I'm watching the History Channel show; JFK Assassination: The Definitive Guide. It's not a particularly good show and is full of crazy people stating impossible things. But what I like about it is they did a History National Poll on a number of aspects of the JFK assassination that reveal why some people will always gravitate toward conspiracies. Number one is that people are really stupid. They don't grasp the most simple evidence or simple science. They will believe things that make them feel good, despite all evidence to the contrary. I'll run down a number of poll results for you to view and see for yourself.
Oswald's rifle couldn't fire all the shots fast enough - 61% of Americans believe
Government's immediate action after assassination was suspicious - 67% of Americans believe
Oswald was telling the truth when he said "I'm just a patsy." - 80% of Americans believe
Jack Ruby was ordered to silence Oswald - 62%
44 witnesses say they heard shots from in front of limo - 97% of Americans didn't know this
Shots were fired from the grassy knoll - 33% of conspiracy advocates believe
Kennedy's head snapping backwards indicates a shot from the front - 73% of Americans believe
There was an assassin other than Oswald - 64% of Americans believe
Cold war tensions were at a breaking point after Cuban missile crisis - 84% of Americans believe
Oswald defected to the Soviet Union - 76% of Americans didn't know
Castro made public threats against Kennedy's life - 67% of Americans didn't know
Communists assassinated John F. Kennedy - 14% conspiracy advocates believe
The CIA recruited Oswald - 42% of conspiracy advocates believe
Oswald attempted to infiltrate a CIA-funded anti-Castro group - 83% Americans didn't know
CIA lied or withheld information from investigators - 81% of Americans believe
The CIA was behind the assassination - 23% of conspiracy advocates believe
Tests have shown Oswald's rifle was capable of making the shots - 73% of Americans didn't know
Oswald had previously attempted another assassination - 86% Americans didn't know
Lee Harvey Oswald made the shots by himself - 29% of Americans believe
The secret service limo driver shot JFK - 2% of conspiracy advocates believe
Kennedy was killed to protect a top secret alien cover-up - 3% of conspiracy advocates believe
A mysterious signal man (umbrella man) gave signal to fire - 8% of Americans believe
The Catholic church was behind the assassination - 2% of conspiracy advocates believe
These other fringe theories explain assassination - 14% of conspiracy advocates believe
Kennedy was killed because of his refusal to go to war in Vietnam - 26% of conspiracy advocates believe
Doctors in Dallas reported different wounds than doctors in Washington - 74% of Americans didn't know
There was a cover-up by the U.S. government - 77% of Americans believe
U.S. government assassinated John F. Kennedy - 22% of conspiracy advocates believe
Mafia had motive to kill JFK because of crackdown - 54% of conspiracy advocates believe
Jack Ruby had close ties to the mob - 74% of conspiracy advocates believe
#5 The Fringe Theories - 14%
#4 Communist - 14%
#3 U.S. Government - 22%
#2 CIA - 23%
#1 The mafia killed Kennedy - 27%
What does all of this mean? This polling was likely done amongst people who visit the memorial site of the assassination, so they are already interested in conspiracy theories. Almost all people who believe in conspiracies tend to ignore the facts and ignore science and embrace a person or web site that spins a somewhat believable story. Conspiracy types never like getting bogged down in details. They'll tell you a missile hit the Pentagon on 9/11, but they won't explain what happened to the flight and the passengers that witnesses saw hit the Pentagon. They'll tell you a demolition crew planted explosives in the World Trade Center buildings while the public wasn't watching, and they just happened to get lucky when terrorists flew planes into the buildings, allowing them to detonate the explosives to bring down the buildings. They'll tell you Kennedy was killed by someone other than Oswald but they can't explain why and how. But each day, they get out of bed and open their laptops and go to their favorite conspiracy web site and become convinced of yet another conspiracy that is easily explained if they paid any attention to the evidence. In other words, there will always be crazy people, even crazy Christians, who will embrace crazy conspiracy theories that are spread throughout the internet. The moderator of this site has decided that rather than spend valuable time booting them off of various forums, he simply created a place for them to share their crazy ideas with other kooks. If you are not a kook, try not to feed into their hysteria and enable them. Maybe they'll ease off the crazy stuff and settle back down on planet earth.
