Conspiracy Clearinghouse

EPISODE 73 | My Chemtrail Romance Planes go by in the sky and leave white trails behind them. Some of us see this and think, wow, ice crystals. Other think it’s a nefarious evil plot to take away our minds or our virility or something else. As soon as someone starts talking about chemtrails, you sort of know where you stand with them. They're a conspiracy nut and can be easily dismissed. Especiall...

EPISODE 72 | Everywhere Is Haunted Guest: Bob LeMent, creator and host of the Static Radio podcast and Everywhere Is Haunted YouTube channel The unseen world is intriguing to many of us, especially those of us embroiled in pop culture. Plenty of people believe in ghosts, spirits, shades, spectres, shadows, phantoms, eidolons, or whatever you want to call them. We talk with Bob LeMent, who runs the...

EPISODE 71 | The Starfighter & the Condor (World Is Weird 7) The story of the Lockheed F-104 Starfighter starts fine, but then takes a turn into comedy, then tragedy before veering into corporate malfeasance, corruption, far-right ultranationalism, secret agents, a modern kamikaze attack, a finance giant and a bag lady, MK-ULTRA Manchurian Candidates and South American state-sponsored terror.  Bec...

EPISODE 70 | Monster Mash: Vampires With Halloween just around the corner, it’s natural to start think about the supernatural. While superheroes and characters from TV and movies are increasingly popular costumes, it’s very often the classics we turn to when choosing what to dress up as for All Hallow’s Eve. Vampire is still a popular choice, and the idea of undead blood-drinking fiends frightens...

EPISODE 69 | Electoral Collage: Voter Fraud, Election Interference & Other Shenanigans (The World Is Weird 6) The US midterms are coming up and there's lots of chatter about fraud. Are they legit? Has there been fraud and interference in the past? Yes, but not every time foul has been cried. A look at claims and scandals 1792-1982, plus a thumbnail history of American political parties. Like w...

EPISODE 68 | Persistent Illusion: Time Travellers We are accustomed to thinking of time as a fourth dimension, though Einstein says space and time are really, when you get down to it, the same thing. As he once said, “The distinction between the past, present, and future is only a stubbornly persistent illusion.” This makes us wonder – will it one day be possible to travel in time the same way we...

EPISODE 67 | Pixels & Paranoia: Video Game Conspiracies From its humble beginnings, the video game industry has expanded from cabinet arcade games to PCs and home consoles. Two-thirds of adults in the US and three-quarters of children play them. It makes more than the film industry, which got to around $21 bn last year; and music, which made almost $26 billion in 2021. Globally, gaming hit $19...

EPISODE 66 | Really Stranger Things: The U.S. Satanic Panic of the 1980s For episode 66 (that's two-thirds of the Beast), we look at the large-scale freakout about "Satanism" that swept across America in the 80s. Music was a frequent target, but so was Dungeons & Dragons, Proctor & Gamble and even McDonald's. Plus a pitstop in Northern Ireland in the early days of the Troubles, when it see...

EPISODE 65 | Acronyms for Satan: CERN, LHC, WWW & More Ever since its very beginning, wild speculation has circulated about the LHC at CERN. That it causes shifts in reality, leading to the dreaded Mandela Effect. That it actually sucked the earth into a black hole (where we now presumably reside). That it creates antimatter. That it is a secret temple to the dark lord of the underworld, SATAN...

EPISODE 64 | Accidental Tourists: Interdimensional Travellers Sometimes the fabric of our world thins out, and people slip through - either from another dimension or into one. So some people think, while others claim it happened to them. Come along on a trip through different times and places, visiting 12th century England, 19th century Germany, Spain, Japan, Mormon mythology and, of course, the U...

EPISODE 63 | Paranoia, the Destroyer: Gangstalking, Targeted Individuals & Havana Syndrome A look at the phenomena of gangstalking and TIs, targeted individuals, who are either suffering a psychotic break, have schizophrenia, or have done something to royally piss off some very powerful people who possess technology so advanced, it borders on magic. Like what we do? Then buy us a beer or three...

EPISODE 62 | Nikola Tesla: The Monster from Venus (Big 'Uns 6) Balkan genius inventor Nikola Tesla shows up all over the place in the conspirasphere, and the stories about him are legion. He was really the father of electricity but his rival Thomas Edison screwed him out of his due, he was assassinated, he never died, his clones live on, he built a death day, and an earthquake machine and oh, so m...

EPISODE 61 | The Great Replacement: The White Wing Goes Mainstream The world keeps changing and some people have had just about enough. So they revert to tried and true paradigms that worked for them in the past, but with a new twist. Like the Great Replacement - the idea that white people are being systematically replaced by non-white people with an eye to eliminating whites altogether. They say...

