9/11 CultWatch

Welcome To The 9/11 Cultwatch Blog

Thank you for visiting the 9/11 Cultwatch blog.

We have watched with alarm the spread of the 9/11 'truth' movement. We oppose its venal analysis, lazy research, dubious politics and the anti-semitism that lies at its core. Unopposed these ideas will spread - the 'truth' movement has already spawned a ginger headed stepson - the 7/7 'truth' movement - other flawed campaigns will no doubt follow.

From the e mails and personal approaches we are receiving, it is obvious that the message of 9/11 Cultwatch is spreading.

You too can help us. We value information on 'truth' activities. If you have a blog or website, why not link to this site? Lacking the financial backing of wealthy cranks like Jimmy Walter or Belinda Mckenzie, means this blog takes adverts to pay its way. If you see any Google Ads here that interest you - click on them. We earn money from that.

Finally 9/11 Cultwatch will consider approaches to speak at conferences, public meetings and to the media about the 9/11 'truth' movement and its offshoots. Feel free to get in touch.

You can follow me, this blog and the I Intend To Escape blog on Twitter at http://twitter.com/#!/MrPaulStott

A Hint At David Icke's Financial Empire?

I have only just been alerted to the Daily Mail of 7 January which contained a piece on Pamela Leigh Richards and her divorce from David Icke.

The web version of this, updated on 9 January, can be viewed here. Researchers have long wondered just how much Icke makes from his incessant touring, conferences, book and DVD sales and subscription website, and more pertintently where that money is then invested. Whilst much of the article is the type of frippery you may expect - Icke allegedly began to suspect Pamela was a shape-shifter when their relationship began to deteriorate - the news that she has been holding out for large settlement, and even demanding 'immense' sums does of course reiterate what a cottage industry Icke has built over the past two decades.

So, will the settlement buy her silence, or will we get an insight into just how much money there is in conspiracy theory?

Using The Truth Movement....

Or alternatively 'I used to be a 9/11 Truth Activist, But I'm Alright Now'.

You have to hand it to Annie Machon. She gets the Vancouver branch of the 9/11 Truth movement to promote her speaking tour in Canada in May, but manages to have a CV that has now been stripped of any involvement in 'truth' activism.

Way to go Annie. I think the word I am looking for is chutzpah.

Happy New Year To 9/11 Cultwatch Visitors

There has been a quiet period on this blog, but that will soon change.

We will soon start again the series of conspiracist quotes, as allowing truthers to express themselves in their own words is one of the best mechanisms against them we have. Over in the United States the issue has emerged of the extent Republican Presidential hopeful Ron Paul is a support of the truth movement. Certainly here in the UK truth activists regarded him as their man, hence the regular presence of 'truth' activists bearing the words 'Google Ron Paul' on major demonstrations in the capital. If Paul's candidacy is to continue, he will have to decide which side of the fence he stands.

I am currently working on an article for the next issue of Notes From the Borderland magazine on a decade of 9/11 truth, which should appear in the next month or so. In the meantime, 9/11 Cultwatch relies so heavily on those who send us information. Keep it coming!

Teaching About Terrorism and 'Conspiracy' Theory

I have just completed a one hour lecture on Terrorism and Conspiracy Theory, and followed it up with three seminars to undergraduates on the same subject.

The main things I wanted to get across to students were the historical scale of conspiracy theories, that they can be accelerated by secrecy, government dishonesty and incompetence and that the Internet has allowed them to go in a thousand and one different directions. I then focused on the 9/11 Truth Movement, looking at some of its core beliefs, MIHOP (that the US government made the attacks happen on purpose) and LIHOP (let it happen on purpose) and the uses that are made of the following quote from the neo-Cons Project For A New American Century:

"Further, the process of transformation, even if it brings revolutionary change, is likely to be a long one, absent some catastrophic and catalyzing event – like a new Pearl Harbour" (2000, 51).

This of course 'proves' that the Bush administration either allowed 9/11 to happen or arranged it! I also covered some issues around race, religion and conspiracy theory, and that whilst black American groups such as the Nation of Islam may be paranoid, that has not always meant that in the past that no one was out to 'get' black Americans!

