Temecula: Former "Loose Change" forum mod posts on randi.org

Mick West

Administrator
Staff member
More evidence that debunking works.

http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/showthread.php?postid=5041642#post5041642

24th August 2009,

Skeptical discussion, particularly the criticism skeptics level towards religion, conspiracy theories, and alternative medicine, can and does have an impact upon "believers". Even skeptical discussion and criticism on the internet can be enough to convince someone. Case in point:


I used to be a poster and eventually moderator on the original Loose Change forums. If you don't know what that is, please visit the conspiracy theory section of these forums as they were at one point thoroughly obsessed with it there. I had fallen into the "conspiracy theorist" subset of humanity at a very vulnerable point in my life, I had just moved hundreds of miles to a seemingly alien part of the country, and my wife was in the hospital under very dire circumstances. I was also abusing prescription pain killers to counteract the anxiety of having to watch my wife die (she didn't die after all) while having virtually no support structure around me. The first time I saw "Loose Change: 2nd Edition" I totally fell for it, and when I found there was actually a community... I dove right in. I spent quite a while enthusiastically embracing and espousing the 9/11 CT dogma, and eventually became a moderator of their forum, which led me to have to deal with skeptics who posted there before we banned them. By the time the original LC forum imploded (I deserve some credit for causing that BTW) I had serious doubts about the 9/11 CT and other CTs. I began digesting a lot of material from the 'other side' after that. Frankly, I was embarrassed that I had ever spoke to people about 9/11, distributed DVDs, and exposed other people to such nonsense.


I eventually realized that I had been submerged in some sort of cult or religion rather than a legitimate movement. It frightened me. I began reevaluating everything else I believed that had the CT tinge on it. I consulted skeptical websites regarding everything from cryptozoology to UFOs. Instead of simply taking other people's words for it, I looked at their reasoning, and it made sense. I began looking at everything critically, and I lost even the most vestigial remnants of religion, I became fascinated by evolution and astronomy and all the other real things out there that are so much more amazing, interesting, and dramatic than anything you can cook up beneath a tinfoil hat.


It works. Just counterpointing stuff on the internet does get through to people, at least some people. Nowadays I find myself using 'reply to all' whenever I get some FEMA camp CT chain email in my inbox, showing everyone that it's really a picture of a camp in north Korea. Nobody who has ever said anything about 2012 around me has walked away still believing the world would end as prophesied by the Maya. I regularly listen to the SGU, Skeptoid, and The Atheist Experience podcasts as well as many other skeptical/atheist podcasts. Now I've gone and joined what I once considered the most evil, close-minded forum on the internets. Skeptics do convince the believers.
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An interesting comment on that thread:

Please remember that there is a difference between someone being convinced and SAYING they've been convinced. The percentage of people who believe in 9/11 conspiracy theories has plummeted in the last 5 years. That change was not accompanied by masses of people joining the forum to declare they were wrong. They just stopped talking about it.

Most people's egos won't let them come forward with a public declaration. They just argue argue argue, then slowly stop arguing, then go silent. The change happens on the inside.


But it does happen.
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I'd agree with that. People simply get on with their lives. Many people find it rather embarrassing that they were once Truthers.
 
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