Recently, quite a few people have told me
“I thought you were on our side”
“Turns out you’re a shill, after all”
“You’re such a let-down”
etc
So here’s an explanation of why I’ve disappointed some of you.

1. If we want a good society, we must challenge power relentlessly, in all its forms.
But this challenge *must* be grounded in evidence.
If we make claims against power that are untrue,
a. they glance off
b. we do harm
c. we lose ourselves.

2. For example, I still believe that Big Pharma is inordinately powerful and often abuses its power.
But this doesn’t mean that vaccines are useless, harmful or used to inject us with microchips.
Nor does it mean that Covid-19 is harmless, imaginary or an artefact of PCR tests.

3. In fact, false claims of this kind are used to enhance a different kind of power, that should also be challenged: the power of people who boost their status and following - and in some cases make a fortune - by spreading conspiracy theories.

4. Don’t get me wrong. Real conspiracies exist. Like the vast amounts of public money paid, often through the government’s “VIP channel”, into dodgy companies, without advertisement or competitive tendering, for PPE and services, sometimes in ways that seem blatantly corrupt.

5. Or the property developers who've given money to the Conservative Party and appear, in return, to have received a deregulation of the planning laws, the grabbing of public land and special, individual favours from ministers.

6. Or the way the residents of Grenfell Tower and similar buildings were stitched up.

7. Or the lobby groups masquerading as thinktanks secretly taking money from tobacco, oil and junk food companies, then, without revealing their funders, arguing against the regulation of tobacco, oil and junk food companies.

8. Or the manipulation of voters through micro-targeted ads on social media, bought by persons unknown and guided by data compiled in firms owned by billionaires.

I could go on.

9. Conspiracy *theories*, by contrast, are claims of alleged conspiracies for which there's no evidence.
In exposing a genuine conspiracy, first you find the evidence, then you make the claim.
In alleging a conspiracy theory, first you make the claim, then you look for evidence.

10. In promoting a conspiracy theory, you might imagine you are sticking it to The Man.
You’re doing the opposite.
a. You distract us from real conspiracies.
b. You boost the power of quacks and charlatans, who are also The Man.
c. You prepare the ground for the far right.

11. Conspiracy theories are a foundation stone of far-right politics. They deflect public anger away from the plutocrats who fund the far right, and onto scapegoats, while stoking the necessary grievance and paranoia.

12. To remain on the side that challenges power, we must interrogate the evidence, interrogate ourselves, discriminate between reality and nonsense and be prepared to change our minds when the evidence changes.
To stick it to The Man you must stick to the facts.