Explosions Heard in the Twin Towers BEFORE They Collapsed
Forget all of the videos and photos of the collapse of the World Trade Centers for a minute. Let's talk about an aspect of 9/11 that we've all glossed over: sound.
Remember that sound travels slower than light, and so witnesses who described hearing explosive sounds before seeing the collapse of the building cannot have been fooled about the sequence.
The following earwitness testimony indicates controlled demolition of the Twin Towers:
British newspaper stated "some eyewitnesses reported hearing another explosion just before the structure crumbled."
Unknown witness interviewed on television stating "it sounded like gunfire . . . . bang bang bang bang bang . . . and then three big explosions"
Highly-reputable astrophysicist wrote in an email that, immediately before the collapse of each of the twin towers, he heard explosions and low-frequency rumbles (he also uses the phrase "demolition-style implosion")
Fire chief from a nearby town heard a "high-pitched noise and a popping noise", right before or at the very start of the collapse of the South Tower (aren't high-pitched and popping noises created by certain types of high-explosives?)
Paramedic captain stated "somewhere around the middle of the world trade center there was this orange and red flash coming out initially it was just one flash then this flash just kept popping all the way around the building and that building had started to explode the popping sound and with each popping sound it was initially an orange and then red flash came out of the building and then it would just go all around the building on both sides as far as could see these popping sounds and the explosions were getting bigger going both up and down and then all around the building" (pdf file; Google's web version is here).
Firefighter “heard this huge explosion that sounded like a bomb [and] knocked off the lights and stalled the elevator . . . [then] another huge explosion like the first one hits. This one hits about two minutes later . . . [and] I’m thinking, ‘Oh. My God, these bastards put bombs in here . . . .”
Police officer stated "you would hear a loud boom go off at the top of tower one. As the building continued to burn and emergency equipment kept on responding stirring up the dust and debris in the streets. After approximately 15 minutes suddenly there was another loud boom at the upper floors, then there was a series of smaller explosions which appeared to go completely around the building at the upper floors. And another loud earth-shattering blast with a large fire ball which blew out more debris and at that point everyone began to run north on West Broad Street." (page 5, which is page 2 of a hand-written memorandum)
CNN producer stated "every few minutes you'll hear like a small sort of a rumbling sound, almost like an explosion sound and another chunk of it will come flying down into the street"; same producer stated "there was just a huge ... [explosion? word apparently erased from original CNN video] and enormous pieces of debris just falling - one right after the other"
NYC firefighter stated “It actually gave at a lower floor, not the floor where the plane hit. . . [W]e originally had thought there was like an internal detonation, explosives, because it went in succession, boom, boom, boom, boom, and then the tower came down.”
Port Authority Police Department officer, who was intimately familiar with the World Trade Center from his years of police duties patrolling there, described how the hallway began to shudder as a "terrible deafening roar" swept over him, then a giant fireball exploded in the street seconds before the south tower collapsed
MSNBC reporter stated "I heard a second explosion ... And then a fire marshal came in and said we had to leave, because if there was a third explosion this building might not last".
A witness heard the following, right before the collapse of one of the towers : "It sounded as if you had a hundred of those . . . firecrackers and you lit them all off at once . . . it sounded like the finale of the Fourth of July over the East River" (at 15:21)
What could make the above-described sounds?
Indeed, even after demolition expert Van Romero retracted his testimony that intentionally-planted explosives brought down the towers, he stated:
"it is possible that the final collapse of each building was triggered by a sudden pressure pulse caused when the fire reached an electrical transformer or other source of combustion within the building."
So were the explosive sounds prior to the collapse of the Twin Towers caused by intentionally-placed explosives or by the explosion of "electrical transformer[s] or other source of combustion"?
Well, if exploding transformers caused these sounds and the collapse of the Twin Towers, why didn't we hear the same things and see the collapse of the the buildings in Madrid, Venezuela, Los Angeles and elsewhere which burned hotter and longer than the Twin Towers? Didn't those buildings contain transformers and other sources of combustion? Why were the Twin Towers the first modern steel-framed buildings to collapse due to exploding sources of combustion?
Any explanation other than demolition-type explosives sounds false.
Remember that sound travels slower than light, and so witnesses who described hearing explosive sounds before seeing the collapse of the building cannot have been fooled about the sequence.
The following earwitness testimony indicates controlled demolition of the Twin Towers:
British newspaper stated "some eyewitnesses reported hearing another explosion just before the structure crumbled."
Unknown witness interviewed on television stating "it sounded like gunfire . . . . bang bang bang bang bang . . . and then three big explosions"
Highly-reputable astrophysicist wrote in an email that, immediately before the collapse of each of the twin towers, he heard explosions and low-frequency rumbles (he also uses the phrase "demolition-style implosion")
Fire chief from a nearby town heard a "high-pitched noise and a popping noise", right before or at the very start of the collapse of the South Tower (aren't high-pitched and popping noises created by certain types of high-explosives?)
Paramedic captain stated "somewhere around the middle of the world trade center there was this orange and red flash coming out initially it was just one flash then this flash just kept popping all the way around the building and that building had started to explode the popping sound and with each popping sound it was initially an orange and then red flash came out of the building and then it would just go all around the building on both sides as far as could see these popping sounds and the explosions were getting bigger going both up and down and then all around the building" (pdf file; Google's web version is here).
Firefighter “heard this huge explosion that sounded like a bomb [and] knocked off the lights and stalled the elevator . . . [then] another huge explosion like the first one hits. This one hits about two minutes later . . . [and] I’m thinking, ‘Oh. My God, these bastards put bombs in here . . . .”
Police officer stated "you would hear a loud boom go off at the top of tower one. As the building continued to burn and emergency equipment kept on responding stirring up the dust and debris in the streets. After approximately 15 minutes suddenly there was another loud boom at the upper floors, then there was a series of smaller explosions which appeared to go completely around the building at the upper floors. And another loud earth-shattering blast with a large fire ball which blew out more debris and at that point everyone began to run north on West Broad Street." (page 5, which is page 2 of a hand-written memorandum)
CNN producer stated "every few minutes you'll hear like a small sort of a rumbling sound, almost like an explosion sound and another chunk of it will come flying down into the street"; same producer stated "there was just a huge ... [explosion? word apparently erased from original CNN video] and enormous pieces of debris just falling - one right after the other"
NYC firefighter stated “It actually gave at a lower floor, not the floor where the plane hit. . . [W]e originally had thought there was like an internal detonation, explosives, because it went in succession, boom, boom, boom, boom, and then the tower came down.”
Port Authority Police Department officer, who was intimately familiar with the World Trade Center from his years of police duties patrolling there, described how the hallway began to shudder as a "terrible deafening roar" swept over him, then a giant fireball exploded in the street seconds before the south tower collapsed
MSNBC reporter stated "I heard a second explosion ... And then a fire marshal came in and said we had to leave, because if there was a third explosion this building might not last".
A witness heard the following, right before the collapse of one of the towers : "It sounded as if you had a hundred of those . . . firecrackers and you lit them all off at once . . . it sounded like the finale of the Fourth of July over the East River" (at 15:21)
What could make the above-described sounds?
Indeed, even after demolition expert Van Romero retracted his testimony that intentionally-planted explosives brought down the towers, he stated:
"it is possible that the final collapse of each building was triggered by a sudden pressure pulse caused when the fire reached an electrical transformer or other source of combustion within the building."
So were the explosive sounds prior to the collapse of the Twin Towers caused by intentionally-placed explosives or by the explosion of "electrical transformer[s] or other source of combustion"?
Well, if exploding transformers caused these sounds and the collapse of the Twin Towers, why didn't we hear the same things and see the collapse of the the buildings in Madrid, Venezuela, Los Angeles and elsewhere which burned hotter and longer than the Twin Towers? Didn't those buildings contain transformers and other sources of combustion? Why were the Twin Towers the first modern steel-framed buildings to collapse due to exploding sources of combustion?
Any explanation other than demolition-type explosives sounds false.
40 Comments:
collapsing floors, transformer explosions, ect...
Its not a building collapsing is gonna be quiet
I was a few blocks aways from the WTC on 9-11. I too heard at least two explosions like bombs. I witnessed the collapse of the building and it looked like controlled demolition
Watch 911 Eyewitness and you can listen to the explosions.
You can download it here ...
http://www.question911.com/links.php
or google it here ...
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-3498980438587461603
or buy the DVD ...
http://www.911eyewitness.com/
Do you have a copy of the seismographs of that day?
Sound doesn't vibrate the ground in the manner described by measurements on the graph.
