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Imagery associated with the Knights Templar appears in the public discourse and symbolism of many white supremacist and white nationalist groups. The 2011 Norwegian mass murderer cited the Templars in his manifesto, as did the 2019 New Zealand shooter. Templar crosses were on display at the 2017 white supremacist rally in Charlottesville, North Carolina. To understand the security imaginary behind these racialised medievalisms and their contemporary animation within right-wing extremism, this article develops the concept of 'conspiratorial medievalism'. The Knights Templar imaginary blends a specific, racialised, and romanticised vision of history with the grammar of conspiracy theory. This is characterised by (a) a belief in the racialised decline and victimisation of a 'righteous' White Christendom; (b) a sense of threat posed by racialised Others and betrayal by insiders; and (c) an anachronistic view of near-omnipotent individual agency. Significantly, conspiratorial medievalism demonstrates an aspiration to not merely combat 'undue' agency of racialised Others, but to reclaim and perform extreme agency themselves. Agency is cast in the idiom of medieval chivalry and framed as the moral obligation of righteous White men. Although Knights Templar imagery may appear superficial, this article finds it is an important justificatory and enabling discourse for racist violence. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Covid-19 pandemic saw restrictions being implemented to curb the spread of the virus. This seeded anti-lockdown demonstrations across the globe. Leveraging network, quantitative and qualitative textual analysis tools, we scrutinize the expression of opposition to these restrictions on 96 public Facebook groups and pages, and its connection to physical places across the globe. To grapple with this relation, we propose the concept of geo-indexing as the practice of adding meaning to physical places on social media and identify a transnational network of geo-indexed posts. Importantly, this geo-indexed opposition was framed as unified against an unjust and undemocratic imposition of restrictive measures. The language used in some of this communication was conspiratorial, albeit to a lesser degree than expected. Moreover, geo-indexed posts were used to evidence the scale of public mobilization, the cohesion of the protests, to articulate the virtue of transgressing health measures and to extoll those who said or did so, across multiple sites. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aim of this study is to investigate the role of the illusion of conspiracy among auditors using the Dematel method. To delve deeper and gain a better understanding of the subject, in addition to theoretical foundations, interviews have been used for further comprehension. Then, quantitative approaches are employed to validate the qualitative results. This study adopts a mixed-method approach. As the research is primarily based on qualitative methodology, particularly employing the grounded theory strategy. The temporal scope of this study spans from the year 1399 to 1402. The statistical population in the qualitative section comprises independent auditors in the auditing organization. In this research, semi-structured interviews have been used to uncover deep insights for identifying indicators of the illusion of conspiracy. Sampling was conducted using snowball sampling technique, comprising 12 main themes and 40 sub-themes. The quantitative section utilized the Dematel method. The statistical population in this aspect consists of all official accountants in Golestan province. The sample includes official accountants with a minimum of ten years of experience and at least a master’s degree. Twenty individuals were selected as the sample. Dematel, utilizing expert judgments in extracting system factors and systematic structuring, presents a hierarchical structure of factors within the system along with their interrelated effects. To achieve this, a fuzzy Dematel questionnaire was designed, and provided to experts, and ultimately, the intensity and relationships between the illusion of conspiracy among auditors and its significance were examined. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The superhero is a popular figure in contemporary media: not just single characters, plots and movies, but entire universes and ‘phases’ spread across multiple protagonists, narrative arcs, devices, mediums and formats, from films and television shows to video games and books. Across much content, a reliance on conspiracy is evident: to motivate characters, link together plots, and move them across time and space. This article articulates paranoia and conspiracy as an emergent aesthetic bound up with the affordances of digital technology. It thus articulates these aesthetic impulses as the outcome of a cultural logic of convergence embodied in the affordances and demands of digital technologies and ecosystems. Considering the three aspects of convergence culture identified by Henry Jenkins (technology, culture, participation), and how they operate within superhero media under the aegis of digitization, this article discusses their penumbra: conspiratorial technology, conspiratorial culture, and conspiratorial participation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In 1956 the U.S. National Park Service (NPS) launched Mission 66, a ten-year program to rebuild and improve infrastructure within hundreds of units of the National Park System, among them Death Valley National Monument in California. As elsewhere, plans in this unit centered on a visitor center, new employee housing, administrative and maintenance facilities, and campgrounds. The original plans developed for Death Valley were abruptly changed, leading to allegations that the NPS was involved in a deal with a resort in the park, in which the NPS would receive a land donation in exchange for overlooking illegal use of monument water by the resort. This Great Death Valley Mission 66 Conspiracy reached the ears of Congress, and in 1962 Congressional hearings were held to investigate these matters. The NPS director and many others were called to give testimony. This story gives a fascinating glimpse into the development of Mission 66 facilities in a large park, and how the plans for these facilities depended on an underlying geography of land ownership, water rights, dubious surveys, and expectations by faraway bureaucrats; these in turn reveal much about possibilities and limitations on opportunities for park development. The Mission 66 facilities in Death Valley have stood the test of time and remain central to visitation in the park to this day. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article uses the concepts of "conspiracy" and "conspiracy theory," along with their literary tropes, to theorize resistance to the colonial ideals of modernity in Israel and Iraq and to contest the oppressive developmental temporalities associated with this modernity. By analyzing Imīl Ḥabībī's al-Mutashāʾil (The Secret Life of Saeed, the Pessoptimist , 1974) and Aḥmad Saʿdāwī's Frānkishtāyn fī Baghdād (Frankenstein in Baghdad , 2013), I show how tropes of conspiracism and conspiratorial thinking are deployed in both of these novels to critique myths of linear progress—often used to justify the Israeli occupation and the U.S. invasion—despite the divergent historical periods and contexts out of which the two texts emerge. In their act of contestation, the novels leverage alternate temporalities in connection to conspiracism, such as the cyclical time of suffering and exploitation, or the apocalyptic time that offers release from said suffering through ending time altogether. Yet in both cases the tropes of conspiracy are ultimately shown to have little explanatory or emancipatory value and high human cost. Both novels thus thematize the analytic and critical limits of conspiracism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Policy & Internet is the property of Wiley-Blackwell and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Nuova Rivista Storica is the property of Societa Editrice Dante Alighieri s.r.l. and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Verse three of Surah Al-Tahrim reveals the secret of the Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) and its disclosure by some of his wives, with traditional accounts attributing the disclosure and the conspiracy to a matter of female jealousy. Understanding the nature of this secret and the associated conspiracy is of special importance, as it has been reduced to an issue of female jealousy on one hand, while on the other hand, both Sunni and Shia commentators have linked the revealed secret to the caliphates of Abu Bakr and Ali (AS), influenced by these narrations. In this article, narrations of the causes of revelation from Shia and Sunni sources, relating to female jealousy and the caliphates of Abu Bakr and Ali (AS), are categorized and evaluated. Then, using the method of Quran chronology and the descending sequence of Surah Al-Tahrim, along with its proximity to Surahs Al-Munafiqun, Al-Nur, Al-Ahzab, Al-Fath, and Al-Saff, it is argued that the truth behind the conspiracy and the disclosed secret in verse three relates to the Prophet’s (PBUH) certain victory over the polytheists in the near future. Therefore, beyond the new interpretation of the disclosed secret under verse three, the method of chronology plays a crucial role in verifying the authenticity of the narrations of the causes of revelation, as the chronology of the surah clearly shows that the narrations of the causes of revelation were mistakenly attributed to verse three of Surah Al-Tahrim and incorrectly applied to it.

