Conspiracy Theory

Most people can't resist listening to all the latest conspiracy theories, no matter how far-out they may be, and then quickly denounce any such theory as untrue... or even downright lunacy. (We also hear the term “unpatriotic” bandied about by the mass media, particularly when some theory involves activities of the far left.) Half-baked “experts” are marched out in droves to prove or disprove many of these theories, and usually do little more than confuse the issue, while simple common sense often appears to have been left far behind. It’s common for "hit pieces" to pick apart extremely fringe and not very popular theories, which in turn makes all conspiracies on a particular subject look crazy. Skeptics magazine and Popular Mechanics did this with their 9/11 investigation. Referring to less than 10% of the many ideas around, they picked the highly improbable points that only few people believed, and used them as a "final investigation" for looking into the disaster. With this, they again proved that the wilder the theory, the easier it is to debunk (and thus put a bad light on all theories about the subject).

“Conspiracy theory” was originally a term used to describe any unproven claim of civil, criminal, or political conspiracy. However, in recent times it has come to refer to any fringe idea which explains a historical or current event as the result of a secret plot of almost superhuman power, authority, and/or cunning. To conspire means "to join in a secret agreement to do an unlawful or wrongful act or to use such means to accomplish a lawful end." Thus, nearly any planning or activity can be properly described as a conspiracy if it is not held up to the light of day, and can range from two kids figuring out a way to heist a candy bar from the neighbor kid to a secret military, banking, and political action aimed at stealing power, money, and freedom from "the people". To many, conspiracy theories are nothing more than a component of human nature, for after all, not everyone is honest, hard working, and straightforward about their dealings or intentions. So how did “conspiracy theory” get grouped with fiction, fantasy and folklore? As one pundit says, “Maybe that’s a conspiracy”.

If we look into conspiracy theories, we’ll find that thinking about a conspiracy is usually considered somewhat akin to lunacy and paranoia by the establishment. Some people even consider it an illness. It’s not surprising to see people writing about conspiracy theories using with the words "crack pot," or "nut job" in their discourse and often say something along the lines of, "for these conspiracies to be true, you would need hundreds if not thousands of people to be involved. It's just not conceivable." Still, it’s odd that these writers assume there must be thousands of participants in a conspiracy when I can hardly believe that any conspiracy involving more than a handful of people could remain secret very long. True, thousands may unknowingly be involved, but actually only a very few really have any idea of what’s going on. Remember that the chance of anything remaining a secret is inversely proportional to the number of people who know about it.

The fact remains however, that there have been conspiracies, proven, and not made up, since time immemorial. The Roman Empire was little more than an open conspiracy to take over the world, and it very nearly succeeded. Remember the plot to kill Hitler? Or how about the “Business Plot” of 1933, wherein a group of wealthy American businessmen that included the heads of Chase Bank, GM, Goodyear, Standard Oil, the DuPont family and Senator Prescott Bush tried to recruit retired Marine Corps General Smedley Butler to lead a military coup against FDR, and install a dictatorship in the United States. Apparently none of the masterminds noticed that their point man was an active FDR supporter, who soon spilled the beans to a congressional committee in 1934. The McCormack-Dickstein Committee acknowledged the existence of the conspiracy which had never gotten past the planning stage. In their report, the Congressional committee supported Butler's allegations, but for political reasons no prosecutions or further investigations followed, and the matter largely was forgotten.

Humm… How many of today’s conspiracy theories are nothing more than oddball ideas… and how many others have a strong basis of truth? After all, if I believed in conspiracy theories, I’d believe that today’s far left is making every effort to drag us kicking and screaming into "one world government" and global socialism. If I believed in conspiracy theories, I’d believe they’re succeeding!