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Coming to terms: the words believers, skeptics and the general public use differently

Mark Horne
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Coming to terms: the words believers, skeptics and the general public use differently

English is a wonderfully flexible language, and modern lexicographers tend towards descriptivism rather than trying to stem the tide of new meanings. Definitions change with usage, with one most notable example being “literally”, which in English dictionaries has both the original meaning, and also the sense often employed today, in which literally is used to mean “virtually” or “metaphorically”. While it upsets Daily Mail comment pedants, this is how English has always worked; if a term is widely used to mean something, then that’s what it means. 

Which brings us to a different group of pedants: skeptics. I confess that I have railed against the use of certain terms being used incorrectly – and suspect many readers have too. Where should we stand our semantic ground, and where are we trying to close the linguistic barn door after the horse has bolted?

‘UFOs’

  • What some more pedantic skeptics think it means: unidentified objects that are, you know, flying. 
  • What everyone else thinks it means: alien spaceships
Two characters are pulling tug of war style against a rope that spells out "UFO" - a speech bubble above the two characters show a battle between space ships and uncertainty (depicted by question marks).

I hear UFO and think that the speaker means an object that’s flying and hasn’t been specifically identified. Unfortunately, the rest of the world thinks of alien spaceships, to the point that the Cambridge Dictionary definition is: 

an object seen in the sky that is thought to be a spacecraft from another planet

While Merriam Webster is a little more cautious: 

a mysterious flying object in the sky that is sometimes assumed to be a spaceship from another planet

UFOs are currently a more lively area of discussion than they have been for years, as the US government has released a lot of UFO reports and footage – which is to say, footage of aerial phenomena that have not been identified. 

The reports make it very clear that they believe some reports to be “sensor errors, spoofing, or observer misperception” and that others may be “technologies deployed by China, Russia, another nation, or non-governmental entity”, rather than presuming aliens, though that explanation isn’t ruled out. Someone in the US government has been thinking hard about this very issue, referring to UAP – unexplained aerial phenomena – rather than UFOs, presumably in an effort to avoid the assumptions and stigma associated with the term. Those efforts are laudable and maybe an approach for us to consider pursuing, but for now everyone from The Economist to The New York Times still goes with the term UFO in their headlines. 

It seems to me that we skeptical pedants have already lost this one.

‘Chiropractors’ (also: ‘Osteopaths’)

  • What skeptics think it means: Pseudoscientific practitioners of unproven and broadly ineffective treatments that use spinal manipulation. 
  • What everyone else a lot of other people think it means: back doctors.
Two characters tug at the word "chiropractic" - one is directing the tail of the "rope" she tugs at towards a bottle of snake oil, the other towards a depiction of a spine. The latter character's piece of rope is now shaped like a stethoscope.

This was one of several early entry points for me to the world of skepticism. A ridiculously tall chap, I was prone to joint and back pain even in my relative youth. On one visit to the doctor I mused out loud that maybe what I needed was to be referred to a chiropractor or osteopath. The GP almost physically recoiled from me and assured me that while physiotherapy might be required, an osteopath or chiropractor most certainly was not. Your curious young author went home and spent a good amount of time on the internet untangling the difference. 

Like a good portion of the general public, I had mistakenly thought that chiropractor simply referred to specialist back doctors, when of course chiropractic is based on the idea that vertebral misalignment is responsible for all manner of health conditions, and can be cured through spinal manipulation. Of course studies have failed to show that it is an effective treatment for any condition, although there may be some evidence for use in certain back conditions. 

Osteopathy is a little different, with osteopathy now increasingly merging in the USA with mainstream medicine, but the origin of osteopathy is found in pseudoscientific roots rather like chiropractic, with its founder Andrew Still claiming that he could “shake a child and stop scarlet fever, croup, diphtheria, and cure whooping cough in three days by a wring of its neck.” Yikes. 

This one isn’t over, and as skeptics we should at least try to stem the tide here. If you have muscle pain, you need a physiotherapist. If you somehow missed your vaccines as a baby and have diphtheria then you need to seek urgent medical attention and antibiotics, not to be shaken or have your spine manipulated. 

This distinction is well worth maintaining. 

‘Placebo’ / ‘Placebo Effect’

  • What some GPs and doctors mean: placebos are something innocuous that you know won’t help, given to make a patient feel better temporarily, and to get the patient off your back in the process. 
  • What some scientists and skeptics mean: patients in the placebo arm of a randomised controlled trial (RCT) to test the efficacy of a drug will be given an inert substance that looks, tastes and seems a lot like the actual treatment. The placebo effect refers to all the factors beyond the study’s control – regression to the mean, subjective improvements, other researcher errors, and so forth. 
  • What some other skeptics, medics and scientists mean: innocuous placebo treatments create an effect, presumably caused by some hitherto unknown mechanism, that not only creates subjective improvements, but somehow also objective improvements. 
  • What everyone else thinks: Everyone else is confused, and who can blame them when they have different qualified groups sending them such mixed messages. 
Two characters tug at a rope shaped like the word "placebo" - above one is a thought cloud with a smiley face holding a pill, above the other is a graph with multiple data points.

Clinical researchers have known since the introduction of randomised controlled trials (RCTs) that the placebo effect was describing the bias, error, illusory effects, conditioning, and subjective improvements that they needed to account for when testing the efficacy of a new drug. The whole point of placebos, a term much older than the RCT, is that they provide an innocuous soothing result in a patient, but that they don’t do anything.

Somehow along the way (and discussed in detail by Mike Hall in more than a few episodes of the Skeptics with a K podcast) other scientists, researchers and even skeptics misunderstood this and started assuming that placebos were having real effects that could create actual, objective improvements in medical conditions, including, most famously, Dr Ben Goldacre:

The placebo effect, similarly, can mislead us all: people really can get better, in some cases, simply from taking a dummy pill with no active ingredients, and by believing their treatments to be effective.

This is not the case, however. It has been found that the effect of placebo on the patient is subjective rather than objective. Patients given sugar pills feel better, but they are not actually objectively any better. 

This is one of those times when both UK and US dictionaries have this down entirely correctly, and it is incumbent upon skeptics to educate ourselves and others, because purveyors of pseudosciences such as acupuncture are already using the “powerful placebo” myth to justify their nonsense. 

‘Risk’ (increased / reduced)

  • What scientists often mean: the measured increase or decrease in the probability of a specific thing happening when you change a variable, compared to baseline for the situation.
  • What almost everyone hears: if I do this thing I will be safe / If I do this thing I will be in terrible danger.
Two characters tug at a piece of rope shaped like the word "risk" - above one is a plate of sausages and bacon, above another a revolver with two bullets beside it.

Apples fight cancer (and heart disease, and strokes) says The Daily Mail, an organ renowned for its apparent mission to decide whether everything either cures or causes cancer:

The latest pioneering research in America has revealed that drinking apple juice and eating apples can reduce the risk of heart disease. 

As obsessive as the Daily Mail is on this subject, many other news organisations also report on this sort of thing, with one recent prominent example being the finding that consuming bacon and other processed meats: 

can significantly raise the risk of bowel cancer, one of the deadliest forms of the disease. 

The word I’m picking on here is risk (though I could have picked on significant) and the inability of newspapers remember to include the word “relative” when appropriate. Statistics are complicated, but I am sure that the average mid-market tabloid reader can cope with the following, as explained by JV Chamary: 

Many people will interpret “increases the risk of colorectal cancer by 18%” to mean a rise from zero to 18%. But that increase isn’t absolute risk – it’s the relative risk.

To put the figure in perspective: the risk of developing lung cancer is 23.6 times higher among male smokers than non-smokers, so smoking increases the relative risk by 2360%. So if you started with a hypothetical 5% risk of developing bowel cancer, consuming 50g of bacon every day would only raise your risk to almost 6%.

This detail was in the original research, of course, but it is absent from some of the coverage and only alluded to indirectly in the other coverage. 

Does it matter? We all know a balanced diet and minimising comparatively unhealthy foods like bacon is for the best, but in the middle of a global pandemic, understanding risk in a more nuanced way is more important than ever. As vaccine take-up slows in the UK we have probably all spoken with friends and family hesitant to be vaccinated, as they are concerned about the risks of the vaccine, even though (comparing like with like) COVID-19 is a greater risk in all adult groups compared to the Pfizer vaccine, and all age groups over 30s for the AstraZeneca vaccine. 

I know that bold statements in headlines sell papers and attract eyeballs, but if people misunderstand the risk of being vaccinated (after all, it is not risk-free) compared to the risk of COVID-19, then unfortunately people could die. 

‘Theory’ 

Two characters tug at a rope shaped like the word "theory". Above one is a tree with roots, above the other a dandelion seed head with seeds floating into the sky.

This is a source of enormous frustration for anyone arguing with creationists, who are known to insist that the theory of evolution is “only a theory”. Evolution by natural selection is a theory, of course – and it is fact! – but this argument relies partly on the lay use of the word theory, which does literally mean speculation, at least in one common usage, and has done since the late 16th century, some decades before it was used in a more scientific context. 

There’s very little that can be done about this, except to be aware of the divergence in meaning in a lay and scientific context, and to remember that if you’re arguing with a creationist online you’re probably not going to convince them anyway. 

‘Critical thinking’

  • What most skeptics and educators mean: analysing facts carefully to come to a reasoned judgement. 
  • What other skeptics mean: I’m a critical thinker and can point out logical flaws in arguments, so I’m always right. 
  • What some other people assume is meant: criticising.
Two characters tug at a piece of rope shaped like the words "critical thinking". Above one, the thought bubble depicts a pathway through a maze, above the other the thought bubble depicts a thumbs down.

Obviously critical thinking and criticism are different, but it isn’t helpful that some dictionaries, including Merriam Webster, don’t even attempt to define this one. 

