"Crazy" By Association

[AuGmENTor]

Nor are we the controlled demolition movement. Nice article Jon...

[simuvac]

The people who compiled the first Scripps Howard poll actually published an article in the journal Journalism & Mass Communication Quarterly titled "Media Use, Social Structure, and Belief in 9/11 Conspiracy Theories" (Vol. 84 No. 2, Summer 2007). What's amazingly imprudent about their study is the fact that ALL of their conclusions are based on the assumption that there is absolutely no reason to believe ANY of the skeptics' claims, and therefore what is being measured is "belief in conspiracy theory."

From the abstract:

"Patterns vary somewhat by conspiracy theory, but members of less powerful groups (racial minorities, lower social class, women, younger ages) are more likely to believe at least one of the conspiracies, as are those with low levels of media involvement and consumers of less legitimate media (blogs and grocery store tabloids). Consumers of legitimate media (daily newspapers and network TV news) are less likely to believe at least one of the conspiracies, although these relationships are not significant after controlling for social structure variables. Beliefs in all three conspiracies are aligned with mainstream political party divisions, evidence that conspiracy thinking is now a normal part of political conflict in the United States."

Wow. Where to begin? How about with the astoundingly naive observation that people who consume corporate media by the bushel are more likely to believe corporate America's vision of the world? What kind of stupid shit is that? Like, duh, of course those who limit themselves to "official" news outlets are going to believe the official version of events.

Or how about the first part. I think if you go to www.patriotsquestion911.com you will see many "believers" in the "conspiracy theory" who are not women, racial minorities, of lower social class, or of a young age. In fact, I'd bet most of the list consists of old, white, middle class men who are moderately to highly educated.

And how does one associate "grocery tabloids" with "blogs"? Maybe tmz.com is a tabloid, but I find plenty of thoughtful analysis on blogs. Are the authors of this study suggesting if it doesn't come from the New York Times, it isn't true?

It's as if these authors haven't read a piece of Media Studies literature in 50 years. And one of them, Guido H. Stempel III, is a distinguished Professor Emeritus in the E.W. Scripps School of Journalism at Ohio University.