10 things I hate about 5G coronavirus conspiracy theorists
So, as you may have read, my patience for 5G coronavirus conspiracy theories disappeared about 10 words into my last blog.
It just seems baffling to me. This theory is already a massive stretch to believe, and yet people are adding more and more impossible narratives into the mix, saying “well nobody’s proved its NOT happening, so it obviously is.”
This kind of bollocks puts key works at risk, puts our technological development as a nation at risk and (given the intelligence of the lady below to completely forget about social distancing while warning these workers about 5G supposedly killing people) puts more lives at risk than this completely fake conspiracy.
What is my response? “Give me more please!” I mentioned research by NYT showing how many Facebook groups there were, and while quantitative research like that is good, it’s time to go deeper.
Follow my Twitch
I am running a variety stream during the COVID-19 lockdown - including a weekly podcast and plenty of gaming.
Yes, I have infiltrated a few of these groups and the kind of content on there has been eye-opening to say the least…
To give this blog some kind of structure (and subtly shoutout to my favourite Heath Ledger movie), I’ve boiled my learnings down to 10 key points that form a bit of a playbook for your average 5G conspiracy theorist, along with how you should respond if you’re confronted with similar arguments in the future.
1 - The classic arguing two sides of the same coin
Eamonn Homles is probably the most well known person to try and play this tactic. Fair play to him, he did try to walk back the argument after he said it on national television, but he’s still a bit of a moron for even doing so in the first place.
Here’s what he said: “What I don’t accept is mainstream media immediately slapping that [theory] down as not true, when they don’t know it’s not true… it’s very easy to say it is not true because it suits the state narrative. That’s all I would say as someone with an inquiring mind.”
...Did you get that? Did you see what he did? In the “don’t know it’s not true,” of the line, he pulled out the oldest trick in the book when it comes to Conspiracy theories - you may have proven that 5G radiowaves have no health detriments, but you haven’t proven it’s completely healthy. It’s an impossible infinite loop that puts a ridiculous burden of proof back on a scientist. This theory is bollocks from the start and has been proven to be bollocks, so stop trying to perpetrate it all under the guise of “listen and question.”
2 - ZERO STUDIES
Let’s dive into the weeds of what Eamonn alluded to here. Apparently, there are no industry studies into the health effects of 5G. Bullshit. Of course people studied this. We’re just conveniently ignoring these studies and favouring stories that favour the narrative here.
3 - Playing the Frank Hahnel card
This is one that we can knock out of the park and debunk really quickly. Many of these group members have shared a particular video titled “Frank Hahnel A real doctor telling it like it is. It’s all fake.”
In this 25-minute marathon of someone repeatedly telling you to “share this video” like some incredibly thirsty YouTuber, he first of all tells you how zinc will cure coronavirus (wrong), and says the words “fake news” 67 times (terrifying to hear this from a doctor - more on that later…), and that COVID-19 is a conspiracy to steal your freedoms.
I know he doesn’t mention 5G in here, but it's worth responding to this kind of shit and debunking it instantly. First of all, that’s not his real name, he is “Eric Nepute,” a man who has terrible reviews on Yelp for this kind of snake oil salesman shyster act, and he’s a fucking chiropractor. Not to talk down the effectiveness of the job, but the medical science needed for this field is incredibly limited and in some situations, they do more harm than good. Do not listen to Dr. Alex Jones over here.
4 - Surprise! 5G coronavirus conspiracy theorists are also anti-vaxxers
Ignoring the fact they shared a Daily Mail article here, the point stands. When a vaccination exists, we all need to have it, to truly get past this illness. The comment section underneath is utterly cancerous.
They believe vaccines are a means of government control. They believe vaccines are a form of socialism. So naturally, this goes hand in hand with 5G spread by corona. The ideologies match up quite nicely for these idiots. To wrap up this point, I’ll use a Daily Mail technique used regularly - alluding to something but distancing yourself from it because you don’t want to be blamed for inflaming rhetoric… Is anti-vaccination beliefs a new form of natural selection? I’ll leave that up to you, dear reader.
5 - They think lamp posts are giving them 5G coronavirus
Conspiracy theories start small, but gradually they take over every element of your life. To help make them feel local, they will usually get linked with average items in the lives of many. So, what will be that item for the 5G corona cluster-F?
