The Vast Mermaid Conspiracy

Has the 1 percent really rigged the economy? Why do Argentinians believe the Vatican is ...

By

Has the 1 percent really rigged the economy? Why do Argentinians believe the Vatican is hiding aliens? And finally, what’s the deal with Bigfoot (and the associated erotica therein)? University of Miami political scientist and conspiracy theory expert Joseph Uscinski joins Jonah to answer these questions, explain who believes such things, and why. We suggest you listen to this truly bizarre episode before the Lizard People take it off the air.


Show Notes:

–FiveThirtyEight podcast with Joe

Start a Free Trial
Get every newsletter and all of The Dispatch. Support quality, fact-based journalism. Get Started ALREADY HAVE AN ACCOUNT? SIGN IN
By
Comments (18)
Join The Dispatch to participate in the comments.
 
  1. Avatar photo
    Jordan

    Hey, this was a fun one. I did want to chime in and hopefully shine a little light on a common misconception. Bigfoots and aliens don't belong in the same category at all. Though popular media has built up a lot of strange ideas around them, these primates are as mundane and terrestrial as your dogs. They're animals. There is no government cover-up; it's just that their habits make them hard to document. Still, as with bears and moose, they are frequently seen and heard in certain regions. When bigfoots get lumped together with paranormal things such as aliens, ghosts, and transdimensional beings, or with silly myths like mermaids, the Loch Ness monster, or the moth-man, it really muddies the waters on this topic. Unfortunately, the elusive nature of North American wood apes—combined with the human predilection for a good mystery and our projection of personality and intentionality onto animals—has a tendency to make them seem more mystical than they are. Media feeds on this, frequently grouping wood apes together with the strange, otherworldly, and mysterious. And of course, always with spooky music in the background! More unfortunate still, some self-styled bigfoot seekers specifically propagate the idea that wood apes are alien or interdimensional or in some other way paranormal. Their messages get jumbled in with the more grounded messages of people like journalist John Green or scientists Grover Krantz and Jeff Meldrum, and others like them, and so things become confused even further.

    Collapse
  2. Jason Runyan

    This was such a fun episode! Loved it!

    Collapse
  3. Avatar photo
    Rob W

    I loved this one, not least because I found out who was responsible for cancelling Firefly.

    Collapse
  4. Avatar photo
    Angie

    That was fun....I like him, and his voice

    Collapse
  5. Avatar photo
    Belt

    Two items I'd like a followup from him: 1) The 'dark web' - is that a thing, and how does it factor in your research? 2) Assume you have a friend, who has bought into a conspiracy theory, and you think it's plainly nuts and possibly going to hurt him in the long run. Can you deprogram him? How? Or do you let it ride? Do you agree to disagree? At what point do you walk away?

    Collapse
  6. Aaron C.

    Pretty cool to see that this guy coauthored a book with one of my professors. Never thought I'd be two degrees of separation from a Remnant guest lol

    Collapse
  7. Avatar photo
    The Bell Tower

    Bernard Bailyn made an excellent point about the prevalence of conspiracy mindedness in the American colonies leading up to the American Revolution. Chapter V of Pamphlets of the American Revolution is instructive on this. He quotes Edmund Burke at one point:

    "The Americans have made a discovery, or think they have made one, that we mean to oppress them: we have made a discovery, or think we have made on, that they intend to rise in rebellion against us."

    Thought this was a great podcast.

    Collapse
  8. Avatar photo
    Doug Palzer

    Hi Jonah,

    I highly recommend getting Shoshana Zuboff on the Podcast. I originally heard her on World Affairs, and the information she provided was so spectacular and illuminating that it prompted the origins of my Master’s thesis. She wrote a book entitled “Surveillance Capitalism” and has been studying the fundamental changes to our economy wrought by technology for decades. Having her on would not only be supremely interesting in its own right, but she could provide much needed context and perspective in the age of Trump v. Twitter, especially for those of us who enjoy hearing you press people into doing rank punditry.

    If you’d like to climb even further down the rabbit hole, you could also speak to Karen Yeung who wrote a brilliant paper about how “surveillance capitalists” are using their tech to put Sunstein and Thaler’s idea of nudges on steroids. She argues their practices violate our liberal notions of notice and consent and moreover threaten our idea of autonomous choice.

    Hope you can get one or both on,

    Thanks!

    Collapse
  9. Avatar photo
    Kev_WDE

    Say what you want about Argentinians, but they can pronounce “Argentina.”

    Collapse
  10. Frank Pepp

    I enjoyed this one a lot! I especially liked looking at the 1% arguments, and the historical perspective of Jefferson being a conspiracy theorist. Which he clearly was as least until he was President. Ha.

    I find some of it tough, especially coming from a Trump skeptic perspective. I don't necessarily believe Trump conspired with Russia. But there were at least remarkably interesting things that looked like soft quid pros. Also, Trump lied about not having business in Russia while he was trying to get a hotel deal. That was right up to or through the Republican convention?

    I said right then there seemed to be strange and unusual favors going back and forth. With Trump seeming only interested in adding a couple items to the Republican Platform, or rather removing support for Ukraine. He seemed skeptical of sanctions on Russia. Meanwhile, Russia openly helping him any way it could. A Trumper mocking me asked why I didn't got to the FBI with this info. And I said, I'd bet the FBI is looking into it. But proving a quid pro quo to a legal standard here will be a big ask.

    I'm not sure any of that makes me a conspiracy theorist. Or that thinking the 1% or rather the .1% have too much and a destabilizing amount of power right now. I like the Koch brother(s)! I didn't like them funding Trumpy organizations doing Trumpy tactics before Trump.

    I assume the bad will of very few people. I assume the Kochs sincerely believed the ends justified the means. It doesn't mean I didn't want them to stop. Trump was the just desert for otherwise good Republicans who believed in winning at all costs. But America did not deserve him.

    Collapse
Load More