I'd like to examine one of the most frequently proffered excuses for accepting the blatantly incongruous and impossible official 9/11 story. It goes something like this:

I can't believe my government would do this!

Let's take this apart a little.

This denial begins with "I can't believe..." Unfortunately, the result of that disbelief renders the denier unable to accept or even look at evidence that clearly disproves the official 9/11 story. Deniers are in the unenviable position of having to fabricate "reasons" why the official story could be true. They simply turn a blind eye to research, evidence and facts -- disavowing logic, the laws of physics and even common sense.

The denial continues with, "...my government..." This seems to make sense because the 'government' is monolithic and composed of a lot of ordinary, well-meaning people. However, to equate the group of people who planned and carried out 9/11 with the 'government' as a whole provides false cover for this denial, and effectively sets up a 'straw man' that can be used in at least two ways:

1. How could our good, decent 'government,' elected by the people, do this?
2. If our 'government' did do it, surely out of the thousands of people who would have known about it, someone would step forward... and so on.

The denial ends with, "would do this!" This of course refers to taking lives and destroying property -- the sum total of the devastation that we witnessed on 9/11/2001. Immediately following the events of 9/11, every media outlet began drilling home the message of how "9/11 changed everything." Condemnation for whoever planned the "attacks" was loud and long. Even though the projected loss of life diminished every week (from ~25,000 to less than 3,000), we were thoroughly imprinted with the memory of a horrific, unprecedented act of destruction.

Now, let's take a look at what a slight turn of this phrase looks like:

I believe that Osama bin Laden (and fellow radical zealots) would do this!

Since we must accept the demolished buildings, the Pentagon damage, and the loss of life as fact, obviously someone did this -- it was not an act of God. What follows, then, is we believe it is possible for a group of people to be so zealous for a cause that they can do great evil in its name.

Yet, how did so many come to allege that the group who perpetrated 9/11 belongs to Osama bin Laden? How did we associate this profile with his group of radical zealots? This is a most interesting study, and I recommend it to anyone seeking the truth. Be sure to note how simple it is for the "man with the microphone" to demonize an individual, a group, or even an entire race. It's been happening for a very long time.

So -- if we accept that this profile can fit one group, we must admit it can also fit another. Let's change the original denial statement a little bit now:

I can't believe a group of radical zealots would do this! But this is patently false, because we do -- all of us. We just differ in which group was responsible.

To summarize, this denial exists by:

1. Setting up a straw man (the 'government')
2. Pretending that heavy-duty propaganda, begun on the day of, was not used to mold our memories and feelings about 9/11
3. Ignoring history which unequivocally demonstrates that there are other groups of radical zealots to whom we can point as the planners of 9/11

Your very saying this shows your one-sidedness. The open-mindedness that so many claim to have is absent. You fail to even acknowledge that "deniers" (a tag with which the truther community has been associated) might actually perform or look at research, evidence, and facts. This is a hurdle that members from both sides need to get over. Not everyone who is not on your side is a mindless sheep. Granted, some are. Some people believe the government is near infallible, and always honorable. Some (it seems to be more) believe that the higher-ups in the truther community are near infallible, and always honorable. Many take the viewpoint that the other side consists of mindless sheep, simply parroting what they have heard from people who tell them what to believe. The people who believe that, unfortunately, are often--though not always--right. "Sheep" is usually a term thrown around by people who are defined by the insult that they use.

Elder4Truth, it seems you are convinced past the point of no return, so I won't waste both of our energy trying to convince you that 9/11 was not an inside job. I still have (secular) faith, however, that you have it in you to treat skeptics as people. Not as sheep, not as a collective group of Bush-loving fanatics, but as individual people, each with his or her own views about what happened on 9/11 and what's happening now. Please take this into consideration. Thank you.

I don't believe that at all.

Rather, I would like evidence that they did.

From everything I've researched, (including sites like this) I have no reason to believe it.

So, where do I fit into your preconceived category?

@ Arvel,

Did I hit a nerve? :)

In response to your point about official story believers (I didn't use the term "sheep" anywhere, btw) who may be doing research of their own -- I wish they'd share it with others. What I largely see is regurgitation of the official story plus fantasy and waffling. I also see clear attempts at misdirection and obfuscation. Some supporters of the official story may simply be trusting souls. Others seem to be operating with an agenda to dissuade people from asking questions and proposing reasonable solutions.