University websites are rather more useful, and I think that Stanford has it down pretty well: 

Its definition is contested, but the competing definitions can be understood as differing conceptions of the same basic concept: careful thinking directed to a goal… “Critical thinkers” have the dispositions and abilities that lead them to think critically when appropriate… Controversies have arisen over the generalizability of critical thinking across domains, over alleged bias in critical thinking theories and instruction, and over the relationship of critical thinking to other types of thinking. [emphasis mine]

I’ve spoken with lecturers whose students embrace critical thinking a little too wholeheartedly, believing that they should question every single fact they’re taught to an unmanageable degree, but as a rule, higher education is all about critical thinking and professors welcome students who are critical thinkers – especially those who are willing to apply the methods to their own claims. 

Skeptics also like to think that we’re critical thinkers, but I do sometimes wonder if we, too, embrace the critical a little too readily, and assume that just because we can spot a logical fallacy that we must be right, our opponent is stupid and victory is assured. Don’t forget that the average conspiracy theorist believes they’re just as rational, reflective and unbiased in their thinking as the next person, even if they actually score badly as critical thinkers!

I think that the best way for critical thinking to be more widely understood is to use it (appropriately), fly the flag for it (when appropriate), and don’t be a jerk (unless appropriate!).

Living donor: why I decided to give my right kidney to a complete stranger

Jairus Durnett
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Living donor: why I decided to give my right kidney to a complete stranger

When I told my family that I was considering an undirected kidney donation – a donation where I did not know the recipient – they thought it was unnecessary and dangerous. They weren’t entirely wrong, but they weren’t entirely right. To use the most common of all skeptical refrains, “It’s actually more complicated than it seems.”

Not necessarily necessary.

There was nothing wrong with my right kidney. There is no strange disorder that made it preferable for me to reduce my kidney function. There’s no essential need that could only be satisfied by donating a kidney. When people said that my donation was unnecessary, they were right in that it was not a necessity for me.

However, there is another person in the equation: the recipient. A donated kidney was very much a necessity for them. Currently in the United States, there are over 100,000 people waiting on a kidney transplant. On average 13 people die per day while on the list waiting for a transplant and others become too sick to receive transplants. I worked with a woman a few years ago who suffered from chronic kidney disease (CKD). Because of her disease, she developed hypertension, had trouble concentrating, was continually tired, and suffered from muscle cramping. Most importantly to her and her family, the increased risk due to CKD meant that she was advised not to have children. For some people becoming a parent is a defining goal of their life. Being denied that goal can be painful and depressing.

Fortunately, the story of my friend has a happy ending. After several years, she was able to get a kidney transplant and went on to have a beautiful child. Her story is not unique. I have known a few other people who received organ transplants and have witnessed the dramatic improvement it makes in their quality of life. So, a kidney donation is necessary for some people. Some people need it to live. Other people need it to achieve their dreams.

But why did I need to be the one who donates? The answer is (of course) complicated. Most of us choose to be a part of a society. We could simply turn our backs and walk away to become hermits, but most of us choose to stay. One of the reasons, I believe, is that being part of a society carries an implicit guarantee that, when we are in need, the other members of our society will help us. It also obliges us to help other people. When someone falls, we help them up. When someone is in a car crash, we stop to render assistance. We do this because it is part of our social contract. I have accepted help throughout my life, and I am obligated to help others whether I know them or not.

In short, I felt it was necessary for me to donate a kidney because I believe that I entered into a social contract that requires me to help others if I can. And I could: I could help someone who needed a kidney.

Danger, Will Robinson!

Ok, so a kidney donation is a necessity, but what about the danger? You might be wondering, could I die, or could my quality of life be severely impeded? And what if I develop kidney disease or a family member needs a kidney donation later – am I harming myself or my family by giving my kidney to a stranger instead of saving it for them? These are rational questions. And, because they are rational, they have already been answered by the organisations that coordinate kidney donation.

Death. This is the big one. People die during surgery, and removing a kidney is a major surgery. The risk of dying during kidney surgery is 3 in 10,000. To put this in perspective, if you live in the United states, your lifetime risk of dying from choking on food is 1 in 2,535. I was absolutely increasing my risk of death by donating, not as much as I do when I eat something, but slightly more than I do when riding a bicycle. To offset that risk, the National Kidney Registry in the United States has the Donor Shield program which provides $500,000 (US) in life insurance for kidney donors. An insurance benefit won’t bring me back to life, but it does set the mind at ease regarding this real, but very small, risk.

Fruit and vegetables

What about the long-term health impacts? People have two kidneys for a reason. With only one, would I have to go on a special diet or avoid certain activities? The answer to these questions is no, not really. When one kidney is removed, the other kidney increases capacity to compensate. I won’t get back to 100% of the kidney function I had before the surgery, but I will probably end up with 70% to 80%. This means I need to eat a normal, healthy diet, but I don’t have to make any extreme changes. However, I do only have one kidney now, and need to be more cautious about injuring it. If I wanted to take up rugby, I should definitely wear padding over my left kidney.

But what about other health risks? Am I shortening my life? The answer, again, is no. My long-term survival rate is about the same as the general population, although there is one thing I need to watch out for. It looks like there is a low, but increased, risk of developing high blood pressure due to kidney donation. Researchers are trying to put a number to it, but it is difficult to compare kidney donors with an appropriate control group. Donors are healthier than the average population because they go through an intensive screening program, and people who have common health issues are screened out. My risk of developing hypertension has increased, so I need to make sure that I don’t take up any new habits that might increase that risk further.

Back to kidney disease. Does donation put me at a higher risk of my remaining, harder-working kidney, giving out at some point? Maybe. There are a small number of donors who develop kidney failure, and researchers are struggling to determine if the risk is greater than for the general population. To minimize this risk, my doctor advised me to wait to donate until I was about 50 years old. By this time, if I were going to develop kidney disease, it’s very likely that the pre-donation screenings would catch the indications. At this point in life, I have a very low risk of developing kidney disease. If it has increased slightly, I am still at low risk.

Still, what if I do need a kidney? Or someone in my family needs a kidney? Some smart people have already addressed this situation. There is a registry of people who need kidney donations, basically a waiting list of people who get matched when kidneys become available. As a donor, if I need a kidney in the future, I get priority on that list. It’s not as nice as having my right kidney, but it means that I will spend less time waiting and will be able to get a kidney sooner, should I need one. The National Kidney Registry makes a point that – out of 5000 kidney transplants, they have had zero donors who needed to take advantage of this benefit. Similarly, they have provided me with five vouchers for family members who may need a kidney donation in the future. The first person to activate the voucher (if any do) will be given priority placement on the waiting list.

I gave my right kidney to a complete stranger. I did it because I think that I am supposed to help people. It may have increased risk in my life, but the risk is small and can be mitigated to make it smaller. It was the right decision for me, and I hope that it might be the right decision for someone who reads this article. Your decision to donate a kidney could save someone’s life.

Recovering memories: The truth is, the Satanic Panic never really went away

Chris French
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Recovering memories: The truth is, the Satanic Panic never really went away

In Part 1 of what was intended to be a two-part article, I described how the Satanic Panic back in the 1980s had led to a widespread outbreak of false accusations of horrendous abuse with terrible consequences. In Part 2, I considered the question of whether another Satanic Panic could ever happen. Contrary to earlier claims that the so-called “Memory Wars” were over and that no one took such concepts as repression and multiple identity disorder seriously any more, I highlighted evidence that such concepts were alive and well in some areas of academia as well as in clinical and legal contexts. In what I hope will be the third and final part of my “two-part article”, I will give a brief overview of evidence from multiple sources showing that, in fact, the Satanic Panic never really went away.

In an excellent Vox article titled “Why Satanic Panic never really ended”, Aja Romano points out that in the US, despite the Justice Department thoroughly debunking “the myth of the satanic ritual abuse cult” in 1992, many of those who had been convicted of such abuse subsequently served many years in prison – and in some cases, they have yet to be released.

Cuban immigrant Frank Fuster was sentenced to six consecutive life terms for allegedly molesting eight children at the height of the 1980s hysteria over alleged sexual abuse in day-care centres. There was no physical evidence to support the allegations and the testimony against Fuster was obtained using coercive questioning of children. Fuster has been in prison for over 35 years and will not be eligible for parole until 2134.

In North Carolina, 72-year-old Patrick Figured is still imprisoned having been convicted in 1992 of ritualistic abuse, again on the basis of coerced allegations. In Ohio, 63-year-old Joseph Allen is still serving time, having been convicted in 1994 of ritualistic child abuse. His co-defendant, whom he had never even met, was subsequently exonerated.

The interior of a prison

In other similar cases described by Romano, convictions were ultimately, if belatedly, quashed. Three members of the Amirault family in Massachusetts were convicted in 1984. One defendant was paroled in 1999 and another in 2004. The third died of cancer in prison in 1997, a year before she was exonerated. In the case of the San Antonio Four, four young gay women were wrongly convicted of child molestation in the context of satanic hysteria and rampant homophobia. Each spent 15 years in prison before having their convictions overturned in 2015. The case of the West Memphis Three involved the wrongful conviction of three teenage boys on horrific charges of sexually assaulting and murdering three young children. There was no physical evidence to support the accusations which appear to have been mainly based upon the teenagers’ Goth lifestyles and rumours that they were Satanists. They were ultimately released in 2011 after each having served 18 years in prison.

Many other cases could be cited but I hope that the point has been made. In all of these cases and more, convictions were not overturned until many years after official recognition that the Satanic Panic hysteria had no basis in reality.

It is hard to estimate how much support the QAnon movement actually has amongst the US electorate but it is clear that the widespread media coverage that these far-right extremists currently enjoy (including articles like this one, of course) will ensure that their ideas are in the public consciousness for some time to come. Central amongst these ideas is that Satanic abuse is real. This time round the perpetrators are not the staff in day-care centres but prominent Democrat politicians and their high-profile celebrity supporters. The parallels between the current crop of QAnon believers and their 1980s counterparts are obvious, not least the fact that both groups see themselves as heroically battling against ultimate evil.

