“Am I sometimes exasperated by the barmier entries, including by those who appear to believe that all terrorism is always false flag? Yes, I am sometimes. But no more than I am exasperated by those who swallow the entire war on terror agenda and the associated wars and attacks on liberty at home.”
I am having an interesting dialogue with angrysoba in comments on his blogpost about one of my blogposts. Some people don’t seem to get the concept of open debate. Angrysoba appears to be angry because he believes it is wrong for anyone to be allowed to express views which he deplores.
http://angrysoba.blogspot.com/2009/12/british-ambassador-and-his-loony.html
“he believes it is wrong for anyone to be allowed to express views which he deplores”
If I remember correctly, Larry from St Louis said something vaguely similar. Quote: ‘Does this seem like the sort of discourse that should be tolerated?’
9/11 – false flag.
7/7 – false flag.
Shoe bomber – false flag.
Pants bomber – false flag.
In a nutshell, the ‘War On Terror’ is false flag.
Does that mean ‘ALL’ terrorism is false flag? Of course it doesn’t. That’s as daft as saying the ‘War On Terror’ isn’t false flag. Beware those that generalise to try and win an argument.
“Angrysoba appears to be angry because he believes it is wrong for anyone to be allowed to express views which he deplores.”
No, I don’t think people should be prevented from saying things I deplore. I just find such things deplorable, naturally.
For example, I don’t think Ernst Zundel should be in jail for denying the Holocaust but I think he’s a nasty piece of work as pretty much anyone who denies the Holocaust is. I think it’s deplorable to call him “Europe’s No.1 Political Prisoner” as conspiracy site WHAT REALLY HAPPENED.com does and I find conspiracies that blame Jews first and look for evidence later deplorable, that’s all.
I haven’t asked you to delete any comments, I have asked you if you feel comfortable with commenters appearing on a daily basis and blaming the woes of the world on “usurious Zionists” or “global banking New World Order Zionists”?
You’ve replied in the comments box on my blog that you find some of the “barmier comments” exasperating and that you also feel the same way about those who swallow the so-called “war-on-terror” propaganda whole.
Okay, but I wonder why you ignore the coded anti-semitism of some posters and express no discomfort at it.
And just to be clear, it was a number of regular posters on YOUR blog who were calling for MY comments to be deleted when I disagreed with their “false flag theories”. I never called for anyone’s comments to be deleted so when you say, “Some people don’t seem to get the concept of open debate” then perhaps you are referring to those who assumed I was a “moron”, “a shill” or a “black-ops shill” and suggested software you could buy to have me blocked.
Anyway, it is much closer to midnight here in Japan than it is over there in the UK, so I’ll have to continue this sometime in the New Year…
Some of the commenters here do seem barmy to me. It’s not so much their theories as their eagerness to believe them without evidence.
That’s a problem with both “sides”, of course. The official explanations of things are sometimes as unconvincing as the stuff random people make up, but that doesn’t automatically make the other explanation(s) true. They could all be tosh.
Craig’s posts have a lot of insight in them and I often try to share them with a wider audience. When doing so I often hope that people can still take the main posts seriously when they scroll down and see a load of comments by conspiracy theorist nutters.
And I hate to use “conspiracy theory” in the pejorative sense since it technically applies to just about everyone who believes any theory. The official 9/11 explanation is, technically, a theory about a conspiracy, i.e. a conspiracy theory, albeit an official one. I hate the phrase and have complained about people using it myself. I just don’t know of a better phrase to describe those who have decided to reject official explanations (fair enough) so much that they’ll dive into the first alternative theory they find and never look back, never engaging the same cynicism or requiring the same levels of proof for the alternative which they apply/require to the official (not fair enough; stupid and annoying).
I don’t know what should be done about it, if anything, though. I think people should be free to say whatever they want and I’m also sure that Craig (and other readers) do not have time to add a counterpoint to every comment they disagree with.