In this article, the authors review current philosophical discussions about the essence and specific features of conspiracy beliefs, the purpose of which is to formulate its relevant definitions. The parties to the discussion are grouped around two conventionally distinguished positions, designated by the terms «universalism» («generalism») and «particularism» («minimalism»). The purpose of the article is to reveal the content of the philosophical discussion of the question about preferable way to theorize conspiracy beliefs. The purpose of the study determines the choice of comparative analysis as a key method. Particularism and universalism are compared by the authors from the point of view of the views of their representatives on the genesis of the content of conspiracy beliefs, the characteristic mechanisms for justifying such beliefs, and a number of socio-epistemological problems that arise in connection with the study of conspiracy beliefs. Based on the comparative analysis carried out, the authors draw conclusions about the adequacy of the very distinction between theoretical positions in the discussion of conspiracy theories using the dichotomy «universalism – particularism». The novelty of the presented conclusions lies not only in highlighting the content of philosophical discussions around the issues of theorization of conspiracy beliefs, but also in the critical analysis of ideas about the opposition of particularism and universalism. The practical significance of the study is to identify the limitations of the conceptual apparatus used to discuss the philosophical reflection of conspiracy beliefs.

This introduction to this special issue of Inquiry looks at recent work in the philosophy of conspiracy theory theory. Looking at two related worries expressed in the wider conspiracy theory theory (the academic study of conspiracy theories) – the Problem of Conspiracy Theories and the Problem of Conspiracy Theorists – this special issue argues that recent work in the philosophy of conspiracy theories is getting all the more closer to not just an epistemic understanding of what, if anything, is wrong with belief in conspiracy theories, but also a framework for both investigating conspiracy theories and understanding how we should talk about the beliefs of conspiracy theorists. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Exploring online criticisms of the "take the knee" protest during "Euro 2020", this article examines how alt- and far-right conspiracies were both constructed and communicated via the social media platform, Twitter. By providing a novel exploration of alt-right conspiracies during an international football tournament, a qualitative thematic analysis of 1,388 original tweets relating to Euro 2020 was undertaken. The findings reveal how, in criticisms levelled at both "wokeism" and the Black Lives Matter movement, anti-white criticisms of the "take the knee" protest were embroiled in alt-right conspiracies that exposed an assumed Cultural Marxist, "woke agenda" in the tournament's organisation and mainstream media coverage. In conclusion, it is argued that conspiratorial discourses, associated with the alt-right, provided a framework through which the protest could be understood. This emphasises how the significance of conspiracy functions to promote the wider dissemination of alt-right ideology across popular cultural contexts, such as sport. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This essay focuses on the police protagonists in David Peace's Tokyo Trilogy and the historical mediations they perform in the worlds of the novels. It argues that these mediations are generated by the way Peace subverts the conventional narrative structure of historical detective fiction: rather than moving toward resolution—solving a crime—the object of detection is continually displaced to conspiracies with historical and political implications, thereby constituting different temporalities that do not move forward but rather repeat, circulate, or are perpetually delayed. Underlying these repetitions, transmissions, and premonitions are historical‐political legacies of Japanese empire, war, and American anti‐communist conspiracies, which open toward a critical‐conspiratorial understanding of postwar Japan. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: While the study of conspiracy theory beliefs is a relatively new research area, there has been a rise in academic interest in recent years. The literature provides evidence of relationships between conspiracy theory beliefs and a range of factors, but the vast majority of studies are limited to adult samples, and it is unclear how such beliefs present in adolescence. Methods: The systematic review was conducted according to the PRISMA‐S format. Relevant databases were searched up to February 23, 2023, for quantitative studies related to adolescent conspiracy theory beliefs. Results: The six included articles show that conspiracy theory beliefs are present from the start of adolescence, and stable from age 14 upwards, with correlations reported for mistrust and paranoid thinking. Negative relationships were reported for cognitive factors such as ontological confusion, cognitive ability, and actively open‐minded thinking. Health‐related beliefs correlated with adverse childhood experiences, peer problems, conduct, and sociodemographic factors. Right‐wing authoritarianism and anxiety positively correlated with intergroup conspiracy theory beliefs. Conclusion: While some factors from adult studies are replicated in the review, there are differences between age groups. The age at which conspiracy theory beliefs begin to form indicate developmental aspects of adolescence, and possibly childhood, that require further examination. Cognitive factors show promise for interventions and should be explored further. However, the lack of studies using adolescent populations is an issue that must be resolved for a greater understanding of conspiracy theory beliefs and a move toward effective interventions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article focuses on the debate between absolutism and comparativism in the context of physical theories, particularly regarding the fundamental nature of quantities like mass and position. Topics include the challenges posed by symmetries in detecting absolute quantities, the historical context of the absolutism/comparativism debate, and the argument that comparativism fails to explain the empirical success of absolutist theories.