I would hate to give the impression that such hysteria is only a problem for our transatlantic cousins. Over the years, I have written a few articles for the Guardian and elsewhere on the topic of false memories. For example, in 2010 I criticised the Rev Pearl Luxon, at that time the safeguarding adviser to the Church of England, for her assertion that “there is no such thing as false memory”. In 2012, I criticised the self-styled “Committee on Ritual Abuse” for misleadingly trying to claim that the solid evidence of harm done by the practice of brutal exorcism rituals performed upon children in the UK somehow offered support for unfounded claims of Satanic abuse. In 2014, I questioned the claims of two Scottish charities, Break the Silence and Izzy’s Promise, that Satanic abuse was rife in Scotland and that it had been for decades. It is worth remembering in this context that the Satanic Panic of the 1980s really took off in 1980s following similar claims by the NSPCC.

As a further example, in 2019, 74-year-old Sabine McNeill was jailed for nine years having been convicted of four counts of harassment and six counts of breaching a restraining order. She was described by Judge Sally Cahill, QC, as being “arrogant, malicious, evil and manipulative”. McNeill had, for several years, led a campaign alleging that Satanic ritual abuse was taking place at a primary school in Hampstead. Needless to say, the claims were totally without foundation, but they provide a good illustration of how totally ludicrous such claims can be and yet still be accepted by significant numbers of people. According to McNeill, the abusers would sacrifice babies, drink their blood and dance around wearing their skulls on parts of their bodies. The babies would be put to sleep by injecting them (allegedly, it was the school nurse who performed the injections), then their throats would be cut. The babies would be cooked in the local McDonalds, which is where the rituals would be carried out on Mondays and Fridays. The babies’ flesh would be eaten on Saturdays.

These allegations may sound preposterous – and indeed, they are – but nevertheless McNeill’s hate campaign ruined the lives of four innocent mothers and their families. In the words of Judge Sally Cahill, QC:

The direct consequence of your actions is that for the four families concerned you have ruined all normal family life. Their children have been unable to attend school normally, and are either home schooled or have to carry tracking devices and alarms. The families have escape routes planed in case of attack, mothers have slept on the floors of their children’s bedrooms to protect them. They have had to move home; they have had businesses ruined as a result of being unable to have an online profile. As if that is not bad enough, for the children they will never, as things stand at the moment, be able to go online and put in their own names without seeing the vile filth that you [McNeill] have peddled over a period of years.

This particular scare began when two young children claimed that they had been victims of abuse at the hands of a Satanic paedophile ring with more than 100 members. The leader of the cult was said to be the children’s own father. The police investigated the allegations and it quickly became apparent that the children had been forced to make up the allegations by their mother, Ella Draper, and her then-partner, Abraham Christie. Apparently, the pair had coerced the children, using threats and physical violence, and then recorded their allegations.

Despite the allegations being dismissed as “baseless” by Mrs Justice Pauffley in March 2015 in a written ruling on care proceedings, the mobile footage of the children making the allegations was uploaded to the internet and viewed hundreds of thousands of times. Numerous websites appeared supporting the discredited claims of Satanic abuse. Verbal abuse, and even death threats, continued to be directed at the children’s father despite the complete lack of evidence to support the original allegations.

It appears that, despite their claims to only be interested in “protecting the children”, far too many people are only too keen for sordid claims of the most extreme forms of abuse to be true, no matter how shoddy the evidence.

Durian fruit myths: the many tall tales associated with the “King of Fruits”

Ke Yi Lim
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Durian fruit myths: the many tall tales associated with the “King of Fruits”

Creamy. Pungent. Bitter. When put together, they’re three words which sound extremely unappetising. Yet, the same three words also describe the durian – one of Southeast Asia’s most beloved fruits, so popular it is even been affectionately termed the King of Fruits.

Here in Singapore, the semi-annual durian season is met with snaking queues that stretch across blocks, every queueing individual itching to sink their teeth into the delicious delicacy. During peak period, durians can be found at dedicated roadside fruit stalls, with each fruit selling for between S$10 and S$50, with the most expensive durian being auctioned off in Thailand for a whopping S$65,000.

Singapore’s love for durian has shown itself in numerous ways, with even national architecture being likened to the thorny fruit. Children often have their first taste of durian at a young age, which leads to one of two possible outcomes: the child loves the fruit and grows up to become a durian lover, or they absolutely detests it and grow up to become a durian hater.

When it comes to durians, there is rarely an in-between; Singaporeans either love it or hate it. But regardless of whether you’re a durian lover or a durian hater, you’ll almost certainly have heard some of the shared stories and myths about durian that have been passed down through families and generations.

When I asked him to think back to the first time he ate durian, 24-year-old Singaporean Jason Ho smiled, and told me about the various stories he remembers. “When I was young, my parents told me that it’s a must to drink saltwater from the durian husk after eating durian, and I’ve just done it all my life,” he says.

The tradition of drinking salt water out of durian husks once you’ve finished with the fruit stems from Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) beliefs, which are common among older generations of Singaporeans, who in turn pass their beliefs to their children. According to TCM, food can be classified as either “heaty” or “cooling”. “Heaty” foods are believed to warm the body and improve blood circulation, but excessive consumption results in fevers and sore throats. Conversely, “cooling” foods are said to help to dispel toxins and heat from the body, but too much leaves the body “damp” and “cold”. TCM followers believe the body should have a balance of “hot” and “cold” in order to function at its ideal state.

Women sharing fruit together

When it comes to durian, TCM teaches that the salt water has “cooling” effects which can reduce toxins and neutralise the heating properties of durian. It is believed that without drinking salt water post-durian consumption, individuals could easily develop sore throats and fevers due to the “heatiness” of the fruit. Drinking the salt water out of the fruit’s husk is also said to remove any lingering bad breath. However, none of these beliefs have any scientific backing, they appear to simply be an act of tradition – a ritual passed down from the older generations.

In Singapore, as in many Asian cultures, listening and respecting elders is seen to be of great importance, partly due to the influence of Confucianism. As such, much of the misinformation that the elders had heard of in their youth gets passed down to their children, with younger generations often accepting it as the truth without questioning.

For durian seller Sam Kwek (not his real name) who was born and raised in a durian plantation in Malaysia, he does not see drinking saltwater from durian husks as essential. However, he still offers the option to customers at his store.

“There are other durian stores offering saltwater to customers after their meals”, he told me. “If I stop offering (saltwater in durian husks), my customers are going to go to competitors’ stores instead.”

Sam is not the only durian seller who feels this way. Singapore’s deeply rooted “fear of missing out” culture, colloquially known as “kiasu” culture, results in many durian sellers continuing to offer saltwater in durian husks to their customers – regardless of the seller’s beliefs. As a result, unaware customers may be persuaded that they can’t afford to miss out on the supposed benefits of saltwater, consumed from a durian husk, simply because their durian seller offers it as an option.

Durian-ed to death?

Drinking saltwater out of durian husks is not the only story that still impacts the generations today. “My parents also mentioned that if durian and alcohol are taken together, it may cause sudden death. I’ve seen people debunk this online, but I still avoid eating the two together to play safe,” says Jason.

The concept of durian and alcohol being a jinxed combination also appears to have been influenced by TCM beliefs, which claim alcoholic drinks have heating properties, too. Therefore, according to TCM believers, when a “heaty” fruit like durian is consumed with a “heaty” drink like alcohol, effects of discomfort and bloatedness may be heightened, possibly resulting in indigestion and heartburn. In reality, the likelihood of sudden death caused by consuming the two together is incredibly low.

From a scientific perspective, studies have found that durians contain sulphur compounds, which may hinder the liver from properly breaking down alcohol when the two are consumed together. Additionally, durians contain high amounts of carbohydrates and fibres, so it is possible that consuming it in large quantities may lead to feelings of discomfort and bloatedness. Thus, while the idea that consuming durian and alcohol together will lead to sudden death seems to be just a myth, it could be true that mixing the two could lead to some discomfort.

While we may not know exactly where and how this misinformation originated, it seems to stem from good intentions. Again, as Asian cultures traditionally hold elders in high regard, the younger generation tends to believe without questioning in what they are told. Thus, the story of durian and alcohol causing sudden death could have been created as a way to protect others from the discomfort that they may experience from eating the two together. Hence, it is of no surprise that this myth has withstood the test of time.

Since durian and alcohol is still a combination of food that is not recommended due to the risk of indigestion and discomfort, this story poses a warning to both durian and alcohol fans alike – only consume the two together if you are prepared for the discomfort that your body may need to firefight afterwards.

Is the durian watching you?

Consumption myths are not the only stories that have been passed down through generations. Growing up in a durian plantation, Sam tells the story of how there was a myth that durians have “eyes”.

“When I was much younger, it was believed that durians would not fall on a person’s head, no matter how long you stood under a durian tree. They were thought to have magical properties just like that, but of course we now know that it’s not true.”

The myth of durians never falling on people’s heads could have been made up to provide ease of mind and reassurance to plantation owners, who had to worry about the thorny fruit splitting their head open when it drops from trees. For Sam, growing up in a family of durian farmers meant regular trips to the plantation. He recalls experiencing a feeling of anxiety whenever a durian falls in close proximity to where he stood, but says that he has never been injured by a durian.

“I don’t remember my father wearing any hats or helmets when going to pick durians, and he’s done it all his life too.” As seasoned professionals, durian plantation owners are in their natural element standing under durian trees and do not see the need to wear protective headgear. Still, whilst the likelihood of a durian falling on a person’s head is miniscule, it does not mean that non-occurrence is guaranteed, and multiple cases exist of fatal head injuries caused by the heavy, spiky durian fruit falling. Perhaps it is wise to wear a hat or helmet when going durian picking, just in case the durian decides to close its “eyes” on you.

A person holding a large spiky green fruit

Interestingly, Jason had never heard of the story of durians having “eyes” – neither from his family nor from his friends. In fact, when he first heard about this myth, he laughed, taking out his smartphone to do a quick online search to see if the story was true. “Sounds ridiculous, why would anyone believe that?”, he asked me.

That this myth is less widely known in Singapore could be due to the fact that durian plantations are mostly located in Malaysia or Thailand – Singapore imports most of its durians, since land constraints restrict the availability of durian plantations. As such, it is unsurprising that the story of durians having “eyes” was not readily passed down from the elderly generation to the younger ones in Singapore – it could have been simply brushed off as a tale, given that it holds little to no impact on the way Singaporeans consume durian today. As evidenced by Jason, the generation born in the digital era would likely flock to search engines to do more research on the legitimacy of the story, before believing it.