What is inherit to the naked eye is the spike at about 2/3 of the collapse measured on the graphs. I sought to find examples of other graphs measuring similar phenomena, I could only find two both were underground, one the graph of an open pit mine and the other a graph of an underground nuclear test.
What assimilates those examples to the trade towers is something mentioned both by the talking head TV people and the site clean-up engineer, that in order for any building to fall through the path that most resists it’s collapse, directly down through undamaged structure, the area at the bottom must be removed first.
http://www.earthinstitute.columbia.edu/news/images/seismic-wave-24.gif
"collapsing floors, transformer explosions, ect...
Its not a building collapsing is gonna be quiet"
We're especially talking about explosions preceding the builidngs' collapse, as if you didn't know.
And all those "transformer explosions" ??? What transformers??? And they hadn't turned off the electricity by then???
Here is some amazing audio and video recorded from the location of the Trinity Church. I suspect "George Washington" has already seen and heard these, but some of the rest of you may not have. After clicking the link, scroll down to the Trinity Church image (it may scroll erratically at first because several audio files are loading, so please be patient). I encourage you to listen to the audio clip first (located just below the Trinty Church picture), then click on the picture itself to watch the video. By listening to the sound first, one tends not to be distracted by the visual images. I had never heard explosions like these before: Explosion Sounds and the World Trade Center - Twin Tower Collapses
MJW
Police office stated "you would hear a loud boom go off at the top of tower one. As the building continued to burn and emergency equipment kept on responding stirring up the dust and debris in the streets. After approximately 15 minutes suddenly there was another loud boom at the upper floors, then there was a series of smaller explosions which appeared to go completely around the building at the upper floors. And another loud earth-shattering blast with a large fire ball which blew out more debris and at that point everyone began to run north on West Broad Street." (page 5, which is page 2 of a hand-written memorandum)
Police offer stated "we kept hearing explosions that would shake the whole room" Fire chief from a nearby town heard a "high-pitched noise and a popping noise" right before the collapse of the South Tower
Good summary!
Check the spelling - it should read "police officer" in both paragraphs.
Thanks.
Boris.
911 Eye Witness provides clear audio of multiple explosions.
http://www.911podcasts.com/
taken with other eye witness oral testimony, provides further evidence of controlled demolition
First, examine sound, check the tapes they tried not to release, nearly EVERY firefighter hears explosions (unfortunately, most of them also died).
Next examine, sight, watch the towers freefall and bombs explode beneath the falling debris.
9/11 was an inside job pulled off by the same people who supressed Ernst Zundel and ban books like "America Deceived" by E.A. Blayre III from Amazon. Here's the last indy link for the novel (before Google Books yanks it from pressure):
http://www.iuniverse.com/bookstore/book_detail.asp?&isbn=0-595-38523-0
brisa said, “Is it Peak Oil? Global Warming? Economic Collapse?”
It’s all of the above and more... it’s the greedy 1 percent who own more than 90 percent of everything and don’t have any use for the other 6 billion plus sheeple that litter the earth.
BTW, did you seriously expect the ruling mafia to own up to its criminal doings?
But it's mainly about Rapture... and the certain conditions that [the cabal believes] must be met on specific dates before the prophecy could be fulfilled.
How about Columbia University Geological division which recorded two minor earthquakes seconds before each plane hit the towers. That's an earth rattling record 9 seconds before the first plane hit, and then miraculiously, 9 seconds before the second plane hit.
(before Google Books yanks it from pressure):
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=--=
Don't worry.Google will promote anything anti-american.It is any OTHER view they are CENSORING!
But it's mainly about Rapture... and the certain conditions that [the cabal believes] must be met on specific dates before the prophecy could be fulfilled.
Amen! Even if you're not a believer, those who run things ARE! But they don't believe in the same God most of us do. They are Satanists and have to pay back their master with our sacrafice to keep their grip on things.
BTW, did you seriously expect the ruling mafia to own up to its criminal doings?
This always kills me. The believers in the official fiction always want proof of the crime. Don't they get it? In any real investigation, we compile facts and then go after the guilty party. At this point, there are many facts being complied. But the difficulty with the whole 9/11 charade is that the perpetrators run the media and the country and cover their crimes and hide behind our own stupidity. All you have to do to figure this out is simply, open your eyes.
When do you get to the part of actually providing evidence of explosives instead of just speculation????
"When do you get to the part of actually providing evidence of explosives instead of just speculation????"
This sounds like a Mafia Don saying "why don't you find the body?" after the murder victim was weighted down with cinder blocks and thrown in the river with the fishes.
In case you forgot, the steel from the WTC was never analyzed by any forensics team; it was immediately sent to China to be melted down. Now that same steel makes up the new navy ship the USS New York.
The only way to have obtained evidence from the WTC site would have been to shoot all the law enforcement posers before they covered up the crimes and then have real forensic investigators look at the rubble before it was carted away.
"the steel from the WTC was never analyzed by any forensics team; it was immediately sent to China to be melted down."
You still believe that myth? Poor boy.
I think that this evidence is a force to be reckoned with.
It shows that the standing theory from day 1 would've been that the buildings came down in a controlled demolition if a real honest investigation was launched from that point forward.
The fact that the media was complicit in the coverup and that these oral histories were sealed up until August of 2005.. is just a sign to how explosive the eyewitness testimony is.
I mean these histories were recorded so that whatever was said in the media, the truth about what people saw and heard on that day would last forever AND THEY WERE SEALED FOR 4 YEARS. Jesus christ, why weren't they released and made public immediately? It's total, complete and utter bullshit.
People who believe in the official fairy tale, what the fuck do you make of that?
You can't discount this because "transformers exploded" that's one hypothesis, that is IMO less valid than a controlled demolition hypothesis, it maybe should be treated as equal with the "bombs in the tower" hypothesis, but why should it be the "de facto default theory" BECAUSE YOU DENIERS ARE INTELLECTUAL COWARDS. Step up to the fucking plate, America as you know it is dead.
911Poller said...
""the steel from the WTC was never analyzed by any forensics team; it was immediately sent to China to be melted down.""
"You still believe that myth? Poor boy."
Quite right, 911Poller. One shouldn't believe everything one finds on the Internet!
Could you please provide the link invalidating the myth for me? I've read the debunking, but I just don't seem to be able to find it now. Thanks.
You're missing one simple and obvious point with all this. If the buildings were brought down with controlled explosions then why were 'explosions' reported from when the first plane hit until after the second tower collapsed? In controlled explosions the explosives tend to be detonated within a few seconds of each other not randomly over the space of a few hours.
[i]How about Columbia University Geological division which recorded two minor earthquakes seconds before each plane hit the towers. That's an earth rattling record 9 seconds before the first plane hit, and then miraculiously, 9 seconds before the second plane hit.[/i]
you certainly have my attention...
could you provide some material on this? links, etc?
i have 2 audio recordings of the first plane hit which both would both corroborate this.
٠٠بقشرن رشيش
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
The official account of 9/11 is a new tale added to The Book of One Thousand and One Nights. Notable stories in the book include Aladdin and the Magic Lamp, Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves of Baghdad, and The Seven Voyages of Sinbad the Sailor.
“In 1888, Russian composer Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov completed his Op. 35 Scheherazade, in four movements, based on four of the tales from the Arabian Nights; The Sea and Sinbad's Ship, The Kalendar Prince, The Young Prince and The Young Princess, and Festival At Baghdad.”
“Legend has it that anyone who reads [or hears] the whole collection will become mad.” Legend also has it that a Genie appears from nowhere and reads the book to important people like the US presidents when they are under the effects of cocaine, or heavily intoxicated.
“The story concerns an impoverished young man named Aladdin living in China, who is recruited by a sorcerer to retrieve a wonderful oil lamp from a booby-trapped magic cave. After the sorcerer attempts to double-cross him, Aladdin keeps the lamp for himself, and discovers that it summons a surly djinn [jinn, jinni or Genie: “The word ‘jinni’ literally means anything which has the connotation of concealment, invisibility, seclusion and remoteness.”] that is bound to do the bidding of the person holding the lamp. With the aid of the djinn, Aladdin becomes rich and powerful and marries princess Badroulbadour.”
“The original full text includes a grossly Anti-Jewish episode, usually omitted in the bowdlerized versions, in which the naïve Aladdin is cheated and exploited by a treacherous Jewish merchant, and is saved by the Jew's honest and upright Muslim competitor. The late Dr. Yoel Yosef Rivlin who translated the book into Hebrew admitted that although he had a feeling of distaste and felt apprehension that his full translation might ruin an otherwise delightful tale for Israeli readers, he still felt duty-bound to provide Hebrew readers with a full and unexpurgated translation.”