With the rise of digital media, conspiracy theories infamous for their emotional manipulation have challenged science epistemology and democratic discourse. Despite extensive literature on misinformation and the role of emotion in persuasion, less is understood about how emotion is used in conspiracy and debunking messages on video platforms and the impact of emotional framing on public engagement with science on social media. Our article fills this gap by analyzing thousands of YouTube videos that propagate or debunk COVID-19 conspiracy theories from March to May 2020. We found that conspiracy and debunking videos used the emotions of trust and fear differently depending on the issue framing of the conspiracy. Our article also reveals a dilemma facing debunking messages—when debunking videos used more trust-related emotions, these videos received more likes yet fewer views. These findings shed new light on the role of emotion on user engagement with misinformation and its correction on digital platforms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Pundits have speculated that the spread of conspiracies and misinformation (termed "misbeliefs") is leading to a resurgence of right‐wing, reactionary movements. However, the current empirical picture regarding the relationship between misbeliefs and collective action is mixed. We help clarify these associations by using two waves of data collected during the COVID‐19 Pandemic (in Australia, N = 519, and the United States, N = 510) and democratic elections (in New Zealand N = 603, and the United States N = 609) to examine the effects of misbeliefs on support for reactionary movements (e.g., anti‐lockdown protests, Study 1; anti‐election protests, Study 2). Results reveal that within‐person changes in misbeliefs correlate positively with support for reactionary collective action both directly (Studies 1–2) and indirectly by shaping the legitimacy of the authority (Study 1b). The relationship between misbelief and legitimacy is, however, conditioned by the stance of the authority in question: the association is positive when authorities endorse misbeliefs (Study 1a) and negative when they do not (Study 1b). Thus, the relationship between conspiracy beliefs and action hinges upon the alignment of the content of the conspiracy and the goals of the collective action. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Celal Bayar Üniversitesi Saglik Bilimleri Enstitüsü Dergisi is the property of Celal Bayar University Health Sciences Institute Journal and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

This research aims to determine the offense of Criminal Conspiracy in Narcotics Crimes and to determine the basis of the judge's considerations in Decision Number 120/Pid.Sus/2023/PN Mks. This research uses normative legal research methods, and a discussion of this thesis is written as a legal research method. The use of normative research methods in research efforts and writing this thesis is based on the suitability of theory with the research methods required by the author. The results obtained are presented descriptively. 1.) Law Number 35 of 2009 regulates sanctions against narcotics abusers who commit narcotics crimes. Dangerous Conspiracy is the act of two or more people conspiring to commit, carry out, assist, participate in, order, recommend, facilitate, provide consultation, become members of a narcotics crime organization, or organize narcotics crimes. Any person who offers to sell, sells, buys, receives, becomes an intermediary in buying and selling, exchanges, or delivers Class I Narcotics without right or against the law shall be punished with life imprisonment, a minimum imprisonment of five years, and a maximum imprisonment of twenty years, and fines of one billion rupiahs and ten billion rupiahs. 2) The Panel of Judges in case no. 120/Pid.Sus/2023/PN Mks sentenced the defendant to six years in prison and a fine of Rp. 1,000,000,000.00 for conspiracy to buy and sell narcotics class I. The defendant's actions were considered aggravating because he rejected the government's efforts to eradicate narcotics and drug abuse, as well as reducing his polite attitude at trial. The defendant has never been convicted; this shows that the defendant's actions are in line with the goals of the criminal justice system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper addresses responses to news about the imposing of a local lockdown in a UK city. The opposition to the measure shows it to be controversial as does the associated rejection of the grounds for taking action against covid more generally, which comes alongside the devaluing of expertise, resistance to public health responses, a proliferation of conspiracy theories and misinformation and the harm that can be caused by focussing on non-adherence to covid measure. The research question for this analysis is therefore: how are arguments about the local lockdown discursively formulated in online discussions? Discursive analysis of online discussions following four newspaper articles identified six arguments used that range from scepticism to conspiratorial: scepticism over (1) the prevalence and; (2) severity of covid; (3) lockdowns generally do not work and (4) the specific city lockdown will not work; (5) lockdowns are overly risk averse; and (6) there are hidden political motives for lockdowns. The discussion shows how both the 'conspiratorial' and non-conspiratorial arguments are potentially harmful from a public health perspective. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Capitol Hill riots on 6 January 2021 were an event of great importance not only because of their political and legal impact, but also because they allowed everyone to observe the symbols, images, masks, and other signs that were displayed in front of the cameras of many journalists and eyewitnesses. The iconography displayed on that occasion should not be dealt with as an extemporary invention but considered the result of a process of semantic and narrative accumulation produced in online and offline interactions. This article seeks to outline a theoretical–methodological framework of contemporary conspiracy images as multimodal forms of communication. Starting with images collected on Capitol Hill along with a corpus of online conversations that occurred on platforms such as Gab, in particular, between 2016 and 2021, examples of the dynamics of constitution of conspiracy images and their genealogy will be provided. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent research explores the high proliferation of conspiracy theories about COVID-19 vaccination, and their potential effects within digital media environments. By means of a 2 × 2 experimental design (N = 945) conducted in Romania, we explore whether exposure to media messages promoting conspiracy theories about vaccination versus media messages debunking such conspiracy narratives could influence people's intention to either support or argue against vaccination in front of their friends and family (interpersonal influence). We also analyze the moderation effects of education and critical thinking. Main results show that both conspiracy and counter-conspiracy media content about vaccination negatively affect people's willingness to discuss the topic with others, which offers support for a silencing effect. Education and critical thinking moderate the main effects, but only to some extent and in certain experimental conditions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While the specifics of the far-right COVID-denying QAnon movement may remain cloudy within popular consciousness, in contrast, many can easily conjure the image of Jacob Chansley, the so-called “QAnon Shaman,” when evoking the January 6th US Capitol riot. Chansley, face-painted in the American flag and draped in faux regalia—a virtual menagerie of animals: coyote, buffalo, and eagle—appears clearly, spear in hand, as if parting the fog of war. Photos of Chansley howling or brazenly posing on the Senate dais are indelibly sketched into our collective memory. Some may conjure him simply as a buffoon, but his trespassing and seditious antics are interwoven with a costume that pulls at the long thread of European and American colonialism. This article posits that Chansley’s animalized insurrectionist attire and his ability to play at the borderlands between human and animal, civilized and uncivilized, was an enactment of white supremacy. Insulated by conjoined racist and speciesist legacies, his ensemble placed him closer not only to Western constructions of nature, but also to animality, all without threatening his human status. Working at the intersections of critical race theory and critical animal studies, and illustrated with mainstream news accounts, this article considers broader cultural contexts that reveal Chansley’s sartorial representation as anything but benign.

This article shows that analyzing how incoherence is resolved in discourse makes it possible to identify clues revealing the “conspiracy” nature of a specific discourse and to distinguish it from a “non-conspiracy” one. It examines some of the main defining features of “conspiracism” in the scientific literature and, based on the analysis of three case studies drawn from interviews with people opposed to the French health policy during the Covid-19 crisis, shows how these features can be echoed in certain forms of resolution of incoherence in discourse. The study reveals that some elements of conspiracy rhetoric can function more as an occasional, or even opportunistic, strategy, than a total and systematic worldview.

Conspiracy theories are now central to our democratic societies, the academic world, and civil society. All seem to agree that we should be able to prevent the presence and spread of conspiracy theories in the public sphere. While this objective is generally recognized, the way to achieve it remains unclear. Like others, we believe that interdisciplinarity is one possible answer. However, this path presents several challenges, the first of which is mutual understanding. In this article, we examine the book of Iacone, Loria, and Meini on conspiracy (2023), to show how the psychological and rhetorical approaches to conspiracy theories can dialogue and understand each other.