Why I Don’t Believe in Conspiracy Theories

http://littlegreenfootballs.com/page/310102_Why_I_Dont_Believe_in_Conspira

by csandreasen • 12 years ago

4 5 12 years ago

eip2• 12 years ago

"With this [CIA] memo and the CIA's influence in the media," author Peter Janney wrote in a guest column on our site last fall, "the concept of 'conspiracy theorist' was engendered and infused into our political lexicon and became what it is today: a term to smear, denounce, ridicule, and defame anyone who dares to speak about any crime committed by the state, military or intelligence services."

Janney, whose late father Wistar Janney had been a high-ranking CIA executive, continued: "People who want to pretend that conspiracies don't exist -- when in fact they are among the most common modus operandi of significant historical change throughout the world and in our country -- become furious when their naive illusion is challenged."

krapp2• 12 years ago

There's a big difference between believing that conspiracy theories don't exist and believing that even if some do, most are still bullshit.

If someone insists that any criticism of their opinions, however outlandish or unsubstantiated their claims might be, amounts to clutching at straws of naive fantasy, then they're the one trying to control me, not the government (conceding for the sake of argument that the government might also be trying to control me)

eip2• 12 years ago

http://wellaware1.com/artwork/large/kennedy1000.jpg

"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." – William Casey, CIA Director (from first staff meeting, 1981)

jqm• 12 years ago

So let me see if I understand... The author believes in conspiracies that have been proved otherwise he dismisses them as, well... wild conspiracies.

So how would one ever go about investigating a possible conspiracy to obtain proof as conspiracies that haven't been proved are dismissed out of hand?

Sure, many conspiracy theories are nonsense. Sometimes these nonsense conspiracy theories might themselves be the product of a conspiracy to make conspiracy theories look ridiculous. Wait.. is that another conspiracy theory?

Why I Don’t Believe in Conspiracy Theories

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