conspiracy theories
Reader comment on item: Additional Thoughts on "Winning the Propaganda War"

Submitted by John McMullen (United States), Dec 28, 2005 at 10:34

Pipes is spot on about arabs believing that everything is a conspiracy.. They make Oliver Stone look like a piker.

When I was working for the CPA in Iraq for most of 2003, the Iraqis were just beginning to buy hundreds of thousands of satellite dishes and TVs, and watched the arab news and TV every day. When they watched any Western news at all, they would convene a family meeting over dinner to discuss what they had seen on TV, and decide whether it was true or not.

When the family group could not reach agreement, the head of household or oldest male would make the final ruling as to whether what they had seen on TV was really true. Truth became whatever the patriarch said it was, whether he had watched the show or not, whether it was really true or not. Thus family Truth had to fit a pre-conceieved world view--all the time. jmcm

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