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Beyond The Tinfoil Hat: 26 Conspiracy Theories People Find Plausible
The US seems to be the home sweet home of conspiracy theories. From Area 51 and Bigfoot sightings to chemtrails, New World Order, Freemasonry, Illuminati, Sandy Hook, “stolen election,” COVID-19 pandemic… Well, we don’t have that much time for naming them all. But you get an idea.
But wouldn’t it be great to look at the minds of people who actually believe the conspiracy theories and see what it is in there that makes them tick?
Thanks to a redditor who posed the question “What conspiracy theory do you believe to be true? What evidence led you to this conclusion?”, we are now able to do just that.
Let’s see what exactly made people believe in one conspiracy or another, and don’t forget that the truth, it’s just out there.
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#1
Modern art exists solely for money laundering. I believe that modern/minimalistic art exists solely for money laundering. It's just a way for rich people to move money around. There's a reason why paintings of plain geometric shapes sell for millions of dollars, and it's not because the buyers are really into shapes
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#2
Women's fake pockets are a marketing ploy. Women's pants have fake pockets to make us buy purses.
#3
That the government uses social media to manipulate, and measure public sentiment and opinion.
Conspiracies are covered under a veil of unknown, much like these theories they represent. They appear from seemingly out of nowhere, start surfing around on social media, some become a part of urban legends, while others disappear until new speculations emerge.
To find out how exactly conspiracies work and what goes on inside conspiracy theorists' minds, Bored Panda reached out to Thomas Roulet, a Senior Lecturer in Organisation Theory and the Deputy Director of the MBA Programme at the University of Cambridge. Thomas is also the author of the 2020 book “The Power of Being Divisive: Understanding Negative Social Evaluations” published by Stanford University Press.
When asked a rather broad question on why people believe conspiracies, Thomas said that there are two main mechanisms in charge: “a sensemaking one and an identity one.”
#4
The 10-year challenge was used to collect facial recognition data. The 10-year challenge all over social media is actually a way to record and gather more facial recognition data.
#5
I believe that the government probably makes some conspiracy theories to try to make questioning the government seem somewhat crazy.
#6
Area 51 is not a place for secret government/military testing with aliens and stuff, instead Area 51 is a scapegoat while shady behind the scenes stuff is going on at another military base that the general public doesnt know about. I mean if you were really going to do something in secrecy, would you do it in the place where everyone thinks it is? H**l no! I dont have any specific evidence to back this up but it makes sense right?
“In an increasingly complex world, people want to make sense of their situation and their social environment. Seemingly unconnected events or clues are constructed as a coherent whole in the most successful conspiracy theories.”
Thomas added that “in a world where social connections are numerous but often meaningless (for example, on social media), people want to feel part of a crowd and a group—there is a need to find a tribe and identify with it.” As a result, “Conspiracy theorists have a strong sense of group identity, which made them attractive to those who might feel marginalized or excluded in society,” he explained.
#7
Banks and landowners conspire to manipulate urban land prices. Turn an area into a ghetto by marking it as a high-risk loan proposition, denying loans in the area. Property values plummet on a down-town area because no one can sell, because no one can get a loan. Once things are down enough, you can buy up prime location land at pennies on the dollar then re-develop it into being worth the 'real' market value of such a central location, plus what you invested in the actual development.
#8
I used to tell people that I believed the government listened to or phone calls. Years later some guy named Snowden proved me right.
#9
I believe the US military went to Afghanistan in order to seize control of the Poppy fields and instead of destroying them they manufactured black tar and other forms of heroin and sent it back to the states. I have several friends that were marines in Afghanistan and they've confirmed these suspicions. The drugs got worse after being in Afghanistan not better or more contained. The USA military is the biggest cartel in the world
According to Thomas, “People buy into conspiracy theories are in all parts of society—from the most to the least educated, from the richest to the poorest,” so no particular group of people is safe from believing in conspiracies. It’s because “everybody needs to be able to make sense of their reality, and everybody needs to feel part of a group and socially integrated.”
#10
The lines on the detergent caps are higher than they should be so you use more detergent for each load of laundry. It's so easy for them to get away with it
#11
Priceless artwork and historical documents are replicas. I’ve always speculated that a lot of priceless artwork and historical documents are actually replicas or copies. Obviously a painting by a world-famous artist using a very specific technique would be very hard to fake, and I don’t think that every art scholar in the world is paid off in some grand conspiracy. Rather, I just think that either the national treasures never left their vaults or that some national treasures actually were lost to history but they were copied.
