For Educational Purposes Only

Many of us have encounter the *Conspiracy Theory* strategy. I sat with one “Investigative” reporter for three hours with a neatly organized presentation folder with concrete documents obtained under FOIA discussing NAIS. I methodically went through the documents and laid a foundation that a child could understand. At the end of the presentation he said, “Well if I cover the story it will be under *Conspiracy Theory*” and I will cover it only if you, “Get a hearing”. I laid my head down on the table and sighed. Got a hearing, many hearings, we did! Did he cover the NAIS story? No!

The NoNAIS movement is the subject of some sophisticated operations and strategies. I found this one particularly insightful on the *Conspiracy Theory*. Hopefully, we can counter the strategy as we build a better mousetrap which will guarantee success to state passage of NoNAIS law and other fundamental agricultural protections.

This article made me reflect back to our origins when we were attempting so hard to get main stream press for NoNAIS. Many of us were naive and unprepared for what could have happened if we got “press” at that time. A blessing in disguise. Now that we are “seasoned veterans” of NoNAIS we are much more able to tackle the media land mines.

Have you run into the *Conspiracy Theory* wall? Longer read, but worth the time if you are active in opposing NAIS or anything else for that matter.

From the trenches……

Recognizing disinformation in the media

Twenty-six ways to slander and intimidate conspiracy advocates

“If we had met five years ago, you wouldn’t have found a more staunch defender of the newspaper industry than me. And then I wrote some stories that made me realize how sadly misplaced my bliss has been. The reason I’d enjoyed such smooth sailing for so long hadn’t been, as I’d assumed, because I was careful and diligent and good at my job… The truth was that, in all those years, I hadn’t written anything important enough to suppress.”

-2002, Gary Webb, ‘Into the Buzzsaw’, as repeated by his fellow investigative journalist Nick Schou in the book ‘Kill the Messenger’(p. 12). Webb’s career was ruined after he published a series of articles tying the CIA to drug trafficking. He never recovered from the affair and ultimately killed himself.

“In the big lie there is always a certain force of credibility… In the primitive simplicity of [the mind of the masses] they more readily fall victims to the big lie than the small lie, since they themselves often tell small lies in little matters but would be ashamed to resort to large-scale falsehoods. It would never come into their heads to fabricate colossal untruths, and they would not believe that others could have the impudence to distort the truth so infamously. Even though the facts which prove this to be so may be brought clearly to their minds, they will still doubt and waver and will continue to think that there may be some other explanation. For the grossly impudent lie always leaves traces behind it, even after it has been nailed down, a fact which is known to all expert liars in this world and to all who conspire together in the art of lying. ”

- 1926, Adolf Hitler, ‘Mein Kampf’, p. 472
About a year ago something began to dawn on me, and that is the fact that many people don’t recognize media bias or disinformation very well.You’d be surprised at how many people can read an article about any given conspiracy topic and not recognize it when facts are being selectively presented, or when the conspiracy point-of-view is discouraged with jokes, personal attacks or unrealistic counter-arguments. This needs to change.

Below you will find 26 tactics that can, and have, been used by the media against people advocating conspiracies. I’ve been gathering them over the course of a year by paying attention to newspaper, magazine and tv reports about controversial issues.

The purpose of this article is two-fold :

It will allow anyone to better recognize media bias and media disinformation; It provides people with a checklist they can use to prepare themselves in case they are invited for an interview and suspect to be ridiculed. As for the second argument, think of the ever increasing amount of bloggers, conspiracy-website owners (this author has been contacted,for example) and political activists. Other examples are upcoming investigative authors, potential whistleblowers and basically anyone prominent who thinks about speaking out in support of a certain conspiracy.

List of tactics including additional explanations, List of tactics only Tactics used:

Subtly or not so subtly intimidate anyone who might be open to the possibility of a conspiracy by questioning the mental state of conspiracy advocates and pretending they are outcasts of society whose opinions nobody cares about.

Additional explanation:Insinuate that anyone interested in unfavorable subjects, which can even be as innocent as looking into the role of Bilderberg or the Trilateral Commission in the globalization process, is a complete nutter who needs his head examined. A subtler approach might be to pretend how we all get so tired of these people, for example by saying or writing, “Yes,I hear you thinking, here you have them again. But let’s find out, what is it exactly that they want to convince us of this time?”

Put the word “theory” behind the word “conspiracy”, no matter how great the evidence, and preferably do this several times in the article to make the (supposedly) theoretical nature of the conspiracy really sink in. Continue reading →