However, the tales of Aladdin have always been of special interest to the Israelis because the book is packed with adventure and incredible stories, special effects and magic powers, conjuring and sorcery: the flying carpet, Aladdin's Lamp, and Osama the surly Genie...
In fact, the latest episode called “The 9/11 Flying Carpets and the Magic Jet Fuel from Aladdin’s Lamp” was written and performed in WTC in NY by its architects, the Israeli Mosad.
Part II – More about the effects of Magic Jet Fuel from Aladdin’s Lamp...
[Quotes from: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aladdin and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Book_of_One_Thousand_and_One_Nights]
http://www.chiefengineer.org/article.cfm?seqnum1=1029 This URL has the testimony of facilities engineers who worked at WTC on 911.
One man saw a 50 ton hydraulic press and a 300 lb. fire door torn to shreds. And this explosion happened seconds before the first plane hit. Also the janitor Rodrigues who saw Felipe David's skin peeled from a blast that came up the elevator shaft. That too was prior to the first plane hitting the WTC.
power down...security cameras off...while the bombs were planted
just saw the old castaways hotel in vegas imploded......boom boom boom...just like that...just like 7wtc...pulled
8.4 seconds
Part II – “The 9/11 Flying Carpets and the Magic Jet Fuel from Aladdin’s Lamp”
This latest tale is a story within a story within a story… or multiple 'Mise en abyme'.
In the previous tales of the Book of 1001 night, the Caliph who always remains unnamed rules an island "between India and China". In the latest tale the Mock Caliph rules a strange country between India, China, and Russia named Al-anarkia.
Ding-dong dolt the cockeyed Hashish Eater Idiot or Shrub for short [idiot: A person of profound mental retardation having a mental age below three years and generally being unable to learn connected speech or guard against common dangers. The term belongs to a classification system no longer in use and is now considered offensive.~ http://education.yahoo.com/reference/dictionary/entry/idiot], asks his wily friend Ja’far the trickster how he could become a Caliph. A Caliph? Okay a Mock caliph.
Amused by Shrub’s cocaine-induced audacity, and seeing a clear opportunity for himself, the evil Ja’far, who later becomes the Grand Vizier (or Grand Wazir, the equivalent of a Vice President), consults The “Master”. The Master has seen in the doltish Shrub in ideal candidate because of his mental incapacity, sadomasochistic perversions and addiction to banned substances, and instructs Z.I.F.F.A.R., his ring of sprites, goblins, elves and pixies who practice black magic and other forms of sorcery under him, to crown Ding-dong the Hashish Eater as the Mock Caliph of Al-anarkia.
Later, on the night of investiture, the Master reveals himself in the flesh to Ding-dong Shrub the Hashish Eater and feels him on his shoulders whereupon two serpents grow [see The Book of Kings.] out of the panic-stricken Shrub’s shoulders.
The Master warns Shrub that to stay alive, and continue to rule as the Mock Caliph of Al-anarkia Ding-dong Shrub must eat the brains of 5 young soldiers from his own army and shed indiscriminately the blood of 1,001 people from other countries EVERY day.
Ding-dong Shrub the Hashish Eater [now the Mock Caliph] and his wife the “Foolish Weaver” are at first worried about the serpents eating habits and turn to Ja’far and the ring of sorcerers [ZIFFAR] for help. The inner ring of ZIFFAR consist of the “The Pious Black Slave”, “The Queen of Serpents”, “The Prince of Darkness”, “The Werewolf”, “The Man Who Forged a Letter in his Name”, “The Man Who Stole the Dish of Gold Wherein The Dog Ate”, “The Sharper of Alexandria and the Chief of Police”, “The Ruined Man Who became Rich Again Through A Dream,” the Mayor of Dodge-em city and many others...
Ja’far the evil sorcerer decides to adopt a tried and tested routine. He dispatches Al-Rumsi, his lesser Vizier, to Baghdad to search for Aladdin’s old Magic Lamp. Al-Rumsi meets with Ali Baba (aka Saddam), the ugly lead thief, and manages to strike a bargain, literally stealing the Lamp from the ugly thief. He returns triumphantly with the Aladdin’s Lamp tucked safely in his briefcase.
Back in Al-anarkia, Ja’far and other ZIFFAR sorcerers rub the Lamp furiously; alas, no genie appears. They then google the Internet and find that the surly resident genie is no longer active; either he has long retired, or has died of kidney failure.
The Acting Head for the Ministry of Truth [Orwell, 1984] comes up with the idea of a virtual genie. “After all”, he blurts, “who the hell would ever know the difference!”
Thus the die is cast. The Aladdin’s old Lamp is back in service- albeit with a virtual surly genie named Osama...
"Open, Sesame!"
Next, the “The Ruined Man Who became Rich Again Through A Dream” buys the lease for the Treasure Towers in Dodge-em’s concrete forest which are filled with gold bullions, precious metals, precious stones, financial instruments, computer data, and lots of valuable secrets.
“The Man Who Stole the Dish of Gold Wherein The Dog Ate”, and others prepare a plot to rub the Towers.
All they need now is a narrative with continuity, verisimilitude, and suspension of disbelief and a reinforced Fourth wall.
A plotline with the strong Plot Devices would be needed.
They must also get the right mix of Dramatic Situations, and select the appropriate Conflicts. They must employ Stock Characters and work on Characterization; they would need the right Rhetoric and Visions in a dramatic Setting.
Errors and Gaps must be kept down to a minimum- but who cares, no one would know, anyway.
Some of the other Characters in The Book of 1001 Nights:
The evil Grand Wazir, “The Pious Black Slave”, “The Queen of Serpents”, “The Prince of Darkness”, “The Werewolf”, “The Man Who Forged a Letter in His Name”, “The Man Who Stole the Dish of Gold Wherein The Dog Ate”, “The Sharper of Alexandria and the Chief of Police” “The Chief of the Kus Police”, “The Ruined Man Who became Rich Again Through A Dream”, “Warden the Butcher (who had an Adventure With the Lady and the Bear)”, “The Water-Carrier who had an affair with the Goldsmith's Wife”, “The Two Wicked Elders”, “The Unwise Schoolmaster Who Fell in Love”, “The Illiterate Who Set Up For a Schoolmaster”, “The Prior who became a Christian”, “The Angel of Death and the King of the Children of Israel”, “The Jewish Kazi and His Pious Wife”, “The Blacksmith Who Could Handle Fire Without Hurt”, “The Christian King's Daughter and the Son of Moslem Merchant”, “the Man Who Longed to see the Night of Power”, “The Man who Never Laughed During the Rest of His Days”, “Judar and His Brethren”, “The man who Enlarged Pearls”, “The Singer and the Druggist”, “The Prince Who Fell In Love With the Picture”, “The First Lunatic”, “Second and Other Lunatics”, “The Mayor of Dodge’em City”, “The Linguist-Dame”...
[The characters described here come from the list of stories within The Book of One Thousand and One Nights. Any resemblance to the actual individuals who architected the 9/11 and carried out the demolitions and benefited from it are purely...]
Part III- The Narrative
Excellent work, George. I'm going to send this around to everyone I know, even the Scientologist transvestite biker gang I met on myspace.
Part III - Narrative
Preamble
The laws of Physics don’t change or morph in the world which we know and perceive as real. In the segment of the reality spectrum that we are tuned to, events (incidents) occur sequentially and plausibly – they always do.
When a physical event occurs, it lives behind a footprint that can be examined, explained and analyzed. There’s always a perfectly simple explanation for what happens in our world (Google for Occam’s razor). For example, buildings don’t collapse without a reason, steel doesn’t melt in jet fuel, and buildings don’t blow up spontaneously, but when they are packed with explosives that are then detonated...
In the world of fiction created by Hollywood, special effects, and make-believe ‘magic’, however, events take a different course: Things can appear out of the blue sky and disappear in a puff of smoke without any reason, trace or explanation – we sometimes believe in the fantasy and 'magic' because of psychological conditioning, influence of rhetorical devices, or fulfillment of an emotional need.
Literary Theory
According to the literary theory, “‘narrative’ is a story or part of a story. A story is any form of text, regardless of medium, describing a sequence of events caused and experienced by characters, some of whom may be fictional.”
Narrative
Traditional Paradigm: “People are essentially thinking beings, basing their reasoned decisions on the merits of discussion and evidential reasoning; what is judged rational is determined by the knowledge and understanding displayed, and by how the case is argued.”