In the closing part of the lecture I covered some of the responses to 'truth' activism - the papers of groups such as Demos, writers like Jon Ronson, David Aaronovitch and Damian Thompson, and the belated responses by the US government. Concluding comments centred on whether there is a 'template' of conspiracist ideals - core elements that can be found in all arguments, and whether we can see in this, glimpses of future conspiracy theories. Most of all I hope students took away the impression that the Internet, as well as being a tool for good, can also retard debate. Look around some workplaces at lunch or break times, and instead of talking to workmates, many people are sat there playing with their I-Phones and Blackberrys. What happens when most people, get most of their news, most of time, from the Internet?

In the seminars, I asked students to consider two things. What  questions did they have outstanding with regards to 9/11, and to what extent should opinion formers, polticians and government seek to respond to 'truth' theories. To stimulate some debate I distributed photocopies of an A5 'truth' leaflet from 2006 "It's 5 Years Since the Attacks on 9/11" - this largely focused on the argument controlled demolition brought down WTC 1, 2 and 7, plus provided suggestions witnesses heard explosions before the towers came down.

Some of the 'celebrity' supporters of 9/11 truth that were listed - Charlie Sheen and David Shayler - had not stood the test of time very well, all three groups roared with laughter at the mention of Mr Sheen. Answers on the first question were few and far between (most student's were clearly sheeple, as they seemed to broadly agree Bin Laden did it) whilst the second brought more mixed answers.
The difficulty of 'responding' to truth arguments was stressed, as was the lack of any named sources for the 'scientific' evidence presented. On one level I was left feeling slightly more optimistic than I had expected to be - students appear to want to discuss evidence and to see named sources for claims that are made - freeze framed pictures of 'premature' explosions did not seem to impress them.

This may be a protest generation. But on this evidence at least, it is unlikely to go up the blind alley of 'truth' activism.

Conspiracist Quote of the Day: 3

"In his previous work, The Secret Society of Freemasons Revealed, Almighty God Dawud Allah explains that nine out of every ten Caucasian babies are born with tails. While this secret has been hidden by Doctors (who are all Masons) Dawud names it as the reason for a preponderance of the word "tail" in white speech ("heads or tails," "boy I will beat your tail," "tailgate party"). It would be a mistake to consider Almighty God Dawud Allah's work as representing the Five Percenters' intellectual highpoint."

From Michael Muhammad Knight, The Five Percenters: Islam, Hip Hop and the Gods of New York (Oxford: One World, 2009) p.196.

Conspiracist Quote of the Day: 2

Headline news in the UK yesterday was the Leveson Inquiry into the conduct of the media.

All a waste of time if they had consulted David Icke, who in this mailing of 30 December 2010, reminds us that the media (and just about everything else) is controlled by the Rothschild-Zionists:

"that the Rothschild Zionists control the mainstream media; Hollywood and the movie industry; governments, not least in the United States; and crucially in the light of current events, they control global finance and commerce."

Classic Conspiracist Quote of the Day

Welcome to a new series on 9/11 Cultwatch where each morning (if I get round to it) I will bring you a classic quote from the weird and wonderful worlds of 9/11 truth and related conspiracy thinking.

To start the ball rolling, lets look back to 2006, when David Shayler and Annie Machon expressed the view that no planes hit the twin towers on 9/11. Annie likes to style herself as a serious columnist in The Guardian these days, commenting on the security services, policing and civil liberties. Those considering her views really should take her long term double act with David into account, in the years before the big man turned all David Icke on us.

This is from Brendan O'Neill's 11 September 2006 interview in the New Statesman:

"We know for certain that the official story of 9/11 isn't true," says Shayler. "The twin towers did not collapse because of planes and fire; they were brought down in a controlled demolition. The Pentagon was most likely hit by an American missile, not an aeroplane." Machon nods. In black trousers and black top, this sophisticated blonde in her late thirties comes across more like a schoolmarm than a 9/11 anorak. "The Pentagon's anti-missile defence system would definitely have picked up and dealt with a commercial airliner. We can only assume that whatever hit the Pentagon was sending a friendly signal. A missile fired by a US military plane would have sent a friendly signal." She says this in a kind of Anna Ford-style newsreader's voice, as if she were speaking the truth and nothing but the truth. She takes another sip of tea.