Yet, when asked why Jason continues to believe in traditions such as drinking from durian husks when there is no scientific evidence behind this belief, he says that it is better to be safe than sorry.

“I trust that my parents only want the best for me, they wouldn’t tell me anything that could potentially harm me. I’ll do the same if I were in their positions too. Plus, I’ve eaten durian in this manner since I was young, so it’d feel weird if I suddenly stop doing it.”

Myths arise from tradition

Unlike the “eyes” myth, which sent Jason reaching for his smartphone, stories passed down through multiple generations of Singaporeans are given the benefit of the doubt, as they are believed to have protected those who came before us. Deeply rooted in the Asian culture, traditions and myths similar to the durian ones are often handed down using speculation and beliefs that are not backed up by science, as an attempt to prevent harmful consequences from occurring.

In many ways, it is no different from the spread of misinformation and fake news through messages on WhatsApp, which were especially rampant among the elderly during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic. While the misinformation surrounding durian is not as severe as the ones surrounding the pandemic, the underlying belief that the friends and family who send these messages have your best interests at heart results in people accepting these messages as the truth, without conducting fact-checks.

While the stories surrounding durian are on the most part harmless, it illustrates the cultural aspect of Singapore – a society that has maintained its traditions, despite being one of the most digitalised nations globally.

It is possible that the myths and misinformation surrounding durian will fade away and disappear in the generations to come, but one thing is for certain – Singapore’s love for durian will never die out.

Should you come across durians in the future, try not to shy away from it due to its creamy consistency, pungent smell, or bitter taste. Give it a shot, and you may just find that you become a fan of the King of Fruits.

Inside the White Rose: from stickers and graffiti to an online Covid conspiracy ecosystem

Michael Marshall
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Inside the White Rose: from stickers and graffiti to an online Covid conspiracy ecosystem

In a previous article, I wrote about the White Rose, the Covid conspiracy movement which is plastering lampposts, bins, and bus shelters across the world with misleading, misinformed and manipulative stickers designed to question the reality of the global pandemic. The stickers, with their simplistic black-on-white style and internet-meme imagery, aim to encourage doubt in the general public by appealing to a gut level of understanding of the pandemic, fomenting mistrust in the government and public health institutions with arguments that have the patina of common sense.

While the primary aim of the stickers is to disrupt the daily compliance of the public with basic counter-pandemic measures, the virality of the graffiti campaign relies on recruiting more and more people to the cause, and teaching them how to print and distribute the stickers for themselves. To that end, every White Rose sticker includes a link to the movement’s Telegram channel, with some stickers affording space for a QR code for extra ease.

Naturally, as a skeptical investigator keen to understand the growth of conspiracy movements, I was keen to learn as much as possible about the White Rose, and so, in early May, I joined the White Rose’s Telegram channel.

The White Rose: 37,134 subscribers

Since its creation on November 25th 2020, posts from the White Rose channel have by and large followed the same format: a photograph of one or more of the White Rose stickers spotted somewhere in the wild, along with step-by-step instructions on how to become a White Rose activist yourself. These instructions are incredibly simple, the last two of which deserve to be quoted verbatim:

  • Step 1: buy a small label printer (the Covid conspiracy connoisseurs’ choice appears to be anything from the Brother QL range)
  • Step 2: download a zip file of all of the sticker artwork (a link is conveniently pinned to the top of the channel, which made it very easy for me to write my first article on the White Rose)
  • Step 3: “Print hundreds of stickers per minute, for DIRT cheap, from the comfort of your home”
  • Step 4: “Wake up the sleeping giant!”
The Brother logo - white background, blue text reading "brother"
Did Big ‘Brother’ cause the pandemic in order to sell printers? It’s no less plausible than the White Rose‘s conspiracy theories.

The simplicity of getting active in the White Rose appears to be the key to its success as a decentralised activist movement – all it takes is a Brother QL label printer that costs around £50. Given how many people around the world have been putting up White Rose stickers, it’s hard to avoid the conclusion that sales of those printers must be booming during the pandemic. If the conspiracy theorists’ motto of “cui bono” was as universal a maxim as they like to think, the real organisation behind the pandemic may well be Big Brother.  

For those who follow even these simple instructions, most recently the White Rose posts have included a link to their relatively new website, which gives would-be conspiracy activists more information on the cause:

We are decentralized and amorphous. We have no centralized leadership, membership list or hierarchical chain of command. Each White Rose participant is an independent free agent, entirely responsible for his or her own actions. We do not exist as any kind of tangible organization, but rather as an idea; a concept; a methodology.

As best as I can tell, this does appear to be a truthful, if somewhat self-aggrandising, account of who the White Rose are. While it’s tempting to look for a power behind the throne and a dark organisation sowing dissent and distrust, the White Rose do appear to be a decentralised group of individuals, somewhat like the Anonymous movement, or (less charitably) like a collection of terrorist cells.

We are strictly non-violent. We do not condone any offensive acts of violence, nor the destruction of property.

We welcome all skin colors, races, creeds, and walks of life, so long as the individual’s behavior and beliefs align with our mission and principles.

We do not subscribe to partisanship, identity politics, or the false left/right political paradigms created, by design, to divide and conquer us, and to attempt to subjugate us under the control of those who falsely believe they own our bodies, minds, and souls. We do not condone, and moreover, we condemn racism of any kind.

Without getting into spoiler territory, as I intend to write a whole other article on what non-Covid material gets shared in the White Rose ecosystem, it’s fair to say we’ll see why the White Rose falls short of these particular aspirations.

Other than the regular posting of stickers in the wild, along with instructions on how to add to them, the White Rose channel itself posts very few other messages. One of these irregular messages suggests a new guerrilla technique for getting the message out: hijacking radio phone ins. The White Rose encourage people to “bypass the censorship” by looking for call in shows about innocuous topics, calling them to pretend you have an opinion relevant to the subject at hand, and then once on air immediately start talking about the “real issues” – such as how the governments of the world are in violation of the Nuremberg Code for peer pressuring people into getting vaccinated, how there will come a reckoning where the politicians are held accountable for crimes against humanity, and how the Covid death toll is artificially inflated. The post promises “bonus points for saying Join the White Rose before they cut you”. So far, to my knowledge, nobody has succeeded in this gambit.

Another message subscribers will see periodically is a listing of all of the Telegram group addresses of local White Rose chapters – 46 of which are in the UK, ranging from Dorset to the Lothians, and a further 45 in the US. Also represented in the list are 5 groups in Australia, and one each in Austria, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, India, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Netherlands, New Zealand, Poland, Portugal, Romania, South Africa, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland. Of the 46 in the UK, one of them was the White Rose – Merseyside.

The White Rose – Merseyside: 154 members

A poster in the Liverpool Fight for Freedom group spreads the conspiracy theory that Boris Johnson received a saline solution instead of a vaccine. The pinned messages prompts users to join another conspiracy theory group.
A poster in the Liverpool Fight for Freedom group spreads the conspiracy theory that Boris Johnson received a saline solution instead of a vaccine. Note how the pinned messages prompts users to join another conspiracy theory group.

While local White Rose groups are understandably orders of magnitude smaller than the global group, unlike the global group they allow members to post directly into the channel, giving a clearer insight into how members of the White Rose see the world. The Merseyside chapter of the White Rose is run by a pseudonymous account with the bio: “just a libertarian against the new world order”. Frequently in the channel, he’d cross post from his other channel, “Liverpool Fight For Freedom” (258 members), and before I knew it I’d been automatically added to that channel, too.

Both channels seemed to interchangeably share all manner of conspiracy claims. The user “T.J.”, whose avatar was an image of a smashed syringe with the slogan “Unvaccinated lives matter”, posted a link to an article about Boris Johnson getting his second vaccine shot. “More like a saline solution”, T.J. opined, implying that Boris knew not to get the real vaccine.

Later in the channel, one user posted a video featuring a woman at a lockdown demonstration, wearing a “Free Hugs. Mental Health Matters” T shirt, who told the camera:

In my hospital that I work for in the NHS, our ICU is currently full of patients that don’t have Covid, but they have bacterial lung infections and bacterial face swabs from wearing masks. One patient that is currently in hospital fighting for his life has four different bacterial agents in his bacterial system.

It’s hard to know quite what she might have meant when she says wearing masks gave patients “bacterial face swabs”. The idea that the masks caused bacterial lung infections is nothing new – there’s a sticker for that – but it’s a claim that’s been comprehensively debunked. It was also, at the time, a handy way of explaining why hospitals were filled with patients experiencing respiratory illnesses – after all, it can’t have been Covid, because to the White Rose follower Covid either isn’t real or isn’t dangerous.

Another poster, simply going by “R”, shared a post from notorious anti-vax conspiracy site Natural News, forwarded from the Telegram channel of its founder, Mike Adams. The post claimed:

Bombshell – Bombshell – Confidential Pfizer research document. Translated from Japanese to English. “Biodistribution” study of mRNA vaccines. PROVES the mRNA moves from the injection site to the blood, then circulates spike proteins throughout the body, attacking the ovaries, liver, neurological tissues, other organs. This is the study that will result mRNA vaccines being pulled from the market. Absolute proof of system-wide dangers to the body.

A man with a huge smile on his face is standing beside a police car. Both the man and the car are covered in White Rose stickers. The man is pointing at the car with one hand, with the other he is holding a white rose sticker against the car - either removing it, or placing it. In the background, a street in central Liverpool.

To back up these striking claims, the post included a link to a PDF… which bears no sign that it’s authentically from Pfizer, is missing a large chunk of its characters, does not support the claims made about it and in no way appears to be the “bombshell” it was claimed to be. Perhaps “R” is better at interpreting scientific papers than I am; or perhaps the user hit share without ever checking what they were sharing.

The local White Rose group was also where the anti-lockdown march through Liverpool was organised, and where photos of the march where triumphantly shared. In one photo, a White Rose activist smiles for the camera while putting stickers all over a police car (though another admin joked that clearly the photo was of a concerned citizen trying to remove the sticker graffiti).