I just think it’s a shame that the blog has (quite understandably) attracted a lot of unbalanced comments.
Conspiracy theories are like religions: When you’re so sure that one of them is true you’ve got to ask yourself why huge groups of other people are so sure a completely different one is the truth. There’s often an ‘official’ one for a country or region, too… Personally, I’m not believing anything without proof.
angrysoba
Either you believe in freedom of speech or you don’t.
Craig has not taken on any role as a censor of or commentator on zionism or anti-semitism. He should be praised for not censoring people just because he doesn’t like their politics, rather than castigated for not “expressing discomfort” about some of the sillier opinions expressed here.
Grow up!
Hi! nekycU
Whoever came up with the “denier” adjective,be it Holocaust or Climate Change,probably knew what they were doing.It seems to me that it is designed to stop debate dead on its tracks.
Angry
I feel disappointed with your courage. I know you disagree with people on the blog, everyone on the blog disagrees with every other person on the blog. That is what happens when people are allowed to. But I would have assumed that you would have enough courage to state those disagreements to our faces, on the thread where we made them. Instead of on your own blog, so we have no way of knowing what you wrote so can’t respond to your accusations.
PS, I’m not one of the truthers, I’m one of the Islamic extremists.
I think if your blog allows editing you should replace “Goldberg wearing a Tshirt that says 911//77” was an inside Job with “Goldberg wearing a Tshirt that says Islam will Dominate!”.
I’m not sure why I wrote that, all my TShirts are now plane because my wife through away my game over TShirt.
http://www.teesforall.com/images/Humor_Wedding_Game_Over_Black_Shirt.jpg
The problem with conspiracy theorists is that they try too hard. They try to explain every single apparent anomaly and weave it all together into something coherent. Which often turns out to be inconsistent and subject to debunking.
Seems to me that an alternative tack should be taken. Accept that there are many elements and pieces of apparent evidence which just cannot be cogently explained with any degree of corroborated veracity, then adopt this working principle: if the (insert atrocity of choice) was caused by unknown conspirators, and no concrete evidence of a conspiracy has been publicised (and no participants in the conspiracy have come forward), what kind of plan would be required to bring about such results? Factor in conspiracy planners with a capacity for inhuman ruthlessness (a type that certainly exists) and yes, I think it could be done.
Which is not the same as saying it was done this way. But progress frequently begins with an outre thought experiment.
Angry are you able to recognise the difference between Zionism and Judaism?
There are some who state any attack on Israel is Antisemitism, others who state any attack on Zionism is antisemitism, you have gone a step further by confusing attacks on usury as antisemitism.
Zionism is a form of nationalism not a religion or part of a religion. Nationalism goes against belief in God and creation. I am not just against Zionism, I am against all forms of nationalism, whether Nazism, Arab Nationalism, Kurdish nationalism etc, because nationalism is just another from racism.
Mike Cobley, anyone who lumps together all theorists that have ever hypothesised a conspiracy has got a serious intellectual problem. Do you believe that we really went to Iraq because of worry about WMD and we are honestly in Afghanistan hunting terrorists and promoting democracy?
I would cautiously second your thoughts on zionismn and anti semititism Arsalan.
What has to mentioned is the alliances these nationalists foster, for example the military connections between Israels zionists and that of the rightwing Hindu nationalists, currently flavouring the pakistan insecurity, with a little help from Lashka i Toibar.
Maybe angrysoba, on a nice teaching job abroad, would like to tell us why it is necessarry to help Conservative MPs, some 80% being part of the secretive CFI, with some 10 million over eight years, providing they are in support of Israels zionists/fashist in power?
why this meddling in our political affairs, when there is no reciprocal acknowledged move, anybody attempting to support Israeli Arab interests, for example fair housing policies, would be fobbed of with calls to ‘stop interfering in Israeli politics, its not a two edged sword, but a blunt cudgel to beat all.