Check back later for more of the same - there is plenty more where that came from!

Uncon 2011 - Views Sought

It seems Fortean Times are emailing those who bought tickets online for Uncon 2011, asking for their views.

I am never sure how much surveys are listened to, but I completed it, urging Fortean Times to reduce or hold the prices next year, to vastly increase the number of stalls, and to seek to involve the magazines readership far more in the event. A series of small talks or discussions is more people centred and progressive than being lectured at on six seperate occasions from a big stage.

Lets see what happens in 2012..............

Jon Ronson At Uncon 2011

I spent this morning at the annual Fortean Times covention - Uncon 2011, held at the Camden Centre in London.

The last time I was at the Camden Centre was in the days the London Anarchist Bookfair was held there. I have to say that event probably rather spoiled me - Uncon has considerably less going on, and at £32.35 including booking fee for a one day ticket, the pricing structure is also somewhat different. Todays session had a room with a coffee bar and six stalls, and then in the main arena six one hour talks on the big stage. Of these the only one that really floated my boat was Jon Ronson, discussing his book The Psychopath Test.

I have apparently met Ronson before (he wrote a sarcastic report for Time Out on a Class War public meeting in Brixton in 1993) but was pleasantly surprised by just how funny he was and how capably he dealt with a thirty minute Q&A session. Ronson's talk took in the Scientologists, a Broadmoor inmate who says he faked mental illness to avoid a long prison sentence, and his experience meeting some of the leading figures in mental health such as Robert Hare. Ronson attended Hare's classes so as to be able to use his psychopath checklist. From Hare, Ronson took the idea that many corporate CEO's display psychopathic tendencies, and indeed that these ideals are actually a boon for business careers. A lack of empathy, remorselessness and a superficial charm are benefits in corporate life. Hare estimates that whilst only 1 person in 100 is a psychopath, 4 in 100 CEOs are. More recently both George Monbiot and Horizon have adapted these arguments.

Before we all rush to work and ask our boss if he minds sitting through the PCL-R test before his first meeting of the morning, Ronson did offer a clear warning of the dangers of untrained amateurs rushing about in the this field, plus secondly the obvious problems with labelling people. Throwing the floor open for questions, this point was again re-emphasised, with Ronson arguing he hopes the first half of the book may allow the reader to become power crazed, the second half to realise the error of their ways.

Ronson expressed relief that his work on conspiracy theorists was conducted before 9/11. He takes the view that he was the first person outside of the 'conspiratorial left or right' to look at the Bilderberg meetings, and that these events now get serious press coverage. Ronson was scathing about the 9/11 'truth' movement, arguing its humourless nature meant it was impossible to empathise with them (and presumeably to make good television out of them!)

Those expecting Jon Ronson to use his platform to criticise the pharmaceutical industry, or the health industry may have been disappointed. His position here is, he insists, evidence based. The only trend he is aware of that lacks any evidence for it is childhood bi-polar disorder. Here children 2-3 years old are being labelled as bi-polar because of what are in effect temper tantrums - with the pharmaceutical lobby and pushy parents happy to revel in 'treatments' for this condition.

More generally in the questions Ronson praised The Guardian for its high moral stance, something that suggests he is unaware of the more critical literature about The Guardian/Observer to emerge in recent years, or the treatment of certain Guardian journalists such as Michael Gillard and Laurie Flynn. He ended by pointing out pyschopathic tendencies are ideal for some of the business practices that have proved so damaging to the economy in recent years - the sub-prime market and asset stripping need a short term, get rich quick and never mind the consequences mentality. The long term businessman behaves in exactly the opposite way.

Uncon 2011 continues today and tomorrow. If the prices are held, or come down, I may well attend next year, but the organisers should throw the event open to Fortean Times subscribers a lot more. Until they do, Uncon won't achieve what it could.

Fortean Times - Uncon 2011

This weekend, I will be one of many punters attending the 2011 Fortean Times gathering in central London.

Held on Saturday and Sunday, with tickets at £30 a pop (plus booking fee) I can only afford to go to Uncon 2011 on the Saturday, which does have Jon Ronson speaking at 1000 on the Psycopath Test. No I have not tried it yet.