From the same protest, there were photos of children as young as 10 holding signs saying “Fight for my Freedom”, and one woman marching through the street carrying a sign saying “Gather in Groups, Swap Microbes and Build Immunity, Save Lives.

Elsewhere at the march, they had a large banner, held by five children, which said “Stop Harm to Children! Justice 4 Children.org.uk. The Children’s voice”. You might be wondering what harm to children the march was referring to – two ladies elsewhere in the march made it clear, with their banners which read WWG1WGA and simply “Q”. But that’s a thread to tug at in my next article – for the time being, I want to focus purely on the Covid conspiracy elements of the White Rose and adjacent channels.

in a covered shopping street in Liverpool city centre a group of people walk - two women hold aloft signs that read "WWG1WGA" and "Q"

While the White Rose suggested I join White Rose – Merseyside, and the latter group suggested I join Liverpool Fight For Freedom, that formal recommendation is not the only way in which members of one group are encouraged to branch out into the conspiracy ecosystem. Occasionally, someone you’ve never spoken to at any point will invite you to join another group, and you can click through to accept the invitation. On other occasions, I was automatically added to a group, which I’d then be a member of until I made the active decision to leave – which is how I came find the Covid Vaccine Victims group.

Covid Vaccine Victims: 127,396 subscribers

This was a group that shares reports of anyone they could find who was vaccinated but later died… including people whose deaths were unrelated.

At one point I saw users had posted social media screenshots of someone called Thomas Lee Flanigan, who had posted about his vaccine in January and February, before he died at the end of April. Their evidence of his death was a blog post he’d written, to be released after he died, which started with:

Well, that’s it. I have completed my shift as the great American cliché… I have joined the likes of Princess Diana, John Belushi and Steve Irwin in leaving while still at the top of my game as an iconic superhero who seemed almost too good to be true

It was a long, light-hearted blog, in which Thomas thanked his wife and kids, joked about how proud he was to have seen the pyramids AND the invention of air fryers, and told all who knew him that they owe him big time because of how great he was. It didn’t seem like the kind of letter you write in the two months of suffering from lethal vaccine side effects. USA Today later confirmed that he died from an undiagnosed aortic dissection, nothing to do with the vaccine. Still, his story was picked up as a Covid Vaccine Victims, and he was claimed as a victim of the vaccine.

The irony here should be clear: the argument of the Covid deniers has long since been that the Covid death tolls are inflated, because people are dying ‘with’ Covid rather than ‘from’ Covid, with some even alleging that car accidents were being intentionally included in Covid mortality statistics. While that isn’t actually true, it is precisely what Covid Vaccine Victims is guilty of: find an obituary, look for evidence that the person was vaccinated, and if they were, add them to the list of victims – regardless of what caused their death.

A screenshot of the telegram group which discusses Thomas's death - the messages are quoted in the main text of this article. The bottom of the screen shot reads "sending messages is not allowed in this group"

While the channel itself claims to be dedicated to memorialising those who they feel are victims of the vaccine, each of the channels posts attracts hundreds of comments, not all of which share the sombre and respectful tone. Some of the comments below the posting of Thomas’ death included:

  • “He got what he deserved”
  • “He died for his belief in this new religion”
  • “Dude thought he was a smartass, turned out he was a dumbass. Rest in peace, dipshit, we fucking warned you”
  • “So Mr Doctor, the microchip works perfectly to hell. Welcome to hell. Who cares.”

This is what the channel mourning Covid Vaccine victims is filled with – every post has hundreds of comments, and they all contain plenty mocking the deceased for having died. It’s bitter, grim and honestly stomach-churning.

It’s not uncommon for channels which restrict subscribers from posting to have conversation take off in the comments beneath each post – in fact, this is often the case in the global White Rose channel itself. After viewing the comments under several of the posts, I was auto-added to a channel which compiles the various comments into a single place.

The White Rose Chat: 7,006 members

The White Rose Chat is by far the busiest of the Covid conspiracy channels I joined – or was involuntarily added to – with thousands of messages each day. The chat gives a fascinating insight into where people get their information: alongside Natural News, regular sources include Joseph Mercola, the anti-vax former nurse Kate Shemirani, the anti-5G activist Mark Steele (who I interviewed in a recent episode of Be Reasonable), David Icke, Toby Young, and the far-right thug Tommy Robinson. When a user called Pav asked for advice on how to ‘wake up’ one of their friends, a user called Pebbles replied:

James Delingpole podcast with Ilana Rachel Daniel. Also his podcast with Dr Mike Yeadon and Naomi Wolf are really good starting points

Keeping on top of the conversation in the White Rose Chat is an impossible task, but what is striking is how quickly the discussion goes off topic, and how people who are drawn to White Rose have more than just their response to the pandemic in common.

A screenshot from the white rose chat group depicting the section of text described in the article where a poster points at effects of climate change and suggests that "Mr Musk believes he can rescue maybe a million people off the planet".

For example, one extraordinary 600-word post speculated that it makes no sense that we’d all be forced to wear a mask for a virus with a survival rate of 99.6% (a reminder: anything that leaves one in every 250 people dead is a Very Bad Thing), but it makes sense when you consider that we are in a period of high volcanic activity – clearly, the poster reasoned, the government knows a catastrophic ash cloud is coming, and they want to prepare us all for wearing masks in an emergency. Assuming, of course, that when the devastating ash cloud comes, there isn’t a decentralised group of disaffected contrarians who tell people the ash isn’t real and isn’t harmful, and that it’s the masks we need to watch out for.

The poster wasn’t done, however. He explained that you merely need to factor in the underground seed vault, plus the seed vault on the moon, plus Elon Musk building a tunnel underground, plus the crazy weather events we’re starting to have (I have an alternate theory about what might be going on with those), and it all becomes clear: Elon Musk wants to rescue a million people from the planet before it gets destroyed by a massive electrical discharge which will “reset the universe”. What does all of this have to do with vaccines, you might ask?

People ask well why the vaccine. My answer is this. Well I have two possibilities.

1) It’s a mass depopulation tool prior to the event as they can’t save everyone. So is it better to put many to sleep rather than suffer.
2) It’s for tracking survivors of the aftermath.

This time we are about to experience is going to be hard. It’s going to be a mental and physical battle. And only those who are prepared spiritually will survive. But hey that’s just my outlook on the situation. Maybe I’m wrong.

Sadly, nobody raised the question as to why ‘They’ would want to save people from death in the great ash cloud / massive electrical discharge by… killing them. Still, this idle speculation over the impending reset of the universe and subsequent mass depopulation of earth was soon lost in a sea of a thousand more conspiracy theory posts, like seeds scattered from a lunar seed vault.

The volume of misinformation in the White Rose Chat is genuinely bewildering, but it’s not even the most troubling aspect. What I found most disturbing was the way in which Covid-related misinformation was constantly forwarded from all manner of other channels, along with invitations to join those channels. For example, the cartoon someone posted of a woman spinning a wheel consisting of names of countries, with the caption: “Time to determine where the next variant comes from”.

Although it might not have been clear to a casual observer, the cartoon was crossposted from the QAnon+ channel, including an invite to join the channel. Which I obviously did… but I’ll save that story, and some of the other deeply disturbing material I found on channels crossposting with the White Rose, for the concluding part of my investigation.

This is part two of a three part investigation – the final part looks at the health misinformation and extremist propaganda using the White Rose to recruit new followers.

Rapa Nui: European myths mask the reason for societal collapse on Easter Island – colonialism

Sarah Hearne
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Rapa Nui: European myths mask the reason for societal collapse on Easter Island – colonialism

For such a small place, Rapa Nui, also known as Easter Island, has many claims to fame. To some it is simply the island with all those giant heads. To others it is the island made famous by Thor Heyerdahl who sailed his raft Kon-Tiki from South America in an attempt to prove his mistaken belief that it was colonised by people from South America rather than Polynesia. But for many, particularly since the history of the island was so vividly described by Jared Diamond in his 2005 book Collapse, it has been a parable of the deadly hubris that can arise when we overexploit our limited natural resources. 

The story normally goes something like this: Rapa Nui was colonised by Polynesian explorers some time between 900 CE (the date preferred at the time Diamond was writing) and 1200 CE (the date now most commonly accepted). Faced with this untouched island, its new inhabitants set about stripping the land of its resources, in large part to aid with the construction and transportation of the giant stone Moai that ring the island. Having deforested the island, the population was plunged into famine and war, and society collapsed. When Dutch explorers found the island in 1722 they found a barren land inhabited by pitiful and starving people, with their useless stone statues standing as a testament to their irresponsibility. 

The parallels with our current twin crises of climate and biodiversity are obvious. But are they really as clear as Diamond and others make out? Did the islanders really deforest their land? Had this deforestation led to the collapse of the islanders’ civilisation before they were discovered by Europeans? And what, if anything, can we learn from Rapa Nui?

Was Rapa Nui Deforested?

In the 16 years since Collapse was first published a great deal of research has been conducted on Rapa Nui, revealing much about its history prior to European contact and showing that a lot of the familiar story has turned out to be, at best, more complicated than first believed and at worst, completely wrong. 

Let’s start at the beginning. The idea that Rapa Nui was covered in trees when discovered by Polynesian settlers is, largely, true. Surprisingly little research has been done to determine the extent of coverage, but best estimates suggest about 80% of the island was covered in palm trees, with a diverse undergrowth of tropical plants, shrubs, ferns and grasses. The Polynesian people who settled Rapa Nui were farmers – they were the latest in a long line of people who had spread out across the islands in the south Pacific, bringing crops and, more importantly, agricultural practices wherever they went. These practices included land clearance, so it is unsurprising that forests were cleared on Rapa Nui. 

It’s worth emphasising at this point just how small Rapa Nui is. At 24.6 km (15.3 mi) long by 12.3 km (7.6 mi) at its widest point, it’s less than half the size of the Isle of Wight, or about 3 times the size of Manhattan. It’s tiny. If it had been subjected to modern deforestation rates its forests would have been cut down in a single day. So the fact it took several centuries to be denuded is arguably a testament to the islanders’ restraint, rather than their profligacy. 

