"Coincidence theorists" is a funny term I've heard bandied about. (Personally, I like 'ostriches.')

I'm not sure if he coined the term (I can't tell who did), yet Michael Parenti explains the concept quite eloquently here in his book Dirty Truths, in 1996, no less:

Often the term “conspiracy” is applied dismissively whenever one suggests that people who occupy positions of political and economic power are consciously dedicated to advancing their elite interests. Even when they openly profess their designs, there are those who deny that intent is involved.

Those who suffer from conspiracy phobia are fond of saying: “Do you actually think there’s a group of people sitting around in a room plotting things?” For some reason that image is assumed to be so patently absurd as to invite only disclaimers. But where else would people of power get together – on park benches or carousels? Indeed, they meet in rooms: corporate boardrooms, Pentagon command rooms, at the Bohemian Grove, in the choice dining rooms at the best restaurants, resorts, hotels, and estates, in the many conference rooms at the White House, the NSA, the CIA, or wherever. And, yes, they consciously plot – though they call it “planning” and “strategizing” – and they do so in great secrecy, often resisting all efforts at public disclosure. No one confabulates and plans more than political and corporate elites and their hired specialists. To make the world safe for those who own it, politically active elements of the owning class have created a national security state that expends billions of dollars and enlists the efforts of vast numbers of people.”

Yet there are individuals who ask with patronizing, incredulous smiles, do you really think that the people at the top have secret agendas, are aware of their larger interests, and talk to each other about them? To which I respond, why would they not? This is not to say that every corporate and political elite is actively dedicated to working for the higher circles of power and property. Nor are they infallible or always correct in their assessments and tactics or always immediately aware of how their interests are being affected by new situations. But they are more attuned and more capable of advancing their vast interests than most other social groups.

The alternative is to believe that the powerful and the privileged are somnambulists, who move about oblivious to questions of power and privilege; that they always tell us the truth and have nothing to hide even when they hide so much; that although most of us ordinary people might consciously try to pursue our own interests, wealthy elites do not; that when those at the top employ force and violence around the world it is only for the laudable reasons they profess; that when they arm, train, and finance covert actions in numerous countries, and then fail to acknowledge their role in such deeds, it is because of oversight or forgetfulness or perhaps modesty; and that it is merely a coincidence how the policies of the national security state so consistently serve the interests of the transnational corporations and the capital-accumulation system throughout the world.

“Do you actually think there’s a group of people sitting around in a room plotting things?”

It's hilarious that people think that is a ludicrous notion.

But they are more attuned and more capable of advancing their vast interests than most other social groups.

That's just the thing. I've seldom been able to profit from inside knowledge or cynical insight. That really sucks. What makes them special while I'm still a wage slave? Wish I knew.

Wise words. Thought-terminating cliches in the HFCS and smartphone-addled world of TL;DR are unfortunately quite powerful.

Oooh, like this. Sounds like that book's worth a read.

Every time I use the ostrich thing someone points out it is a myth. That ostriches don't bury their heads in the sand but are eating and digging at the ground and only from a distance appear to be hiding their heads.

I say too late...I am going with it. Fucking ostriches all of them. Afraid of crushing their fragile pretend world view. Just like an ostrich.

Hrm, it actually still kind of works if you think about it - heads down in denial because food...as Upton Sinclair said, "'It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends on his not understanding it."

The thing about people having their heads in the sand... this is only possible when they are on their knees.

Maybe they also pretend they have big backwards bending ostrich legs too!

In Canada our prime minister is king of the Ostrich people, shout out to the Gaad father.

Hey I've been discussing that with my friend too! I really like it :D

We are skeptics. Skeptics of everything, as everyone should be. That's all there is to it.

Skeptics of everything

Though the main flaw with a lot of 'theorists' is that they stick with their theory, no matter what. If you're skeptical enough you can also see that the whole 9/11 being a cover up or some other 'story' is just as far fetched as the regular account of it being a terrorist attack by a few trainee pilots.

That's why I don't like the 'we are' phrasing, as a lot of people both conspiracy theorists as non-theorists aren't skeptical at all. Just trying to believe something and react adversely to people who believe otherwise.

I do not make it an "us" vs "them" for me its a debate.

If they insist on calling me a 9/11 truther, logically they have to be a 9/11 faither.

9/11 faither

I like it, or how about 9/11 priests.

I prefer liar.

I'm not a conspiracy theorist I'm a public information analyst.

Look at this comment chain I just had with a redditor. It ended with him saying:

Then you can fuck right off, you stupid little child.

Because I didn't agree with an assumption they were making.

https://www.reddit.com/r/news/comments/4fbkuf/blackmail_obama_under_pressure_to_declassify/d285iqk

Here's the most informative/unbiased write-up I cound find on the matter.