If you are a reader of 9/11 Cultwatch or Notes From the Borderland and you see me wondering about - do stop me and say hello.

Occupied With Conspiracy Theories?

Spencer Sunshine has written an interesting summary of the occupy movement and some of the less savoury characters which have appeared in its slipstream.

Focusing on events in the United States, and placing them in an historical context, occupied with conspiracy theories appears courtesy of the ever informative Shift magazine.

Emel Magazine + Dr Mohammad Naseem = Comedy Gold?

Emel is a Muslim lifestyle magazine, distributed nationally. I get mine, every two or three issues or so, from Sainsbury's in Dalston.

Each issue contains a two page feature, Migrant Memories, where a senior Muslim reflects on their life here in Britain. November's, headed 'Serving the Society' features Dr Mohammad Naseem, Chairman of Birmingham Central Mosque, former (?) financier of the Respect Party and owner of one of the best syrup and figs in the West Midlands.

Dr Naseem is of course well known to visitors to this blog for his prominent role as a 7/7 conspiracy theorist, indeed shortly after the London Bombings he was using public platforms in the West Midlands to insist it was impossible any Muslims could be involved in the attacks. This bizarre position continued even after the first suicide video - that of ringleader Mohammad Sidique Khan - surfaced. Since then he has popped up in the BBC's Conspiracy Files programme working with leading 9/11 'truther' Tony Gosling, and distributing a DVD around his mosque which argues Israel was responsible for the 7/7 attacks.

More recently Birmingham Central Mosque has threatened to sue Prime Minister David Cameron, after he mentioned it in connection to conspiracy theories about terrorist attacks. Oddly eight months on there is no news of a writ landing on the doormat at number ten, and Dr Naseem does not take the opportunity to update Emel's readership on this important case. So what do we get from the great man?

Well in terms of controversy, very little. He tells us about his belief in inter-faith dialogue and the Rabbi he worked with after 9/11 - sadly we are not told if the mosques 'Jewish Comrades' have received one of their copies of 7/7 Ripple Effect. Things look as if they might get interesting when Dr Naseem tells us that some of his 'decisions in the public arena have sparked controversy' but there follows merely an unremarkable passage about appointing women to public posts. How the good Doctor views himself is interesting, saying he is a "strong critic of the political establishment when it enfringes on our rights as citizens of a democratic country" - it is hard to place 7/7 or 9/11 'truth' activism in this context.

So - no mention of Respect, nothing about suing the Prime Minister, and of course nothing about 7/7 suicide videos being created by the security services to frame Muslims. On balance, we are left with the conclusion that Emel - rather like secular lifestyle magazines - prefers the anodoyne and the uncontroversial, to the dramatic and downright odd. Still, they have achieved the near impossible - they have provided a platform where Mohammad Naseem comes across as rational.

From Wellington: Activism Based In Reality

It is fantastic to see the type of ideals 9/11 cultwatch holds, being picked up and adopted elsewhere.

For years we have warned of the dangers of activists being lead up the garden path with fantastical stories, and/or missing the fact that if we are to develop influence, we have to criticise our rulers for things they have done, not things they have not.

Libcom.org features the text of an excellent talk made at an Occupy meeting in Wellington, New Zealand on 27 October. Against Conspiracy Theories!

Joanna Yeates: The Conspiracy Theorists Were Wrong Again

The conviction today of Vincent Tabak for the murder of his neighbour, Joanna Yeates, brings to some closure a very sorry affair.

Back at Christmas 2010, when Ms Yeates went missing, one of the leading 9/11 truth activists, Tony Gosling, found he had the UK's biggest news story on his doorstep. He reacted by posting on the Internet a series of ever more lurid explanations for her murder. These included speculations about black magic, the involvement of freemasons, the full moon, corrupt police officers, and links to unsolved killings in the area.

Whilst Gosling and his associates were ensuring the Internet was full of mindless rubbish, the tabloids took on a similar role with regards to the newspaper industry. Here speculation was almost as wild, but considerably more cruel, focusing on Ms Yeates entirely innocent landlord, Chris Jeffries. He has since received substantial compensation for his treatment at the hands of the press.