While there may have been ecological collapse it does not automatically follow that there was societal collapse. For this to have occurred people must have been reliant on that ecology and there’s little evidence to suggest this was the case. The islanders were farmers – they cleared the trees to provide land to grow crops. And they were very good at it. They created sophisticated lithic gardens, designed to protect the soil from desiccation and erosion and maximise food production. In these gardens they grew taro, sweet potatoes, yams, bananas and sugarcane in sufficient quantities to not only feed themselves, but also to trade with Roggeveen’s crew when they stumbled upon the island in 1722. Protein came from chickens and marine animals such as fish. In other words there is no evidence that the islanders suffered as a result of their deforestation. In fact, it was likely the key to their success.

The Moai carvings that were moved from the quarry in which they were made stand side by side on the Island's perimeter. The photo shows 7 of the large carvings stood shoulder to shoulder.

But what of the Moai? The statues, while clearly significant to the people who made them and to the islanders to this day, did not have any obvious impact on the ecological trajectory of the island. The evidence for the transportation of the statues is controversial and subject to a great deal of conjecture. Some argue that sleds or rollers were used to transport them, others that they were “walked” using ropes. There is evidence for and against both these theories, but regardless of the method, the impact on the forests would have been negligible. Even if the highest estimates are presumed, the number of trees cut down for use in statue production and movement is around 15,000, a fraction of the total number of trees and one that could easily be sustained.

Did Civilisation Collapse on Rapa Nui?

The short answer is yes, but not when everyone imagines. The society that developed on Rapa Nui inevitably changed over the centuries as the population grew, the island was explored and agriculture was intensified. But while there have been claims of warfare and even cannibalism as a result of food shortages following deforestation, there is little evidence to support them. Population estimates before European contact vary considerably, but recent figures based on the island’s agricultural productivity suggest a sustainable population of between 3,500 and 17,500.

Certainly, the people that the Dutch explorer Jacob Roggeveen and his crew encountered on Easter Sunday 1722 were friendly, inquisitive, and open to trade. However, that first encounter with Europeans provided a small taster of things to come. Roggeveen went to shore with 134 men, “all armed with musket, pistols, and cutlass”. It seems that one of these men got spooked and began firing their weapon, which caused more men to fire, 

and the Indians, being thereby amazed and scared, took to flight, leaving 10 or 12 dead, besides the wounded. [source]

Roggeveen stayed at Rapa Nui for a week: a short time but still long enough for his crew to impregnate women and most likely introduce various sexually transmitted diseases to the population. Over the next century the island was visited numerous times, but rarely for supplies. As a paper by Grant McCall from 1976 bluntly puts it, “the most desired product has been the people themselves”. Women were prostituted or even raped by crew after crew. Later, as whalers and sealers expanded into the Pacific, men were kidnapped and forced to work on these vessels. Then, when the commercial value of guano on Peru’s offshore islands was realised, kidnapping of islanders accelerated.

Hoa Hakananai'a standing in the British Museum. Image by Wikimedia user Fallschirmjäger [CC BY 3.0].

During a visit in 1877 French ethnologist Alphonse Pinart recorded a mere 111 men, women and children on the island. Disease and extensive kidnapping and enslavement had reduced the population to a shadow of its former self. Cattle and sheep were brought to the island in the mid-19th century and intensive farming began in the 20th century leading to some of the most extensive soil erosion in the world. At the same time anthropologists began visiting the island and took many artefacts away with them, most famously the two Moai that are in the British Museum including the very pointedly-named Hakananai’a or “stolen friend”.

What Can Rapa Nui Teach Us?

There are two key lessons I think that we can learn from Rapa Nui. The first is an ecological one. Rapa Nui experienced a massive ecological change following its settlement by Polynesians, but that change did not lead to societal disaster. In fact, it allowed the population to thrive. Yes, species went extinct, and that is a great loss, but from a purely anthropocentric perspective massive ecological change worked in our favour. The islanders worked with their environment, using their skill and knowledge to turn this rocky dot in the middle of the ocean into a productive and welcoming home. Had it not been for European contact and the disasters that wrought, there is little reason to think that the island would not still provide them a productive and welcoming home. 

This is not to say that we can be complacent with the ecological change we see today – far from it. It is to say that ecological loss does not inescapably lead to societal disaster. We are an incredibly adaptable and resourceful species and if we work with the changing environment we can create a sustainable future for ourselves. 

The second lesson is broader but equally, if not more, important. From the time of its European discovery Rapa Nui has been viewed through a European lens, one that found it hard to believe that the people living on the island could be sophisticated, intelligent and resourceful. From Roggeveen’s belief that the island would be a paradise if only “properly… cultivated”, to Erich von Daniken’s belief that aliens must have made the Moai, the talent and expertise of the inhabitants of Easter Island have been repeatedly met with incredulity.

The European eye has repeatedly disparaged the islanders’ ingenuity and resourcefulness. The collapse myth is only the latest version of this disparagement.

Europeans could not conceive that people living on such a small and remote island could have produced such stunning works of art, or that they could live comfortably in such seemingly barren environs. The European eye has repeatedly disparaged the islanders’ ingenuity and resourcefulness. The collapse myth is only the latest version of this disparagement. The need to believe that it was the islanders themselves who destroyed Easter Island – and not the Europeans who pillaged it time and again, raping its women, kidnapping its men and leaving disease and despair in their wake – represents a need to minimise the devastating impacts of European colonialism. It serves to comfort ourselves that it’s not just us who destroy our world: see, even “primitive” people do it.

Ultimately, Rapa Nui teaches us to recognise our own biases and assumptions. People see what they want to see, and for far too long people have wanted to see an island whose inhabitants sowed their own seeds of destruction. They did not. They were resilient and resourceful and we owe it to them to recognise that. Rapa Nui is not a warning of the consequences of ecological  mismanagement. It is a warning of what happens when we treat people as commodities. And that is a lesson we would do well to heed.

Further references

  • Diamond, J. (2005) Twilight at Easter. In Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed. pp 79-119. Penguin.
  • Hunt, T. & Lipo, C. (2011) The Statues That Walked: Unraveling the Mystery of Easter Island. Simon and Schuster.
  • Boersema, J. J. (2011) The Survival of Easter Island, Dwindling Resources and Cultural Resilience. Translated by Diane Webb. Cambridge University Press. New York.

The Society of Homeopaths, and the issues with regulating healthcare in the UK

Michael Marshall
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The Society of Homeopaths, and the issues with regulating healthcare in the UK

Last week, the Society of Homeopaths announced that it was withdrawing from the Accredited Registers programme of the Professional Standards Authority. The withdrawal is the final chapter in the long-running saga of the Society’s accreditation, which was first granted in 2014 and has remained highly controversial since.

When it comes to healthcare regulation, the landscape in the UK is something of a mixed bag. Some regulators, for example, are statutorily regulated: such as the General Medical Council, the General Dental Council, the General Pharmaceutical Council and the Nursing and Midwifery Council. Among this list of conventional health and social care professions with statutory regulation sits the General Chiropractic Council and the General Osteopathic Council – somewhat surprising inclusions, given the pseudoscientific nature of chiropractic and osteopathic treatments. These bodies are themselves overseen by the Professional Standards authority – the government body which oversees and accredits healthcare bodies.

With statutory regulation, at least in theory, these two pseudoscience-centric professions can be effectively policed: ‘chiropractor’ and ‘osteopath’ are protected terms, so it is unlawful to use either term without having the relevant qualifications and without being registered with the relevant regulator. However, in practice, once again things are much more of a mixed bag. When presented in the past with complaints regarding osteopaths making misleading claims in their advertising (such as on websites and in social media posts), the General Osteopathic Council has indicated that they’re unwilling to consider a claim noncompliant unless each complaint has first been ruled on by the Advertising Standards Authority – essentially, one might argue, shifting the burden of statutory regulation onto a non-statutory organisation with limited resources and no obligation to investigate every case presented to them. This seems to be absurd: a regulator of a healthcare modality should not need to refer to an advertising industry watchdog to understand what the treatment it regulates can and can’t do.

A close up of a person's back with someone else's hands on the spine

The General Chiropractic Council has shown more of a willingness to engage with reports of misleading claims from their registrants (particularly over the last eighteen months), but the frequency of misleading claims within the chiropractic industry remains high – in an audit I conducted last month for the Good Thinking Society, 56% of the 50 chiropractors chosen at random were making claims that were not compliant with the advertising code, with 38% of chiropractors making claims that were clearly or seriously noncompliant. Some of the issues found included the promotion of applied kinesiology, of pseudoscientific food intolerance tests, claims to treat colic in babies, and attribution of health issues to ‘subluxations’ – the term used by the founder of chiropractic, D. D. Palmer, to describe blockages in the flow of ‘innate intelligence’ through the spine, which according to Palmer were responsible for an implausible number of health issues. These are not claims that should be supported by any responsible healthcare practitioner, and many of the claims I found were almost identical to the ASA’s textbook examples of noncompliant claims.

Voluntary ‘Accredited Register’ Programme

While osteopaths and chiropractors are the only alternative medicine practitioners who are subject to statutory regulation, they’re not the only ones to fall under the remit of the Professional Standards Authority – the PSA have a parallel voluntary scheme, the Accredited Register (AR) programme, which healthcare industry bodies can choose to be part of. Being part of the AR programme means abiding by certain standards, concerning safety, accountability, and good governance. In return, registrants to an accredited register are able to (and, indeed, must) display the logo of the Professional Standards Authority on their communications. While the presence of the logo does not mean the PSA, and by extension the UK government, endorses the clinic in question or the therapies they carry out, practitioners have been known to highlight their registration with an accredited register as an illustration of their professionalism and expertise, it is easy to see how a member of the public may then make the leap into assuming that if a therapist is accredited, the therapies they’re offering must be evidence based and effective.

