Brainwashed America - 9/11

My Grandma made a statement to me last year: "You're sick for thinking George Bush & our Government was behind 9/11"

That whole conversation was brought about with her laying in to me (quite zealously) all her political beliefs and opinions. That conversation, come to think of it, was actually one sided with her doing all the talking. She then asked me what I thought of 9/11 and I told her I don't take anything at face value. When asked to elaborate, I explained to her that my method of uncovering the truth is to investigate/gather facts from both sides of the story, and simply see what makes sense to me.

Apparently, investigating anything outside of what we are told on the news was just nonsense to her. Now I know better than to try to explain an outside view to somebody so opinionated and closed-minded, and I usually just stop the conversation right there and walk away*. But she insisted I explain what I thought about 9/11.

I proceeded to tell her there are a lot of shady things surrounding the whole event, like the impossibility of both building collapsing the way they did, and how Bush probably knew about this happening and chose not to do anything about it. And, well, yeah...that didn't go over too well.

This post is not about my opinions or my Grandmas opinions (though she's absolutely insane). This is about when my eyes were opened to how blindly people will follow what they hear, and what they WANT to hear...

I think you'd have to be a complete dolt, or severely brainwashed to not question what is told to you. When you hear "...blew up central bus station today...insurgents...30 people killed, 16 missing..." - How do you know that's what really went down? Were you there? Unless you were down the street, meandering in a nearby alley, or actively participated in said events, no, you don't know what happened.

You are told what the news broadcasts and prints to the gen pop, and are expected to believe it. I'm not saying there is no truth there, but since news and propaganda is man made, it is subject to corruption. And once again, you'd have to be a complete dolt or severely brainwashed to not see there is MASS corruption in this age. We are in the Age of Information, and it is for the better or for the worse.

Your job, as a critically thinking human being is to discern for YOURSELF what makes sense to you. Blindly following what you read and hear is not a sign of intelligence, it is a sign of ignorance. Ignorance to the fact there are possibly more sides to any story. It's not too hard to lift your fingers and Google some answers. We are in the Age of Information, use it to your advantage.

"That's the internet, you can't believe anything on the internet! Why would I trust the internet?"

No, that's Wikipedia you're not supposed to trust :)

Once again, that's taking things at face value. Why would you trust the internet? Why would you trust ANY source of information? I'm not saying to go on one site, read some rants and posts, form an opinion and be done with it. That's not how research works. Research requires time (and a bit of investigative ability), and in the end you should have the feeling and satisfaction of thoroughly investigating enough to give you the sense of "I now know for myself what makes sense".

Don't take ANYTHING at face value. Not even my words, you should just take this as a push to find out what makes sense to you. If you discover conspiracy surrounding a story, now you are educated about such events, if you find what the news and media says is true, that's okay too. Bottom line is to get the facts for yourself and go from there.

*Such people usually do not care to hear what your opinion is, and get in to debates just to try to prove how wrong everybody else is. These people usually like to hear themselves talking as well.