Please see Terral's posts for an example of well-researched and well-supported theories, absent any fantasy or waffling.

I think you will agree that real research does not start with a conclusion, which is what I was pointing to in my original post. If you say you are a skeptic and you start with, "I can't believe [some group other than bin Laden] could have done this," then what sort of research can you do? If you call yourself a skeptic and start with, "Plane damage + fire caused the collapse of WTC1, 2 and 7," aren't you simply parroting the official story?

As for personal views on 9/11, yes, I certainly do allow that people can differ on what happened. I don't take sides on whether or not Russel Pickering's Pentagon research tells the true story. But truth is not subjective. There may be many opinions (well-founded and otherwise), but there is only one truth.

You said,

Are you trying to let yourself off the hook? ;)

You say, "I don't believe that at all," referring to the common denial I dissected.

Is the inverse true then? That is, you do believe that [some group other than bin Laden's boxcutters] could have done it? This is a good start!

Then you say, you would like evidence that [some group other than bin Laden's boxcutters] did do it.

Then you say you have no reason, based on your research so far, to believe that [some group other than bin Laden's boxcutters] did it.

Well, all I can say is you need to research more. Hold on to your doubts. Follow links and read everything. There's a lot of material out there. There are a lot of pointers to material in posts here.

Please see Terral's posts for an example of well-researched and well-supported theories, absent any fantasy or waffling, that may bring you some new information.

Nah, it's nothing.

Sorry, I didn't mean to imply that you did. Clarity with only text is not one of my strong points.

The third possibility is the one I'm trying to get you to see: the people who have looked at the arguments, maybe even believed that 9/11 was an inside job until they saw not only LC, but work that agrees with LC, work that disagrees with LC, work that attempts to debunk the work that tried to debunk LC, and so on, until they decided on which seemed more logical to them.

Yes, we can definitely agree there, and that is something of which I would never accuse a truther. There is little difference, however, between starting with a conclusion and making the case fit that conclusion and looking at some of the case, deciding on a conclusion, and then looking at everything through tinted glasses. This is something of which I would accuse a lot of people on this forum, truthers and skeptics alike.

I will discredit any skeptic who acts like that as much as you would.

I ask this every so often, because it's necessary. I want you to, just for a minute, imagine that 9/11 was not an inside job. You don't have to believe it, just pretend. Believing the main points of the 'official theory' is the only thing to believe other than an inside job. If you don't believe WTC 1 and 2 fell due to explosives planted within, there is little else to believe outside of plane damage and fire.

Long-winded, I know, but my point is that 'belief of the official theory' does not equal 'blind faith in the official theory'.
I had trouble wording this section; if you need me to try again, let me know.

I have nothing to show you that you haven't seen before. Lacking that, I have nothing that could convince you.

You're insinuating that I'm bluffing, if I'm not mistaken. I lack any credentials on the more technical aspects of 9/11, so I don't debate about them. If the conversation turns down that road, I say that I don't have experience, and don't discuss one way or the other, but I still follow. The only goal I have for myself here is to convince truthers that the OCT isn't absolutely crazy and impossible, and to point out the more glaring faults in some people's reasoning. To get you to fathom the possibility that belief in the official explanation is not necessarily due to lack of research, or a government paycheck. I don't care so much if you choose to hop the fence that's between us; I just want you to see the other side.

Arvel,

Thanks for your reply. If I have painted all official story believers with broad brushes in the past, I'll try to be more careful in the future.

I realize nobody wants to be referred to as deluded or ignorant or brainwashed. And paid shills of course, would definitely be upset if they were 'outed.'

Maybe I should explain my own convictions. I cannot see how the official story can be true. I do not know what actually IS true. But I have seen consistent, compelling evidence and listened to what seems to me to be very sound reasoning, to put the lie to the official story in a hundred ways.

So. If the official story cannot be true, then something else is. The field of study is wide and the theories offered are numerous. That's why I want to see objective, impartial, scientific studies that start with NO conclusions whatsoever, concerning what really happened on 9/11.

Would you support such a study?

If it was truly impartial, and the people inside the investigation were isolated, so that no one outside of it could sway them, then yes, of course.

Thanks to you too. I'm glad you've made that decision.

Do you really think there are people being paid to post on internet forums here?

If you paid for it, knock yourself out. Just don't ask me to pitch in.

hmmm