Blackshirts

That's my new nickname for the 9/11 conspiracy kooks, after seeing this photo.

There is a bright side to these maniacs being allowed to defile the memory of 9/11 with lies and pseudoscientific nonsense, writes one of Andrew Sullivan's readers:

I was on London's Oxford Street this lunchtime. Coming out of the tube station was a group of men, maybe half a dozen in total, carrying placards that proclaimed "9/11 was an inside job!" and things of that nature.

My initial reaction was mild annoyance, but then I thought about the possiblity of men walking down the busiest shopping street of Riyadh, Tehran or Saddam-era Baghdad accusing their governments of such massive atrocities.

There will be many tributes this day, and rightly so. But the fact that a group of people are allowed to walk down a London street saying the most hateful and offensive things, without violent reaction by the people, without imprisonment by the state, speaks volumes of the moral superiority of Western values over the barabarity of Islamism.

And it's a real-life reminder of how freedom is the best tribute of all.

Damian P.

Update: Johann Hari and Brendon O'Neill, neither of whom can be accused of being shills for the New World Order(TM), have interesting pieces on conspiracy theories and the "9/11 truth movement" as well. O'Neill tracks down one blackshirt, a former MI5 agent, who believes no planes at all were involved in the 9/11 attacks:

...I ask Shayler if it's true he has become a "no planer" - that is, someone who believes that no planes at all were involved in the 9/11 atrocity. Machon looks uncomfortable. "Oh, fuck it, I'm just going to say this," he tells her. "Yes, I believe no planes were involved in 9/11." But we all saw with our own eyes the two planes crash into the WTC. "The only explanation is that they were missiles surrounded by holograms made to look like planes," he says. "Watch the footage frame by frame and you will see a cigar-shaped missile hitting the World Trade Center." He must notice that my jaw has dropped. "I know it sounds weird, but this is what I believe."

Posted by damian at September 12, 2006 07:14 AM