# Conspiracy Theories **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [July 17, 2009, 4:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conspiracy-theories/503352 "2009-07-17T16:30:21Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Monty](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/monty/32/47_2.png) [@Monty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Monty)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2009, 2:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conspiracy-theories/503352/41 "2009-07-18T02:24:42Z")
As long as we have still have stupid people who want other people to bow to them and say the stupid people really aren’t stupid, we will have the WONJCT. The “theories” will never die. ---
**Author:** ![Siam\_Sam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d78d45/32.png) [@Siam\_Sam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Siam_Sam)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2009, 2:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conspiracy-theories/503352/42 "2009-07-18T02:24:55Z")
I’m suddenly reminded of sitting at the bar one time in Gulliver’s Traveller’s Pub on Khao San Road, a fairly big establishment not in a red-light district, but rather right on the corner of Bangkok’s big backpacker ghetto. It was filled with mostly young backpackers, but there was a middle-aged guy who sidled up to me and struck up a conversation. Turned out to be Canadian. He started telling me all about how the US government staged 9/11 itself. Something about making a fortune selling al of the scrap metal, none of which could be traced afterward. Or something like that. I do seem to attract all of the weirdos. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2009, 2:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conspiracy-theories/503352/43 "2009-07-18T02:28:24Z")
Oh for crying out loud. \*\*FinnAgain \*\*and **gonzomax** , it was a little bit of column A and a little bit of column B The study was published in 1954. but the researchers that knew about it remained tone deaf or just tried to avoid the “little problem” that the whole thing was unethical. > **[Tuskegee Syphilis Study - Encyclopedia of Alabama](https://encyclopediaofalabama.org/article/tuskegee-syphilis-study/)** > > From 1932 to 1972, the U.S. government sponsored the nation's longest-running public health experiment in and around Tuskegee, Macon County. Under financial constraints imposed by the Great Depression, the U.S. Public Health Service (PHS)... > [@](#): > > When PHS researchers published reports on the study or gave lectures at medical meetings, physicians occasionally questioned the ethics of the study. Their concerns were brushed aside by the PHS doctors, who asserted that they were doing critical public health work. Other concerns about the study expressed within the PHS also were brushed aside. Even after Nazi experiments on prisoners in Germany became public knowledge and were denounced, the Tuskegee experiment went unquestioned. > > In 1966, Peter Buxtun, who was tracking venereal disease cases for the San Francisco Health Department, heard about the study from a colleague during a coffee break. He was outraged by the idea that citizens just like those he was trying to help were being willfully denied treatment by the PHS. He requested copies of the PHS reports and began a campaign through government channels to end the study. Stonewalled at every turn, Buxtun gave his information to Jean Heller, an Associated Press reporter, who published the story on July 25, 1972, in the Washington Star. > > The outcry that followed was international in scope. ---
**Author:** ![gonzomax](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e8c25b/32.png) [@gonzomax](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gonzomax)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2009, 2:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conspiracy-theories/503352/44 "2009-07-18T02:32:27Z")
> [@FinnAgain](#): > > Well, damn, a wiki cite! I am undone, woe is me. > Oh, wait, no. > [Olansky, S.; L. Simpson, et al. (1954). “Environmental factors in the Tuskegee study of untreated syphilis”. Public Health Rep 69 (7): 691–8.](http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/articlerender.fcgi?artid=2024316) > Exactly as I said, it was published to the public in 1954. > You being ignorant of basic facts does not exactly mean I’m lying. Finn I was out of line with that remark. I apologize. ---
**Author:** ![FinnAgain](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/finnagain/32/12500_2.png) [@FinnAgain](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FinnAgain)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2009, 2:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conspiracy-theories/503352/45 "2009-07-18T02:40:01Z")
> [@GIGObuster](#): > > \*\*FinnAgain \*\*and **gonzomax** , it was a little bit of column A and a little bit of column B There’s no “column B”. It was not covered up. It was published to the world. That was the fact under discussion. The medical community had full knowledge of it, and I’ll try to track down the NPR interview of the guy who just wrote a book on the history of the US medical establishment’s experiments on blacks, because maybe some folks will listen to audio instead. I was 100% correct. Your own quote shows that it was public knowledge among members of the medical community but that the newspapers had not gotten a hold of it. Or, as someone might say “It was publicly published in 1954. That nobody knew about it at all before then is possible, but unlikely. It wasn’t a conspiracy of silence, it just wasn’t popular knowledge any more than you know what chemical formula Dow Chemicals is currently experimenting on.” ---
