Toothache
Let the music play!
I am fascinated with the idea of conspiracy theories. Not the theories themselves, some of those are pretty wild and fantastic and too impossible to be true. The attitude people have towards conspiracies is the aspect that fascinates me the most.
Now, it is pretty clear the governments of the world keep a lot of secrets, for many different reasons. There are legitimate reasons to keep these secrets from the genuine public. There are many reasons while secrets are kept in order to protect someone who really should be investigated though, so it is not a perfect system by any means. People with power will use that power to cover their asses if they can, and people in government do have a lot of influence.
As for the more fantastic conspiracies, there is an element of truth in all of them, but people often jump to the wrong conclusions. "Oh there's mysterious craft and lights sighted from Area 51, it must be UFOs." Not to mention that Area 51 has been the testing ground for highly advanced aircraft for over 50 years. Even the conspiracies with a strong element of truth, like the assassination of JFK, has a few holes.
Here's my concern. Governments need to be held to account. If a government official or representative does something wrong, or orders something illegal, they need to be held to account. Governments often have to do things that they know will be unpopular with the public at large, so they try to give it as little public light as possible. If people try to bring that into the public eye, is it a conspiracy?
So I suppose my real question is - Is is a conspiracy if it is true? Of course, proving a conspiracy to be true is hard at best and downright impossible at worst, which is why they are called conspiracy theories. A lot of people believe that JFK's death was a government action. There are people who believe 9/11 was an inside job. Are they crazy, or is there some real evidence to support these theories?
It is no secret that they are growing over 90% of the world's opium in Afghanistan, even though 8 years before the Taliban actually destroyed the poppy crops and drug production. Does the American government have a hand in world drug production? Some might argue they do, and have had for decades. You can see how people can take simple facts like this (growing opium) and string it into a convincing sounding theory (American government manages the illegal drugs industry). It certainly doesn't work to destroy the theory, no matter what you believe.
There is obviously real conspiracy and real corruption. With the dismissive attitude of a lot of people who investigate these conspiracies, it is hard for real corruption to be rooted out. It is no good for government to investigate themselves, because that is a good way for them to hide the real truth.
tl;dr, basically how do you feel about conspiracies, and which conspiracies really should be independently investigated and which ones are really just people blowing hot air?
Now, it is pretty clear the governments of the world keep a lot of secrets, for many different reasons. There are legitimate reasons to keep these secrets from the genuine public. There are many reasons while secrets are kept in order to protect someone who really should be investigated though, so it is not a perfect system by any means. People with power will use that power to cover their asses if they can, and people in government do have a lot of influence.
As for the more fantastic conspiracies, there is an element of truth in all of them, but people often jump to the wrong conclusions. "Oh there's mysterious craft and lights sighted from Area 51, it must be UFOs." Not to mention that Area 51 has been the testing ground for highly advanced aircraft for over 50 years. Even the conspiracies with a strong element of truth, like the assassination of JFK, has a few holes.
Here's my concern. Governments need to be held to account. If a government official or representative does something wrong, or orders something illegal, they need to be held to account. Governments often have to do things that they know will be unpopular with the public at large, so they try to give it as little public light as possible. If people try to bring that into the public eye, is it a conspiracy?
So I suppose my real question is - Is is a conspiracy if it is true? Of course, proving a conspiracy to be true is hard at best and downright impossible at worst, which is why they are called conspiracy theories. A lot of people believe that JFK's death was a government action. There are people who believe 9/11 was an inside job. Are they crazy, or is there some real evidence to support these theories?
It is no secret that they are growing over 90% of the world's opium in Afghanistan, even though 8 years before the Taliban actually destroyed the poppy crops and drug production. Does the American government have a hand in world drug production? Some might argue they do, and have had for decades. You can see how people can take simple facts like this (growing opium) and string it into a convincing sounding theory (American government manages the illegal drugs industry). It certainly doesn't work to destroy the theory, no matter what you believe.
There is obviously real conspiracy and real corruption. With the dismissive attitude of a lot of people who investigate these conspiracies, it is hard for real corruption to be rooted out. It is no good for government to investigate themselves, because that is a good way for them to hide the real truth.
tl;dr, basically how do you feel about conspiracies, and which conspiracies really should be independently investigated and which ones are really just people blowing hot air?