Conspiracy Theorists

[Lugnuts]

I realize this is nothing new.. Conspiracy theories around since the dawn of time, Adam never ****ed Eve, he ****ed Joe.. Etc, etc, etc.

But to me, they've intensified, gotten much more outlandish, and most concerning of all-- seem to have more followers than ever. Yes?

After watching the Seahawks-Falcons game Sunday, I had to wake up to hear people on talk radio saying Pete Carroll never called timeout and Matt Bryant, who quite obviously heard the whistles and took a practice kick-- which he's done before, btw... Matt Bryant actually missed his field goal attempt.

This, after cameras quite clearly show Carroll calling timeout.

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Infinitely more disturbing:

http://www.salon.com/2013/01/15/this_man_helped_save_six_children_is_now_getting_harassed_for_it/

A man who sheltered 6 scared kids during the Newtown massacre is now being harassed -- badly-- by conspiracy theorists who say the massacre never happened.

This ****'s not just confined to some crazy professor in Florida.

What the ****ing ****, folks? Has CSI-SVU-CRAP completely distorted most people's reality?

 

[The Big Ragu]

I just want to go on the record saying that if Adam ****ed Joe, it was a lifestyle choice.

Carry on with conspiracy theories.

 

[Ace]

It's amazing how people will believe anything.

Of all the nutty conspiracies, this is the nuttiest.

 

[Boom_70]

This is a good spot to say that Webby , Boom and 21 are three different people.

 

[Azrael]

This particular theory was completely predictable from the moment of the shooting. The last several mass shootings, in fact, have played into the Technicolor gun nut paranoia over the UN and Obama and 'Agenda 21.'

 

[Walt_Disney]

Mickey Mouse hopes those harassing that guy in Newtown either die slowly in a fire (not talking about passing out eventually from the smoke, but enduring the pain throughout), or die a slow death from cancer.

 

[LongTimeListener]

Still the one I want to see explored is the idea that Jeffrey Dahmer was living in that area of South Florida and had access to the same kind of van that police were looking for when Adam Walsh -- John's son -- disappeared. It seems to have at least some basis in fact.

I love conspiracy theories. Just read a book called "Voodoo Histories" that dispels the great ones of the 20th/21st century, but it also piqued my interest. The Marilyn Monroe one is a good one, abetted all these years by the FBI's refusal to release documents that should by law be publicly available.

 

[Dick Whitman]

This particular theory was completely predictable from the moment of the shooting. The last several mass shootings, in fact, have played into the Technicolor gun nut paranoia over the UN and Obama and 'Agenda 21.'

But the Aurora shooting conspiracy theories, if I recall, were more along the lines of that the government supplied Holmes with the guns in an effort to bolster its case for gun confiscation. I don't know that people were denying that it actually happened - more like it was a Dem conspiracy gone horribly wrong.

The Newtown conspiracy theorists actually believe that the crime did not occur.

 

[Bob Cook]

It's not so much that there are conspiracy theories. It's that they seem to gain much more traction these days. Certainly, the Internet is a part of that, because it's a lot easier to spread a conspiracy online than mailing all-caps typed letters around the country. But the other part of it is that people just don't seem to check out anything. My Facebook feed is filled with viral photos about jack-booted thugs taking your guns, and jack-booted thugs making you get a flu shot, with narratives that fall apart the moment you hit Google to verify the information.

 

[Songbird]

I just want to go on the record saying that if Adam ****ed Joe, it was a lifestyle choice.

Carry on with conspiracy theories.

As if there were awards shows back then to imply such things.

 

[bumpy mcgee]

Jesse Ventura and Alex Jones think there's more to this thread that 'they' don't want you to know.

 

[The Big Ragu]

I just realized that the angriest I may have ever been on here was when some jackass started a thread about his 9/11 doubts and questions, and some other jackass started insulting me for not being open-minded enough to entertain ridiculous "questions" about something I watched from my rooftop -- I ran up there within minutes of the first plane hitting and watched the second plane glide into the building.