Walter Fisher’s Narrative Paradigm: “The Narrative Paradigm is a theory proposed by Walter Fisher that all meaningful communication is a form of storytelling or to give a report of events […] and so human beings experience and comprehend life as a series of ongoing narratives, each with their own conflicts, characters, beginnings, middles, and ends.
“In non-technical terms, no matter what the context (whether scientific, philosophical, legal, etc) a narrative is a story, an interpretation of some aspect of the world that is historically and culturally grounded and shaped by human personality (per Walter Fisher).”
Storytelling Animals: “Fisher offers a humanistic model of communication in that individuals take sometimes complex information and transform it into narratives. This characterizes humans as ‘storytelling animals’ exchanging messages with each other, and that each message is judged as credible in terms of its consistency and by reference to the values and beliefs of the audience.”
Narrative Rationality: “Fisher reacts against this model as [being] too limited and suggests a new paradigm of ‘narrative rationality’. He begins with the proposition that:
• People are essentially storytellers;
• Although people claim ‘good’ reasons for their decisions, these reasons include history, culture, and perceptions about the status and character of the other people involved (all of which may be subjective and incompletely understood);
• The test of narrative rationality is based on the probability, coherence and fidelity of the stories that underpin the immediate decisions to be made; and
• The world is a set of stories from which each individual chooses the ones that match his or her values and beliefs.”
In practice, both paradigms coexist; however, the people who are “essentially thinking beings, basing their reasoned decisions on the merits of discussion and evidential reasoning” are heavily outnumbered by the “storytelling animals” who apply subjective reasoning though their reasons are incompletely understood by them.
As every successful scriptwriter, film director, or magician knows, the scripts always target the majority audience!
Fiction
“Fiction is storytelling of imagined events and stands in contrast to non-fiction, which makes factual claims about reality.”
What’s a Plot?
Aristotle's says in Poetics, “a plot in literature is ‘the arrangement of incidents’ that (ideally) each follow plausibly from the other.”
A-Plot
“A-Plot is a cinema and television term referring to the plotline that really drives the story. This doesn't mean it's the most important, but rather the one that forces most of the action.”
The A-Plot in ‘The 9/11 Flying Carpets and the Magic Jet Fuel from Aladdin’s Lamp’ script is about a group of 19 lesser genies from Al-Cock-a-doodle-doo ‘terrorist’ clan who hate the Al-Anarkian way of life and their freedoms (!). They undergo training by the one surly Genie, Osama Bin Gurian [and his sidekicks, see Stock Characters] in the acts of black magic, sorcery and terror. They enter Al-Anarkia to wreak havoc. Rather than being turned away or arrested at the borders as genies of ill-repute (they are on the intelligence agencies ‘Terror Lists’) they are welcomed with open arms to Al-Anarkia. In fact, their entry to the country is made conveniently easy by the Mock Caliph himself, who has previously changed the Visa requirements for the genies. On entry to Al-Anarkia they are all being put under surveillance by the government’s numerous police and spy agencies. However, on the fateful morning of 9/11 the surveillance is mysteriously (and conveniently) lifted so that they could hijack four flying carpets and attack various targets… Their ‘success’ rate in hitting the targets and creating carnage proves to be phenomenal, even though they have little or no experience in flying or navigating flying carpets. The flying carpets, too, work as if by magic. They destroy tall towers and punch holes in thick layers of reinforced concrete. Shrub the Mock Caliph, Al-Anarkia’s superhero [are you kidding me?], and his sidekicks [the lesser, chicken heroes] then wage a long war against ‘terrorism’, or ‘War on Terror’, to ‘protect’ the citizens of Al-Anarkia, restore ‘democracy’, ‘freedom’ and ‘stability’ to all other countries that are ruled by despots like Ali-Baba. Ultimately, the plot aims to unite all of the white people in the ‘free’ countries against the poor ‘colored’ countries that breed ‘terrorists’ who hate ‘freedom!’ and Al-Anarkian way of life.
The A-Plot is mostly fictional and is used to shroud all but one of other subplots, the B-Plot. The B-Plot is semi-transparent, though not completely hidden.
In the B-Plot, the scriptwriters employ Foreshadowing, a literary device, by dropping subtle hints (which are amplified by the make-believe ‘renegade’ authors on the Internet and alternative media) about the plot. They leave the audience to work out the ‘real’ reasons behind the stated goal of the fictional ‘War on Terror’. The B-Plot is used as a fallback option, pumped with ‘we are doing all of this for you’ rhetoric. The B-Plot is meant to make the majority of the audience feel good (Schadenfreude, a German term meaning ‘pleasure taken from someone else's misfortune’) about maintaining their lifestyles despite the suffering that it brings to the others and despite the physical limitations and constraints imposed by nature.[The earth’s natural resources are running alarmingly low, the ecosystems are collapsing and Peak Oil is looming.] Capitalism is cannibalism. The big fish must eat the small fish to stay alive. Al-Anarkia would use 9/11 as a pretext to invade Poppyistan to build military bases poised against oil-producing countries (the vast opium fields would also be treat for the elite and security services). Al-Anarkia then invades Baghdad to control her vast oil reserves.
The B-Plot is the ultimate justification for the A-Plot and is used as a powerful Rhetorical Device to remedy any inconsistency that the audience might have noticed in the A-Plot. The Narrative goes something like this: “Why should we let these evil terrorists (man, women, children, babies and all) who don’t like our way of life, attack our country and kill our people be entitled to the oil in their countries when we, the ‘victims of terrorism’, have to cough up 3 dollars for a gallon of gas?”
The C-Plot is real. A desperate investor, The Ruined Man Who Became Rich Again Through A Dream, who has recently bought the lease for Twin Treasure Towers, plans to destroy the Towers (and another building, No. 7) during the 9/11 attacks and use the insurance money to rebuild them. The Towers are loss-making; however, to demolish and rebuild them by conventional means would prove prohibitively expensive. Also, The Man Who Stole the Dish of Gold Wherein The Dog Ate” and other perpetrators plan to rob the Twin Treasure Towers of vast quantities of gold bullions, precious stones, financial instruments and other valuables such as highly sensitive data… and possibly destroy certain damaging evidence that are stored therein) in the confusion created by the action in the fictional A-Plot. Also in this plot, the ‘defense’ industry plans to rake in billions in defense contracts. They devise diabolic schemes to sell individuals, businesses, airlines and governments new anti-missile missile systems that can intercept the terrorists’ nuclear missiles and other terrible weapons. Clearly, people need protection in their toilets, homes, offices, cars, planes, yachts … against the Poop Missiles, the missing WMD, that the Al-Cock-a-doodle-doo terrorists could defecate on them anyplace, anytime.
The D-Plot is arcane. Perceived enemies of Israel, the world’s 1.2 billion Moslems, must be annihilated and all of their land, water and oil reserves be given to Israelis, who need it to prosper and expand...as 'promised'.
The E-Plot is esoteric. It’s about Baghdad, the Babylonian Kabala and Rapture...
Plot Generator
A plot generator is “a fictional plot device which permits the generation of plots for an extended serial without requiring a great deal of logical connection between the episodes”. A plot generator allows the scriptwriters to introduce any idea the wish into the story.
“The TARDIS in the ‘Doctor Who’ [British] television series is the epitome of a plot generator, in that it can take the Doctor anywhere in space and time, where he can encounter anything the writers want him to encounter. The HoloDeck, introduced in the pilot of Star Trek: The Next Generation, could also be viewed as a plot generator, as its open ended nature allowed the show's writers to construct a number of stories later in the series.”
In “The 9/11 Flying Carpets and the Magic Jet Fuel from Aladdin’s Lamp” the plot generator is the one ‘Al-Cock-a-doodle-doo’ the ‘Terrorist Genies Without Borders’ a group capable of striking any target, anyplace, anytime to wreak havoc on innocent parties in the heart of the ‘free’ and ‘civilized world.’
Narrative Hook
“A narrative hook (or hook) is something in the opening of a story that "hooks" the reader's attention so that he will read on. One of the commonest forms is dramatic action, which engages the reader into wondering what the consequences of the action will be.
“One of the commonest forms is dramatic action, which engages the reader into wondering what the consequences of the action will be. This particular form has been recommended from the earliest days, stemming from Aristotle, and the widely used term ‘in medias res’ stems from the Roman Empire.”
In James bond movies the hook is often in the opening with an action-packed dramatic sequence.
In “The 9/11 Flying Carpets and the Magic Jet Fuel from Aladdin’s Lamp” the scriptwriters use the impact of the flying carpet against the Twin Treasure Towers as hook.
However, action in itself is regarded as an insufficient hook. The audience should be made to “wonder what will happen next, or what the reasons for the actions to occur were.”
