Countering Conspiracy Theories on the Left

Conspiracy thinking is very deep in American culture. There's sort of a Protestant puritan ideology that is central to American culture: "Bad things happen because of bad people." God holds individuals responsible for bad things that happen. So, morally, ethically, legally... we have to find individuals to be responsible for bad things. The simplicity in that is that social reality is much messier. It doesn't take much at a time like 911, when emotions are running high, for political leaders to make vague references to shadowy figures that we don't know. That encourages the thinking that runs in the direction of conspirators and conspiracy. In the case of Osama Bin Laden and Al Qaeda, the fact that it's a non-Christian religious movement with very strong anti-Christian overtones has enough resonance with the same things that anti-Semitism brings to the surface. It enables a bonding between the religious and political sentiments.

Counterpunch interviews Jerry Lembcke, the sociologist and author of The Spitting Image: Myth, Memory.