Even eight years after the Sept.
11 attacks, some still cling to the
belief that the events of that day
were not masterminded by Alqaeda
but by the U.S. government.
Indeed, this year such theories
have garnered increased media attention.
On Sept. 8, news outlets reported
that Van Jones, President
Obama’s Green Campaign adviser,
had signed a petition that
blamed the events of 9/11 on U.S.
government officials and the Bush
administration. This controversy,
now being referred to as the Van
Jones scandal, resulted in Jones resigning
from the administration.
Also on Sept. 8, actor Charlie
Sheen released a fictional interview
with President Obama in
which he questions the president’s
beliefs regarding the credibility of
the official 9/11 report. Sheen, in
a video statement, challenges the
president to answer the many
“unanswered” questions and the
concerns of Americans who believe
the attacks were staged.
But much like the Van Jones
scandal, Sheen’s interview has
been slow to pick up big time
media coverage.
Nonetheless, MSNBC reported
that one in every three Americans
believes the government was involved
in planning and staging
the attacks.
Many people who hold such beliefs
have become part of what is
known as the “9/11 truth movement.”
Their official web page,
www.911truth.org, displays their
mission as the “2009 Truth Statement.”
The statement calls Americans
to question the government.
“In spite of Americans having
elected the ‘other’ party in hopes
it would deliver on its promise of
a change in direction, we find ourselves
asking these same questions
and encountering the same
resistance to transparency,” a
statement on the website reads.
Erica Biggins, 20, a nursing student,
refutes the claims of the
9/11 truth movement. Biggins
said she dismisses the credibility
of the conspiracy theories involving
9/11 government involvement.
Although Biggins was only
in junior high school when the
events of that day took place, she
recounts her beliefs about 9/11
with a firm stance. “I think it’s all
a bunch of rumors and people are
just trying to make a story out of
nothing,” she said.
Biggins subscribes to the official
version of events that day: Al
Qaeda terrorists attacked America
by hijacking passengers jets and
crashing them into the World
Trade Center towers, the Pentagon,
and into a field in PA.
Other students aren’t as sure as
they’d like to be as to what happened
on 9/11. Communications
major Alex Kline, 19, of Feasterville,
said, “I don’t know what to
believe.”
Kline has heard of a few alternative
theories to the official report.
One theory she described involved
government knowledge of
the attacks before they ever took
place, and the belief that the government
completely ignored any
warning events that might have
prevented the attacks. Another
theory claims the World Trade
towers collapse was identical to
the collapse of a purposely demolished
building.
Kline said she was surprised to
hear these alternative theories but
thought some were a little convincing.
Although Kline wonders
what the whole truth is, she said,
“There is no way for us to ever
know for sure.”
Perhaps, but such conspiracy
theories have been widely discredited
by experts. All evidence
points to the attacks being executed
by Al-qaeda terrorists, who
themselves have claimed credit
for them.
Psychologists have pointed out
that conspiracy theories are as old
as humanity, and that they develop
in the wake of many major
news events, from the assassination
to President John F. Kennedy
to 9/11.
Some say such theories may be
a coping mechanism, a way for
people to deal with a truth that
may be too difficult to face.
With 9/11, the idea that terrorists
could so brazenly attack the
U.S. and kill so many people may
be too much for some people to
handle, because it means accepting
the reality that we are, in fact,
vulnerable.