Further, “overly dramatic openings may leave the reader indifferent because the characters acting or being acted on are non-entities; even murder of a faceless character may not engage interest.”
So the scriptwriters recommended the authorities in Al-Anarkia to employ a ‘Terror Alert System’ to create an additional and powerful hook. As the effect of the initial actions wane, the state of the ‘Terror Alert Condition’ is raised, e.g., from ‘blue for guarded’ to ‘yellow for elevated’ to ‘orange for high’ and possibly to ‘red for severe’; but rarely, if ever, down to ‘green!’.
Stock characters
A stock character is a fictional character that relies heavily on cultural types or stereotypes for its personality, manner of speech, and other characteristics. Stock characters are instantly recognizable to members of a given culture. Because of this, a frequent device of both comedy and parody is to wildly exaggerate the expected mannerisms of stock characters.
Plot Device
“A plot device is a person or an object introduced to a story to affect or advance the plot.” However, if a story is poorly-written the readers would notice “such awkward or contrived plot devices” that they would have ‘serious trouble maintaining suspension of disbelief; indeed, the devices may even leave plot holes.’”
Plot Devices: Chekhov's Gun; Cliffhanger; Deathtrap; Deus ex machina; Discovery; Eavesdropping; Flashing arrow; Foreshadowing; MacGuffin; Narrative hook; Pistol effect; Plot coupon; Plot dump; Plot generator; Plot point; Quest; Red herring; Reversal; Sexual tension; Stock character; Villain; Voyeurism.
Narrative Environment
“A narrative environment is a space, whether physical or virtual, in which stories can unfold. A virtual narrative environment might be the narrative framework in which game play can proceed. A physical narrative environment might be an exhibition area within a museum, or a foyer of a retail space, or the public spaces around a building - anywhere in short where stories can be told in space.”
In “The 9/11 Flying Carpets and the Magic Jet Fuel from Aladdin’s Lamp” the narrative environment is the Homeland and the rest of the ‘free world’ where the terrorists can strike at leisure anytime.
Quotes from: http://en.wikipedia.org/
Part IV – How can you tell the difference between real events and make-believe or ‘scripted events’ that are ‘acted out’ by ‘characters’, some or all of whom may be fictional?
Plot Devices, Plot Holes, Literary Techniques, Suspension of Disbelief, Continuity, Rhetorical Remedies, Verisimilitude, Truthiness...
Part IV – How can you tell the difference between real events and the make-believe or ‘scripted events’ that are ‘acted out’ by ‘characters’, some or all of whom may be fictional?
Before answering that question, let’s review Plot Devices, Rhetorical Remedies and other terms and definitions used by the movie and television industries.
Narratology
“Narratology is the theory and study of narrative and narrative structure and (...) the way they affect our perception.” The objects studied include “all kinds of narrated texts - both fiction (literature, poetry, etc.) and non-fiction (historiography, academic publishing, etc.), - as well as the dramatic structures, plot devices, characterization, settings, genres, and literary techniques.”
Continuity, Breaking the Fourth Wall, Suspension of Disbelief and Verisimilitude are important components of narratology.
Conceit
“Conceit is an extended metaphor, associated with metaphysical poetry, designed to push the limits of the imagination in order to portray something indescribable.”
Continuity
“Continuity is a very important aspect of any story. Per definition, it means the consistency of the characteristics of characters, plot, objects, places and events seen by the reader or the audience. To put it simpler, continuity includes everything about the universe where the story takes place - facts, history, common logic, laws of nature, etc. Ideally, these shouldn't contradict themselves.
Verisimilitude.
“In literature, the term denotes the extent to which the characters and actions in a work of fiction exhibit realism or authenticity, or otherwise conform to our sense of reality. A work with a high degree of verisimilitude means that the work is very realistic and believable; works of this nature are often said to be ‘true to life.’”
“Verisimilitude is also the willingness to suspend one's disbelief (even if the events or fictitious representations might otherwise be considered preposterous) when the intensity of the story or interest in the characters overrides the need to believe that things are scientifically correct.”
Suspension of disbelief
“Suspension of disbelief is a willingness of a reader or viewer to suspend his or her critical faculties to the extent of ignoring minor inconsistencies so as to enjoy a work of fiction.”
“Suspension of disbelief is an essential component of live theatre, where it was certainly recognised by Shakespeare”.
“The audience accepts limitations in the story being presented, sacrificing realism, and occasionally logic and believability for the sake of enjoyment [or to bring the story to a conclusion.]”
“Suspension of disbelief is also essential for the enjoyment of many movies and TV shows involving complex stunts and special effects. It's why many action movie fans are willing to accept the idea that the good guy can get away with shooting guns in public places or that cars will explode with a well-placed shot to the gas tank. It's also why many Dukes of Hazzard fans will accept the idea that a Dodge Charger can be jumped great distances with little to no damage to the car. Movies employing large amounts of CGI effects (such as the Matrix Trilogy or Terminator 2: Judgement Day) require a suspension of disbelief, as they are capable of portraying situations which clearly deviate from the laws of physics.”
“One of the most well known examples of suspension of disbelief is the acceptance that the iconic superhero, Superman, hides his identity from the world by simply donning a pair of glasses, wearing conservative clothing, and acting in a ‘mild mannered’ fashion, which contrasts with the large and in-charge personality of Superman. Not only is the disguise so thin as to be ridiculous, but the fact that the alter ego of Superman, Clark Kent, writes numerous stories about ‘The Man of Steel,’ and that his girlfriend, and later wife, is a constant source of Superman stories as well, which often involves her own rescue from the brink of death (which often involves her staring him in the face for several seconds), requires a high level of suspension of disbelief to accept that such circumstances could be a reality, where so few people discover Superman's secret identity. In the TV series, The Adventures of Superman, this absurdity was carried to an extreme. Lois and Jimmy were constantly suspecting Clark of being Superman, yet when obvious evidence was right in their faces (such as times when Clark was missing his glasses) they never saw the resemblance. (Noel Neill and Jack Larson, in DVD commentary, said their standard answer when questioned about this was, ‘We wanted to keep our jobs!’) In his book Superman: Serial to Cereal, author Gary Grossman pointed out the paradox that an audience was willing to accept the notion that a man could fly through the air, in defiance of all known laws of physics, and yet question the relatively mundane fact that his friends seemed too stupid to observe the obvious.”
Deviating From the Laws of Physics
Also deviating from the laws of physics, is the story of the two flying carpets in Al-Anarkia that with only a few drops of Magic Jet fuel left in them from Aladdin’s Lamp they manage to incinerate two 110-story skyscrapers. The buildings disintegrate and collapse at freefall speed. A third 47-story building on seeing the fate of its peers commits suicide collapsing symmetrically on its own footprint.
Breaking the Fourth Wall
“The fourth wall is part of the suspension of disbelief between a fictional work and an audience. The audience will usually passively accept the presence of the fourth wall without giving it any direct thought (...)”
The fourth wall is broken when “either a character or the scriptwriter addresses the audience directly so that the reader or audience may acknowledge what is being presented is fiction.” The repetitive use of ‘Breaking the Fourth Wall’ technique, however, extends “the world of the story to provide the illusion that [the audience] are included in it.”
In the script for ‘The 9/11 Flying Carpets and the Magic Jet Fuel from Aladdin’s Lamp’ the Al-Cock-a-doodle-do ‘terror’ group characters break the Fourth Wall by bombarding the audience with written statements, audiotapes and videotapes almost on a daily basis to extend the world of story to provide the illusion that the audience are definitely included in the script- and they better watch out because Al-Cock-a-doodle-do is watching everyone (!)
Setting
“Setting refers to the set of locations (or the entire world) where the story takes place.”
Ficton
“Ficton is an imaginary world that serves as the setting or backdrop for a story.” A ficton can be identical to our world (save a few details) or different from it in every aspect - depending on the wishes of the author.
Backstory
“Back-story, the story ‘behind’ or ‘before’ the events being portrayed in the story being told; past events or background for a character that can serve to color or add additional meaning to current circumstances. Provides extra depth to the story by anchoring it to external events, real or imagined.”
“The dramatic revelation of secrets from the back-story is a useful term for forming the story, recommended as far back as Aristotle's Poetics.”
Backstory for ‘The 9/11 Flying Carpets and the Magic Jet Fuel from Aladdin’s Lamp’ included multiple broadcasts of video clips and still photos of Osama Ben Gurian clutching a Kalashnikov and talking to his comrades. Also, a short clip of the alleged members of Al-Cock-a-doodle-doo doing gymnastics, jumping through burning rings… was shown over and over and over on Al-Anarkian TV stations such as FOX, JNN...