Turns out people have been seeing weird nipple shape bumps on top of lights and they’ve concocted the theory they are secret weapons - containing the equivalent to weaponised microwaves… For those who do believe this, let me break some news to you. These are photocell light sensors to turn on the lamps when it's dark, you utter, utter planks.
6 - Sharing disinformation
This is a simple one. The internet has become a great viral base for conspiracy theories to spread. If you need a piece of writing that blindly agrees with your ideas, regardless of the scientifically proven truth out there, it's got your back! Hell, you can even get studies from pubmed that do the same - let me clarify a detail to anyone who links to a study from this site.
It’s the equivalent of that one guy who used Wikipedia as a source in their dissertation (...guilty). The US national library of medicine is managed by the community, meaning its rather easy to get a study there.
One such example used is right here that seems to go through EMF waves being a detriment to human health, creating a widely cited quote in other 5G studies with one key issue - the writers forget to mention that 5G waves have been with us since the 1970s (analogue TV and radio) and they have not made a single person ill, caused cancer, or carried a virus. So, what happens when you call this out? Well, there’s a backup plan for that...
7 - Talk about the Cyrus a parsa court case
So maybe you weren’t phased by this 5G conspiracy theorist’s use of someone’s Facebook post or a YouTube video from some user named something like “thetruthisoutthere69.” That’s no problem because they have another burden of proof in their arsenal. Use legitimate links that have no real relevance to the point they are making and use them as a bit of a glue to stick together parts of their narrative.
One that’s regularly shared is a legal battle between Cyrus a Parsa (founder and CEO of the AI organisation - get ready to see that name a lot if you look into this rabbit hole) and Google, that extended to CEOs of other companies like Facebook and Microsoft. The case dives into some of the more suspect behaviours of tech companies and their use of AI, and accuses them of “endangering the world’s citizens” by weaponising AI.
Let’s start by looking at Cyrus’ Twitter account, and you’ll see the account of a rather bored conspiracy theorist with a lot of money and time on his hands. Same as the above point, none of his 5G health impacts seem to take into account the waves have been around for decades in other forms. It will come as absolutely no surprise that he is of a right wing persuasion, spreading the bullshit that people were being programmed by AI to attack President Donald Trump. Let’s be honest, this court case is for the exposure and PR around this conspiracy, and will be promptly thrown out. Plus, his theories run suspiciously close to the Q-Anon works, so this should be a red flag. Speaking of…
8 - Q-Anon gets referred to a lot
If there is one thing that should discredit any theory immediately, it should be the ties to Q-Anon. You remember them, right? They were the source of the theory that Hilary Clinton had a hand in child sex trafficking through a pizzeria in Washington D.C, which led to someone bursting in with a gun.
They’ve been a fine bunch of pricks around the Coronavirus - spreading rumours of it being a Cabal Weapon launched by the democrats to disrupt Trump’s election chances. Dear Q, please do get in the sea.
9 - Blame Bill Gates
Every 5G conspiracy theorist seems to hate Bill Gates at the moment, believing him to be the mastermind behind the whole operation. The most prominent figure being recently found guilty Roger Stone, who suggested he had a hand in creating it so he can microchip people. “Whether Bill Gates played some role in the creation and spread of this virus is open for vigorous debate.
I have conservative friends who say it’s ridiculous and others say absolutely,” he said to an American talk radio show. The classic distancing yourself from the accusation tactic, to muddy the debate while keeping your hands clean (see: my friends believe this). However, he does let his mask slip a little, as he continued: “He and other globalists are using it for mandatory vaccinations and microchipping people so we know if they’ve been tested. Over my dead body. Mandatory vaccinations? No way, Jose!”
...See it? He could have said anything else, but he decided to very deliberately call them globalists - an insight into how this is a political argument for the nationalists out there. The “us vs them” causes the conflict that leads to conspiracy theories being born and physically acted upon. So, to use his own tactic here, whether Roger Stone is a criminal who had close ties to Jeffrey Epstein is open for vigorous debate. We have the courts who say absolutely, and I have friends who say more will be found…
10 - Turning on their own groups
This one particularly makes me chuckle. When all the conspiracy theories perpetrated by the user has been debunked, they will turn to the last place - their own masters.
If posts get deleted, it's not because Facebook has a blanket rule to ban content speaking of 5G causing coronavirus, it’s a wider conspiracy and the group admins are in on it. Conspiracies on top of conspiracies - it’s the dream.
