Talk:9/11 conspiracy theories

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Frequently asked questions

Many of these questions arise frequently on the talk page concerning the 9/11 conspiracy theories.

To view an explanation to the answer, click the [show] link to the right of the question.

Q1: Why does this article not discuss 9/11 conspiracy theories as a valid scientific or historical hypothesis?

A1: Wikipedia relies on reliable sources that have a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy. The Neutral point of view policy, especially the sections Undue weight and Equal validity, requires that editors not add their own editorial biases when writing text based on such sources. As the relevant academic field generally rejects the several hypotheses grouped under the umbrella of 9/11 conspiracy theories, it would be a disservice to our readers to have a full description of the topic that does not reflect the consensus view. Further advice for how to treat topics such as this one may be found at the Fringe theories and Reliable sources guidelines.

Q2: Doesn't Wikipedia's policy on "neutrality" require a neutral treatment?

A2: Wikipedia's policy on neutrality does not require that all hypotheses be treated as equal or valid, nor is neutrality decided by the opinions of editors. On Wikipedia, neutrality is represented by a fair summary of the opinion found in the relevant scholarly, academic, or otherwise expert community. If that community rejects an idea with unanimity or near-unanimity, due weight requires that that rejection be presented.

Q3: Why didn't you include (other theory) in the article?

A3: Wikipedia's due weight guidelines state that an article should "make appropriate reference to the majority viewpoint wherever relevant and must not represent content strictly from the perspective of the minority view." Thus, we cover those conspiracy theories which have received significant coverage in reliable sources.

Q4: Isn't the official government story a "conspiracy theory" too?

A4: Wikipedia refers to reliable mainstream sources when determining appropriate descriptions. As such sources do not commonly refer to the official account as a "conspiracy theory" neither do articles here. The term conspiracy theory is typically used for claims that an event is "the result of an alleged plot by a covert group or organization or, more broadly, the idea that important political, social or economic events are the products of secret plots that are largely unknown to the general public." Although the version in government reports would fit the literal meaning of the term, conspiracy theories are generally viewed as theories that "read between the lines," and assume a hidden motive & massive manipulation of evidence to deceive the public. By nature, conspiracy theories are unsubstantiated and intended to question the official or scientific explanation.

Q5: Isn't "conspiracy theory" a pejorative term? Shouldn't the article be named something more neutral?

A5: Titles are typically chosen based on whether it is the common name used for the subject in reliable sources. While the term conspiracy theory has been used as a pejorative, so has "scientist," "American," and various other terms. It is not universally considered pejorative. There have been numerous discussions about the title of the article since the attacks occurred. After several debates, "conspiracy theory" has been judged to be the most common, accurate, and neutral term to describe the subject this article covers.

Q6: My edit was cited. Why was it removed?

A6: Wikipedia requires all contentious claims be cited to reliable sources. This is difficult with conspiracy theories, as they are already outside the mainstream. Generally speaking, we do not consider citations from blogs, websites with no editorial oversight, or YouTube videos to be reliable. If the material is about living people, this is especially important. If you feel your citation fits within Wikipedia's guidelines, please post a comment on the Talk page so it can be discussed.

9/11 conspiracy theories was a good articles nominee, but did not meet the good article criteria at the time. There may be suggestions below for improving the article. Once these issues have been addressed, the article can be renominated. Editors may also seek a reassessment of the decision if they believe there was a mistake.

Article milestones
Date	Process	Result
March 29, 2006	Peer review	Reviewed
June 3, 2006	Good article nominee	Not listed
August 12, 2006	Articles for deletion	Speedily kept

Current status: Former good article nominee

United States: September 11 High‑importance

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This article has been mentioned by a media organization:

Noam Cohen (11 September 2011). "On Wikipedia, Echoes of 9/11 'Edit Wars'". The New York Times.