Just found it:

http://www.sportsjournalists.com/forum/threads/31245/

 

[Walt_Disney]

There are college professors (not the conspiracy studies ones) who believe 9/11 was staged. If people really want to believe, evidence doesn't matter.

 

[Lugnuts]

It's not so much that there are conspiracy theories. It's that they seem to gain much more traction these days. Certainly, the Internet is a part of that, because it's a lot easier to spread a conspiracy online than mailing all-caps typed letters around the country. But the other part of it is that people just don't seem to check out anything. My Facebook feed is filled with viral photos about jack-booted thugs taking your guns, and jack-booted thugs making you get a flu shot, with narratives that fall apart the moment you hit Google to verify the information.

There you go. You've hit on several things there, not the least of which is that the Internet is making us ****ing lazy.

 

[poindexter]

This particular theory was completely predictable from the moment of the shooting. The last several mass shootings, in fact, have played into the Technicolor gun nut paranoia over the UN and Obama and 'Agenda 21.'

But the Aurora shooting conspiracy theories, if I recall, were more along the lines of that the government supplied Holmes with the guns in an effort to bolster its case for gun confiscation. I don't know that people were denying that it actually happened - more like it was a Dem conspiracy gone horribly wrong.

The Newtown conspiracy theorists actually believe that the crime did not occur.

No, the Aurora conspirists ARE that nutty

http://www.naturalnews.com/036536_James_Holmes_shooting_false_flag.html

 

[Bob Cook]

Also, there are certainly organizations that benefit by, well, not exactly tamping down conspiracy theories. I'll pick on the NRA just because this article lays out exactly how the organization benefits by stoking fears that They're Coming For Your Guns.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/achenblog/wp/2013/01/13/nra-history-the-making-of-the-gun-lobby/

On the opposite side, I believe ACLU membership also tends to go up during Republican administrations.

Plenty of organizations (and politicians) have realized telling their constituents they are constantly some unseen, or unknowable, and definitely unlikely threat is good for business.

 

[Bob Cook]

There are college professors (not the conspiracy studies ones) who believe 9/11 was staged. If people really want to believe, evidence doesn't matter.

It's one thing to say the available evidence leaves some questions in an existing narrative. An obvious example is the Kennedy assassination. But it's another to take those holes in the story and blow them up into What THEY Don't Want You To Know with no evidence to support it.

In some ways, you think of conspiracy theorists as nutballs wearing tinfoil hats in their mothers' basements, but there are plenty of theories that grab a hold of people you think of as normally intelligent and productive. The vaccine conspiracy theories, for example.

 

[Baron Scicluna]

I'm still wondering where 12 million people disappeared to in Germany in the 1940s.

 

[The Big Ragu]

It's not so much that there are conspiracy theories. It's that they seem to gain much more traction these days. Certainly, the Internet is a part of that, because it's a lot easier to spread a conspiracy online than mailing all-caps typed letters around the country. But the other part of it is that people just don't seem to check out anything. My Facebook feed is filled with viral photos about jack-booted thugs taking your guns, and jack-booted thugs making you get a flu shot, with narratives that fall apart the moment you hit Google to verify the information.

There you go. You've hit on several things there, not the least of which is that the Internet is making us ****ing lazy.

I don't think it is the Internet making us lazy. It's how information technology has made people aware of things they otherwise wouldn't have been aware of that quickly, and can create enough sensationalism to keep it in the "news" for days or weeks or longer.

What I realized with the 9/11 stuff is that for most people it wasn't quite as real as it was for people who lived through it. It was something abstract -- that they watched on TV. Too many people think of it pretty much the way they think of CGI effects movies they have seen, instead of the real buildings that came down and killed real people.

I posted about this at the time. I realized this when we were walking past a storefront a few years ago that was a temporary 9/11 museum, and it was filled with tourists buying trinket souvenirs.

 

[Boom_70]

David Stern gave Pat Ewing to The Knicks