Brought in by a phoney election, it was George W Bush who damaged American credibility, sacrificed his people and put up for sale the soul of American. The Western elite have engineered the minds of the American people to back the pursuit of empire, sustained by wiping out the wealth and assets of the poor people of the world, while spilling the blood of their children.
Shock & awe was planned in the vaults below Dimona, the completeness of nine (9) and the symbol of the towers (11) combined as a synonym for the shock of planes roaring into the World Trade Complex and awe, as the buildings collapsed in a spectacular display of destruction.
Osama Bin Laden was to be the face behind evil, dying of kidney failure and controlled by the CIA, he would represent the necessity for invasions and occupations in a new ‘war on terror’, an endless 21st century crusade that would disguise the real Empire wars and shatter the framework of democracy.
America had the platform for this crusade with 750 bases in over 100 sovereign nations that started with a brief incursion into Afghanistan that would establish a ‘good and necessary war’ and oil the wheels of the American military complex before diverting men and machines into Iraq, the prize of an imperial adventure that both the American neo-con hawks and the liberal hawks fully backed.
It was to be a monumental failure in judgement, an insult to the collective will of the world people. Besides the damage to US credibility, and not just to the Muslim world, the Iraq adventure empowered Iran, turned the quest for oil into a mirage, brushed out the military command’s hope of a base for future operations, murdered 1.3 million people, displaced 4 million more and bought torture into the American psyche.
The US had little choice but to get out of Iraq. Lost and dejected the US military machine knew Afghanistan was the only hope to rebuild American pride, so, despite crippling debt, America regrouped and rebuilt the psyops of defeating al-Qaeda, building democracy, stopping heroin, fighting terrorism and liberating Afghan women. Having lost the Iraq oil reserves (that would crash the banking system), the fight now would be to secure Central Asian oil and gas and the crucial transit corridor of Afghanistan, bypassing Iran, Washington’s key geopolitical objective.
The escalation of the war in Afghanistan would establish permanent bases right on the borders of geopolitical competitors China and Russia.
The war in Afghanistan quickly became the AfPak war, an escalation to secure the nuclear weapons of neighbouring Pakistan and set the stage for the invasion of Iran.
But it is all an illusion, a desperate effort to survive. The Iraq war destroyed the far reaching plan. The insult of this war cannot be airbrushed out; its post war incompetence was dazzling. The world witnessed the destruction of society reducing humans to their basic instincts. America had created killing fields on a vast scale. People watched in horror on the BBC as American imperialism destroyed or undermined religions, culture, communal solidarity and meaning to people’s lives.
This failure has given a potent gift, a way for ordinary folk to stop this madness. We can challenge effectively by supporting the development of a spiritual and religious renewal that will deepen ones awe and wonder of the universe, increase the sensitivity to the needs of the environment, empower women who witnessed many children die. We will validate individual freedoms with a commitment to a community that affirms the humanity of others in different spiritual and religious traditions. This community will be built on Facebook, this is our plan, this is our war, and this is our salvation.
Arsalan, I sometimes think you write with your tongue firmly in your cheek. Why should you want to wear a T-shirt that says “Islam will Dominate!”. Why should anyone want to dominate or to be dominated? I don’t want to dominate you and I certainly won’t allow you to dominate me if I can help it.
Don’t you see what nonsense all this tribal name-calling is? Like you, I’m anti-Zionist but not anti-Jewish. While I’m anti all totalitarian, intolerant belief systems, whether religious or secular, I’m not anti their adherents as human beings unless they seek to harm me and interfere in the way I choose to live my life in a peaceful manner. But people who wish their preferred set of beliefs to rule the world are highly dangerous, don’t you agree?
The real problem here is psychological and its affecting most of the human race. Its basically down to loyalty and support of your own tribe, which was extremely important for survival – both of yourself and your tribe for a multitude of obvious reasons.