Section sizes

Section size for 9/11 conspiracy theories (39 sections)
Section name	Byte count	Section total
(Top)	9,320	9,320
Background	7,363	7,363
History	21,643	21,643
Types	2,818	2,818
Theories	15	71,913
Foreknowledge	1,247	15,167
Suspected insider trading	6,774	6,774
Air-defense stand-down theory	4,315	4,315
Alleged communications leak	1,116	1,116
Israeli agents	1,715	1,715
World Trade Center	11,883	11,883
Pentagon	12,717	12,717
Flight 93	8,309	8,309
Hijackers	4,647	4,647
Foreign governments	2,883	15,972
Israel	6,506	6,506
Antisemitism in conspiracy theories	2,650	2,650
Saudi Arabia	3,933	3,933
No-planes theory	3,203	3,203
Cover-up allegations	28	7,948
Cockpit recorders	2,542	2,542
Bin Laden tapes	4,641	4,641
CIA recruitment efforts	737	737
Motives	15	4,240
Pax Americana	1,815	1,815
Invasions	2,060	2,060
New World Order	350	350
Suggested historical precedents	1,581	1,581
Proponents	8,001	11,729
Analysis	3,728	3,728
Media reaction	25,163	25,163
Criticism	11,824	11,824
In politics	13,450	13,450
Legal cases	1,239	1,239
See also	383	383
Notes	26	26
References	1,732	1,732
Bibliography	6,384	6,384
External links	1,918	1,918
Total	200,674	200,674

Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment

This article is or was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): YourGuyJY.

Above undated message substituted from Template:Dashboard.wikiedu.org assignment by PrimeBOT (talk) 13:08, 16 January 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Semi-protected edit request on 29 January 2021

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The section on insider trading includes the excerpt from the 9/11 Commission Report describing how one firm purchased 95% of the put options on one of the days, but does not mention the detail that this was Alex. Brown, which A. B. Krongard had been a director at. This was mentioned in the press at the time. Example: https://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/news/mystery-terror-insider-dealers-9237061.html 216.164.226.176 (talk) 03:57, 29 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Not done, not in reference given. ◢ Ganbaruby!  (Say hi!) 06:37, 29 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Requested move 31 January 2022

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The result of the move request was: No consensus. There are differing views as to which title better satisfies WP:COMMONNAME, as well as how to weigh the criteria of consistency and precision. (non-admin closure) Colin M (talk) 19:49, 10 February 2022 (UTC)[reply]

9/11 conspiracy theories → September 11 conspiracy theories – Most other articles in the topic area call it the "September 11 attacks" or just "September 11", not "9/11". The last move request was in 2010, but consensus could have changed since then. Another alternative could be Conspiracy theories about the September 11 attacks. –LaundryPizza03 (d c̄) 22:36, 31 January 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Neutral. After reading User talk:Crouch, Swale's comment and thinking about it some more, the current title probably is the more common term, despite it not being consistent with our other article titles. I'm now neutral on this move. ~~Support~~ to be WP:CONSISTENT with the formatting of main article. Rreagan007 (talk) 00:00, 1 February 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Weak oppose this was discussed in 2018, see Talk:9/11 conspiracy theories/Archive 40#Requested move 18 December 2018. Google results for September 11 conspiracy theories mainly return things calling it 9/11 conspiracy theories. Yes we should generally try to be consistent but given this is seems to be more of a named topic rather than a descriptive title I think we look at what this is called not the main event. Crouch, Swale (talk) 11:09, 2 February 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Support people say "9/11" because it's faster (and the people on Twitter who promote these theories would say "Bush did 9/11" because they are using a spoken register in their writing), but in written registers "September 11" is preferred. User:力 (powera, π, ν) 23:31, 5 February 2022 (UTC)[reply]

• Oppose to main general suggestion. In particular, note that “September 11” and “conspiracy theory” when combined created a longer title than necessary. Moreover, the terrorist attacks aren’t actually the primary topic of “September 11”, but they are the primary topic of “9/11”. This type of move seems to have zero benefit at best, but many drawbacks at worst. Strong oppose to last alternative suggestion. That is an excessively unwieldy title. Could serve as a good redirect. Mrbeastmodeallday (talk) 12:24, 7 February 2022 (UTC)[reply]

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Wiki Education assignment: English 202A Writing in the Social Sciences

This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 23 August 2022 and 9 December 2022. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Charisse.v (article contribs). Peer reviewers: Openskies789, Sbradford1149, Kaylingonzalez00.

