| I once read heavily about cults and militias, back when I was interested in becoming an agent for the FBI. I figured, jeez, these cult members, how could they fall for something so stupid? I resigned myself to a policy of avoiding all religions. Genius! I can never be part of a cult if I refuse to believe in all higher powers!
Then 9/11 rolled around. Conspiracies abound. I had just become somewhat politcally awakened a few months before the attacks, and as most teenagers do, I leaned to the left. I read sites that hinted at, or explicitly stated that 9/11 was a conspiracy. Things began to add up. Of course it was done by Bush! How could a steel building collapse if the melting point of steel isn't reached by burning jet fuel? There must've been a bomb!
But slowly, over time, I began realizing that most of the evidence for conspiracies is contrived at best. The logic is half-formed. "The worst lies are mostly truth," a wise man once said.
Many people espousing theories know nothing of how the systems they confronted work. Example: the melting point of steel. To bend a spoon, you needn't melt it, just make it warm. The same thing with the WTC. If 900 witnesses saw one thing, and one saw another, the conspiracist assumes the one black sheep is the only one not being controlled by the government coverup.
I finally figured out how intelligent, educated people can be sucked into cults. It's logical. It really is. Empirical evidence is trumped by "logic." This is Copernican thinking all over again (planet orbits must be circular, since a circle is a perfect shape!) Cults give people what they need. I needed an explanation as to how something so horrible as 9/11 could've happened. I assume that's something close to how people who are afraid of death or society create religions.
Maybe there is a giant conspiracy. Then again, maybe Emperor Xenu is coming on a comet spaceship to take 15 people who've never been kissed to Planet Blisstonia. |