EPISODE 60 | Under My Skin: Morgellons Disease A boy with a rash, a concerned mother, the internet and a lack of medical knowledge combine to create the phenomenon known as Morgellons Disease. It's a nefarious condition where coloured fibers appear under your skin, causing fatigue and pain, possibly placed there by evil forces. Or it might be a mental delusion transmitted from person to person by...

EPISODE 59 | Atlas Sank: Titanic Conspiracies The lure of the sea is an ancient one, and perhaps no sailing vessel has garnered more attention than the RMS Titanic. It's a story we all know, or think we know - a classic tale of ship meets iceberg. But what if that's not the story? What if the iceberg is an innocent patsy and something else was the cause, like a fire, or a U-boat, or a cursed mummy...

EPISODE 58 | Spanish Caravan (Travelogue 3) Spain is a fascinating country - rich in variety and history, and its fair share of high weirdness. We travel to Madrid, Catalonia and Valencia for statues to Lucifer, UFOs, haunted metro stations, abandoned villages, tomato fights and much more. Like what we do? Then buy us a beer or three via our page on  Buy Me a Coffee . #ConspiracyClearinghouse #sha...

EPISODE 57 | Pseudolaw: Cabbages & Kings The law is complicated, or maybe it isn't. Maybe there are secrets that the clever can tease out to their advantage. Did you know the government opens a secret bank account for you when you're born? Or using ALL CAPS when writing documents absolves you from legal responsibilities? That juries are illegal? And the highest law in the land is the local she...

EPSIODE 56 | Red Pill This!: The Simulation Proposal Mainly inspired by a 1999 movie, many people suspect we may be living in a computer simulation of some sort. If we are, how can we tell? Maybe by looking at some ideas from physics, which has some truly unusual ideas as to the nature of things. The universe might be made of tiny vibrating strings, or physicalized information. It might be a holog...

EPISODE 55 | The Dead Internet Theory Weirdly similar but also somewhat nonsensical tweets, emails that seem written by bots, the same posts showing up again and again - something seems to be amiss with the internet. And some people think they have found the answer: the internet died a few years ago and is now almost entirely run by sophisticated AI bots. This is the Dead Internet Theory. We'll lo...

EPISODE 54 | Pootie-Poot on the Prowl: V. Putin Takes Center Stage Many see parallels between Putin's invasion of Ukraine and Hitler's of Poland in 1939. Other see echoes of Stalin in today's Russian leader. But maybe we need to go back further, to Napoleon, to see what's up with this guy. Here's a look at "Little Boney", as British satire of Napoleon had it, and "Pootie-Poot", which was George W....

EPSIODE 53 | Time to Get Ill: DST, Y2K & 2012 We can find doom and gloom anywhere we focus our attention. Even time itself is not free from the shadowy glances of the suspicious. This is a look at some time-related freakouts - Daylight Saving Time, time zones, Y2K and the 2012 phenomenon. See a video version on our YouTube channel. Like what we do? Then buy us a beer or three via our page on ...

EPISODE 52 | The Mandela Effect & Memory (Because Reasons 6) Nelson Mandela died in the early 80s, or he didn't. The comedian Sinbad was in a genie movie in the 90s, or he wasn't. Brand names keep getting changed, or not. Either our memories are not as reliable as we think they are, or someone is going around changing the very fabric of reality.  See a video version on our YouTube channel . Like w...

EPISODE 51 | Et Tu, Reptilicus: Mythconceptions About the Ancient World History is a concept, often imperfectly recounted and remembered, sometimes purposefully obscured or confused. So, we think we know things that, in fact, we don't really know. Let's jump into the Wayback Machine and take a look at some things we think we know about the ancient world. See a video version on our  YouTube channel...

EPISODE 50 | The JFK Assassination (Big 'Uns 5) Guest: Fred Litwin, author of On The Trail of Delusion: Jim Garrison: The Great Accuser The JFK assassination is sort of a gateway drug for conspiracy theories, and boy there are lots of ideas about what happened that day in 1963. Fred Litwin once believed a lot of those theories, but has since changed his mind and is firmly in the lone gunman camp....

EPISODE 49 | 'Merican Monuments (Travelogue 2) Nations help tell the story of themselves to themselves with monuments, so let's look at two famous ones in the US of A - Mount Rushmore and the Washington Monument. Secret rooms and hatches, astonishing racial insensitivity, UFOs, Bigfoot, interdimensional portals, ancient weather control tech and a countdown calendar to the Apocalypse. That's a lot...