Global Research, January 22, 2016
Professor James Tracy was fired by his university for his writings on the Sandy Hook School massacre, in which he questions the validity of the “official” version of events. Whatever one’s views regarding Professor Tracy’s analysis, this action by Florida Atlantic University constitutes a blatant violation of academic freedom. (GR Editor, M. Ch.)
This article was originally written in November 2015. Many have accused this author of teaching “conspiracy theories” to college students. Contrary to critics’ assertions, however, events such as the Sandy Hook School massacre or Boston Marathon bombing were never addressed in any courses taught at his former university.
Only in the last college class he taught over a twenty year career in academe (13 of which were spent at Florida Atlantic University) did he have a chance to carefully examine and discuss September 11, 
2001, or, more specifically, the US government’s official 9/11 conspiracy theory.-JFT
2001, or, more specifically, the US government’s official 9/11 conspiracy theory.-JFT
An enduring psychological effect of “the propaganda of the event” is a foremost element of all modern forms of war. Advances in hidden governance and concentrated media ownership have made the “war on terror” possible via increasingly fine-tuned trauma based mind control–in other words the enforcement of belief through overwhelming events subsequently placed in meaningful narrative context absent any contradictory information.
Such a phenomenon is readily apparent among the younger generations, particularly as they have come to rely on US government-sponsored conspiracy theories in order to make sense of momentous political events bearing upon their lives. Despite their irrational nature and profound shortcomings, such conspiracy theories are unquestioningly accepted as valid by an overwhelming majority of journalists and academics, who then repeat them as fact to their respective constituents.
This author recently taught an undergraduate media studies class where he chose to specifically address news coverage of September 11, 2001 and the broader history of false flag terrorism. This was the first time one specific historical incident was focused on throughout the term, and the overall approach involved cultivating students’ understandings and recollections of those events as the foundation of a working model that might demonstrate how such significant events and their re-presentation by corporate media and educational institutions actively hinder honest attempts to make sense of that tragic day, and thereby our present political location and historical moment.
Despite the academy’s progressive veneer, with few exceptions 9/11 and similar deep events are actively eschewed even by self-professed “radical” scholars, otherwise quick to take up questions of social and political power, particularly as they pertain to race, class, or gender. Taking their cue from public intellectuals such as Noam Chomsky,[1] they conclude that such questions interfere with analyses of ongoing “oppression,” not to mention potentially jeopardizing personal economic opportunities (i.e. accumulation of “cultural capital”) inevitably bound up in professional reputation. Unfortunately, this author’s experience suggests how such assumptions only tend to prolong and exacerbate the psychological trauma and detachment from historical reality many students still harbor as a direct result of 9/11.
More:
http://www.globalresearch.ca/teaching-911-to-conspiracy-theorists/5502360
More:
http://www.globalresearch.ca/teaching-911-to-conspiracy-theorists/5502360
