Conspirarists Part One.

‘Conspiracy Theory’ – a theory about some events that have/are happened/ing but are being either kept in secret or covered up ex-post.  

Conspirator – a person taking part in the conspiracy.

Conspirarist – a conspiracy theorist that theorises that a conspiracy theory exists.

Couple of months ago, I started getting into conspiracy theories no-not-like-that, as in – it fascinated me why people believe them. This was triggered by a gym member posting an ‘interview’ on the gym group chat and urging us to listen. The interview was with a (in?)famous anti-vaxxing quack who was basking the light because of the Covid19 pandemic extravaganza.

This in turn led me to explore the rabbit hole of who was the podcast host and why was he ‘interviewing’ (what a joke, he was asking leading questions, not interviewing) people who effectively contributed to scaremongering and fearshovelling in times when people needed clarity and comfort.

It was interesting to see that earlier in the career the podcast host [1] interviewed slightly kooky yet ok people but as the time progressed the interviewees became more and more…questionable. Let’s call this PodcastPlatform1. As I was looking through all of the content, an interesting pattern emerged:

1. There is one bitcoin ‘expert’ [2] that came on regularly to persuade people to sign up to either a pyramid-scheme or a make-money-quick scheme or possibly both.  
2. There’s one ehh…drug ‘expert’ whose main topic was that ayahuasca and its potential to “Kill Your Fears and Alter Your Consciousness”.
3. Also, rarely, but persistently an old Taoist man who talks about sex and multiple orgasms that you can reach or whatever. Orientalism? Never heard of it.

I’d joke that this place is Men’s Health on steroids, but that would be offensive to Men’s Health. However, PP1 does read like a men’s magazine on ayahuasca. Also, I was initially confused as to what exactly this place is about because it advertises “Business Masterclasses that are serious about your potential” in the banners surrounding the podcast window. The business class is led by your humble podcast host – Skeletal Man.

The classes in question will apparently allow you to:

1. Do what you love.
2. Be your own boss.
3. Become financially free.

Like, who doesn’t love the idea those things? Well, the UK government doesn’t for a start. (Please see IR35 issue that’s going around, plus minus few other difficulties with self-employment). But anyway.

In a half-an-hour promotional video Skeletal Man explains how, you too, a simple person can combine something and money and make excellence and gather long term customers with proven roadmaps to provide exceptional value. Quite ordinarily, the Skeletal Man boasts this to be the best business course out there. As for proof, he just lists some numbers that are not verifiable. The courses aren’t accredited or creditable to further education, but you’re promised you’ll make money back quickly, so it doesn’t really matter.

For mere $3000 Skeletal Man will teach you step-by-step instructions in an 8 week course so you can too have your podcasting empire worth 7 figures like he does. Now, this podcasting platform and business course peddler is actually a UK company, so we have access to company house records, which, according to tax returns and write-offs submitted do not show this venture as worth “7 figures [3]”. The records do show somewhat questionable activity, if you’re up with your business management.

See there are, at the time of writing, four classes. Apart from Business Masterclass there’re also a Broadcasting Masterclass, an Inspire Masterclass and a Life Coaching Masterclass. I’ve done some very lax calculations on that $3000 basic plan membership and oh yes, we’ll get to that, but here comparatively are other course prices (as of 2020 UK):

Keep in mind that $3000 tag is for the cheapest tier, the other two tiers are “Price on Request”. The middle tier actually gets you interviewed by the Skeletal Man, therefore exposing your business to the audience. I am not sure how it contributes to learning but it is certainly one of the more convoluted ways of paying to advertise yourself.

The top tier allows you to be coached by the Skeletal Man himself, who is an expert in all four courses.

I mean, if you’re looking for get-smart-fast-scheme, and you somehow have spare cash that you have got out of your pyramid-scheme who am I to stop you. But it’s quite interesting that independent reviews of these “courses” are quite scathing, and include that there’s no money back guarantee, the coaches barely appear in person and the content provided is pretty basic entry level stuff taken from somewhere else for free and drip fed. Oh, and the very successful graduates of the course turn out to be mentors. And if you do some more digging, some of the graduates appear to list themselves working for this program and mentoring at the same time they graduated. Which…time wise is questionable order of events. Or they don’t list this course in their education at all.

Other interesting titbits are that the course has a classic red “offer ending in 88:88:88” banner that renews its timer every time you clear your cookies for this page and a “as seen on” line which is followed by a grey jpg of more or less known/respectable media outlets with none of the links. You know, the same links that could prove that this course was actually featured on the claimed outlets.  

But what does this all have to do with conspiracies really? Well, this PP1 hosts them. It invites some very strange people – quite often those who have been rejected by their peers and whose opinions boil down to “it was better back in the olden days before progress and new things”. And with those people come over very devout audiences. Audiences which are not informed very well, to put it politely.

Quite often these audiences are happy to listen to generalisations and do not question the specifics. People who are afraid of new things or perhaps, even people whose beliefs have been dismissed and rejected by their peers and so they are seeking comfort in these fringes. But more crucially, it is people who might have money. Money they are willing to spend on a platform that caters to their fear of the different AND who are more likely to buy attractive get-x-fast schemes.

The Skeletal Man never actually outright agrees with the topics he interviews people on. He nods a lot, but he is very careful to keep his guests talking. It’s a great study of plausible deniability on paper and tacit approval in action.

During one of the more controversial interviews and even more controversial fundraisers they got attention of their direct competitor. Let’s call that PP2. And this platform was created by eh…ex-Establishment Journalist. If nothing else, the Journalist knows how to do journalism. He does a whole investigation with proof and evidence and tries to contact the Skeletal Man for comment but to no avail. See, the proof and evidence at minimum show that the Skeletal Man is a liar, and at worst – a conspiracy grifter.

And this matters to the Journalist because, he also has a podcast platform that has tiered membership and merch…and…courses. And their own Zen master. Hello, Orientalism, is that you again? Anyway, just think how low the Skeletal Man had to get in order to be investigated by its direct competitor, but not in a “aha gotcha way” but in a “you are making us all look bad way”.  But also note that no matter how weird, you can still make money of it and funnel people into get-x-fast schemes.

[1] Who looks very skeletal in a way that makes you think he did coke for a long time.

[2] Whose profile on PodcastPlatform1 proudly stated that he worked Lehman Brothers, you know, one of THE most famous contributors to the financial crisis of 2008. That one. This guy’s main achievement as we see it right there proudly displayed is that he worked in a place that dealt in sub-prime mortgages. And this is supposed to be trustworthy??? But then again this content isn’t aimed at me, it’s aimed at someone who wants to invest in bitcoin and but doesn’t know much about it. But Lehman Brothers? Really?

[3] Middling 6 if you’re interested. Which is fine, but it’s really not 7. 

image credit: https://pixabay.com/users/sallyjermain-8418830/