#12
The countdown timers on ads for games or streaming services are actually longer than seconds. Seems too long sometimes.
Many new conspiracies have emerged in times of the worldwide pandemic, and Thomas says that it has to do with the fact that the current situation adds complexity and changes on a daily basis.
“It is hard to comprehend, to understand, and it's brutal and sudden. All of this makes people want to make sense of an incredible, unprecedented, and difficult-to-accept situation. Such a unique situation calls for an out-of-the-ordinary explanation—and lends itself well to conspiracy theories.”
Moreover, “People are looking for information, and they are looking for culprits to explain the terrible situations they have to experience. They want to believe this can be pinned on a specific actor,” he concluded.
#13
Disney only named a movie Frozen to distract from 'frozen head' Google searches. That Disney made a movie named Frozen so that when people google things like 'frozen' and 'Disney' together, info about the movie comes up instead of stories about Walt Disney’s frozen head.
#15
UFO sightings are just humans from the future on a time-traveling safari. All the UFO sightings throughout history are just humans from the future on a time-traveling safari meant to observe how we were in the past. They are supposed to keep out of sight, but thanks to human/mechanical errors, there have been hiccups with their cloaking which have resulted in being seen. That's why there have always been so many reports of them throughout history, but there has never been an attack. It's just us. Also the reason why we don't see as many examples of UFOs now even though pretty much everyone has a camera is because people are not that interested in this time period since we already document aspects of human life all the time.
#16
When Ted Kaczynski (the unabomber) was at Harvard, he participated in a brutal psychological experiment led by professor Henry Murray. The experiment lasted for three years and by many accounts they seemed to have an extreme impact on Kaczynski’s psyche. I think this experiment was part of the CIA’s MKUltra project and destabilized Kaczynski enough to where he eventually went on his reign of terror of sending bombed packages around the country. During the MKUltra project, the CIA collaborated with university professors on these mind-control experiments but a lot of the documentation was destroyed when people started to look into it. TL;DR: The unabomber participated in an experiment that was a part of the MKULtra project that eventually led to him becoming a mass-murderer.
#17
I believe in the mattress store conspiracy, so the conspiracy is that mattress stores are for money laundering. I went onto google maps and typed in ‘mattress stores near me’. There were 4 MATTRESS STORES IN THE SAME SHOPPING CENTER. There was a road that had 5 mattress stores less than a mile apart. So I definitely believe in it.
#18
I believe that chapstick causes lips to become more dry a couple hours after usage. I base this on the fact that my lips are more dry 5 hours after using chapstick than 2 days after using it
#20
Apple started the AirPod memes. I believe that Apple started the 'wearing AirPods = cool/rich' meme intentionally to boost sales. They became the best-selling wireless earbuds worldwide after the meme.
#21
Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 wasn't an accident. There were definitely external forces that catalyzed its disappearance. The flight path was diverted many times and there was a lot of shady stuff about some of the passengers and the pilot of Flight 370. We may never know unless the plane is found.
#22
Michael Jordan's father was murdered in retribution for Jordan not paying off massive gambling debt. Jordan didn't retire and then come back, he was suspended for gambling. In the mid 90's, Michael Jordan was an industry. The truth about his gambling habits may have cost a lot of people a lot of money, so the cover story was presented.
#23
Tinder gives fake 'You got a new match!' notifications to get you to swipe more. I have a theory that Tinder gives fake 'You got a new match!' notifications so people get excited and open Tinder, which leads them to swipe more.
#24
Restaurant owners sing 'Happy Birthday' to embarrass you. Restaurant owners know how awkward it is to be sung to in front of the whole establishment, and they do it to discourage people from taking advantage of their free birthday food.
#25
Gas station owners are the ones putting the card scammers on the pumps. They don't want your info, they want you to distrust pay at the pump so you'll come inside and make an impulse buy. Most stations barely make any money of gas, the money is in the stuff they sell inside.
#26
The bacon industry is ever so slightly making normal sliced bacon thinner every few years,so that eventually,what was once considered normal sliced bacon becomes thick cut,thus saving the big bacon industry money. My only evidence is the fact that my bacon,which I have always and will only buy from a specific brand,seems to be getting thinner and thinner,more flimsy,more likely to fall apart as I get it out
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