**Author:** ![straggler](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/3d9bf3/32.png) [@straggler](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/straggler)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2009, 2:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conspiracy-theories/503352/46 "2009-07-18T02:44:59Z")
> [@Simplicio](#): > > Gulf of Tonken Incident maybe? Interesting proposal, thanks. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2009, 3:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conspiracy-theories/503352/47 "2009-07-18T03:45:45Z")
> [@FinnAgain](#): > > There’s no “column B”. It was not covered up. It was published to the world. That was the fact under discussion. The medical community had full knowledge of it, and I’ll try to track down the NPR interview of the guy who just wrote a book on the history of the US medical establishment’s experiments on blacks, because maybe some folks will listen to audio instead. > > I was 100% correct. > > Your own quote shows that it was public knowledge among members of the medical community but that the newspapers had not gotten a hold of it. Or, as someone might say > > “It was publicly published in 1954. > That nobody knew about it at all before then is possible, but unlikely. > It wasn’t a conspiracy of silence, it just wasn’t popular knowledge any more than you know what chemical formula Dow Chemicals is currently experimenting on.” Calm down, I’m not saying that you are wrong, only that it seems that we forget that, specially before the internet, lots of papers were published to the world, but still not known by many, or the true implications taken into account. Gregor Mendel published his research on genetics in 1866 and it was ignored after some discussions. In 1900, his work was rediscovered. Yes, Darwin was evidently not aware of Mendel’s work :eek: But I do not have a problem with the Tuskegee research being ignored or not. I do think that ignoring the implications and the ethics of the research were next to criminal, and that needed still to be reported. ---
**Author:** ![E-Sabbath](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/e19adc/32.png) [@E-Sabbath](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/E-Sabbath)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2009, 4:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conspiracy-theories/503352/48 "2009-07-18T04:13:46Z")
> [@straggler](#): > > Slightly off topic, but has there ever been a long running “conspiracy theory” that had a small but devoted niche following (ala 9/11 truthers, holocaust denialists, USS Liberty, JFK, moon landings, Roswell, Elvis, etc..) that actually turned out to be _true_? (True in the sense that it is basically now universally held to be true). Roswell, technically, was true. It was _not_ a weather balloon, as the Air Force said at the start. There was a cover-up. It was a radiation detection balloon. That people just went left-field about it is just what happens, but the bullshit detector did ping correctly there. ---
**Author:** ![E-Sabbath](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/e19adc/32.png) [@E-Sabbath](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/E-Sabbath)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2009, 4:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conspiracy-theories/503352/49 "2009-07-18T04:15:20Z")
And now we know why Fnord didn’t go bankrupt with GM and Chrysler. ---
**Author:** ![tomndebb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9e5f3/32.png) [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2009, 4:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conspiracy-theories/503352/50 "2009-07-18T04:30:02Z")
> [@gonzomax](#): > > But then it was Finn lying again. > [@gonzomax](#): > > Finn I was out of line with that remark. I apologize. I appreciate the apology. I also hope you refrain from having to issue another one in the future. [/Modding] ---
**Author:** ![FinnAgain](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/finnagain/32/12500_2.png) [@FinnAgain](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FinnAgain)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2009, 4:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conspiracy-theories/503352/51 "2009-07-18T04:40:18Z")
> [@GIGObuster](#): > > Calm down, I’m cool as a cucumber. > [@GIGObuster](#): > > I’m not saying that you are wrong, only that it seems that we forget that, specially before the internet, lots of papers were published to the world, but still not known by many, or the true implications taken into account. But that’s neither the topic of the thread nor the claim I debunked. The point wasn’t that prior to the Information Age it was harder to remain abreast of all the information out there. The claim was that Tuskegee showed that a coverup could work. Except, the point is that the people. running Tuskegee _published_. So by definition, no coverup or conspiracy, simply information that was freely available to the public, that numerous doctors were aware of, but that was simply never sent to the press. Sure, it was morally abhorrent, possibly criminal, etc, etc, etc… But the point is that there was no coverup, no conspiracy of silence. It was clearly and unambiguously announced to the public by the people who were doing it. ---
**Author:** ![BlackKnight](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/eb8c5e/32.png) [@BlackKnight](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BlackKnight)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2009, 6:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conspiracy-theories/503352/52 "2009-07-18T06:49:54Z")
\ > [@E-Sabbath](#): > > It was a radiation detection balloon. I thought it was a sound-wave detection balloon? Wikipedia seems to back me up on this: [Project Mogul](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Mogul) \ ---
