Warning: some media on this page, although widely known, remain disturbing
What motivates the "Gatekeepers of the Left"?
Truthers are those who question the official story on the September 11th attacks. Until recently, however, Michael Moore, Cannes laureate for Farenheit 9/11, was not the typical truther.
Truthers are more extreme than Moore. For instance, they believe that the building on the left, the World Trade Center 7 skyscraper, had no reasons to collapse, and that it was brought down through controlled demolition. Amongst them, Architects and Engineers for 9/11 are the most notable, since they gather more than a thousand certified professionnals who argue that this collapse is a typical controlled demolition.
Until recently, Moore did not go as far as saying that the US administration was not only negligent and complacent, but — perhaps — actively involved. But, in 2007, he declared:
I've had a number of firefighters tell me over the years and since Fahrenheit 9/11 that they heard these explosions— that they believe there's MUCH more to the story than we've been told. I don't think the official investigations have told us the complete truth— they haven't even told us half the truth.
But Moore is not the typical intellectual of the Left. Like him or not, he loves to listen to people — that's his job. It can lead him to become something of a Truther... something that Noam Chomsky would not tolerate.
Noam Chomsky went as far as saying that knowing what happened on 9/11, who was responsible, would not make a difference: "Who cares?", said He.
Or, as George Walker Bush said:
Let us never tolerate outrageous conspiracy theories concerning the attacks
Because the discourse of the majority of the intellectuals of the Left is aligned with that of G.W. Bush, Truthers now call them the Gatekeepers.
What motivates Chomsky to say that these investigations are unimportant? More generally, why did Chomsky, and other left-leaning intellectuals, choose not to pay attention to these events, as well as to another shady episode of American history, the assassination of J.F. Kennedy?
In Dirty Truths, Michael Parenti, after repeated discussions with Chomsky, comments:
Chomsky is able to maintain his criticism that no credible evidence has come to light only by remaining determinedly unacquainted with the mountain of evidence that has been uncovered.…
The remarkable thing about [those] on the Left who attack the Kennedy conspiracy findings is they remain invincibly ignorant of the critical investigations that have been carried out. I have repeatedly pointed this out in exchanges with them and they never deny it. They have not read any of the many studies by independent researchers who implicate the CIA in a conspiracy to kill the president and in the even more protracted and extensive conspiracy to cover up the murder. But this does not prevent them from dismissing the conspiracy charge in the most general and unsubstantiated terms.
Why this lack of curiosity? This condescending attitude towards potential allies, those conspiracy nuts?
Several hypotheses, which are not mutually exclusive, have been proposed: incestuous relationships with corporate philanthropic foundations; belief in structuralism (no singe agent or conspirator can change things, it's all a matter of social structure); cowardice; conformism; elitism. We'll evaluate these various hypotheses, but, in the end, the real question remains:
What are those positive motivations of the "Gatekeepers of the Left" that clash so violently with the curiosity of these millions of citizens who have seen and appreciated some of those hugely popular online documentaries such as Loose Change?
