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Was Controlled Demolition a Psyop to Distract from Real Questions? (15 posts)

1. truthmod
   Administrator

   Of course, many of us here are of the opinion that the entire attacks were a psyop on some level. But, was perhaps CD a key element--one which was so over-the-top, so plain-to-see to some, yet so incredibly preposterous to many, that it served to obscure other, much more productive paths of investigation? And also to further alienate "believers" and "non-believers?"

   Was CD like the flash and smoke of a magician disappearing?

   These are master deceivers we are up against. Their political/class lineage has being doing this kind of stuff since the very beginning.

   There is a percentage of the population that will believe whatever the authorities say. There is also a very large percentage that may have doubts or questions, but they are generally able to contain, ignore, or deny them in order to maintain their social position and psychological "stability." Then there are people like us, who just aren't buying the bullshit, and are actively trying to agitate and inform. Together, the first two populations make up a pretty monolithic force, and social engineers (like the people who plan 9/11s) are well aware of how to utilize them and play them against people like us.

   Posted 15 years ago #
2. JennySparks
   Member

   When I saw this title I thought "Duh it was ALL a psyop" but reading I see what you mean. It was almost like a "hey look over here person-who-is-not-buying-our-story. Now directly confront this aspect with no strategy other than "the truth will set you free" expectations, which we have coopted for decades--sucker."

   Micheal Ruppert was prescient on this point--and pilloried for it. Read "Don't think of an Elephant" by George Lakoff--framing is everything if the truth is to have half a chance of getting free.

   There is a percentage of the population that will believe whatever the authorities say. There is also a very large percentage that may have doubts or questions, but they are generally able to contain, ignore, or deny them in order to maintain their social position and psychological "stability."

   To be fair there are more shades here. There are the very rational inclined whom if you gave them court worthy evidence, beyond a shadow of a doubt, they'd have no problem accepting it. What holds them up is their logic: "But it would be insane to try to stage something like 9/11--there is no way to get away with something like that!"

   It's not that they worship authority or are politically conservative---they are just very sane, rational, mostly socially liberal, and are incapable of putting themselves into a powermonger's shoes enough that it makes sense. They also have a trust that the criminal justice system, whatever it's flaws, wouldn't miss this, right? Right?

   Posted 15 years ago #
3. Arabesque
   Member

   I actually agree somewhat with this point of view.

   First of all, I believe that the towers were destroyed by CD. I believe that there is extremely compelling evidence to support this. I also believe that the NIST report is as much a cover-up as the 911 commission report (i.e. "Molten Steel is irrelevant to the investigation").

   However, there is a certain segment of activists who believe that only CD should be emphasized. This is a fallacy because the destruction of the buildings is only one part of the puzzle. If you look at MSM articles, they will not seriously discuss other issues like the fact that there were wargames, or that NORAD changed its story three times, or that key individuals were promoted rather than fired, or that "the orders still stood".

   This information is just as important as how the building were destroyed. In many case it is actually more incriminating at the moment because it actually in many cases "names names", and points towards individuals that need to be investigated.

   Controlled demolition needs to be investigated in order to name any suspects.

   Until that time the government is off the hook, because we KNOW that they are going to block investigations. But we already have many lies on record and many individuals are so obviously in need of investigation that a lot of energy would be better spent promoting this information. I am not saying that CD should not be promoted, I just don't believe it should be exclusively promoted.

   Posted 15 years ago #
4. JennySparks
   Member

   However, there is a certain segment of activists who believe that only CD should be emphasized.

   Actually, from what I can sus, this segment is not only very small and I wonder how many are genuine activists. No sane person restricts themselves to only one tool to find a tough solution. I suspect the "CD only" crowd is either the confused "if we can just make them see the TRUTH, it will magically solve 911" with a few people deliberately sowing discord in any attempt to say, "yeah, but how will that put the perps in jail?"

   It's a similar problem with rank and file no-planers(to distinguish them from the ones who planted no-planes disinfo). You'll hear them say stuff like, "But if we can prove no planes, then it's obvious 911 was an inside job."

