.
I picked these two examples because they're the most current conspiracy theory movements in this country. But there are a number of older ones, such as theories around the attack on Pearl Harbor, the JFK assassination and the Moon landings.
It seems that Americans have a soft spot for conspiracy theories, across the entire ideological spectrum (9/11 Truthers tend to come from a different place, politically, from Birthers). My belief is that conspiracy theories are attractive to people because they give the illusion of control and explain away events that people don't like. I guess for some people, believing that the Bush administration was behind the 9/11 attacks in order to make their buddies in the military-industrial complex more rich is a more attractive answer than the real truth.
I've personally never had the misfortune to know any conspiracy theorists. Does anyone here know any such people personally?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/9/11_Truth_movement
Even going on 10 years after the event, there are a number of people who still cling to the belief that the government was either behind the 9/11 attacks, or at that it allowed them to happen for some nefarious reasons.
A more recent conspiracy theory movement is the so-called birther movement
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Birther
Which consists of people who believe that Barrack Obama is not Constitutionally qualified to be President, and that there is a conspiracy to hide this fact.
I picked these two examples because they're the most current conspiracy theory movements in this country. But there are a number of older ones, such as theories around the attack on Pearl Harbor, the JFK assassination and the Moon landings.
It seems that Americans have a soft spot for conspiracy theories, across the entire ideological spectrum (9/11 Truthers tend to come from a different place, politically, from Birthers). My belief is that conspiracy theories are attractive to people because they give the illusion of control and explain away events that people don't like. I guess for some people, believing that the Bush administration was behind the 9/11 attacks in order to make their buddies in the military-industrial complex more rich is a more attractive answer than the real truth.
I've personally never had the misfortune to know any conspiracy theorists. Does anyone here know any such people personally?
Modern Man on
Aetian Jupiter - 41 Gunslinger - The Old Republic
Rigorous Scholarship
Rigorous Scholarship
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Rigorous Scholarship
I laugh my ass off every time. Im always "ok, yeah that makes sense. Yeah, thats possible. Ok, im not so sure, but I see where you are coming from. Yeah, that does make sense there. Uh-huh, I see why they would do that. OMG LIZARD PEOPLE! FUCK! AGAIN!? Damnit!"
What I find funny is the continued focus on Area 51. If I were trying to hide something big somewhere else, drawing peoples' attention to somewhere like that would be my first order of business.
One of them started and was way more crazy in D&D, actually.
My dad sort of believes the 9/11 shit because "that's not how that should look". Every time he mentions it I point out that he has no basis of knowledge to extrapolate what a 110 story building falling down "should" look like and so on, and he eventually concedes the argument (I don't usually push arguments with him to their conclusion) but then just makes another comment in six months or so. It's really annoying.
kpop appreciation station i also like to tweet some
Here we go. Proof that lizard-people are running everything:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qj8741m2jLc
Rigorous Scholarship
Actually, it's basically the same as arguing with creationists.
This neo-feudalism would be more tolerable if our betters had fancy titles.
Into MMA, pro wrestling, fitness, health, drinking coffee and reading.
Height: 5' 11" Weight: 217 Goal: 200
Lizard People? Bullshit.
Chemtrails? I don't think so.
Flouride Mind Control? Hahaha
Bilderberg controlling the world? Get real.
9/11 was in inside job? IT'S THE TRUTH, WATCH THESE YOUTUBE VIDEOS.
uh, there was A LOT more damage than just a "fire in the basement"
Since 'natural-born citizen' isn't really defined as a legal term, it doesn't make a whole lot of difference, but the theory accepted by non-crazy legal scholars is that one must be born on US soil (embassies and international military bases count).
His major points:
The Illuminati control everything.
We (the USA) had a giant magnet that could control the weather.
In the 80's the Russians stole our weather magnet. This is why the weather was so screwy.
I had to cut him off there because my break was over. A few weeks later he was caught on camera firing an assault rifle into one of the 2 ATMs in town. He was arrested, and from what I heard the authorities found a lot of weapons in his home. Then they started checking the yard and found tons more buried, along with some improvised mines.
Crazy people are fun
Which leads me to believe they're only saying it to feel smarter/more empowered. Otherwise they'd be buying bomb shelters and pallets of MREs, too.
I've never heard a good reason for why a building like that shouldn't just fall down because there was a fire in the basement.
That's right of the soil, you are forgetting right of the blood. The child of an American citizen who lived in the US more than 5 years can claim American citizenship as well and be a natural citizen.
Which is probably why the project was an idiotic failure, but still, what the hell, CIA? My favorite quote of the wiki article is
No shit.
But at the time those five years had to be after the age of 16 and Dunham was 19 when she had Barack.
If all buildings collapse when there are fires in them i think the concept of a skyscraper should be re-thought.
Right, I know. I was just pointing out that if she had had Barack when she was 21 then there wouldn't even be an issue legally.
Also, if I remember my architecture right, it was built with a cantilevered structure, where a very small number of beams support most of the weight. This usually isn't a problem because the vital support areas are places that are very difficult to damage without wrecking the building. However, if the are damaged or destroyed, the building loses a lot of it's interior support, and the redistribution of weight will stress the remaining vital supports beyond their tolerances in short order.
*edit*
Especially if the building is _still_ on fire.
When the fire is caused by an enormous airplane carrying thousands of gallons of jet fuel, it shouldn't come as a surprise when the building falls down.
There is whimsy in that stuff, proper fantasy, and the ramifications of these "truths" are enormous.
Birthers are just boring idiots, they don't deserve the title.
The idea that LSD has a way it is "supposed" to be used is silly.
It is just a chemical. It has no inherent intent or purpose.
Besides, it is quite a logical leap to make to go "I don't understand how this happened" to "It definitely was the ebil gubbmint!"
Yeah, thats been my problem with conspiracy theories.
You get oddities or inconsistencies that are brought up.
But the explanation is even less inconsistent than the original explanation.
No one said that was what was happening. It is merely a matter of triage. You have two huge buildings on fire and one smaller building. You only have so many fire fighters. Then a few moments later half of them get killed.
Understandable they pulled back from that building. Normally the fire fighters would have put the fire out, and there would be no resulting building collapse, however this was an extreme circumstance.
You can't design every way you live for the most extreme possibilities imaginable.
It's my understanding that a NBC is someone who is a citizen at birth. Mitt Romney's dad ran for President back in the day, and he was born in Mexico (to two American citizens). No one batted an eye at that.
The birthers want to move the goalposts to create a definition of NBC that will exclude only Obama. The "saner" ones agree that he was born in Hawaii, but that he's not a NBC because (a) his dad wasn't a US citizen and/or (b) he had the right to claim Kenyan and maybe UK citizenship.
Rigorous Scholarship
But my point was that making claims about the plausibility of an event that one knows little about is conjecture. I'm saying that I'm not an engineer and I know fuck all about this. For me to claim that one outcome is more likely than another requires a valid argument for why, and I must have some kind of knowledge to make that argument. Both our claims, in bold, are baseless.
I actually work with 2 people who think the Stone Mason's control not only this town, but the AFB as well.
Sadly, I work with a guy who has a ring and claims to be a Stone Mason. Which led me to ask why he was a GS-07 mail room clerk. His response, controlling the mail ensures they control the base.
My personal favorite is the episode about David Icke(prominent lizard people theorist);
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-2912878405399014351#