h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

I think the general opinion is that the invasion was a matter of all-too-common Foreign Office incompetence, though that's not to deny the political capital that you-know-who managed to wring out of it. (& I do sometimes wonder if her darling boy made any money selling weapons to the Argentine generals beforehand)

In a way, but even a conspiracy theory must have some sort of evidence either to support it, or to cast doubt on the official explanation.
Like some of the strange surroundings to the Lockerbie crash - for instance, supposedly, the hillsides and forests were combed for evidence for months by teams of locals, then some FBI (or similar) guy flies in and almost instantly happens to find the one crucial centimetre-sized fragment of evidence in a Scottish pine forest. Maybe he _did_ find it, but if the general story is true, it is undeniably suspicious.
I'm skeptical about governments, but also about conspiracy theories.

Lets face it. The powers that be are all a bunch of money grabbing gits who'll be the first against the wall when the revolution comes and I for one won't even give 'em a blindfold!! (Ha!)

Indeed. The selling of arms goes hand in hand with the deliberate allowance of war at the top of the International Politics Premiership.
A horrible industrial town up the road from me (that's MIDDLESBROUGH, if anyone wants to know) once made a so-called 'supergun' for Saddam Hussein's genocidal plans in Iraq, only that's not much of a scandal these days. The same applies to supplying the Indonesians battering the hell out of the East Timorese. No doubt Mr Blair has got his finger in this South East Asian pie.

The withcraft trials of 17th century New England?
The conspiracy theory at the heart of these incidents was perhaps the great conspiracy theory of them all....religion?

Absolutely! Religion has to be the largest conspiracy theory in history in order to subdue the masses and keep the power and money in the hands of a select few.

oooooh... controversial!! Especially when you post a comment like that on a forum of a page made by somebody with a † in their name...

I don't mind really
I'll try not to provoke ANOTHER long religious debate here, but I'll give my reasons for not including religion on the main page:

I'm a Christian. I realise that Christians (or from my viewpoint, people who CALL themselves Christians) have done some pretty appalling things in the past, and even now can be very pushy. As far as I can, I apologise for that . Christianity *SHOULD* be about free will. I think forcing your religion upon somebody is terrible.
There are some religions - Islam in particular (I hope nobody takes offense at this) - and some denominations of Christianity - that are pushy and power grabbing by nature. But I don't really want to include comments like this on my page because it could well upset people.

Apologies, there was no personal offence intended... (some of my friends are Christians and Jehova Witnesses). The subject is just something I feel rather strongly about and can't help but climb up onto my little soap box from time to time!

Thats ok , none taken.
I can't stand pushy Christians' methods myself... my experience of Jehovah's witnesses is that they put more people off Christianity than anything.

I'm sure every nationality, race, religion, gender or other grouping of people has its own subset of overbearing people (including atheists and agnostics).
I suppose we get used to those people in our own groups, and see their better sides as well, whereas those from 'other' groups who we don't properly know (eg Islam) can often appear to have few or no redeeming features, and they also tend to draw our attention away from the moderate, human majority.

Pushy types are rather intimidating - whatever they're pushing - especially double glazing salesmen!

Just briefly returning to the religion thing and Jehova Witnesses, I tend to feel sorry for them when they turn up on the door step as it is something I'd hate to do although I do realise they do it by choice. My other half plays on this and has "set me up" in the past by sending them to talk to me with "My wife will talk to you...". Until recently, we had some neighbours who were Jehova Witnesses and I have to own up to their being the nicest neighbours we've ever had. They knew our oppinions and we had some interesting conversations which didn't, fortunately impinge on our friendship at all.

My lamppost ariticle is
http://www.h2g2.com/A222274

Conspiracy theories about religion are just one of the ways in which conspiracy theories are advanced. A conspiracy theory is a theory often aimed at people in power, or associated with power, or with the potential to take power (the Roman Catholic Church, the Government, Islam, Jews, Freemasons, The Intelligencia, Industrialists, Witches, Heretics, Japanese, etc.), where one is lead to believe that "They are up to Something", and that this "Something" will have dire consequences for everybody if left unchecked. Common day occurences then begin to be twisted to add credence to the theories, and thus more and more people over time begin to believe in the conspiracy.

When enough people begin to believe that this "Something" is true, what you can get if it is pushed to extremes is a situation where the anti-conspirators do something far far worse and far more dreadful than the original conspiracy. Thus, you have The Inquisition, Witchcraft Trials, Naziism, The Cultural Revolution in China, the Oklahoma bombing, etc., etc.

Today being the anniversary of the creation of the Irish free state (as it was called back then), I thought I'd throw in an Irish conspiracy for you. Anyway, it is fairly well known the Eamonn DeValera(Important member of IRA) sent Micheal Collins to England to sign the creation of the Irish free state. However, he didn't get the 6 northern counties (and it's widely believed DeValera knew he wouldn't be able to get Independance for the whole country, and so sent Collins to take the blame). Anyway as a result of this there was a civil war and Collins was killed. It's believed that Collins was killed by DeValera (despite both being pro-treaty) to keep him quite about the whole affair.

Interestingly enough, this theory has resulted in many History Examination failings in the past couple of years, as conspiracies are rarely taken as historical fact.

What was the approach of the recent film about Collins' life on this issue?

The examination point is extremely interesting - when some cover-up, or rewriting of history is exposed, it'll take time for the original truth to be displace the erroneous version of history. At what point does the original, true version of the facts become officially accepted? Unless you have a Department of Historical Truth, who else decides - the history book publishers, the examination boards?

All the more reason to insist this Labour Govt. stick to their promises regarding the Freedom of Information Bill. (Methinks they doth backslide!)

Probably that De Valera was a right cunnit!

Not so Gwennie. We don't want total freedom of information. It's very dangerous, and it's bound to get into the wrong hands....ie....any politician or...even worse...Rupert Murdoch. In fact, Tony Blair was formerly a member of the East German Stasi, and his lovely Labour party have based this freedom of information (or everybody snitches on everyone else) on his time in the East Berlin Commie government. Stick that in yer conspiracy pipe and smoke it.

Nope! Can't! Won't! Shan't! I don't smoke - so there! Sticks thumbs in ears and waggles hands... (very childish I know, but fun!).

Beatles theory at:
http://www.h2g2.com/A277328