For many of the organisations who have signed up to the AR scheme, this risk is likely to be minimal – it’s unlikely (though not impossible) that the fields of non-surgical cosmetic treatments, play therapy, sports rehab or counselling are rife with claims that run directly contrary to the best available evidence. However, in the case of other accredited registers, the risk of being seen to endorse pseudoscientific modalities is much higher – such as in the case of the Complementary and Natural Healthcare Council (whose members include naturopaths, reiki practitioners and craniosacral therapists), the Federation of Holistic Therapists, or the Society of Homeopaths.

In the case of the Society of Homeopaths, the potential risks represented by its registrants need not be the subject of speculation, as recent years have seen media investigations demonstrate time after time that homeopaths registered to the Society are willing to make claims that go far beyond the evidence when it comes to promoting homeopathy (which is easy to do, of course, given that the evidence shows homeopathy offers no benefit at all).

A history of noncompliance

In April 2018, after excellent work from tireless skeptics and activists like the UK Homeopathy Regulation blog, the Guardian reported on more than 120 homeopaths who were claiming to ‘cure’ autism via the CEASE therapy – a regime of homeopathic treatments and vitamin C megadosing, which claims that toxins in vaccines are the cause of autism, and that their therapy can offer Complete Elimination of Autistic Spectrum Expression. Needless to say, autism is not something that can or should be ‘cured’, and no amount of homeopathic sugar pills is going to achieve that dubious goal.

As the Guardian highlighted, a number of 120 CEASE therapists identified were registrants of the Society of Homeopaths, who were part of the PSA’s accredited register scheme. As such, the PSA gave the Society of Homeopaths a deadline by which they needed to ensure their registrants did not make claims to treat or cure autism, as a condition of its re-accreditation. A year later, in March 2019, the Advertising Standards Authority issued a warning to 150 homeopaths in the UK that they must stop advertising and offering CEASE therapy – once again, among their number were registrants of the Society of Homeopaths.

Despite having failed to effectively make it clear to their members that claims regarding autism and CEASE therapy were not acceptable, the Society of Homeopaths were reaccredited by the PSA in 2019. In the decision, the PSA acknowledge that CEASE therapy was potentially harmful and conflicts with the advice of the NHS in several respects, including with regard to the childhood vaccinations for potentially life-threatening conditions. Nevertheless, the PSA decided on April 1st to approve the Society of Homeopaths’ accreditation for a further year.

The decision to reaccredit the Society of Homeopaths was the subject of much criticism, and as a result the Good Thinking Society – the skeptical charity I work for – brought a Judicial Review to challenge the reaccreditation decision. We argued that for PSA accreditation to mean anything at all, the public needs to be confident that when the PSA identify potentially harmful therapies, they take the necessary steps to protect the public, rather than accepting it and, effectively, endorsing it. Around the same time, NHS Chief executive Simon Stevens and NHS national medical director Stephen Powis wrote to the PSA to express their serious concerns over the reaccreditation decision, explaining:

“This is a vital issue at a time when there is a rise of mis-information about vaccines – some of which is apparently promoted by homeopaths – and which poses a significant danger to human health.

“The basis of their practice remains fundamentally flawed”

It is hard to argue that the anti-vaccine misinformation is something that happened without the knowledge of senior figures at the Society of Homeopaths, either. In November 2019, an investigation by the Daily Mail revealed that Linda Wicks, the chair of the Society of Homeopaths, had been spreading dangerous anti-vaccine rhetoric on social media.

In February 2020, while Good Thinking’s Judicial Review was waiting for a High Court hearing, the PSA opted to reaccredit the Society of Homeopaths for a further year – however, this time in doing so they imposed a series of strict conditions that the Society must meet, in order to retain its accredited status, including forbidding registrants from spreading vaccine misinformation or claiming to treat or cure autism. As these conditions effectively addressed many of the concerns outlined in the legal challenge, Good Thinking withdrew the Judicial Review.

The PSAs new conditions had been imposed for less than six months when it was revealed that the newly-appointed Safeguarding and Professional Standards Director, Sue Pilkington of Somerset Homeopathy, had herself shared anti-vaccine conspiracy theories on social media. The fact that the Society had appointed someone who had spread vaccine misinformation to the position ensuring registrants did not spread vaccine misinformation unsurprisingly did not go down well with the PSA, who imposed yet more conditions on the Society of Homeopaths. Meanwhile, throughout the pandemic, registrants of the Society have been revealed to have promoted ‘bogus coronavirus treatments’ and spread misinformation regarding the safety of the COVID-19 vaccine, causing the head of NHS England to accuse them of having “crossed the line”.

A bottle of homeopathy, open with pills spread across a leaf and onto a table top. There is a wooden spoon and a book beside the bottle and pills.

It was perhaps no surprise, therefore, that earlier this year the Society of Homeopaths had their accreditation suspended, pending final efforts by the Society to meet the various conditions they had failed to meet the previous year. It was just as unsurprising when, late last month, the Society decided to withdraw from the PSA Accredited Register scheme entirely.

The Society withdraws

According to the Society of Homeopaths, the primary reason for withdrawal was not their failure to prevent their registrants from spreading autism misinformation and anti-vaccine propaganda. Instead, the Society claim, the real reason that they will no longer seek accreditation is financial:

After a number of consultations with the Authority, it has become clear to the Society that the new fee structure for the Accredited Registers Programme disadvantages smaller organisations in favour of larger bodies, and the fee increase proposed by the Authority to the Society, aside from lacking clarity for the future, effectively prices us out of the scheme.

While I have no real reason to doubt the difficulties the Society of Homeopaths claim to have in being able to afford the cost of accreditation, it’s hard not to view their withdrawal in the light of their suspension, and the lack of progress they seem to have made in meeting the conditions the PSA imposed. The Society have assured their followers that their usual standards of practice will not be affected by the lack of regulatory oversight:

Public protection, patient safety and patient choice are paramount and built into all the Society’s processes and governance. Accountability is ensured through a balance of representation by practitioners and independent members on the Board as well as on the Society’s professional standards and education committees.

It is worth reiterating at this point that the processes and governance of the Society of Homeopaths allowed for vaccine misinformation to be spread by their chair in 2019, and their Safeguarding and Professional Standards Director in 2020. One would hope that the significant flaws in the processes and governance that allowed for these appointments to happen were one of the areas the Society of Homeopaths did manage to make progress towards fixing.

While the withdrawal statement from the Society of Homeopaths cites their financial concerns as primary, they do hint at other potential issues with their continued inclusion in the scheme, explaining that, at the time of issuing their statement, “further changes to the Authority’s standards and criteria are also still to be confirmed”. The following week, the PSA issued their own statement, announcing their reworked Standards, which came after a 2020 public consultation sought insight from the public around what value accreditation has and what accreditation means.

Regulation in the public interest

According to the PSA, the new Standards by which healthcare registers will be judged eligible to be part of the Accredited Register scheme includes a ‘public interest’ test:

Our ‘public interest’ test will allow us to weigh up whether the evidence about the benefits of treatments covered by a register outweigh any risks. We will also consider how clearly and accurately the register and its registrants describe these benefits and risks. This will help to make sure that patients, service users and employers can have confidence about choosing services from someone on an accredited register.

PSA Accredited Register logo

The inclusion of a public interest test – a proof that a treatment’s benefits outweigh its risks – ought to be a key development for the PSA’s Standards. It also stands to reason that a treatment that can offer no provable benefits (demonstrated by a reliable and robust form of evidence, or a reasonable prior plausibility of efficacy) would struggle to clear any risk-benefit threshold. I’d certainly find it hard to argue that the benefits of comprehensively-disproven treatments such as homeopathy outweigh the risks posed to patients through misleading claims of autism ‘cures’ and the spreading of vaccine misinformation.

The introduction of the PSA’s new Standards, including the requirement that a register must be able to demonstrate that therapies offered by their registrants offer sufficient benefit to outweigh the risk, may prove a headache to more than just the Society of Homeopaths – the new public interest test may prove to be the undoing for a number of voluntary registers of dubious, unproven and disproven modalities. Meanwhile, it should allow responsible practitioners of evidence-based therapies to continue with confidence, and hopefully reassure the public that the logo of the PSA on the website or marketing materials of a clinic or practitioner has real meaning.

How American conspiracy theories invaded my family home in Singapore

Jadon Teo
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How American conspiracy theories invaded my family home in Singapore

I have always been a deep sleeper, and rest has been my constant escape. But in the wee hours of March 31, 2021, sleep refused to come. I had actively avoided conversation with my parents for fear of learning how deeply conspiracy theories had infected them. That night, I had decided to face the truth, and had paid the price for it.

Now everyone would believe their family special, to some extent. I believe my family more special than most, particularly in comparison with other Singaporean families. Until last year, neither any of my nine siblings or I were permitted to attend a public school, apart from university. Socialising with outsiders was frowned upon and prevented with tactics such as guilt tripping and threats of punishment. Any form of entertainment was forbidden, which is why I was 18 years old the first time I set foot in a cinema. Neither of my parents have held any stable form of employment for almost 12 years. My supposedly Christian family last attended church more than 15 years ago. And yet it was the discovery of how deeply my parents had fallen into conspiracy theories that gifted me my insomnia.

WhatsApp message that reads: "PLEASE READ THIS VERY CAREFULLY A MUST READ. This is from Dr Keary Dickson from facebook. GOOD DAY EVERYONE. Are you one of those who don't understand what is going on right now, then you will need to read this write up I decided to put out for those who have ears. I will be talking about 1. The new World Order 2. The corona virus pandemic 3. The 5G network 4. The Grants for African 5. The Mark of the beast NOW LET ME GIVE YOU A SUMMARY OF MY SUBMISSION The gods of this world wants to reduce world population for easier control and management. They want to achieve the following objectives 1. One world economy 2. One world government 3. And one world religion"

Conspiracy theory believers in Singapore are not as high profile as they are in the US. Unfortunately, a combination of unfortunate events caused my parents to lose confidence in public institutions and large churches. They turned to foreign Christian leaders who were less mainstream, holding views that are far-right conservative and disturbingly radical. I didn’t think much of it, because after all, how extreme could Christian teachers get?

