Last Friday, most Americans marked the 25th anniversary of 9/11 as a day the country came under attack from an external enemy. In East Harlem, a very different crowd gathered to search for an enemy within.
The occasion was Turning the Tide 2026, a four-day convention of what participants call the 9/11 truth movement. The opening night took place in the auditorium of El Museo del Barrio, a room that can hold more than 500 people. Only a few dozen showed up.
The audience skewed older. The scene was described as gray-bearded boomers and women in keffiyehs. The setting itself did some of the talking: century-old murals of fairy tales lined the walls while the crowd listened to a familiar one of its own.
Roger Waters was there, and he put the movement's mood into one line: 'Where is the younger generation?' he asked. 'Why aren’t they out in the streets in the fucking millions going, 'This is insane!''
Waters, 83, remains a major figure in the movement's orbit. But his celebrity has faded after years of public controversy. In 2023, he dressed in a Nazi-esque leather uniform in Berlin during a concert, which led to an investigation by German police. That same year, the documentary 'The Dark Side of Roger Waters' featured former artistic collaborators accusing him of antisemitism. He denies the claim and sued the filmmakers unsuccessfully.
What matters here is not simply one performer's unraveling public image. It is the durability of conspiracy culture itself. Even after a quarter century, after memorials, archives, investigations, and public memory have hardened around the events of September 11, a small audience still gathers to insist the real story has not been told.
That persistence has a cost. It weakens trust in institutions, rewards grievance over evidence, and gives the most reckless voices a stage long after the facts have moved on. Say it plainly: a free society depends on argument, dissent, and skepticism, but it cannot function if every settled event becomes an endless hunt for hidden enemies.
The record is public. What happened on September 11, 2001, is no longer a blank page waiting for a dramatic rewrite. The consequence of treating it that way is not insight. It is self-inflicted confusion, and the people most likely to pay for it are ordinary citizens trying to separate evidence from theater.