The effect is that most individuals within their tribe would support the most horrendous evils committed by their tribe against other tribes. Any blame would always be directed at the opposing tribe, regardless of the actual course of events. Whilst laws existed and would be applied, they were only applied for crime committed within your own tribe. If you killed another within your own tribe, you could expect the full force of the law. If you killed someone from another tribe, then your act would be celebrated – even if it resulted in tribal warfare.
Such tribalism is still obvious today. It didn’t disappear when blacks were allowed to come into white pubs. Certainly it is far less of a problem than it was 50 years ago, but it still exists deep within nearly everyone’s subconscious.
Most people simply do not see it.
For example I read today a comment on Alternet
“During last winters assault on Gaza, over thirty kilometers of pipeline carrying water was targeted and destroyed. Children are now dying from drinking contaminated water. Barbara Lubin of Middle East Children’s Alliance visited Gaza this summer, and using local engineers and local materials they managed to cobble together two water purification systems. Their intention is to return and build more. They are urgently appealing for donations. The details are posted on their website. Reading Barara Lubin’s account of children with limbs torn off by DIME weapons and bodies burnt by white phosphorous it is all to easy to imagine the hatred that this single 22 day attack has fomented. It was carried out using US supplied military ordnance”
Our culture/tribe is responsible for that. If this was happenning in Stockton-on-Tees, there would be absolute uproar. Because it is another tribe – virtually no-one gives a shit, and the BBC will even prevent anything much being published about it – even an appeal for Aid.
The fact that our tribe commits the most horrendous evil on others, simply isn’t acknowledged by most people within it. Its psychologically too hard to take. Its much easier to blame the other tribe.
From the very first day, I doubted the official story of 9/11, but it was not until 18 months later, that I became totally convinced that the official story was literally impossible because it broke the basic laws of physics.
I was convinced that all 3 buildings had been brought down by controlled demolition. I didn’t know who was responsible for it, but I was convinced that the US Government was lying. If they were lying what was the reason?
It then dawned on me – and this was before the Iraq war started, that the evil responsible for 9/11 probably came from within my own culture. I felt that someone had kicked me very hard in the goolies. It was even more shocking than the event itself. Virtually everyone I related all the physical evidence I had collated, refused to believe it and thought I had gone insane. Some humoured me, pretending to believe me – as if they were talking to a psychotic. Others exhibited outright Rage, that I could even suggest such a thing. They were completely convinced that bearded terrorists from caves in Afghanistan had done this.
I felt so alone, that it was as if I was having a nervous breakdown. No one would believe me, and the only way I could deal with it was by keeping quiet about it – at least amongst my work colleagues and friends.
And then we went to war with Iraq and killed and mutilated Millions of innocent people.
Yet still people can’t see how evil our tribe is, and mock those who point it out as being insane.
10 years ago, I would have been one of the mockers. I thought anyone who believed in conspiracy theories such as this to be totally nuts. Sure we were dropping bombs on Yugoslavia, but I believed the propaganda, that it was to prevent an even greater evil.
The greater evil is us. It is within ourselves and our governments and those who control them.
Until we acknowledge what the problem is, we can do nothing to improve the situation.
Tony
The best way to get rid of conspiracy theorists is to hold full and impartial inquiries into 9/11, 7/7, Dr Kelly’s death, Lockerbie etc
John D. “Either you believe in freedom of speech or you don’t.”
I do.
“Craig has not taken on any role as a censor of or commentator on zionism or anti-semitism.”
According to Craig, you’re wrong on both counts.
MS: “Whoever came up with the “denier” adjective,be it Holocaust or Climate Change,probably knew what they were doing.It seems to me that it is designed to stop debate dead on its tracks.”
Okay, MS, let’s debate it. Did the Holocaust really happen?
Arsalan: “I feel disappointed with your courage. I know you disagree with people on the blog, everyone on the blog disagrees with every other person on the blog. That is what happens when people are allowed to. But I would have assumed that you would have enough courage to state those disagreements to our faces, on the thread where we made them. Instead of on your own blog, so we have no way of knowing what you wrote so can’t respond to your accusations.”
