My first conspiracy theory (Human Pursuits 20/2/22)
I was a stupid fifteen-year-old contrarian. Here's what I learned.
VANCOUVER – I was fifteen when I first considered whether jet fuel could burn hot enough to melt steel beams. It was ninth grade, and I was sitting in the computer lab of my junior high. Footage of the Two Towers collapsing flashed across the screen of my candy coloured iMac. I’m not sure how I exactly found Loose Change – whether it was passed to me by some Truther classmate, or whether I discovered through my own volition. But I remember the unease that crept over me as I watched, of consuming something that felt almost contraband. “We are told these massive structures were destroyed by ten-thousand gallons of jet fuel” said the unnamed “documentary” narrator “A perfectly symmetrical collapse resulting from asymmetrical damage, with the collapse following the path of greatest resistance.”
Well, fuck, when you put it that way…
Even in 2005, I knew better than to believe everything I read online. But I also saw conspiracy theories as a harmless thought experiment. Wondering whether 9/11 was an inside job was no different than trying to find the lost city of Atlantis, or wondering who actually killed Kurt Cobain. It was entertainment centred on the suspension of disbelief. For weeks, I referenced Loose Change in conversation, informing friends and teachers about the unfortunate realities of the deep state. I told them the U.S. government had, at best, known about 9/11 and done nothing to prevent it. At worst, it had committed an act of violence against its own people. One day my English teacher asked me if I seriously believed what I was saying. “I don’t know,” I replied with a shrug “How else do you explain the lack of debris at the Pentagon?”
But while it was easy to hide behind a sense of the irony, the truth is that talking about conspiracy theories was oddly powerful. I would say something shocking – that the Towers collapsed in a way similar to a controlled demolition, or that the Pentagon was hit by a U.S. missile – and then watch as the adults got (understandably) squeamish. I wasn’t a particularly talented kid, but I could hold an argument for argument’s sake. Contrarianism offered me a sense of control. I told myself it was all a game. Devil’s advocate. Of course, the thing about devil’s advocate is that it sorta turns every conversation you have into hell on earth.
In a different life, this story runs the risk of getting incredibly dark – of taking off ramps to the most unhinged parts of the internet. Luckily for me, my interest in conspiracy theories proved to be a passing phase. A teenage preoccupation left behind with other childhood things. As the shock value wore off, the cognitive dissonance set in. I felt strangled by the various threads to nowhere, by the endless speculation surrounding Loose Change, by the supposed evidence that never quite held up under scrutiny. Popular Mechanics debunked the entire thing, but still the theory grew in popularity. By 2016, more than half of the American people believed the federal government was concealing information about the 9/11 attacks. And it didn’t stop there. Disbelief became kindling for shared delusion. Birthers. Pizzagate. QAnon. A mob breaches the U.S. Capitol, a Freedom Convoy rolls into Ottawa. A series of small, overlapping fires belching smoke into a once blue sky.
Comments, criticisms, collaborations? Email me at ethan@humanpursuits.org, or follow me on Twitter and Instagram.