**Author:** ![ianzin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/ed655f/32.png) [@ianzin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ianzin)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2009, 10:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conspiracy-theories/503352/53 "2009-07-18T10:51:32Z")
I’m aware I’ve posted this before, but I think it bears repeating. There’s a Peanuts cartoon where Lucy announces she has come up with the perfect theory. Charlie Brown asks what it is. Lucy shares her theory: Beethoven would have gone on to write even better music if he hadn’t gone deaf. CB asks what’s so perfect about that theory, and Lucy says, ‘It can’t be proved one way or the other’. For a conspiracy theory to endure and thrive, the only essential characteristic is that it can’t be proved either way. If a conspiracy theory can be affected by reason, evidence and documented facts then it can’t enjoy _widespread_ success for very long. Sooner or later the weight of evidence will either show that the conspiracy is/was real, or expose the flaws in the theory itself. Sure, there will always be a small number of people who cling to a given conspiracy theory long after it has run out of juice, but then there are people who believe in fairies and homeopathic remedies. (And I have actually met someone, in real life, who sincerely believed in fairies as having a material and matter-of-fact existence.) This is why the really good, enduring conspiracy theories are the ones that can’t be proved either way, but instead provide endless opportunities for theorising, debate, speculation and bar-room conjecture. ---
**Author:** ![Lust4Life](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/ecc23a/32.png) [@Lust4Life](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lust4Life)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2009, 12:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conspiracy-theories/503352/54 "2009-07-18T12:42:36Z")
I think that the spread of CTs are actually a part of a greater conspiracy,spread enough absurd or easily debunkable CTs thus discrediting the believers so that when as must inevitably happens someone stumbles on a genuine conspiracy nobody sane believes them. Or DO I believe that? ---
**Author:** ![E-Sabbath](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/e19adc/32.png) [@E-Sabbath](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/E-Sabbath)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2009, 1:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conspiracy-theories/503352/55 "2009-07-18T13:39:48Z")
I’m sorry. I meant to type atomic bomb detection balloon. You’re right about it being sound. As far as the Tuskegee Experiments, I think we have to look how cultural attitudes changed between '54 and '66. It’s not that it was hidden… it’s just the first time it was revealed, nobody _cared_. ---
**Author:** ![gonzomax](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e8c25b/32.png) [@gonzomax](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gonzomax)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2009, 6:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conspiracy-theories/503352/56 "2009-07-18T18:14:18Z")
Illogical. The Tuskegee Experiment was unknown to the masses until 1972. But ,if the argument is that some info was published in the middle 50s, how does that prove a conspiracy can not be done. Keeping it hidden for 25 years was a pretty good cover up. Keeping it hidden for 40 years is just better. But it shows how a nasty operation like that can be hidden from the people for a long ,long time. ---
**Author:** ![jakesteele](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ed8c4c/32.png) [@jakesteele](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jakesteele)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2009, 7:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conspiracy-theories/503352/57 "2009-07-18T19:03:43Z")
[quote=“FinnAgain, post:3, topic:503352”] T > [@](#): > > hey’re never going to go away, especially since they fulfill a very basic psychological function. > The world is, essentially, chaotic, dangerous and uncertain. Bad things happen all the time for little or no reason. Being able to create a conspiracy narrative puts everything into place. Kennedy didn’t’ die because some wackjob decided to put a bullet into his brain, he died because of a carefully orchestrated government plot. The WTC wasn’t down by a handfull of men with box cutters flying jets into them it was a secret government/Jewish/Israeli conspiracy. > > Not only do they give order to things, they also make people feel powerful and in the know. After all, if they can convince themselves that they’re one of the few who Knows The Truth then no matter what else is going on in their life, they’ve elevated themselves by their supreme wit and knowledge, without having to actually do anything. \*\*\*\*\*That is a very good explanation that sums it all up. I would throw this into the mix also: Any answer, even a bad one, is better than none at all. It’s called ‘cognitive closure.’ Also, there are some conspiracies that are true, i.e., Tuskeege (sp) Airman, MKULTRA, Water Gate, etc., that throws fuel on the fire and helps justify new ones. ---