   I will leave the dissection of this logic--and its flaws-- to others. The point is these people don't understand the difference between the TRUTH and turning that knowledge into political will/momentum to change things in the real world--ie bring the perps to justice. Or a new investigation.

   Mind it would help if some of our forums were designed to account for the difference between general discussion, research and specific strategies/tactics. As it is most are thrown in higgly piggly.

   Posted 15 years ago #
5. gurich
   Member

   I think Jenny makes a good point about good intelligent people not being able to (or rather not trying to) think like Cheney, Rumsfeld and friends (I don't give Bush that much credit). How do we reach these people? The points about strategy, tactics and action are well taken. You people know how I feel about CD, and I think it is something to weigh in terms of risk when focusing on strategy.

   I would be glad to open a new strategies and tactics area on my new forum. From what I can see we have much more to worry about than the 9/11 facilitators or perpetrators. An excellent researcher at STJ911 has decided to drop 9/11 and focus on root causes. In that context the 9/11 attacks become just another example of corruption that is endemic to the system. Personally, I find myself moving in this direction as well.

   Posted 15 years ago #
6. nornnxx65
   Member

   good points, all, and of course you're familiar with this:

   Complete 911 Timeline http://www.historycommons.org/project.jsp?project=...

   Over 5000 entries, so many names tied to names, dates, events and places- is there really not a solid criminal case that can be built from the timelines? Kucinich has 3 solid impeachment articles and probably used it as a resource.

   I've noticed that some people who believe 9/11 was an inside job seem more interested in believing that than in compelling full investigations and implementing whatever reforms and safeguards are needed to reduce the risk of corruption, tyranny and false-flag terror. It's all good, imho, they are getting the word out and waking people up. Other people are quietly working behind the scenes digging stuff up, and that's good that others are looking at the root causes, which i suppose includes the psychology of human beings and society.

   If you're over 20 (or younger) you've probably noticed technology is evolving faster now than when you were a kid, and there's good reason to believe the pace is going to continue accelerating; this Universe began with a Big Bang nearly 14 billion years ago and out of it emerged human beings, who created the information age; what reason is there to believe it's stopping here?

   Accelerating Change http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accelerating_change

   As one impact of info tech advances is individuals are empowered thru cheap and easy access to knowledge and communications, the People are naturally using these technologies to expose truths, organize people and hold our public servants accountable for truth and justice. The future is bright, imho- I think the "elite" parasites did not take this transparent information environment into their calculations, and I think the Universe has used them up to this point in history (while the People were willing to tolerate such rule), but it does not like them and their exploitation of the human race- besides being immoral, it's not an efficient way to manage an economy or society. Of course, i could be wrong, i'm just a kook with a keyboard who believes 9/11 was an inside job. We shall see. We live in interesting times.

   Posted 15 years ago #
7. chrisc
   Member

   Remember this?

   The World Trade Center Collapse: A Necessary Illusion

   In my two years of 9/11 truth activism, I never emphasized the physical evidence. I always knew it was a dead end that would suck the movement's energy and accomplish nothing. But let me be straight up for a moment, if a bit speculative, because thinking about these things is helpful. They demolished the World Trade Center towers with explosives. I have no doubt about this, just as I have no doubt that the planes were flown by remote control. I also believe that hijackers did, in fact, board the planes (despite the articles claiming some of those named are still alive). I think the hijackers were trained US operatives (patsies), and that they likely did not know they were going to die. I also think the most probable explanation for the shoot-down of flight 93 is that the passengers did, in fact, storm the cockpit, only to discover that the plane was being flown by remote control. And so in order to prevent any of them from calling their loved ones and blabbing (yes, phones can work on planes), they had to shoot it down. Or perhaps the hijackers themselves learned their real fate and allowed the passengers into the cockpit to try to regain control of the aircraft. We'll never really know, and this is the idea. "Anything can be believed," and so it is equally plausible, as others have speculated, that the shoot-down of Flight 93 was planned from the beginning.