Tony Gosling, for all his radical pretensions, is no better than The Sun, Daily Express or The Scotsman, waffling idly about matters he knows nothing about, for his own titillation, profit and influence. Instead of selling newspapers and impressing advertisers, Gosling hoped to find evidence for his own curious theories, and improve his standing in the 'alternative' media. It is to be hoped that his corner of the Internet is so obscure, that those who held Joanna Yeates dear did not come across any of this nonsense.

One final point to close on: If Mr Gosling is so wrong on this case, why should anyone listen to him when he is pontificating about 9/11, 7/7 or the Bilderberg's?

Time For Occupy Activists To Stand Up To Nonsense

From the emails 9/11 Cultwatch has been receiving, some of the comments posted here, and those on several Anarchist email lists, it is clear that activists in the Occupy movement are standing up to nonsense in two ways.

Firstly, they are standing up against the injustice of banks being propped up with taxpayers money, and those same taxpayers then suffering unemployment, cuts and recession. Secondly they are standing up to the small, but irritating presence of conspiracy theorists, anti-semites and David Icke followers who have latched on to these protests. Icke himself has felt the need this week to issue a video as guidance to his supporters at Wall Street and elsewhere.

This video has been spamming Facebook pages supporting Occupy, and has popped up in a thousand other locations. For those wanting to counter Icke and his minions, I offer a summary of its arguments below:

It is 32 minutes long, a curious mixture of anti-capitalist rhetoric, that will go down well with some protestors, plus the usual expose of who controls the government e.g. 'the Rothschilds, Rockefellers' at 6.50 min in.

Buzzwords seems to be 'networks' for the above, 'human enslavemen't plus a fear of 'vultures' taking the occupy protests in the wrong direction. This is deliberate, as the few wish to have complete control over humanity. Their aim - world government, a world central bank, a world army and the break up of countries into regions.

Following this - a global electronic currency. This is why we have a deliberately created financial crisis in the EU and US. Protestors will be manipulated into demanding a worse solution than we currently have, unless they get 'streetwise'.

Some old staples come up - Mossad and US intelligence created 9/11 - problems are created to meet the agenda of the elite. George Soros is trying to manipulate the Wall Street protests, so they end up calling for a world government. (In a way it should be easy for Anarchists to distance ourselves from this smear, I can't see too many Anarchists calling for world government?)

To Icke we have cartel-ism, not capitalism. He gets very nutty about 24 minutes in - claiming that Orwell and Huxley knew, via the Fabian Society, the future route the elite would take - Huxley supporting them, Orwell opposing. That apparently is why Orwell wrote 1984.

Icke particularly hates moveon.org and any suggestion of global warming or climate change being raised by protestors (he seems ignorant of the vast evidence of climate change, instead seeing it as another way to bring about international law and global governance) and calls for individual responses, not group think. Clear he wants to see space limited for certain groups, and in particular for anyone raising climate change. No debate - to Icke such currents should be thrown out.

Forewarned is forearmed.

Countering Nonsense In The Occupy Movement

From speaking to activists over the past few days, it is interesting, and slightly concerning, to note some news emerging from the Occupy movement.

Spreading from Occupy Wall Street, a series of similar occupations have occurred internationally. In the UK this has included an attempt to occupy the London Stock Exchange, and events in regional cities like Norwich and Birmingham. Opposition to the disastrous decision to bail out banks on the verge of financial collapse has now found a degree of articulation.

There are of course issues and debates around this. Speaking to Anarchists like Ian Bone at the Anarchist Bookfair yesterday, there were concerns that the importance of the Occupy movement was being greatly overstated, usually by sympathetic activists who want it to be so many things. It's particular form has also been criticised, whilst the vagueness of its anti-capitalist message has been condemned by libertarians, who draw a distinction between what they see as capitalism and corporatism/crony capitalism.

A more serious debate is now on-going about how to deal with the presence of conspiracy theorists at occupy events. The financial crisis is naturally something easily explained by the likes of David Icke, who has been vociferous in his condemnation of what he sees as Rothschild-Zionism. To Icke, no discussion of 9/11, or the financial crisis, can be made without reference to this conspiracy. Such nonsense makes all protestors easy targets for media exposes, hit-pieces on their 'racism' or their portrayal as addled thinkers. The serious questions raised about government economic policy, capitalism, our financial system and government relations with it, are in danger of being ignored in place of arguments about anti-Semitism or the sheer oddness of certain protestors.

