Conspiracy Theories

Went out the other night with a few Canadian acquaintances. When the conversation turned to Bush and Michael Moore (as all conversations seem to do these days) I became privy to some conspiracy theories I thought were long dead.

1. The 9/11 attacks were staged by the American government (as evidenced by the hit on the pentagon, which supposedly was not by a plane but by a missile)
2. North Korea is actually a good place, it's just imperialist propaganda that brainwashes people to see North Korea as an enemy and justify imperialist aims in Asia.
3. Nick Berg was beheaded by the CIA (he was already dead when severed by the Jihad "actors" in order to drum up more rage against Muslims).
4. There are no terrorists. The War on Terror is just an excuse for future decades of war propaganda to justify imperialist aims.

In his view, supposed "anti-Bush/America" sources such as Michael Moore and Al Jazeera (in response to what I thought was the obvious question: Why aren't more mainstream anti-Bush voices on to these theories?) are either ignorant of the depth of deception going on (and thus allowed to operate) or even possibly just fronts to give the illusion of opposition, while sources that are brave enough to expose THE TRUTH (!!!) are actively silenced.

[note that all caps and several exclamation points are required by both MLA and APA standards when reporting statements made by conspiracy theorists refering to the truth or falsehood of central beliefs: eg. How can you believe all the LIES fed to you by the American media!!!!]

Now, these views were held by only one of the two Canadians. The other one clearly didn't buy in to any of these views, and Mr Conspiracy Theory even admitted that he was no longer able to talk with his friends back in Canada about this (he lives abroad) because they were too closeminded and apparently affected by the media there.

Yeah, that famous pro-Bush imperialist Canadian media.



Now this person is a decent, kind, and (otherwise) intelligent human being. I expect this kind of reasoning (or amazing lack thereof) from a 13-year-old Saudi in his 5th year of religious "schooling" under the tutalage of a radical wild-eyed Imam (and the Joooos use the blood of arab babies for their ceremonial foods! It is the TRUTH!!!!). But what gives here?

It takes all kinds I guess...