   But the World Trade Center demolition is obvious, which leads to an important question: why did they do it? Wouldn't simply crashing the planes into the buildings have been enough? Why bring them down completely? The typical responses here apply: They needed their "New Pearl Harbor," a mass casualty event to shock the public into supporting a retaliatory war. They also needed a spectacle that wouldn't be easily forgotten. These explanations are true enough. Another often cited and plausible one is that they needed to make the lie obvious enough that the people who mattered (government, corporate, and military leaders, for example) would know that they--the secret government within the government--did this and got away with it. This sends a powerful message of invincibility to anyone who might be thinking of opposing them. And the fact that they demolished building 7 later that evening in a classic-style demolition sure seems to support that argument. It's as if they were saying, "just in case you didn't get it the first time, we'll show you one even more obvious."

   But there is another reason they demolished the World Trade Center towers, in my opinion the most important reason, which is that they needed the lie to be incredible. As Hitler and Goebbels understood, the bigger and more incredible the lie, the more people will believe it, because they will have to make a bigger psychological leap in order to disbelieve it. Mass manipulation of this kind plays on the natural desire many people have to conform, and it is much more difficult, psychologically, for the conforming individual to disbelieve a popularly-held incredible lie than a mundane one, for to do so would set one widely apart from the herd. To put this another way, imagine if they had merely crashed four planes into the ocean. How much easier it would be then for people to speculate that the government may have done this as a pretext for war. To do so would not require a really incredible contradiction of the official story, marginalizing oneself from the mainstream. It would not be so easy to dismiss such claims as "outrageous conspiracy theory," and ridicule would be less effective. What is important to remember here is that propaganda of this sort is not designed to fool critical thinkers, but to provide conforming individuals with a reason not to start thinking critically. Thus the total destruction of the World Trade Center in such a dramatic yet obvious way was, in my opinion, an essential, psychological component of the operation.

   http://www.septembereleventh.org/five_years_later....

   Posted 15 years ago #
8. truthmod
   Administrator

   Wow, that's great stuff. I don't remember reading that part, but I probably did. Right on, Emanuel Sferios. That really is one of the most important articles ever written in this movement.

   Great insights, everyone.

   An excellent researcher at STJ911 has decided to drop 9/11 and focus on root causes. In that context the 9/11 attacks become just another example of corruption that is endemic to the system. Personally, I find myself moving in this direction as well.

   We're right there with you. We don't want to ignore or shun 9/11 truth, but we think that root causes, context, and broad understanding are much more important than one event.

   Posted 15 years ago #
9. chrisc
   Member

   A couple of recent examples of how the controlled demolition is used to conflate people like us with the disinfo nonsense, a comment on Erik Larson's Pentagon article after it was reposted to Indymedia:

   Nafeez Mosaddeq Ahmed does not, as far as I am aware, go in for the sort of loonspud theories commonly bandied around on this site re 9/11 and 7/7 ie. insisting it was an inside job (and indeed stridently announcing that this has been 'proved' in both cases), towers brought down by controlled demolition, no planes, holograms, energy weapons from space, no such thing as Islamic terrorists etc. Oh yes, and a rather odious obsession with the 'role of the jews' is never far from the surface either.

   If the 'truthers' stuck to commonsense investigations into security failings, cover-ups in the face of incompetence etc, I am sure they would be treated with much less derision. However they do not, and treat every skeptical voice with knee jerk responses of 'shill' and 'spook', so personally I think they are fair game.

   http://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/regions/sheffield/2...

   And from a week or so before, an email to the UK Indymedia moderation list:

   I make little or no distinction between those who believe that the WTC was destroyed by a controlled demolition and those who believe in the 'energy weapon' theory. Both in my mind are equally ridiculous.

   Most people think that it is ALL disinformation. Being the majority strain in the 9/11 truth movement still leaves you as a tiny minority everywhere else. Most people in activist circles believe that the truthers are at best a joke. At worst a serious and damaging distraction from the real questions arising from the events of 9/11.

   http://lists.indymedia.org/pipermail/imc-uk-modera...

   I seem to have got to the point where I'm really struggling to be bothered to argue with this utter crap... I'm so totally sick of it :-(

   Posted 15 years ago #
10. chrisc
    Member

    That really is one of the most important articles ever written in this movement.

