Conspiracy of Silence
KENT BARKER considers the Conspiracy Theory: defined as ‘an explanation for an event or situation that asserts the existence of a conspiracy by powerful and sinister groups, often political in motivation when other explanations are more probable’.
A friend of mine in Hastings has been arguing for years that the sweetener, aspartame, is carcinogenic. It’s a major ingredient in most low-sugar drinks including Coca-Cola. So it would seem improbable it caused cancer. Surely soft drinks manufacturers would have tested it? Unless, of course, somewhat improbably, they had conspired to cover up the information. But then the tobacco industry did just that for years – knowing that smoking caused cancer. So does this make my friend a Conspiracy Theorist? Well, earlier this month the World Health Organisation conceded there is indeed evidence aspartame can cause cancer.
My friend has also been warning that ‘revolving doors’ subvert effective regulation: This is where senior industry staff and its regulators go to work for each other. Another Conspiracy Theory? If so it’s been rather demolished by the recent revelation that UK water companies regularly recruit top staff from the regulator Ofwat.
Labour says it will stop former government members immediately taking jobs as lobbyists or advisors in areas related to their ministerial portfolios. In the US, one respected journal argues that “Big Pharma’s revolving door is ‘imperilling democracy’, and they decry the pharmaceutical industry’s ‘titanic’ profits that ensure a ‘perpetual stranglehold over government”. A conspiracy by a powerful – or even sinister – group?
Speaking of the US, people like Rachel Carson and other opponents of DDT were branded “hysterical” for their opposition to that pesticide in the 1960s. Were they Conspiracy Theorists? DDT was finally banned in 1972 after proof of its risk to the environment and human health. Environmental lawyer and campaigner Robert Kennedy Junior – currently a contender for the US presidency – is branded a Conspiracy Theorist, having argued that neurotoxic mercury in medicines should be banned. Mercury was later withdrawn as an adjuvant in most vaccines. Current campaigners who argue its main substitute,aluminium, is also dangerous are now deemed conspiracy theorists too. As, indeed, is almost anyone who has the temerity to question vaccine safety at all – despite the public knowledge that millions have been paid out in Britain, the US and elsewhere to victims of severe vaccine damage.
Just what is it that so upsets those in power when people come up with ideas they don’t like? Indeed why are so many alternative views branded Conspiracy Theories and denigrated or even ‘cancelled’? Of course, the powerful have a vested interest in remaining there, and multinational corporations – especially the pharmaceutical industry – have a vested financial incentive for disparaging or quashing negative comments.
Apparently so serious a threat to our nation are these Conspiracy Theorists that the BBC has appointed a ‘Disinformation Reporter’ (surely a daft title if ever there was one!). Marianna Spring apparently sees the enemy everywhere: “There’s no prototype for a conspiracy theorist, they can be a doctor a nurse a teacher or an artist,” she says in her didactic and one-sided podcast Marianna in Conspiracyland: “Conspiracy is muddled up with a range of views and hides in the most unsuspecting corners of communities.” One might think that her views themselves are the very epitome of a conspiracy theory – an “explanation for an event or situation that asserts the existence of a conspiracy by powerful and sinister groups”.
Her podcast focuses on – and traduces – a little-known independent newspaper called The Light which claims a circulation of 100,000 copies and purports to tell the ‘Uncensored Truth’. It is certainly lockdown and vaccine-sceptic but backs up many of its assertions with government statistics and articles from the British Medical Journal. It also warns of the dangers of the ‘Great Reset’ – an apparently sinister plot for widespread economic deregulation possibly creating a cashless society and abolishing private property. This must surely be the greatest Conspiracy Theory ever? Except that it is not. It is – largely – true, and the brainchild of Klaus Schwab, founder of the World Economic Forum. Indeed his initiative for a post-Covid recovery plan was launched in 2020 by then Prince, now King Charles!
The point of all this is simple. One person’s blue skies thinking may well be another’s Conspiracy Theory. But what we are doing is effectively trashing either parties’ ability to propose and discuss ideas. It’s as dangerous as the ‘No Platform’ movement preventing people from speaking in university lecture halls. In fact, it’s arguably more dangerous as it’s not just stopping them, it’s pouring scorn and opprobrium on their views and making them appear a danger to society. Whatever happened to the maxim – misattributed to Voltaire – “I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say It”? And above all what if a particular view, branded a Conspiracy Theory today, turns out to have been right tomorrow?
We hope you have enjoyed reading this article. The future of our volunteer led, non-profit publication would be far more secure with the aid of a small donation. You can also support local journalism by becoming a friend of HIP. It only takes a minute and we would be very grateful.
Excellent article Kent, we need more light shone on this topic.