A Bestiary of the 9/11 Truth Movement: Notes from the Front Line

[salvorhardin]

A heavily excerpted excerpt from a long article, just to give readers a general overview of Bartlett and Miller's observations about the social groups making up the 9-11 Truth movement.

Two social scientists describe their experience confronting the 9/11 Truth movement in the United Kingdom after they published a paper linking conspiracy theories with extremist ideology. They argue that the 9/11 Truth movement is composed of three groups and that each accepts the conspiracy meme for different reasons.

...

The first can be called the “hardcore” group. ... The hardcore group’s involvement in 9/11 Truth is monochrome and Manichean: it’s a “good/bad,” “black/white” struggle against an oppressive influence whose existence hardcore members believe they are on the cusp of proving.

The second layer could be called the “critically turned” group. ...more than anything, the critically turned’s membership in 9/11 Truth arises from anger at the political order they will soon inherit. It is too closed. There is too much power in the hands of too few. Their sense of justice and idealism is rudely confronted by a world of state espionage, links between big business and government, and lies over weapons of mass destruction (WMDs).

...

Finally there is a much larger, more diffuse group, which we term the illiterati. They are people for whom membership in 9/11 Truth is as much a social and recreational pursuit as an exercise in critical inquiry.

Full article: http://www.csicop.org/si/show/a_bestiary_of_the_9_11_truth_movement_notes_from_the_front_line

Some of these observations have been made here, repeatedly, although I think the skeptics that take part in this forum (myself included) have a bad habit of lumping everybody together. Yet, I don't think there's any reason to think these groups are mutually exclusive. Nor do I think they're somehow endemic to 9-11 Truth.