    Yeah, it's awesome, another quote:

    One of the characteristics of 9/11 disinformation a lot of people have a hard time grasping is that much of it is designed specifically to convince people of US government complicity in 9/11. This might seem like a contradiction, until one understands that 9/11 disinfo is part of a broader system of mass manipulation where the opposing perspective plays an essential role. The basic idea is to control both sides of the debate, and frame it in a way that makes the opposing side ineffective (not necessarily unbelievable). In the end it doesn't matter whether even a majority of the people believe the US government was complicit in 9/11 (this is already the case). What matters is only that the perpetrators can never successfully be prosecuted. Thus they pollute the body of evidence with red herrings and false lines of inquiry. If, in the process, they happen to cause some people to disbelieve the official story (as in the case with the "no plane at the Pentagon" hoax), all the better, because the end result is a weakening of any legal case that might be brought against them.

    There is an important quote by E. Martin Schotz from his book, History Will Not Absolve Us: Orwellian Control, Public Denial, and the Murder of President Kennedy. It is: "One of the primary means of immobilizing the American people politically today is to hold them in a state of confusion in which anything can be believed and nothing can be known." Conspiracy theories, in other words, provide the perfect cover for real conspiracies. When anything can be believed because the available information is a convoluted mix of truth, falsehood and probability; when the actual truth itself is convoluted, involving deception, mystery and illusion; then one is ultimately left to their own emotions to decide. And emotions, of course, can be easily manipulated. What do you want to believe? After all, it's up to you. You'll never know the truth, or at least you'll never be able to prove it in a court of law. Do you really want to be marginalized and ridiculed as a conspiracy theorist? You get the idea.

    Posted 15 years ago #
11. emanuel
    Member

    Hi everyone,

    I'm Emanuel Sferios. I just signed up for an account here. My friend Mark Robinowitz sent me this thread because I was mentioned in it. (Thanks for the appreciation, btw.) I haven't been involved in 9/11 truth activism since I wrote that article, and as far as I can tell, the movement has only become more ineffective.

    But who runs this site? I've never been here before. Is Nick Levis involved? There isn't an "about" page as far as I can tell, and when I tried to look at some profiles I get this error page saying, "This Account Has Exceeded Its CPU Quota."

    And how do you manage to operate forums without devolving into chemtrail nonsense? We had to close downt he forums on septembereleventh.org very early on due to this.

    Emanuel

    Posted 15 years ago #
12. chrisc
    Member

    Hi Emanuel :-)

    I can't answer all your questions, but perhaps some of them...

    Is Nick Levis involved?

    He posts here sometimes, I don't think he is involved with the running of the site.

    And how do you manage to operate forums without devolving into chemtrail nonsense?

    Fairly ruthless moderation!

    The only other 9/11 truth forum that I can stand is the Truth Action one, http://truthaction.org/forum/ that is also moderated along the same lines as this one. There is a thread there on chemtrails that I started...

    "Chemtrails": No-Planes linked Disinfo? http://truthaction.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=2473

    Posted 15 years ago #
13. chrisc
    Member

    the movement has only become more ineffective

    One of the most positive thing that has happened since 2005 is that the Truth Action 11th day protests have started up: http://truthaction.org/

    But there clearly hasn't been any massive breakthrough :-(

    FWIW this is the article I helped write in 2005 about where things had got to, we wanted it to be on the front page of UK Indymedia but that argument was lost so it just appeared on the Sheffield front page:

    11th September 2001, Five Years On http://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/regions/sheffield/2...

    Posted 15 years ago #
14. truthmod
    Administrator

    Welcome to our site, Emanuel. We're currently having some site issues with the "CPU Quota" error--we're not sure if it's some kind of sabotage/attack or just a technical thing, but we're trying to clear it up.

    Here is a little background on TruthMove:

    http://www.truthmove.org/content/background/

    We're a small group that was founded in response to similar frustrations and critiques that you've described. We've worked with Nick Levis and John Albanese in the past, but the original group was founded by me, Max, and Julian in NYC in 2006.

    We are serious about maintaining a space for responsible, intelligent, broad, and respectful discussion--and we'll ban saboteurs as soon as we spot them.