— Assignment last updated by Openskies789 (talk) 00:30, 24 October 2022 (UTC)[reply]

citation needed for this?

"According to an international poll that same year, huge majorities in Muslim countries prefer to believe baseless conspiracy theories rather than listen to the mainstream facts of what happened on September 11, 2001, in New York City and Washington. "

in any case I think this is a very un-wikipedia-like sentence, even if it is true (which seems unlikely to me). why not:

According to an international poll that same year, a majority of the population of some Muslim countries believe in some form of 9/11 conspiracy theory.

That does sound better. Dronebogus (talk) 01:59, 5 November 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Nuclear demolition

There needs to be the underground nuclear demolition section added to the conspiracy theory section, there is wide and thorough research into this category by nuclear physicists and demolition experts. Please include it. 2601:280:C781:B7F0:BCCB:D650:2632:1ED1 (talk) 06:51, 3 January 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Provide reliable sources documenting these claims first. — The Hand That Feeds You:^Bite 13:03, 3 January 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Gas pipeline through Afghanistan as conspiracy.

I find it odd that in this article the person has listed this as conspiracy theory..According to the fact the beginning of this pipeline started in 2015. 2604:2D80:DA10:4B00:3D63:1DD8:E70:7997 (talk) 22:51, 14 February 2023 (UTC)[reply]

The conspiracy theory is that the attacks in the USA were staged in order to justify a war, just so a gas pipeline could be built in Afghanistan & profit US companies. It's not surprising that corporations decided to capitalize on the situation & build a pipeline once the US military invaded, but it remains a conspiracy theory that the attacks were part of a plan just to get that pipeline built. — The Hand That Feeds You:^Bite 22:55, 14 February 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Interesting comparison with moscow apartment bombings

Re: accusations of the attacks being staged by the home govt. for their own popularity benefit

OF COURSE the accusations on the latter (moscow) one were FAR more accurate and less of a 'conspiracy theory' (said so so that I don't get banned on 'suspicion of promoting' wild conspiracy theories)

but still..i don't think it would do harm for wikipedia to include this bit 2402:E280:3D1D:5B0:F8E5:CCBD:7266:964B (talk) 10:19, 16 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

and if it is apparently WP:OR (which I doubt), then what/why does the statement "encyclopedia compiling ALL human knowledge" should/shall mean 2402:E280:3D1D:5B0:F8E5:CCBD:7266:964B (talk) 10:23, 16 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Reliable sources discussing such a comparison need to exist before we can have anything to say on the matter. Girth Summit _(blether) 12:20, 16 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Semi-protected edit request on 2 March 2024

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change " a researcher from the French National Centre for Scientific Research published in Le Monde." to "a researcher from the French National Centre for Scientific Research published in the newspaper Le Monde.". It makes it clear that Le Monde is not a scientific journal, which I personaly thought reading it. MartinUnknown (talk) 18:21, 2 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Done --TheImaCow (talk) 13:01, 3 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Semi-protected edit request on 14 May 2024

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This statement (“These include the theory that high-level government officials had advance knowledge of the attacks. Government investigations and independent reviews have rejected these theories.[2][3]”) should be changed because I could not find any evidence that the government were/were not involved so it is best not to even include it. Nowhere did it say these theories were rejected nor confirmed. I’m sure this has confused other people I just would like this to be a lot clearer and correct statement. Thank you for your slave work for Wikipedia it is greatly appreciated as you do what 99% of others would rather not. 174.234.143.10 (talk) 04:40, 14 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I could not find any evidence that the government were/were not involved

That's asking to prove a negative, which is not possible. Also, do NOT use the term slave work. — The Hand That Feeds You:^Bite 11:44, 14 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Question

Why isn't there a section debunking the conspiracy theories like in the Moon landing conspiracy theories article? 2806:230:1036:BCED:EE2E:98FF:FEF4:9A03 (talk) 04:39, 19 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Because the modern preference is to debunk them in-line, rather than giving the CTs too much weight by letting them go uncontested & then having the debunking in its own section. The moon landing article is based on the older way of doing it. — The Hand That Feeds You:^Bite 12:56, 20 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]