I was shocked to wake up on the morning of 19 April 2020, to find a long post, sent by my mother to my family’s WhatsApp group chat, detailing how the pandemic numbers are fake, and that Gates and Fauci were behind it. It was the first many similar posts she shared with our group chat, covering a wide range of topics from Bill Gates bringing the mark of the beast through ID2020, to climate change being a hoax.

Reading the posts, I could see they were filled with serious logical leaps, with gaping holes left by lack of evidence to support the grand claims being made. So, on March 30, 2021, I finally mustered the courage to face my parents and ask them the hard questions that no one else would.

My father

My father told me he doesn’t think his beliefs fit any mainstream conspiracy theories, and his primary concerns were about COVID-19. He simply asked, how serious is the pandemic? If you compare its ranking among the top 10 most deadly diseases in Singapore, he asked, do you truly believe that the measures taken – the nationwide lockdown, temporary business closures, and taking billions from the government reserves for relief funds – are justified? In his words:

Is it worth it to go through all these measures for something that is not so deadly, compared to the top 10 killers (illnesses) in SG… and what if something worse, something bigger comes along. How much longer can we afford to do this?

He pointed out that COVID-19 has a low fatality rate, and that 2020’s fatality numbers are not much higher than previous years’ fatalities. However, he did also claim that it is easy to blame other disease fatalities on Covid, which was the first window into the conspiracies he believes. He quoted two organisations beloved of Covid-deniers – the World Doctors Alliance and America’s Frontline Doctors – to say that COVID-19 is not that deadly, and that ivermectin with zinc tablets can cure it, if done in the early stages of the disease. The WHO has stated that there has not been enough testing done to declare ivermectin, which is generally used to treat parasitic worms in animals, a suitable cure for Covid.

Interestingly, my father also voiced concerns over the recently developed Covid vaccines. He told me: “given the rather mild effects of Covid, is it worth taking the risk with an experimental vaccine?” Citing the lack of animal testing and lack of understanding of the mRNA technology that is used in them, he believed the Covid vaccines were not sufficiently tested to warrant the trust that governments are putting in them.

Much of my father’s information about Covid and the vaccine were taken from principia scientific international (PSI), a site that supposedly is run by professionals, who claim to investigate using Karl Popper’s scientific method to provide unbiased facts. However, in their About page, PSI describes how their method works: First they publish a draft proposal of a submitted science paper onto their website, done after an internal review. Next, the submitted paper is open to comments from the public for no less than a month. Finally, PSI reviews the comments, takes on board the ones they find relevant, and alters the paper before posting it formally on their website. In essence, it is a crowdsourcing platform disguising itself as a scientific community, which can print anything its panel decides is relevant, with facts determined according to “peer reviewed comments” from the general public. Platforms like PSI make it very easy to spread opinion and misinformation disguised as factual, scientific truth.

Other sources my father cited as credible information include the Epoch Times and Lin Wood, a Christian pro-Trump lawyer who is convinced that the 2020 US Election was plagued by mass voter fraud. Their common positioning, that the mainstream media and Big Tech are being manipulated by the government to only say what it wants you to hear, resonated with my parents’ anti-institutional views.

My father has always been a rational person, and has always tried to be logical in his thinking and reasoning. He tried, for the most part, to state clearly what he felt the impending threats and risks associated with specific movements could be, and what we should do to guard against them. He expressed his views calmly and rationally, without the emotional outbursts and strong feelings that often accompany conspiracy theories. His choice of sources is clearly often questionable, however, when provided with evidence that proves the information he believes false, he is willing to change his stand. Interestingly, he never once posted his views on the family WhatsApp group chat, so I do think he understands the dangers of spreading claims he cannot prove to be true.

My mother

I only wish the same could be said about my mother. She has never been shy to express her opinion, and when the line between fact and opinion began to blur, I truly began to fear. It wasn’t for myself that I was worried, but for my 8 younger siblings, many of whom are too young to understand what’s true and what isn’t. Before my conversation with her, I had thought that there was no one who was beyond reach; when I left that day, I wasn’t so sure.

The conversation started harmlessly enough. I had seen my younger sister post an Instagram story about how there were two Joe Bidens, and decided that that was a safe opener. It was a topic so distant and irrelevant to us that any opinion should have been idle speculation. My mother shocked me – not just by believing the ‘two Bidens’ myth, but with the conviction and certainty with which she made her argument. She may as well have been describing the stripes on the neighborhood stray cat.

She began by citing the “pictures she’s seen on the internet that show Joe Biden over 10 years” which can be found in this YouTube video, before describing how she saw his speeches in the past compared to now. “10 years ago, he had this killer sharp look, and was so eloquent and spoke well, and now he’s just a different person,” she told me. When I probed into the specifics of why she thought so, she replied: “I don’t really care about the specifics of it. All I know is that something is strange, and I think you should find out more.” This ambiguous stance that refuses to take a firm position on an issue would continue to plague the rest of our five-hour long discussion.

Just like my father, my mother began her foray into conspiracies during the COVID-19 pandemic. “We noticed that what is happening and what is reported in the media doesn’t match up,” she said. Her search for the truth led her to the YouTube channel “It’s Supernatural” by Sid Roth, in which he interviewed a prophet named Tracy Cooke. Cooke claimed to have been brought by God to China and shown the Wuhan lab where the virus was developed. He claimed that he was shown the people who were behind that lab, who were (as my mother put it) “of course, Pelosi and all those other people,” in reference to Nancy Pelosi, Speaker of the US House of Representatives. Cooke claimed that the people behind the lab created the virus so that the Democrats would win the 2020 Election.

It went on from there. My mother would detail so many conspiracies that it would be both impractical to fully list them in this article, and physically painful for me to recount. Among the major ones she mentioned were a conspiracy to turn the US into a communist state, the evils of vaccines, the Illuminati, that Bill Gates is bringing the mark of the beast, that 5G radiation is mind control, that aliens are visiting us, that 9/11 was staged, that the JFK assassination was an inside job, the moon landings were faked, the great reset, transhumanism, antisemitic propaganda, and eugenics.

Absolutely central to my mother’s beliefs is the QAnon conspiracy: that a satanic cult known as the cabal is controlling the world. Despite this, and the fact that she gets most of her information from QAnon telegram, Facebook, and YouTube channels, my mother claims that she does not subscribe to Q’s theories, and that she couldn’t care less about him.

A Qanon flag at a rally in Virginia with the tag line "Where We Go One We Go All". Image by Anthony Crider (CC-by-2.0)

Initially I found this hard to believe. All the evidence was pointing to my mother identifying a QAnon supporter. She made uncountable references to the “Patriots,” claiming many of their beliefs as her own. She even called Mike Pence a “traitor” for “not doing what was in his power to prevent the election fraud.” In fact, when probed, she admitted that her nationality was the only thing preventing her from identifying herself as one of them.

This dramatic escalation shocked me, but what shocked me even more was how willingly she accepted that narrative. All it seemed to have taken was for someone who appeared on a “Christian” talk show to claim that something was so, and to her it was Holy Scripture. This blind belief became a recurring observation as the conversation progressed, as she unlocked the intricate web of conspiracy she came to regard as truth.

My mother’s faith is very dear to her. She takes pride in being a Christian, and on her relationship with God. That is why every time I challenged the validity of her sources, she simply gave me a scoff and said, “the Holy Spirit is the one that led me to search for this truth.”

To demonstrate her point, my mother told me that all the sources she found most credible claimed to be of the Christian faith. “They make prophecies,” she said, “and those prophecies come true. That’s one reason why I believe them.” I asked her for a few examples of the prophecies that were made and came true:

  1. There will be snow in all states of the US (prophet Hank Kunneman)
  2. There will be winds of change (prophet Hank Kunneman)
  3. There will be lightning (prophet Hank Kunneman)
  4. Something unusual will happen with a ship (prophet Robin Bullock)
  5. I tripped over three times walking up steps and the last time I fell lower (prophet Robin Bullock)
  6. During the election period, a blackout will be coming (unknown)

“Prophets” like Hank Kunneman used these prophecies to “prove” that Donald Trump is still the President of the United States – yet, even if all these ‘prophecies’ came true, they clearly say nothing about why we should believe Donald Trump won the election. My mom disagreed – perhaps because, on the other side of the central beliefs my mom had, on the side of good and opposing the satanic cabal, was none other than the righteous Donald Trump. I was disturbed to find out the amount of faith my mother had in the ex-President of the United States.

Donald Trump standing at a microphone

It was at this point that I officially lost all hope of bringing my mother back to the truth. If she could believe a person who told 30,573 lies is a credible source of information, nothing short of an act of god could even attempt to convince her to change her position. From our conversation, she implied a belief that government officials were barely short of all-knowing individuals, and that everything they said was either the truth, or deliberate misinformation meant to mislead the public. And since the narrative my mother had chosen to follow had already set clear sides, there is no uncertainty as to who the liars were always going to be.

My mother shut down any further attempts at reasoning. It became clear to me that the conspiracies my mother believes were no simple case of gross misinformation. She had picked her grains of truth – the satanic cabal and their evil plan to take over the world – and had spun her own religion from it. It was no longer a matter of proving or disproving facts; it was a belief system that she held, and information was accepted or rejected based on how it fit into her model. Accepted information was to be spread like the gospel, and she truly did spread it vigorously. Any valid challenge could at best hope to her discard one small piece of the puzzle, with the gap to be filled with the most versatile puzzle piece of all: “There’s something strange happening there,” she would say.  

My family

I had heard of conspiracy theorists before, but I would never have guessed that such theories would take root in my own family. I ignored it for months, allowing it to fester and grow. Perhaps I was hoping it would go away by itself. This is a dangerous notion, a notion that I strongly discourage in the event that any reader happens to find themselves in a similar situation.

Everyone would believe that their family is special, to some extent. I believe my family more special than most. Not everyone can relate to living in a household where conspiracy theory is preached as truth. I hope that after reading this article, you have found some insight into the dangers of the conspiracy spiral. As my professional writing lecturer, Professor Olby, said, “Conspiracy theories are not unlike a gateway drug.” Letting one in sets the precedent for how to deal with non-mainstream information, and each time you accept one mistruth, it becomes that much harder to reject the next one.

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