    If you've never seen this document before, you might want to check it out:

    2008 Declaration: Standards and Strategies for 9/11 Truth

    http://www.truthmove.org/content/2008-declaration/

    Good to have you here, and hope to hear more from you...

    Posted 15 years ago #
15. truthmover
    Administrator

    Welcome to our forum. Looks like TruthMod had the same idea while I was writing this. But more welcomes never hurt. :)

    But who runs this site? I've never been here before. Is Nick Levis involved? There isn't an "about" page as far as I can tell, and when I tried to look at some profiles I get this error page saying, "This Account Has Exceeded Its CPU Quota."

    TruthMove was founded by Max and Julian, two NYC residents. "The Truth and Lies of 9/11" was our intro back in 2003. After a couple years of getting into the facts, we started to work with Les, Nick, Frank, and the bunch over at ny911truth. We were involved for about a year. After we realized that Les wasn't kosher, we left the group and decided to start our own organization. Some of our motivations: We didn't want Les to be the only game in town as we felt he poorly represented the movement. We wanted to create a website that was both factual and yet accessible. And we wanted to address a wider array of information that has been ignored or squashed by the mainstream press. TruthMove launched on May 1st, 2006.

    We have an intro page that describes our mission. But we decided not to include bios with pics. We aren't trying to brag about our BA's and you can view lots of images of us doing street action. Most of us use our full names when called for, and we are known personally by many people in the movement who can vouch for us being real and sane. We don't really want people to view us as anything other than average Americans who started asking question.

    Sorry about the CPU warning. We've got some technical issues to work out. Any time you see that, just wait a minute and try again. Everything is visible.

    And how do you manage to operate forums without devolving into chemtrail nonsense? We had to close downt he forums on septembereleventh.org very early on due to this.

    I'm starting to think about writing Discussion Forum Moderation for Dummies. We just took a lot of experience with crappy forums such as Democratic Underground, and we came up with specific guidelines and policy for moderation. Having a clear topic is essential as it is equally essential that off topic threads be deleted or locked. What is topical here is defined by the contents of our site, which provide a clear picture of our priorities and as well as our approach.

    We do not address 'chemtrails' on our site, and so that subject is not directly on topic here. However, off topic subjects often intersect with those we address, and so you might see a post here like the one Chrisc linked to above. Another example would be the discussion of disinformation. There is an obvious distinction between promoting information and a discussion of the impact that information has on the movement.

    Forum introduction is the critical make it or break it phase for moderation if you have some immediate traffic. I suppose my biggest recommendation at that point is to NOT welcome debunkers. A perfect example would be the first attempt made by ae911truth to host a forum. They had no clear guidelines and appeared uncertain at best about their moderation strategy. Mark Roberts was the first registrant and made the first comment. It never recovered and they had to start over and decided to make the new forum private.

    That waste of energy, as people could have helped them prevent it, and also lesson learned brings me back to whether or not a forum has a strong definition. Moderators need to have a clear sense of the purpose and parameters of the forum. Why does it exist and what is unique about it. And moderators need to communicate concerns about behavior in a very direct and clear manner. That may include moments of relative ambiguity in which moderators have to say, "That's just not what we want this forum to feel like."

    This forum is home to me. I want everyone who appreciates this space to feel as comfortable as I want to feel here. One implicit purpose of our forum is to be a space free of any trolling, debunking, or repetitive argument. And we're also not putting up with mean people. I suppose that personally, I want people posting here to be those who recognize that the problems we face make no time for over-active self-interest.

    Finally, relative to the definition of your forum, you have to be willing to sacrifice quantity for quality. Principle before association. We don't want to talk to everyone. We want to talk to those with whom we have certain things in common.

    I could go on. I'm thinking about writing an essay about this.

    Anyway, once again, welcome to the forum. And if you really want to get a better feel for our project have a quick look at the following.

    Truth Movement: Our Common Priority http://www.truthmove.org/forum/topic/954?replies=1

    Intro Page: http://www.truthmove.org/page/intro/

    And you might have a look at our primary category pages: Values, Insight, Action, and Psychology

    Posted 15 years ago #

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