What the television audiences perceive as news bulletins are mostly scripted movies designed to achieve specific audience responses.
Background narratives in Al-anarkia:
The terrorists who don’t like our way of life; they waged war on us! Weapons of mass destruction (WMD). The axis of evil. We are the protectors of freedom. The Peak Oil! We must have undisrupted supply. China is a threat. We are the guardians of democracy. Israel is our ally: We must protect our Allies… and many other words and phrases strung together but completely void of meaning.
Stock Characters
“A stock character is a fictional character that relies heavily on cultural types or stereotypes for its personality, manner of speech, and other characteristics. Stock characters are instantly recognizable to members of a given culture.”
Stereotypes
“Stereotypes are considered to be a group concept, held by one social group about another. They are often used in a negative or prejudicial sense and are frequently used to justify certain discriminatory behaviours.”
Social stereotype
“Social stereotypes are cases of metonymy, where a subcategory has a socially recognized status as standing for the category as a whole, usually for the purpose of making quick judgments about people.”
“Social stereotypes take the negative characteristics of some and apply it to all in a given, often arbitrary, category. They are a tool of propaganda and divisive politics.”
Stereotypes of groups by other groups
“Common stereotypes include a variety of allegations about groups based around: race, ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, nationality, or religious belief; also profession and social class (see social stereotype).
The main stock character used in ‘The 9/11 Flying Carpets and the Magic Jet Fuel from Aladdin’s Lamp’ is the surly virtual genie Osama Ben Gurian personified as the ‘Dark Lord.’
The Dark Lord
The Dark Lord is ‘a sinister villain’ “with an entourage of henchpersons, usually bent on conquest of the world, galaxy, or universe.”
“A villain is an ‘evil’ character in a story, whether an historical narrative or, especially, a work of fiction. The villains are the bad guys, the characters who strive against the hero. Female villains are sometimes called villainesses.”
Psychological attributes
What makes a character into a villain is his/her capacity and willingness to act with evil motives.
“A common psychological feature of the movie villain is a haughty overconfidence that leads to the unnecessary explanation of one's sinister plans — which is sometimes just a cheap plot device used by the author to explain to the audience details which he/she could not express by more natural narrative means.”
Osama the surly virtual genie and his Al-Cock-a-doodle-do ‘terrorists without borders’ group issue statements after statements explaining their reasons for the hatred and detailing their plans to harm Al-anarkia and her interests.
Labeling
“In social terms, labels represent a way of differentiating and identifying people that is considered by many as a form of prejudice and discrimination.”
Stereotyping
“The most common method of 'labeling' people derives from a general way of perceiving members of a certain nationality, religion, ethnicity, gender, or some other group. When a majority of people hold a certain point of view towards a certain group, that point of view becomes a stereotype. That stereotype affects the way other people perceive the groups in question and the result is a 'label' that is metaphorically imposed on the members of the group in question. A member of a targeted group is thus 'labeled' by the larger society, and along with it, the nuances underlying the label, be it positive or negative, that aids in the formation of social stereotypes.”
Prejudice
The term Prejudice implies the process of ‘pre-judging’ something. “It implies coming to a judgment on a subject before learning where the preponderance of evidence actually lies, or forming a judgment without direct experience.”
“When applied to social groups, prejudice generally refers to existing biases toward the members of such groups, often based on social stereotypes”.
Allport’s Scale of Prejudice and Discrimination
Allport’s Scale of Prejudice measures the manifestation of prejudice in a society on a scale of 1 – 5.
Scale 1, Antilocution. “(...) a majority group freely make jokes about a minority group. Speech is in terms of negative stereotypes and negative images. This is also called hate speech. It is commonly seen as harmless by the majority. Antilocution itself may not be harmful, but it sets the stage for more severe outlets for prejudice. Examples are jokes about the Irish, French, blacks, gays, (...) Muslims etc.”
Scale 2 Avoidance. “People in a minority group are actively avoided by members of the majority group. No direct harm may be intended, but harm is done through isolation.”
Scale 3 Discrimination. “Minority group is discriminated against by denying them opportunities and services and so putting prejudice into action. Behaviours have the specific goal of harming the minority group by preventing them from achieving goals, getting education or jobs, etc. The majority group is actively trying to harm the minority.”
Scale 4. Physical Attack. “The majority group, vandalise minority group things, they burn property and carry out violent attacks on individuals or groups. Physical harm is done to members of the minority group. Examples are lynchings of blacks (...)”
Scale 5 Extermination. “The majority group seeks extermination of the minority group. They attempt to liquidate the entire group of people (e.g., Indian Wars to remove Native Americans [...] Ethnic cleansing in Bosnia, etc.).”
Prejudice Towards Arabs and Middle East
The script to pin the responsibility for the 9/11 events on the Arabs was written well before the events actually occurred- possibly as early as 1921.
In Western media
“Hollywood has been accused of using a disproportionate number of Arabs as villains and of depicting Arabs negatively and stereotypically. According to Godfrey Cheshire, a critic on the New York Press, ‘the only vicious racial stereotype that's not only still permitted but actively endorsed by Hollywood’ is that of Arabs as crazed terrorists.
“The 2000 film Rules of Engagement drew criticism from Arab groups, described as ‘probably the most racist film ever made against Arabs by Hollywood’ by the ADC. Paul Clinton of the Boston Globe wrote ‘at its worst, it's blatantly racist, using Arabs as cartoon-cutout bad guys’.
“Jack Shaheen [Professor Emeritus of Mass Communications at Southern Illinois University], in his book Reel Bad Arabs, surveyed more than 900 film appearances of Arab characters. Of those, only a dozen were positive and 50 were balanced. Shahee[n] writes ‘Seen through Hollywood's distorted lenses, Arabs look different and threatening.’”
“In his essay ‘Arabs in Hollywood: An Undeserved Image’, Scott J. Simon argues that of all the ethnic groups portrayed in Hollywood films, ‘Arab culture has been the most misunderstood and supplied with the worst stereotypes’:
“Rudolph Valentino's roles in The Sheik (1921) and The Son of the Sheik (1926) set the stage for the exploration and negative portrayal of Arabs in Hollywood films. Both The Sheik and The Son of the Sheik represented Arab characters as thieves, charlatans, murderers, and brutes.
“Other movies of the 1920s share a common theme of power-hungry, brutal Arabs ultimately defeated by white westerners:
The Song of Love (1923)
A Cafe in Cairo (1924)
The Desert Bride (1928)
“Simon singles out A Son of the Sahara (1924) as ‘the strongest subconscious attack on the Arab culture of all the Arab movies of the 1920s.’
“The same themes prevailed into the 1970s and beyond:
• Black Sunday (1977) concerns an Arab terrorist plot to bomb a stadium during the Super Bowl.
• The Black Stallion (1979) opens with Arabs mistreating a horse aboard a ship, then attacking a boy with a knife and stealing his life jacket.”
Billionaires, bombers, and belly dancers
“A report titled ‘100 Years of Anti-Arab and Anti-Muslim stereotyping’ by Mazin B. Qumsiyeh (director of media relations for the American Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee) specifies what some in the Arab American community call ‘the three B syndrome’: ‘Arabs in TV and movies are portrayed as either bombers, belly dancers, or billionaires’:
Thomas Edison made a short film in 1897 for his patented Kinetoscope in which "Arab" women with enticing clothes dance to seduce a male audience. The short clip was called Fatima Dances (Belly dancer stereotype). The trend has shifted over the years and was predominated by the ‘billionaires’ for a short while especially during the oil crises in the seventies. However, in the last 30 some years, the predominant stereotype by far has been the ‘Arab bombers.’
“In a piece in the Los Angeles Times published July 28, 1997, Laila Lalami offers a 12-step guide to making a successful Arab-bashing movie, including such items as ‘the villains must all have beards,’ ‘they must all wear keffiehs,’ ‘they must all have names like Ali, Abdul or Mustapha" and "have them threaten to blow something up.’”
“Jack Shaheen, Professor Emeritus of Mass Communications at Southern Illinois University, documented these trends in his book The TV Arab (ISBN 0879723092), which identifies more than 21 major movies released over ten years which show the U.S. military killing Arabs. These include:
• Iron Eagle (1986)
• Death Before Dishonor (1987)
• Navy SEALs (1990)
• Delta Force 3: The Killing Game (1991)
• Patriot Games (1992)
• Executive Decision (1996)
“In Reel Bad Arabs (ISBN 1844370194), Shaheen writes that ‘television's image of the Arab is omnipresent [and] is becoming a part of American folklore.’ He also writes that Arabs have ‘consistently appeared in American popular culture as billionaires, bombers, and belly dancers.’”