Oswald's rifle couldn't fire all the shots fast enough - 61% of Americans believe
Government's immediate action after assassination was suspicious - 67% of Americans believe
Oswald was telling the truth when he said "I'm just a patsy." - 80% of Americans believe
Jack Ruby was ordered to silence Oswald - 62%
44 witnesses say they heard shots from in front of limo - 97% of Americans didn't know this
Shots were fired from the grassy knoll - 33% of conspiracy advocates believe
Kennedy's head snapping backwards indicates a shot from the front - 73% of Americans believe
There was an assassin other than Oswald - 64% of Americans believe
Cold war tensions were at a breaking point after Cuban missile crisis - 84% of Americans believe
Oswald defected to the Soviet Union - 76% of Americans didn't know
Castro made public threats against Kennedy's life - 67% of Americans didn't know
Communists assassinated John F. Kennedy - 14% conspiracy advocates believe
The CIA recruited Oswald - 42% of conspiracy advocates believe
Oswald attempted to infiltrate a CIA-funded anti-Castro group - 83% Americans didn't know
CIA lied or withheld information from investigators - 81% of Americans believe
The CIA was behind the assassination - 23% of conspiracy advocates believe
Tests have shown Oswald's rifle was capable of making the shots - 73% of Americans didn't know
Oswald had previously attempted another assassination - 86% Americans didn't know
Lee Harvey Oswald made the shots by himself - 29% of Americans believe
The secret service limo driver shot JFK - 2% of conspiracy advocates believe
Kennedy was killed to protect a top secret alien cover-up - 3% of conspiracy advocates believe
A mysterious signal man (umbrella man) gave signal to fire - 8% of Americans believe
The Catholic church was behind the assassination - 2% of conspiracy advocates believe
These other fringe theories explain assassination - 14% of conspiracy advocates believe
Kennedy was killed because of his refusal to go to war in Vietnam - 26% of conspiracy advocates believe
Doctors in Dallas reported different wounds than doctors in Washington - 74% of Americans didn't know
There was a cover-up by the U.S. government - 77% of Americans believe
U.S. government assassinated John F. Kennedy - 22% of conspiracy advocates believe
Mafia had motive to kill JFK because of crackdown - 54% of conspiracy advocates believe
Jack Ruby had close ties to the mob - 74% of conspiracy advocates believe
#5 The Fringe Theories - 14%
#4 Communist - 14%
#3 U.S. Government - 22%
#2 CIA - 23%
#1 The mafia killed Kennedy - 27%
What does all of this mean? This polling was likely done amongst people who visit the memorial site of the assassination, so they are already interested in conspiracy theories. Almost all people who believe in conspiracies tend to ignore the facts and ignore science and embrace a person or web site that spins a somewhat believable story. Conspiracy types never like getting bogged down in details. They'll tell you a missile hit the Pentagon on 9/11, but they won't explain what happened to the flight and the passengers that witnesses saw hit the Pentagon. They'll tell you a demolition crew planted explosives in the World Trade Center buildings while the public wasn't watching, and they just happened to get lucky when terrorists flew planes into the buildings, allowing them to detonate the explosives to bring down the buildings. They'll tell you Kennedy was killed by someone other than Oswald but they can't explain why and how. But each day, they get out of bed and open their laptops and go to their favorite conspiracy web site and become convinced of yet another conspiracy that is easily explained if they paid any attention to the evidence. In other words, there will always be crazy people, even crazy Christians, who will embrace crazy conspiracy theories that are spread throughout the internet. The moderator of this site has decided that rather than spend valuable time booting them off of various forums, he simply created a place for them to share their crazy ideas with other kooks. If you are not a kook, try not to feed into their hysteria and enable them. Maybe they'll ease off the crazy stuff and settle back down on planet earth.
