Isn't the simplest explanation that the people in the photographs, Asian, Caucasian, pro-China and pro-Tibetan independence, were on the way to the relay as individuals or in small groups and simply intermingled en-route?

As for the absence of the guards; that is easily explained. Jin Jing's torch had not yet been lit and the guards were busy protecting the real Olympic Torch – the one carrying the Olympic Flame.

Of course no arguments can convince hard-core conspiracy theorists. Like the White Queen in Alice through the Looking Glass, they can believe six impossible things before breakfast.

For example some bloggers say China staged the Lhasa riots to justify a crackdown. But why would China provoke trouble on the sensitive question of Tibet in the middle of Olympic year? An American blogger answered that a genuine uprising would have been timed to coincide with the games themselves or the torch relay; proof that the March riots were faked. Expecting disruption, Beijing decided to retaliate first to get the trouble out of the way before the Games began.

Well, from Beijing's point of view didn't the plan work brilliantly?

It is interesting to recall how the story of the Lhasa riots evolved. Economist journalist James Miles reported attacks by Tibetans on Han and Hui-owned businesses. The New York Times later commented on the initially slow police response. The conspiracy theorists claimed the authorities deliberately withdrew police to allow the rioters a free hand. Then a picture apparently showing soldiers carrying monks clothing (actually a much earlier photograph of film extras) was circulated on the internet and reprinted by some western media. The Dalai Lama remarked that he had heard of "police in monk's clothes". The circle was complete.

The back to front reasoning of the Tibet conspiracy theorists recalls the popular blogosphere fantasy that George W. Bush, Dick Cheney staged the 9/11 attacks to justify the invasion of Iraq. Ignoring the obvious question as to why Bush and Cheney framed a bunch of Saudis to justify attacking a different country altogether, the bloggers cite dozens of factoids in support of their views, for example the allegedly "large number" of Jewish employees who took sick leave on September 11th. Doesn't that remind you of the "convenient absence" of guards when Jin Jing was attacked?

Unfortunately, the blogosphere has become home to every crank, crackpot, fantasist and green inker on the planet. Among the craziest theories is the idea that a secret World Government has been established, according to taste, by the Illuminati, the Cathars, the Anti-Christ, lizards from Outer Space, the Jews, or the Vatican. How long will it be before some reincarnation of Fu Manchu takes his place in the list?

Many of the hard-core green inkers form part of the elite American division of the blogosphere, which for want of a better word, we may call the lunosphere. But they have their counterparts in other countries, including China. A Chinese nationalist once told me solemnly that Stalin and Mao had conspired to separate Outer Mongolia from China; this despite the fact that in 1921 when the Mongolian state was founded, neither Mao nor Stalin was in power.

As to Jin Jing she now has problems of her own. Just weeks after becoming a national hero, in the eyes of some ultra-nationalist bloggers she has become a villain for failing to throw her weight behind a boycott of French supermarket chain Carrefour. The nightmare world of the conspiracy theorists respects neither truth nor people.

(China.org.cn April 22, 2008)