911myths.com

haha

That's what passes for normal and healthy mental behavior nowadays.

Not really. Few of us have the audacity to troll IRL.

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I'm a student of history, science, mythology and the arts, tyvm.

If these fuckwit peasants were capable of comprehending a conspiracy more complicated than a weed deal, maybe they wouldn't be fuckwit peasants. They might be officials in a corrupt local government or executives at a small company. It's an interesting question that I don't have the answer to, why only a small (possibly smaller than ever) elite is capable of being in on something.

Some late-night restless musings...

• Most of us in the populous developed world lack any kind of natural community or in-groups. It's been replaced by surrogates like scrawling on the bathroom wall to ghosts, with the secret police watching and knowing who everyone is all the while (this). Occasionally internet communities are able to get together for some IRL discussion, but I've never seen any good results from that. Do you know anyone IRL that you can talk to about anything that's important to you without passive-aggressively treating you like a lunatic? I don't. Likewise, I don't know anyone down for anything that requires more planning and discretion than smuggling beer into a ballgame.

• Most people get their income from earning wages from employers they often incorrectly believe are stable and trustworthy. Because they're so dependent on harvesting that one resource, they have no need to trust anyone else. We rely on Google and Craigslist more than word of mouth. Imagine how different it must have been for rural villagers, traveling merchants, or immigrants from the same homeland settling in the same neighborhood, fresh off the boat in some foreign empire where they barely speak the language. They had to conspire with one another to some extent just to survive. People likely had useful things to say, asymmetries of knowledge that were valuable. Now, everything gets drowned out and commoditized in this ocean of piss.

• People higher up in society must still rely on omerta and mutual collaboration to be able to do business or maintain their position. They have the right combination of lack of naivety and selfish incentives (entrepreneurial necessity where you need to get off your ass and make things happen if you want to eat, periods of stable detente from the ability to mutually threaten and blackmail one another, adaptation to a niche within and hence incentive to preserve this ad-hoc system itself).

• As an example, I've been reading about the history of intelligence agencies (they go back to the dawn of civilization), especially those of the Soviet Union starting with the communist revolutionaries... they were paranoid as fuck about conspiracies against them, and even if they weren't always right about the details, it was obviously a necessary heuristic for survival in their world. Likewise, they were obviously capable of conspiring against others. It was mostly their reason for existence. They weren't just victims on the receiving end of conspiracies, they were the perpetrators of them. Very unlike we marginally aware proles who are at least capable of comprehending that people more more powerful, audacious, wealthy and clever than us are robbing us in an organized fashion, based on whatever snippets of evidence get leaked to us on this increasingly censored and monitored medium.

I'm sorry you don't have anyone to talk to. I've got buddies that all we do is talk about this stuff. I'm one of the mild ones, too, because I think prepping is useless and a waste of time and energy.

the fact that they are so paranoid about us (general population) should tell us that they know they are abusing power, and must be just expecting for general discomfort to arise

Yup because giving people labels in order to group up and fight against each other is the absolute best way to solve issues.

My favorite when it's able to be used for things that are proven science and facts, is "Conspiracy Fact". I'll definitely be adding yours to my list.

In response to being called a truther, does that make everybody else liars?

The reason they are called 'truthers' is because they use the word 'truth' as something to claim. While just as with respect and fame, you can't say you 'have' truth or you are seeking the truth. The joke is of course that a lot of truthers tend to believe in things including truth, so that it becomes a religion instead of a science.

Yep

prefer something friendlier, like "actual historic fact deniers"

Whats the opposite of a 9/11 truther? A 9/11 liar.

Critical thinkers who end up being right alot

I'll just stick with what I've always called them: Dumb ignorant cunts.

Coincidence Theorists

Funny thing is that , the very government official story about 9/11 is that it was an Al-queda muslim conspiracy against the USA ... so either way you look at it 9/11 was a CONSPIRACY , with truthers saying that it was by the government , while the sheeple continue to say it was by the mudslims.

It's like people don't have access to dictionaries and are unable to look at what the term "conspiracy" means, and don't tell me that the government says it was a PLOT , cause PLOT = CONSPIRACY .

That would also make the Sheeple , CONSPIRACY BELIEVERS

"Conspiracy Deniers"

DENIALISTS. I know that and English is not even my first language.

Idiot works just as well.

Not really. Few of us have the audacity to troll IRL.

Skeptics of everything

Though the main flaw with a lot of 'theorists' is that they stick with their theory, no matter what. If you're skeptical enough you can also see that the whole 9/11 being a cover up or some other 'story' is just as far fetched as the regular account of it being a terrorist attack by a few trainee pilots.

That's why I don't like the 'we are' phrasing, as a lot of people both conspiracy theorists as non-theorists aren't skeptical at all. Just trying to believe something and react adversely to people who believe otherwise.