A: That's true maybe of people in the Harvard faculty, but that's because for them conspiracy is a curse word. If something comes along that you don't like, there are a few sort of four-letter words that you can use to push it out of the sphere of discussion. If you were in a bar downtown, they might have different words, but if you're an educated person what you use are complicated words like conspiracy theory or Marxist....It's a way of pushing unpleasant questions off the agenda so that we can continue in our own happy ideology.
http://www.bostonphoenix.com/archive/features/99/04/01/NOAM_CHOMSKY.html
see also:-
"Noam Chomsky is today's most sophisticated conspiracy theorist."
http://www.constitution.org/hwheeler/contheory3.htm
>From: Louis Kontos <Louis.Kontos at liu.edu>
>Reply-To: lbo-talk at lbo-talk.org
>To: lbo-talk at lbo-talk.org
>Subject: Re: [lbo-talk] Chomsky on conspiracies
>Date: Tue, 01 Nov 2005 11:28:26 -0800
>
>Where's the contradiction? There are conspiracy theorists and there are
>people who engage in straightforward analysis who are called conspiracy
>theorists in order to dismiss their work. These statements, moreover,
>hardly
>seem controversial.
>
>
> > Doug Henwood wrote:
> >
> > [from a snotty profile of Chomsky in today's Guardian
> >
><http://books.guardian.co.uk/departments/politicsphilosophyandsociety/story/0,
> > 6000,1605276,00.html>]
> >
> > "One of the good things about the internet is you can put up anything
>you
> > like, but that also means you can put up any kind of nonsense. If the
> > intelligence agencies knew what they were doing, they would stimulate
> > conspiracy theories just to drive people out of political life, to keep
>them
> > from asking more serious questions."
> >
> > _____________
> >
> >
> > I'd be interested to see how uncle Noam would reconcile the above with
>what
> > he said below in a 1990 interview. Perhaps he is he a born again
> > 'inconsistency theorist'....:-
> >
> > Joe W.
> >
> > http://www.chomsky.info/interviews/19900907.htm
> >
> > QUESTION: Well, do you feel also ... I mean, I know that you have
>advanced
> > these arguments and a number of other people have also advanced these
> > arguments -- they are there to be found by anyone who wants to seek them
> > out.... But at the same time, I think there's a great effort in the
> > mainstream media to write these arguments off as conspiracy theory.
> >
> > CHOMSKY: That's one of the devices by which power defends itself -- by
> > calling any critical analysis of institutions a conspiracy theory. If
>you
> > call it by that name, then somehow you don't have to pay attention to
>it.
> > Edward Herman and I, in our recent book, Manufacturing Consent, go into
>this
> > ploy. What we discuss in that book is simply the institutional factors
>that
> > essentially set parameters for reporting and interpretation in the
> > ideological institutions. Now, to call that a conspiracy theory is a
>little
> > bit like saying that, when General Motors tries to increase its market
> > share, it's engaged in a conspiracy. It's not. I mean, part of the
>structure
> > of corporate capitalism is that the players in the game try to increase
> > profits and market shares; in fact, if they didn't, they would no longer
>be
> > players in the game. Any economist knows this. And it's not conspiracy
> > theory to point that out; it's just taken for granted. If someone were
>to
> > say, "Oh, no, that's a conspiracy," people would laugh.
> >
> > Well, exactly the same is true when you discuss the more complex array
>of
> > institutional factors that determine such things as what happens in the
> > media. It's precisely the opposite of conspiracy theory. In fact, as you
> > mentioned before, I generally tend to downplay the role of individuals
>--
> > they're replaceable pieces. So, it's exactly the opposite of conspiracy
> > theory. It's normal institutional analysis -- the kind of analysis you
>do
> > automatically when you're trying to understand how the world works. And
>to
> > call it conspiracy theory is simply part of the effort to prevent an
> > understanding of how the world works.
> >
> > QUESTION: Well, I think also the term has been assigned a different
>meaning.
> > If you look at the root of the term itself -- conspire, to breathe
>together,
> > breathe the same air -- I mean, it seems to suggest a kind of shared
> > interest on the part of the people "breathing together." It just seems
>that
> > the word has been coopted for a different use now.
> >
> > CHOMSKY: Well, certainly, it's supposed to have some sort of sinister
> > meaning; it's a bunch of people getting together in back rooms deciding
>what
> > appears in all the newspapers in this country. And sometimes that does
> > happen; but, by and large, that's not the way it works. The way it works
>is
> > the way we described in Manufacturing Consent. In fact, the model that
>we
> > used -- what we called the propaganda model -- is essentially an
> > uncontroversial guided free market model.
> >
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