Everyone Must Check In

Empiricism and Sandy Hook

In a presentation on 9/11 available on YouTube, Professor Judy Wood makes the very important point that the question “what happened?” is vital. Her reasoning is that we can only ask why and how after we have answered the question ‘what’. If we fail to understand what actually happened during an event, then our interpretations of why and how it happened will be necessarily incorrect. Professor Wood carefully examines all the available evidence - photographic, video, eyewitness and seismic - and draws the conclusion that a million tons of concrete and steel was turned into a giant dust cloud on 9/11 - and we didn’t notice at the time. Having had this established we are now free to explore the why and the how. But ‘what happened’ comes first; it must be answered using all the available evidence so that we can then reconstruct the event to the best of our ability.

What happened at Sandy Hook on December 14th, 2012? The official story is that 20 children and six teachers at an elementary school were killed by a young man. But from the very beginning of the story, ‘what happened?’ is a question you’re simply not allowed to ask. If you do, you’re sick for questioning the grief of the parents, or you’re sick for asking questions about dead children, or you’re just using the deaths of the children for gain, politics or fame:

The dead children are a given you see. This aspect of the tragedy cannot be questioned. Didn’t you see all the media interviews of the grieving parents? Just what kind of sicko are you?

In other words, the vital preliminary step of asking ‘what happened’ has been cut off at the knees, squashed, made verboten. There are dead kids. It was a tragedy. Let’s move on. But as we approach the tenth anniversary of the event, it is very reasonable to question whether there were any dead children at all:

• no-one was allowed to see the bodies

• the parents were not allowed to take custody of their children’s bodies

• no-one cleaned up the blood

• first responders were not allowed to approach the school

• the chief medical examiner seemed unsure about how they died

• at least one victim appeared alive and well on President Obama’s lap the next day

• at least one parent, with a background in acting, had a dual-role on the day as a first responder and later as a parent calling for gun control

• the horrible and disfiguring grief of parents who have lost a child, which I have seen personally, was conspicuously absent from the parents on TV

• so-called family photographs are poorly photoshopped or tampered with

• one parent is not only seen smiling and laughing before he appears in front of the cameras but later he is seeing smiling at his daughter’s funeral

• official FBI reports show zero murders in Newtown, Connecticut for 2012

I have absolutely no desire for fame, politics or gain, neither am I sick in the head. These are just a few of the questions I would like to see answered. And I really do mean a few: I have hundreds that haven’t been answered by the authorities. At all. Of course the media has written quite a few pieces debunking all the conspiracy theories about Sandy Hook but as Miles Mathis points out, “publishing an article with the title Debunked does not automatically mean the theory has been debunked. You actually have to make a strong argument.” None of these pieces do. At least, not ones I’ve ever come across.

With what we’ve been told about Sandy Hook, it’s easier to ask the question ‘what didn’t happen?’ than the other way around. And that’s not a good sign. As the tenth anniversary approaches, I shall continue to ask ‘what happened?’