The people who were telling the truth all along were treated poorly, and perceived as lunatics. Like medieval lepers, the individuals who raised the banner of 9/11 truth were insulted, and excluded from public dialogue, and the respectable boundaries of communal conversation that exists in every human society.
What is strange about people's mental blindness towards the truth is that you don't have to be smart to connect the dots and see that high-level U.S. government officials were behind 9/11; to see that 2+2 equals 4. It doesn't require any special mental skill to judge lies as lies.
Perhaps the most difficult truth to swallow is that the lie about 9/11 fooled people, including experienced scientists and highly gifted intellectuals, not because of media brainwashing, government manipulation of the public, or a lack of access to information, but because of human conceit and an unwillingness on the part of many individuals to take a look at the evidence about the controlled demolition of the twin towers and building se7en. People just don't want to take off the government's blindfold.
For the past several years almost everyone had access to a computer, where they could have easily searched the phrases "9/11 truth" or "9/11 evidence" or "9/11 was an inside job" but many people didn't choose to because a) they weren't intellectually humble enough, b) they were afraid of what they might find, and c) they were lazy.
Most people chose to conform to the popular opinion that the 9/11 attacks were done by Osama Bin Laden and Al-Qaeda, as the government had told them. They thought to themselves "Why bother researching for evidence about the collapse of the towers? Only crazy and mentally deluded people think individuals within U.S. government were behind 9/11." Calling someone who speaks the truth a "crazy" or a "conspiracy theorist" is psychological reassuring, but it is pathetic.
The biggest problem in Western society is conformity. The American psychologist Rollo May said: “The opposite of courage in our society is not cowardice, it is conformity." Gay individuals know what it is like to be trashed and ridiculed by the mainline culture with terms like "faggots," and so do black individuals who were psychological abused, murdered because of their skin color, and called dehumanizing names that need not be repeated here to make a point. The term "conspiracy theorist" is another present-day example of how language can be used to dehumanize, and ridicule individuals that are not in the norm.
"Conspiracy theorists" are thought to be intellectually inferior people who don't deserve to receive attention. The term is used by both mainline conservatives and liberals, as well as people across the political spectrum, to dismiss thoughtful individuals that bring up damning evidence that implicates the highest authority figures in the United States government in grand crimes and events, the most famous being the assassination of John F. Kennedy, and Martin Luther King Jr., and the murder of nearly 3,000 people on September 11, 2001.
"I would say the term conspiracy theorists," says Graeme MacQueen, a retired professor, and founder of the Centre for Peace Studies at McMaster University, in a fantastic interview with WFHB Fire House Broadcasting, "has been an extremely powerful and useful term for those who want to prevent any questioning of what happened on September 11, 2001, and I think it doesn't survive scrutiny. I think its a thought stopper and a silencer." He added that when you call someone a conspiracy theorist "everyone breathes a sigh of relief and says 'good, we don't have to look this, this is just a conspiracy theory, we don't have to look for evidence, we don't have to use our critical faculties' and it operates that way, it prevents people from thinking. . .If I wanted to denigrate you I can say you're an idiot, but calling you a conspiracy theorist is much more effective because it's a sophisticated term."
MacQueen is doing tremendous work along with Laurie Manwell, a professor at Guelph University in Neuroscience and Applied Cognitive Sciences, in educating the American and Canadian public about the scientific evidence that rules out the official 9/11 story and explaining the psychological and political ramifications that arise when first realizing this haunting truth. In September they gave a presentation called "Peace Through Truth; 9/11 and State Crimes Against Democracy” at the 9/11 Working Group of Bloomington in Indiana. The event received little media coverage, obviously, but the Indiana Daily Student did publish a short article called "9/11 skeptics present ‘Peace Through Truth" by Rachel Trees. An excerpt:
The 9/11 Working Group of Bloomington’s presentation Saturday at the Buskirk—Chumley Theater titled “Peace Through Truth; 9/11 and State Crimes Against Democracy” outlined speakers’ skepticisms toward the events that took place on 9/11.
Speakers included Graeme MacQueen, founding director for McMaster University’s Centre for Peace Studies in Ontario, and behavioral neuroscientist Laurie Manwell.
“The folks who are engaged in the movement are serious scholars who come to conclusions based on evidence that should be available to everyone in the room,” said Byron Bangert, member of the 9/11 Working Group of Bloomington.
Professor Manwell is a pioneer in the emerging field of 9/11 studies. Her paper "In Denial of Democracy: Social Psychological Implications for Public Discourse on State Crimes Against Democracy Post-9/11," was published in the American Behavioral Scientist in February 2010. There is interesting analysis throughout her paper but here I will post an excerpt from her conclusion. She quotes the great journalist and broadcaster Edward R. Murrow, and then offers her own equally apt words:
In the same year that William Golding proffered his warning about the importance of dissent in a climate of fear, another great spokesman, Edward R. Murrow, also reminded us of the necessity of dissent to fulfill our responsibility of defending democracy from rampant fear:Thanks to the insight of courageous scholars and professors like Laurie Manwell, Graeme MacQueen, David Ray Griffin, Steven Jones, Niels Harrit, and many others, we have a better chance at winning back the freedoms that we've lost in our Western democracies because of the 9/11 attacks. They are helping citizens to think critically and compassionately about the 9/11 crime, filling a role that journalists have avoided because they have not bothered to think.We must not confuse dissent with disloyalty. We must remember always that accusation is not proof, and that conviction depends upon evidence and due process of law. We will not walk in fear, one of another. We will not be driven by fear into an age of unreason, if we dig deep in our history and our doctrine, and remember that we are not descended from fearful men—not from men who feared to write, to speak, to associate and to defend causes that were, for the moment, unpopular.We scholars can and must take seriously the citizen’s call to action and not allow fear to override the demand for interpersonal tolerance of different political views. We can and must create dissonance in the public psyche to encourage social responsibility and education on matters of national interest. We can and must investigate the current state of affairs for ourselves and not delegate accountability to elected officials who may harbor alternative agendas. We can and must remember that trading freedom for security divests our contemporary and all future collective power to participate in democratic governance. We can and must believe that change is possible when we choose to be a part of it. We can and must dissent in the face of everyday denials of democracy.
"The conventional view serves to protect us from the painful job of thinking," said the Canadian-American economist John Kenneth Galbraith. Thinking is the least, but also the hardest, thing that we can all do as citizens. In times like ours thinking is forbidden because it is dangerous to the establishment, which is probably the biggest reason why thinking is so necessary. New thinking bears new fruits.
By rethinking the 9/11 attacks we can help end the wars in the Middle East, and save our Western democracies at the same time. It is a win-win situation. But change is not automatic. We are all engaged in a historical struggle for freedom, truth, and justice. We are all in this together. We must continue to raise our voices, and puncture the bubble of fear, cowardice, and complacency. It is also important that we tell the message that a better world is possible once we accept the truth about 9/11 and bring the real criminals behind the attacks to justice.