“Arab Muslims are fanatics who believe in a different god, who don't value human life as much as we do, they are intent on destroying us (the west) with their oil or with their terrorism; the men seek to abduct and brutally seduce our women; they are without family and reside in a primitive place (the desert) and behave like primitive beings. The women are subservient — resembling black crows — or we see them portrayed as mute, somewhat exotic harem maidens.”
“The movies which Shaheen identifies as the three worst in terms of negative portrayal of Arabs in modern films are:
• Wanted: Dead or Alive (1987); ‘Arab thugs... plan to ignite Los Angeles... killing millions.’
• True Lies (1994); "Arnold S. INC." shoots dead Palestinians like clay pigeons. "
• Rules of Engagement (2000); ‘a film which ‘justifies’ US Marines killing Arab women and children.’[Does that ring familiar?]
“In response to 9/11, previous negative portrayal of Arabs in the media (including their Muslim and South Asian counterparts) may have incited hate crimes against the Arab-American community.”
Plot Dump
“Plot dump, infodump, or exposition is a term used by the movie and television industries to describe a plot device by which critical elements of the plot, often involving the back-story, are not depicted directly but are instead elaborated in dialogue by one of the characters or by a narrator.”
In the script for ‘The 9/11 Flying Carpets and the Magic Jet Fuel from Aladdin’s Lamp’ the infodump was delivered by the Al-anarkian TV and ‘news’ media in the form of endless coverage and spin, and through major speeches and interviews given by the Mock Caliph, Ja’far the Evil Grand Vizier, the Pious Black Slave, Al-Rumsie the lesser Vizier and a host of other characters involved in the plot.
Rhetoric
“Generally, rhetoric is an art of persuasion through language, but it is also very often used in narrative - to draw the reader's attention to the text and to make the characters' conversations more realistic [where reality and logic are otherwise suppressed]. Various rhetorical devices may be used in order to achieve the author's goals and make the audience/reader understand and accept the point that the author was trying to make.”
“Both the terms ‘rhetoric’ and ‘sophistry’ are also used today in a pejorative or dismissive sense, when someone wants to distinguish between ‘empty’ words and action, or between true or accurate information and misinformation, propaganda, or ‘spin,’ or to denigrate specific forms of verbal reasoning as spurious. Nonetheless, rhetoric, as the art of persuasion, continues to play an important function in contemporary public life.”
Authors manipulate the language of their works to create a desired response from the reader. This is the realm of the rhetorical devices.
List of Rhetorical Remedies [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rhetoric]
Literary topos; Logical fallacies; Rhetorical figure; Ad captandum; Allusion; Anaptyxis; Ambiguity; Aphesis; Aphorism; Apologue; Aposiopesis; Archaism; Atticism; Brachyology; Cacophony; Circumlocution; Climax; Conceit; Eloquence; Enthymeme; Ethos; Euphemism; Figure of speech; Formal equivalence; Hendiadys; Hysteron-proteron; Idiom; Innuendo; Ipsedixitism; Kenning; List of pejorative political slogans; Merism; Mnemonic; Negation; Overdetermination; Parable; Paraphrase; Paraprosdokian; Pericope; Period; Perissologia; Praeteritio; Proverb; Rhetoric of science; Soundbite; Synchysis; Synesis; Synonymia; Tautology; Tertium comparationis; Trope; Truism; Word play.
Frame Story
“A frame story (also frame tale, frame narrative, etc.) is a narrative technique whereby a main story is composed, at least in part, for the purpose of organizing a set of shorter stories, each of which is a story within a story -- or for surrounding a single story within a story.”
In ‘The 9/11 Flying Carpets and the Magic Jet Fuel from Aladdin’s Lamp’ the impact of the flying carpets against the Twin Treasure Towers are employed as a frame story for both the other events on 9/11, and all other subsequent ‘terror’ attacks throughout the ‘universe.’
Magic Realism
“Magic realism (or magical realism) is a literary genre in which magical elements appear in an otherwise realistic setting.”
Common aspects of magical realist novels and films
Some or all of the following elements are found in many magical realist novels and films:
“
• Contains fantastical elements
• The fantastic elements may be intuitively ‘logical’ but are never explained
• Characters accept rather than question the logic of the magical element
• Exhibits a richness of sensory details
• Uses symbols and imagery extensively. Often phallic imagery is used without the reader/viewer consciously noticing it.
• Emotions and the sexuality of the human as a social construct are often developed upon in great detail
• Distorts time so that it is cyclical or so that it appears absent. Another technique is to collapse time in order to create a setting in which the present repeats or resembles the past
• Inverts cause and effect, for instance a character may suffer before a tragedy occurs
• Incorporates legend or folklore
• Presents events from multiple perspectives, such as those of belief and disbelief or the colonizers and the colonized
• Uses a mirroring of either past and present, astral and physical planes, or of characters
• Ends leaving the reader uncertain, whether to believe in the magical interpretation or the realist interpretation of the events in the story
“
Deus ex machina
Deus ex machina is a Latin phrase meaning "God from the Machine." It describes an unexpected, artificial, or improbable character, device, or event introduced suddenly in a work of fiction or drama to resolve a situation or untangle a plot(...) The phrase has been extended to refer to any resolution to a story which does not pay due regard to the story's internal logic and is so unlikely it challenges suspension of disbelief; allowing the author to conclude the story with an unlikely, but more palatable ending. In modern terms the Deus ex machina has also come to describe a person or thing that suddenly arrives and solves a seemingly insoluble difficulty.”
So, how can you tell the difference between real events and the make-believe or ‘scripted events’ that are ‘acted out’ by ‘characters’, some or all of whom may be fictional?
Plot Holes!
Plot holes? Yes, Plot holes. Real events occur sequentially and without any logical gaps. “Plot hole is a gap in a storyline that goes against the flow of logic set-up by the plot. Plot holes are usually seen as weaknesses and flaws in a story, and writers try to avoid them (...) to make their stories seem as realistic and lifelike as possible.”
“The viewing or reading audience notes a plot hole when something happens during the story that seems highly unlikely, or would be impossible to imitate in real life. If a bank robber's car is being chased by five or six police cruisers, and the bank robber successfully evades capture simply by making a left turn down a dark alley when all the pursuing officers ought to see this, that is seen as a plot hole.”
Discerning audiences almost always find plot holes no matter how well the scripts are written.
Quotes from http://en.wikipedia.org/
In Part V - A Multitude of Plot Holes in ‘The 9/11 Flying Carpets and the Magic Jet Fuel from Aladdin’s Lamp’
Coincidence?
Convenient timing, no?
Hmm... less than 24 hours after being quoted live on national TV,
Mineta is unemployed:
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Oliver North interviews Professor James Fetzer of http://www.st911.org/
on "Hannity and Colmes" of FoxNews
*****Thu Jun 22, 2006 9:45pm ET*****
http://tinyurl.com/my3k3
http://www.911podcasts.com/view.php?cat=0&med=0&ord=Name&strt=0&vid=122&epi=327&typ=0&form=0
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Transportation secretary resigns
*****Fri Jun 23, 2006 1:28pm ET*****
By John Crawley
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. Transportation Secretary Norman Mineta,
who spearheaded an unprecedented overhaul of transportation security
after the September 11 attacks, announced his resignation on
Friday....
http://tinyurl.com/hwhey
http://today.reuters.com/news/newsArticle.aspx?type=newsOne&storyID=2006-06-23T172752Z_01_WAT005901_RTRUKOC_0_US-BUSH-MINETA.xml
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Other related info:
http://www.physics.byu.edu/research/energy/htm7.html
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=964034652002408586
This preview clip from an Alex Jones documentary was what nailed it for me.
http://70.84.33.210/~infomedi/video/previews/170305martialpreview2.wmv
Al-anarkia is one of the only two countries in the universe where Jewish supporters of Israel can buy the lease for three loss-making buildings in her financial capital Dodge’em city, have the demolition experts (coordinated by the Caliphate’s evil Grand Vizier) blow them up into easily transportable chunks (having first warned the Israeli occupants to evacuate the buildings), receive full spectrum military protection from the Caliphate’s armed forces before, during and after the demolitions, get the Caliphate’s security services foot the bill for the demolitions, have the Transportation department haul away the debris at their expense (and on the double before they could be examined), receive full cooperation and logistics support from the city’s [degenerate] mayor (who couldn’t give a damn as dozens of his brave firefighters were being sent to their deaths- was subsequently knighted by QE2 presumably for his chivalry and bravery at keeping a straight face and not spilling the beans), successfully claim the insurance money... and get the disinformation experts to tell everyone that the ‘Jews’ didn’t do it (the Martians who own the big oil did it!)