There is only two responses to this. I discount ignoring them, because they will not go away, and numerically will form a significant number of the protestors in many cities. For such thinkers, the financial system is one of the issues - they certainly will not abandon it. Icke has been calling on the human race to get off its knees for so long, when they actually see it happening, their movement is energised

One response is to allow the Icke types to dominate. To walk away and do something else instead. The second response, which I know many are now turning to, is to try and counter them. This is difficult, not because their arguments are so strong - they are not - but because arguing with people full of Zeitgeist or Icke thought is not an easy process. They have been exposed to an absolute truth. Those who do not follow it cannot be allowed to simply disagree with them, but become part of the problem as soon as they disagree.

It is neccesary to attack Icke's anti-Semitism, his ludicrous reptilian fantasies and to ask what Icke has proved in twenty plus years of 'exposing' the system. Other than improving his bank balance - the answer is nothing. Events like the banking crisis and 9/11 are actually very simple. Al Qaeda claimed responsibility for attacking New York, and the evidence for US or Israeli participation is nil. The banking crisis occurred because the banks gambled lots of money, and governments who had long dropped any pretence of regulation, bailed out their mates with our cash.

Keep it simple. Because it is simple.

The Circled A Radio Show: Conspiracy, Truth, Cults and Who Really Killed JFK

The interview I did way back on 13 September with Yodet from The Circled A radio show is now available for download.

I am delighted that within a few hours of it being available on the Circled A site, a 'truther' had popped by to denounce me as a Neo-Con. If you need a chuckle with your cornflakes this morning, do check out the comments. I must go now - I have a meeting with Paul Wolfowitz and Dick Cheney at 0900!

On Bin Laden Conspiracy Theories

Robin Ramsay's Konspiracy Korner column in the November issue of Fortean Times is devoted to conspiracy theories surrounding the death of Osama Bin Laden.

Ramsay sketches a few of the claims to emerge, and how the US government's media management after the raid on Abbotabad could almost have been designed to foster conspiracy theories. If one area is left out, it is the proliferation of theories that have rapidly spread in the Muslim world - one, pushed by Iranian sources, does not deny US forces landed at a compound in Abbotobad, but believes that they abducted and killed a Pakistani taxi driver instead of Bin Laden!

There is one major ommission in Ramsay's article. No where does he acknowledge that it is not simply the United States and Pakistani governments that acknowledge Osama Bin Laden was captured in May's raid - but Al Qaeda itself.

And that should go a very long way to closing this particular book.

BBC World Service Considers 9/11 Truth

Yesterday evening BBC World Have Your Say devoted a whole hour to the criticism from Al Qaeda of Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, and his belief in 9/11 conspiracy theories.

US 'truth' activist James Fetzer represented the 'truth' movement, a man who in a modern variation on coals to Newcastle, has been busy pushing 9/11 truth in the Muslim world. No one from 9/11 Cultwatch was able to get through to take part in the World Service phone-in, but I was able to post several comments on the Facebook page, which quickly degenerated into the usual spat between truthers and sceptics. What better way to spend an evening than having someone yell 'nano-thermite' at you?

You can download the podcast of the programme here, and follow some of the comments made about it on the Wall of World Have Your Say. Only at the close of the programme was perhaps the most important issue mentioned regarding 9/11 'truth' theories and their adoption globally - where do they leave the Middle East, and how do they impact on countries going through seismic political change?

I see no evidence truthers are even considering such questions.

 

Conspiracy Theory Conference - 25 September, Conway hall

It is pleasing to see conspiracy theory as a subject being taken seriously.

Sunday 25 September sees the British Humanist Association organise a full day conference at Conway Hall in Holborn. Details of the event can be seen here - with a cost of £10 or £8 deductions. Speakers include Jamie Bartlett of Demos, Chris French and Robert Brotherton, Karen Douglas, and from the other side of the fence, Ian R Crane.

I shall be there and encourage others to attend.