I gave you the link to my blog and I was hardly shy of disagreeing with many of the commenters. I humbly apologize for not getting round to you.
Arsalan’s T-shirt: “Islam will Dominate!” And yet “Zionism” and “usury” are like, so unFAIR!!!
“Angry are you able to recognise the difference between Zionism and Judaism?”
Hmmm…That reminds me of something I read in a Theodore Dalrymple essay. He asked one of his patients in the prison he worked at, “Do you know the difference between guilty and not-guilty?” The prisoner replied, “Yes, guilty is where you admit what you did and not-guilty is where you don’t admit what you did.”
Happy New Year.
You don’t have to believe in any particular conspiracy theory to disbelieve the official version of 9/11. John Farmer, who was senior counsel to the US government’s investigating commission, says in his book ‘The Ground Truth’ that “at some level of the government, at some point in time…there was a decision not to tell the truth about what happened”.
You couldn’t have it straighter from the horse’s mouth than that.
angrysoba,
I’m glad I made you laugh, but if you were a little more perceptive you would realise that more than one Tony posts here. The writing styles are completely different for a start.
My comment
“Look – this is Total Fucking Bollocks To Try and Stop People From Trevelling in Aircaft. I Don’t Know Who is Behind It But Strongly Suspect It Is The Global Warming Cult….”
might seem insane to you. In fact if I objectively analyse my social and political interests, I should be a fully paid up member of Greenpeace, the Green Party and everything connected to the issue of environmental protection.
However, from an analytical point of view, based on fundamental hard physics, I am convinced that CO2 at anything like current levels, does not present any problem whatsover to the Earth’s climate, and higher levels of CO2 would be beneficial to life on the planet. This completely contradicts the views of the vast majority of my “tribe”.
There therefore needs to be another reason behind the current mass hysteria infecting governments across the World to make ludicrous decisions to confront a non problem, whilst doing absolutely nothing to confront real environmental problems.
My connecting of “pants on fire” with the Global Warming movement might seem ridiculous to you, but it is completely obvious that the hysterical reaction of even more draconian restrictions on air travel will be in a total agreement with the objectives of many within that camp. They want to stop air travel full stop (well except for their own beanfeasts in place like Copenhagen, Bali and Rio).
I accept that most of the Global Warmers believe their indoctrination and are sincere, in just the same way as you believe yours.
However, it is not they who pose the real problem. It is those who are really in control of the world wide propaganda. You may think that Global Warming, 9/11, Financial Collapse, Wars, and Total Control are different tunes, but I reckon there is one conductor in control of the orchestra and he is a complete cunt.
Tony
Angrysoba:
“As proof, one of the posters links to an article by reputable news source, Prison Planet:”
“Israel has announced that it is setting up a network of bloggers to combat websites deemed “problematic” by the Zionist state,”
I assume you use the word ‘reputable’ in the sarcastic sense.
Are you using the prison planet reference to discredit this claim, despite the reports origin in the Israeli news website Haaretz?
angrysoba
yes the Holocaust did happen.
but it’s not my opinion,it’s fact.but as a historical event it should be open to scrutiny.
It’s more important to focus on what’s happening now than whether the holocaust took place or not. It’s our governments who have recently exterminated more than a million Iraqis and maimed millions more. It’s our governments who are continually bombing civilians in lands rich in resources and strategically important to them.
And yet it seems it’s OK to do this but it wasn’t OK for the Germans to exterminate the Jews.
Funniest New Years Greeting I have come across
Sent by Text
“After due consideration, I have decided to renew our Friendship for 2010. DO NOT FUCK IT UP”
The full hilarity of this could only be understood if you know the personalities of the women involved. An interesting thing of note, is that the receiver of the message is completely laid back and the last person to Fuck Up any Friendship.
