Skronk wrote:

big_dave wrote:I have a hard time with this concept of an "official story", being as it is, completely made up.

So, to you, the concept has no validity?

Absolutely no validity. It has no place in any serious discussion.

You don't recognize the difference between the accepted version of events (fire weakening the building's trusses, for instance), as apposed to a dissenting view (controlled demolition)?

I recognise that, but I see it a different way.

I see people, for whatever reasons, constructing a strawman (the official story) and then, as an example of confirmation bias actively hunting bite-sized pieces of information that disagree with the strawman they have created for themselves.

The practice is irrational and has no merit whatsoever. It is closer to yiffing and fan fiction than serious political activism.

big_dave wrote:

Earwicker wrote:Who's confirmation bias were you talking about?

The confirmation bias that is required by any JFK conspiracy, in the light of there being no specific evidence to support the front bullet theory or the presence of a "badge man".

That all depends on what you consider 'specific' evidence though. Witnesses attesting to seeing and hearing grassy knoll shots could be seen as specific evidence. Not hard evidence but i think your confirmation bias is ruling them out.

I've not heard of any 'specific' evidence that proves Oswald did it alone - have you?

There's not been a trial after all.

big_dave wrote: the single bullet ... has not be successfully debunked whereas a GCSE student with a lot of time on his hands could debunk most of the front bullet theories.

Or, to put it more reasonably - given that you hold no opinion one way or another - apparently - regarding the assassination - you personally are not convinced by the front bullet evidence.

big_dave wrote:I see people, for whatever reasons, constructing a strawman (the official story) and then, as an example of confirmation bias actively hunting bite-sized pieces of information that disagree with the strawman they have created for themselves.

You mean some folks decided to make up the Warren Commission report so that they could waste their time trying to make up things that seemed to contradict the Warren Commission Report?

That is one hell of a conspiracy theory.


You are batshit crazy.

Whether the killing head shot came from the rear or from the front(personally I believe it came from the Dal Tex building) distracts from the much easier question.
Its fairly obvious the head shot wasnt a 6.5 fully jacketed ammunition.
The ammunition from Mannlicher-Carano is designed for deep penetration- it can pass through 47 inches of pine wood. It could pass through 2 bodies hit bone and stay relatively intact(maybe not quite as pristine as the magic bulet). But it would not fragment into a hundred small fragments like the Kennedy head shot. This bullet basically disintegrated into small pieces in Kennedy's brain(which is in parts unknown at this moment).
Whether the head shot came from the front/back location - the bullet was consistent with a high speed frangible ammunition, a sabot casing, or explosive ammunition- not a fully jacketed bullet than can penetrate through a body largely intact and would not turn into dust in JFK's brain.

big_dave wrote:I see people, for whatever reasons, constructing a strawman (the official story) and then, as an example of confirmation bias actively hunting bite-sized pieces of information that disagree with the strawman they have created for themselves.

You're conflating the strawman official stories created by conspiracy theorists with the actual official explanations, and with the consensus of popular thought however flawed it may be. That is to say, while the conspiracy theorist in many cases must construct a straw man version of events to make himself listenable, this is built on top of an accepted official or consensus explanation, and is in fact directly related to the assumption that there is an official explanation that fails to explain everything: the most common straw man is simply the claim that the official explanation must address every theory and possibility, or else it is covering up for whatever's left..

Rick Reuben wrote:strawman

Why's it gotta be strawman?
You a wicker hater?

Rick Reuben wrote:

Antero wrote:You're conflating the strawman official stories created by conspiracy theorists

Conspiracy theorists have no role in the construction of the official story.

There is only one official story, and all conspiracy theorists battle the same exact one.

This is false, and rests on poor reading skills on top of it, because that's clearly not what I said.

An individual studying an event will bring certain biases to their study and make certain assumptions about the event, which will in turn influence the way that they interpret the official story. If an individual is not careful to put aside his or her own biases and, by challenging his or her own assumptions, seek a measure of objectivity, then the individual will engage with a straw man version of the initial theory rather than the theory itself.

Take 9/11 - some conspiracy theorists claim that the BBC's erroneous report of a building collapse prior to its actual fall is evidence of conspiracy, whereas others (both supporting and opposing the official story) consider it an unimportant and tangential error. Those who claim it is evidence of a conspiracy must, in order for the coverage to be analytically relevant, be making the claim that the coverage in question qualifies as part of the official story. Accordingly, they have created their own version of the official story that contains different information than other versions.

This is not the creation of the official story, but rather the construction of an interpretively dependent version of the official story - in this case, a straw man, because some British newscaster thinking a building had fallen when it was only damaged is hardly of great importance compared to other points of data.

Rick Reuben wrote:I challenged you to provide a strawman official story for either 9/11 or JFK, and you have failed. You obviously don't understand the term 'official story' .

You obviously don't understand the term "strawman."

This thread needs more pictures of dolphins.

See 100 Bullets issue 27 "Idol Chatter"

Rick Reuben wrote:

antero wrote:an interpretively dependent version of the official story

What a nut. If there are versions of a fucking official story, then there is no official story. Official is singular, you goof.

*sigh*

Let me try this in short, simple phrases.

If you say that things are part of the official story when they aren't, you have made a straw man version of the official story.

I wouldn't even bother trying to explain this except for the fact that you've gone past illogical and dishonest and asinine into straight up motherfucking illiterate, and it actually surprises me. Somehow.