GeorgeWashington, I enjoy your blog.
Are their other entries that go back beyond the "Last 10 Posts"?
Do you have an accessible archive?
I've learned a lot from what you have posted.
Thanks.
Part V - A Multitude of Plot Holes in 'The 9/11 Flying Carpets and the Magic Jet Fuel from Aladdin's Lamp'
Plot holes, you may recall, pop out when 'something happens during the story that seems highly unlikely, or would be impossible to imitate in real life.'
The first series of big plot holes in the fictional tale of 'The 9/11 Flying Carpets and the Magic Jet Fuel from Aladdin’s Lamp' appear just as the plot is about to unfold. The unreal events that generate the plot include:
[Plot hole] A group of 19 lesser genies from Al-Cock-a-doodle-doo 'terrorist genies without borders' having received training in the acts of black magic, sorcery and terror from the surly virtual Genie, Osama Bin Gurian [and his sidekicks], enter Al-Anarkia to wreak havoc UNCHALLENGED.
How could that be?
[Plot hole] Al-anarkia wastes over 1 trillion dollars in ‘defense spending’ each year and has established military bases in 130 countries throughout the universe. She trains tens of thousands of agents, spies, informers, terror specialists, fake terror networks [set up to train and entrap the ‘real terrorists’], pimps, drug dealers, street fighters, terror gangs... in EVERY single country throughout the universe.
How could the ‘terrorists’ score so high and with such apparent ease? Well, er... actually they didn't.
REM: Deus ex machine?
Deus ex machine, a Latin phrase meaning ‘God from the Machine,’ describes an “unexpected, artificial, or improbable character, device, or event introduced suddenly in a work of fiction or drama to resolve a situation or untangle a plot.”
And why would they want to do such things?
[Plot hole] The genies want to kill Al-anarkians because, we are told, “they hate our freedoms!”
[Plot hole] Rather than being turned away or arrested at the borders as genies of ill-repute (we learn that they are on the intelligence agencies ‘Terror Lists’) they are welcomed to Al-anarkia with open arms. [Bear in mind that Al-anarkia’s annual defense budget tops 1 trillion dollars, and her spying agencies control every phone call, email, fax...]
[Plot hole] In fact, their entry to the country is made conveniently easy by the Mock Caliph himself, who has previously changed the Visa requirements for the genies.
[Plot hole] On the fateful morning of 9/11 they hijack four flying carpets and attack various targets [according to the official account]... Their 100 percent success rate in hijacking the 4 carpets can only be superhuman! Such high rates of success are only achievable in fiction or in videogames.
[Plot hole] They manage to fly the carpets and hit the intended targets hundreds of miles away even though they have little or no experience in flying or navigating the flying carpets.
REM: Ficton
“Ficton is an imaginary world that serves as the setting or backdrop for a story. A ficton can be identical to our world (save a few details) or different from it in every aspect - depending on the wishes of the author.”
continued...
Part V
(continued…)
More technical notes:
Procatalepsis
“A procatalepsis is a rhetorical figure or strategy in which the [script]writer raises an objection and then immediately answers it; by doing so, the writer seeks to strengthen his argument by dealing with possible objections before his audience can raise counter-arguments.”
Ever since 9/11 there have been many reports of terrorist activities in Al-anarkia. These reports are either fictitious, or the acts are engineered by Al-anarkia authorities for at least two reasons:
1. A procatalepsis to preempt the audience who might ask questions like, “why don’t the terrorist do something, are they on a strike? A religious holiday?”
2. As additional hooks (see notes on ‘Narrative Hook’ in Part III) to keep the audience on their toes.
“Imagery is any literary reference to the five senses (sight, touch, smell, hearing, and taste). Essentially, imagery is a group of words that create a mental image. Such images can be created by using figures of speech such as similes, metaphors, personification, and assonance.”
So the word “terrorist” automatically projects in the mind of the audience one or more of the desired 9/11 images that have been televised over and over again, inducing an avalanche of reactions, especially subconscious.
“Imagery is also the term used to refer to the creation (or re-creation) of any experience in the mind – auditory, visual, tactile, olfactory, gustatory, kinesthetic, organic. It is a cognitive process employed by most, if not all, humans. When thinking about a previous or upcoming event, people commonly use imagery.”
Equally, any reference to 9/11 plays a ‘parade of horribles’ in the mind of the audience.
“Remembered imagery is mostly based on what an individual has already experienced. People have a clear image of those ‘experienced’ things, which they can recall at will.”
Any reference to 9/11 [or to terrorism] falsely projects the image of the ‘Arab terrorists’ in the mind of the audience...
“Imaginary imagery does not seem to have a corresponding equivalent in the real world -- often it is a strange combination of remembered images, or of remembered images mixed with confabulation.”
[Recommended reading: Confabulation, or the confusion of imagination with memory; false memories; Korsakoff's syndrome; induced confabulation and choice blindness, psychologist Petter Johansson’s experiment; Cognitive psychology ”
Audience surrogate
“In the study of literature, an audience surrogate is a character who expresses the questions and confusion of the reader. It is a device frequently used in detective fiction and science fiction.
“In detective fiction, the audience surrogate is usually a minor character that asks a central character how he or she accomplished certain deeds, for the purpose of inciting that character to explain (for the curious audience) his or her methods.
“In science fiction, the audience surrogate frequently takes the form of a child or other uninformed person, asking a relatively educated person to explain what amounts to the backstory.
“In superhero comics, the audience surrogate is often the sidekick of the hero. The earliest example of this is Batman's sidekick, Robin, who was created specifically for this purpose.”
“A revealing line in mystery or science fiction stories is that after the author explains the backstory, the audience surrogate will frequently utter lines to the effect of: "Well, when you put it that way, even I can understand!"
In Al-anarkia, the audience surrogates are quadruplet: Firstly, the ‘supervillain’ himself (the virtual surly genie Osama Ben Gurian) who explains everything to such minute details that even [rather especially] the ‘dumbest redneck’ in town could understand him; secondly, his numerous sidekicks who regularly appear on the media and make numerous statements about their ‘terror plots’; thirdly, the ‘quote whores’ (i.e., the journalists, news anchors, political analysts, ex-generals, the ubiquitous Israeli security experts…); fourthly, senior members of the Al-anarkia administration.
MacGuffin
“A MacGuffin (sometimes McGuffin or Maguffin) is a plot device that motivates the characters and advances the story, but has little other relevance to the story itself.”
“The element that distinguishes a MacGuffin from other types of plot devices is that it is not important what object the MacGuffin specifically is. Anything that serves as a motivation will do. A true MacGuffin is essentially interchangeable. Its importance will generally be accepted completely by the story's characters, with minimal explanation. From the audience's perspective, the MacGuffin is not the point of the story.
“The technique is common in films, especially thrillers. Commonly, though not always, the MacGuffin is the central focus of the film in the first act, and then declines in significance as the struggles and motivations of the characters take center stage. Sometimes the MacGuffin is all but forgotten by the end of the film.
“Because a MacGuffin is, by definition, ultimately unimportant to the story, its use can test the suspension of disbelief of audiences. Well-done works will compensate for this, with a good story, interesting characters, talented acting/writing, and so on. Poorer works, which fail in those areas, often only highlight a MacGuffin, sometimes to the point of ridiculousness. MacGuffins may be acceptable to the general audience, but fail to be believable for experts in the subject matter (such as a particular technology, or historical detail).”
The main MacGuffin used after the 9/11 events in Al-anarkia caliphate were the imaginary weapons of mass destruction (WMD).
Source of quotes: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/
911Poller said...
When do you get to the part of actually providing evidence of explosives instead of just speculation????
Would you believe a few eyewitnesses or the sounds of your own ears?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lD4NOlUF3A4
I know all of you know about folding old US money and how it shows the Twin Towers being hit in progression. The $5 dollar bill shows the two towers as they were before they were hit, the $10 dollar bill Shows the first tower getting hit, The $20 Shows both towers after they were hit, With the actual locations of the plane hits of both towers being shown, and the $50 dollar bill shows both towers gone with juust a smoke curl rising in the aftermath. I noticed something though I have never seen anyone else show, on the flipside of the $20, It is a Pic of the Pentagon after it was hit in the center. Check it out
the reason for this is that when the towers were being constructed, engineers needed a way to save money. They saved millions by trying to make the building more protective on the outside, instead of making a stronger interior. This led the towers extremely vulnerable, but engineers never put much thought of attacks into their blueprints. It was just a way to cut the bottom line.
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