Conspiracy theories 'absurd' notions
National Affairs
Claire Hoy

Where to begin? According to an Ipsos Reid public opinion poll on behalf of Canwest News,

some 22 per cent better than one in five of Canadians who were asked, said they believe that 9/11 wasn't orchestrated by Osama bin Laden's al-Qaeda terrorist.

For them, it seems, the U.S. government did it. Or, if not the government, "a group of highly influential Americans and others" apparently intent on cranking up the war machine in the name of profit and as any committed conspiracy theorist knows oil.

How pathetic is that? How sad that so many Canadians and particularly younger, better educated Canadians with constant access to the internet actually believe that the whole thing was a conspiracy.

By the way, in order for the conspiracy to work, you realize that bin Laden and his guys would have to be in on the scam too, since they have consistently taken credit for the largest terrorist attack in North American history. But hey, little details, no matter how obviously absurd it is to ignore them, do not deter the dedicated conspiracists.

No doubt these are some of the same people or at the very least their fellow travelers who buy into the notion that the moon walk was shot in Sudbury. Then there's that poll from years ago an American one showing that 15 per cent of those asked believe Elvis Presley is still alive and hiding out somewhere to avoid the media.

And the beat goes on.

What a sad commentary on our society and particularly on the down side of the internet, which, more than any other source, continues to spew out such garbage and present it as fact.

Then again, Michael Moore has become a multi-millionaire "documentary" maker and he too spends only passing moments worrying about what actually happened as opposed to depicting what he wants people to think happened.

So if you can believe in Michael Moore, it's not that much of a jump to believe that bin Laden got together with George Bush and "others" and concocted the whole 9/11 thing.

The other part of this poll which is almost but not quite as troubling is that a majority of Canadians, some 53 per cent particularly those under 35 years old told the pollster that the attacks were "a very specific violent reaction to foreign policies of the US government."

Right. That's why the bin Laden put out a list of many of the major Western nations including Canada and has systematically orchestrated horrific terrorist attacks against them. Fact is, Canada is the only country on the list which has not been attacked by al Qaeda. Not yet, anyway. Perhaps had we been attacked more of us might believe that the Islamic terrorists, not the U.S. government, are the bad guys in this story.

There is no doubt that the poll results reflect a widespread and in my view, completely unwarranted view in this country that the Americans, particularly the Bush Administration, are the personification of evil in this world. Hand in hand with that is the equally unsupportable view that oppression against Islamic societies by the evil Americans is what sparks terrorism, a view which neatly sidesteps the reality that a)-Islamic terrorists overwhelmingly come from the wealthier, better educated classes of their societies and b)-they hate everybody who does not subscribe to Islam.

But hey, when you've got a national political party albeit with less than 20 percent support across the country overwhelmingly supporting the notion that Canada should renege on its' commitment to NATO and the United Nations in Afghanistan NDP Leader Jack Layton continues, wrongly, to call it an American operation what else can we expect?

At a time we should be genuinely mourning the death of so many innocent people including 24 Canadians we have the spectre of people allowing their dislike of Bush to blind them from the obvious truth, i.e. bin Laden, not Bush, is responsible for 9/11.

It is a grievous slur against all those innocent men and women who died that day to absolve their killers of blame in order to vent a collective spleen against an administration which is not held in much regard in this country.

It is also patently absurd, in the same category as believing that the earth is flat and that day is night and that those who really want to destroy our way of life are really a bunch of good guys who are a)victims of U.S. oppression and b)badly misunderstood.

If you're one of those who believes in the conspiracy, it's time to give your head a shake.