Another point, which is somewhat nicer, is that any fucking up of friendship has absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with the fact that these women are of completely different races, culture and skin colour. Neither of them ever noticed that. They are both friends of my wife.
The sender of the message was once in my house, and demanding attention of everyone at a party in a similar way to that of a spoilt 5 year old child.
I said, your only problem is that you have taken your Yoga to the extreme and are one of the few people in the world who can actually achieve the feat of getting your head up your own backside.
5 minutes later, she said Tony, I think you have offended me. She then exploded into a rage and fucked off.
Tony
Quoth Jaded:
“Mike Cobley, anyone who lumps together all theorists that have ever hypothesised a conspiracy has got a serious intellectual problem. Do you believe that we really went to Iraq because of worry about WMD and we are honestly in Afghanistan hunting terrorists and promoting democracy?”
Sorry, my bad. I was specifically thinking about events like 9/11, 7/7, the attack on the USS Liberty, various solo bombers, suicide or not, events where it is difficult for the public to be sure just exactly what was going on. Iraq and Af-Pak are imperialist projects enacted out in the open, with politicians and media cheerleaders ignoring public doubt and anger while pushing the flimsiest of rationalisations for their murderous campaigns. Does that clarify it?
Tony, that is so off-topic it’s on another blog!
Angry
Yes I do believe you if you name us by name on your blog you should tell us.
Anticant
“Arsalan, I sometimes think you write with your tongue firmly in your cheek.”
That was my way of saying that I am not a truther.
What I meant was he decided to attack us behind our backs, and when it came to me personally he got it wrong.
Yes I have views that others wont like, but they are not the views he has accused me of having.
Anticant the main reason I don’t wear tshirts that say “Islam will dominate” because it is winter and it is too cold to wear Tshirts.
Instead I wear sweaters that say XL and some times XXL or L, but never M or XXXL.
Anticant no one wants to dominate you. Not me or anyone else. Other than the people who are already dominating everyone and they are not Muslim, and really they are not of any religion.
If people said Muslims will dominate they are calling for Muslims to become the ruling elite. I can’t speak for the person who held a bit of card board with “Islam will dominate” written on it, but to say he or the rest of the 1/4-1/3 of the world’s population who are Muslims want to dominate over the 3/4-2/3 who are not is not correct, because “Islam will dominate” does not mean “Muslims will dominate”. What it can mean is people will “see the light and convert”, in the context of the Muslim belief that Jesus will one day return carried down from the sky by two angels and kill the AntiChrist, and when this happens everyone will convert to Islam, so Islam will dominate.
Thanks Tony for the insight – yes 9/11 nearly drove me barmy on the Tory WebCameron blog before it was taken down after being swamped with arguments and counter arguments on the Physics of free falling towers and repeated posts on the environmental catastrophe of wind-farms built near communities. Ah those were the days. The peer reviewed scientific paper clinched it for me. Shame our children’s children will have to deal with the terrible truth, although perhaps the empire will be in charge by then. Jeez I’ve become so cynical in my old age!
Oh boy
MS: “Whoever came up with the “denier” adjective,be it Holocaust or Climate Change,probably knew what they were doing.It seems to me that it is designed to stop debate dead on its tracks.”
angrysoba: “Okay, MS, let’s debate it. Did the Holocaust really happen?”
MS: yes the Holocaust did happen.
but it’s not my opinion,it’s fact.but as a historical event it should be open to scrutiny.
Well, that is an improvement of sorts. The Holocaust is open to scrutiny, you fool! There are all kinds of different interpretations of it. For example, which side, MS, do you fall on the Christopher Browning-Daniel Jonah Goldhagen debate, I wonder?
The only kind of “debate” that the use of the term “denier” rules out when studying the Holocaust is whether it happened or not, so what makes you opposed to the word and how does it limit a debate on a subject that you have already ruled as fact?