Loose Change

A friend gave me a DVD copy of the film "Loose Change". We watched the DVD last weekend. This film is a documentary that asserts that the 9/11 attacks were made by the American government. The film is available for purchase from the "Loose Change" website or available for free from a variety of sources. The makers of the film are more interested in spreading the information than making money from the film. In May of this year, it was the top downloaded video from the Google Video service. It was scheduled to be viewed at the British Houses of Parliament earlier this month. Though there is some confusion whether this actually happened or not. At the end of the video, the creators ask that you share the DVD with friends and make copies for friends. In this spirit, my friend made a copy for me. I have already been asked by another friend to make a copy for them. I have never made a copy of a DVD, so I will probably loan the DVD to them.

"Loose Change" has a similar format as a Michael Moore film. It examines many aspects of the tragedy. The film shows a number of publicly available video clips and pictures. Over these scenes, the narrator (Dylan Avery) makes assertions on why the events were not a plot led by Osama Bin Laden, but a plot by the American government. The movie moves along at a rapid pace and I never found myself bored. As I was watching the movie, I kept going "Wow, that is interesting." I wasn't really sure how much to believe what I was seeing, but the ideas were presented in a compelling fashion.

While the movie is entertaining, it contains numerous errors. Mark Edwards has created a "Loose Change Viewers Guide" which asserts "I counted 81 errors of fact (statements like "1+1 = 3"). In addition, I counted 345 instances of conjecture not supported by evidence, logical fallacies, uses of images that do not support the conclusions being drawn, and other flubs. And that's only counting errors of commission. The errors of omission are more serious. (Note: I have turned up more errors while doing this update, but I find it too depressing to count them.)"

For example, the movie asserts that the attack on the Pentagon may have been caused by a small plane or a cruise missile rather than an airliner. However the Wiki page points out that, "major omissions about the Pentagon attack include not mentioning that dozens of eyewitnesses state that they saw an American Airlines jet strike the Pentagon, that tons of Flight 77 debris was recovered there, along with numerous personal effects of passengers, and that all but one of flight 77's victims' remains were positively identified by forensics experts. No attempt is made in "Loose Change" to interview – or to present the findings of – the thousands of experts who were involved in the 9/11 investigations."

After watching the film I am reminded of the conspiracy theories about JFK's death. However, it is conceivable to me that a small number of people could have pulled off the JFK conspiracy. The conspiracy presented in this film would require large amounts of people (I would guess hundreds). I find it hard to believe that hundreds of people could be involved in this and no one would come forward by now. Furthermore, even other believers of 9/11 conspiracy theories have criticized this movie for its errors. Having said that I still think it was an entertaining movie and I am glad that I got a chance to watch it.