**Author:** ![E-Sabbath](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/e19adc/32.png) [@E-Sabbath](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/E-Sabbath)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2009, 7:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conspiracy-theories/503352/58 "2009-07-18T19:39:01Z")
Gonzomax, it’s… well. The Tuskegee Experiment is a direct descendant of the kind of medical thinking that gave us the eugenics sort of thing in the 30s, sterilizing the mentally retarded and all that. It was, if you notice, in the 50s, _barely_ ethically acceptable. Today, it would be completely unacceptable. I’m just pointing out that changes in society and the medical profession happened _during_ that time. [Declaration of Helsinki - Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Declaration_of_Helsinki) The 1964 Declaration of Helsinki happened right in the middle of that period for a reason. The start of the experiment in '32 predates even the Nuremberg Code, which was the first real modern list of medical ethics. Goebels wasn’t… well. No, he _was_ over the line, but he… uhm. How can I say this. He wasn’t as far over the line as some people think, if you compare other experiments. Other inhuman experiments: Harold Blauer, treated for depression by being injected with mescaline. Said after each injection he did not want more. The injection that killed him was something like sixteen times stronger than a LD-50. '54. There’s the Jewish Chronic Disease Hospital case, where there were intradermal injections of live human cancer cells into 22 chronically ill, debilitated non-cancer patients in 1963 without their consent. Doctors wanted to see if the cancer cells would live longer. Several hundred postoperative gynecology patients at Memorial Hospital had the same injections, also without consent. No, the researchers didn’t know if this would give the injected cancer or not. '53, Daniel Burton, born prematurely. Given highly concentrated oxygen by researchers, despite reccomendation from treating physician, who knew studies showed blindness could result. Blindness resulted. > **[Human medical experimentation in the United States: The shocking true history...](https://www.naturalnews.com/019189.html)** > > Human medical experimentation in the United States: The shocking true history of modern medicine and psychiatry (1833-1965) This website can not be trusted, it is biased and peddles falsehoods, but the incidents on this page and the page following _seem_ to be accurate. Note the change from black victims to homosexual ones around '68 or so. Medical science has a lot of horrors in the closet. ---
**Author:** ![gonzomax](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e8c25b/32.png) [@gonzomax](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gonzomax)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2009, 7:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conspiracy-theories/503352/59 "2009-07-18T19:48:58Z")
> [@E-Sabbath](#): > > Gonzomax, it’s… well. The Tuskegee Experiment is a direct descendant of the kind of medical thinking that gave us the eugenics sort of thing in the 30s, sterilizing the mentally retarded and all that. It was, if you notice, in the 50s, _barely_ ethically acceptable. Today, it would be completely unacceptable. I’m just pointing out that changes in society and the medical profession happened _during_ that time. [Declaration of Helsinki - Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Declaration_of_Helsinki) > The 1964 Declaration of Helsinki happened right in the middle of that period for a reason. > The start of the experiment in '32 predates even the Nuremberg Code, which was the first real modern list of medical ethics. Goebels wasn’t… well. No, he _was_ over the line, but he… uhm. How can I say this. He wasn’t as far over the line as some people think, if you compare other experiments. > > Other inhuman experiments: Harold Blauer, treated for depression by being injected with mescaline. Said after each injection he did not want more. The injection that killed him was something like sixteen times stronger than a LD-50. '54. > There’s the Jewish Chronic Disease Hospital case, where there were intradermal injections of live human cancer cells into 22 chronically ill, debilitated non-cancer patients in 1963 without their consent. Doctors wanted to see if the cancer cells would live longer. Several hundred postoperative gynecology patients at Memorial Hospital had the same injections, also without consent. No, the researchers didn’t know if this would give the injected cancer or not. > > '53, Daniel Burton, born prematurely. Given highly concentrated oxygen by researchers, despite reccomendation from treating physician, who knew studies showed blindness could result. Blindness resulted. > > [Human medical experimentation in the United States: The shocking true history of modern medicine and psychiatry (1833-1965) - NaturalNews.com](http://www.naturalnews.com/019189.html) > > This website can not be trusted, it is biased and peddles falsehoods, but the incidents on this page and the page following _seem_ to be accurate. Note the change from black victims to homosexual ones around '68 or so. > > Medical science has a lot of horrors in the closet. Not just in the past either. The psychiatrists and doctors were deeply involved it the development and implementation of our torturing in Iraq. They worked directly in Abu Grebe. ---
**Author:** ![ivan\_astikov](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/58f4c7/32.png) [@ivan\_astikov](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ivan_astikov)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2009, 8:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conspiracy-theories/503352/60 "2009-07-18T20:21:18Z")
Every country that runs black budget operations, is the victim of a conspiracy to use tax payer’s money with no accountability. Are we to suppose that those involved in such subterfuge only have loyalties to their countries? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conspiracy-theories/503352.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conspiracy-theories/503352.md?page=4)