Yesterday my daughter told me about a recent trend on TikTok - Scientology Runs. For those not in the know, Scientology is very much a pseudoscientific self-help cult that has ruined many people's lives and tries to legitimise itself by, amongst other things, convincing celebrities to join and then convince others in turn that it's a legitimate organisation. If you want to know what Scientology teaches, check out this primer from South Park:
Longtime member Pippa emailed us the other day after she heard Bronwyn talking about Thomas Driver on our podcast. She said:
Last week Bronwyn and I went to see the Doomsday comedy event in Wellington, featuring ex Jehovah's Witness Norwegian goat farmer Jonas Skogstroll, as well as several other comedians who have left religions and cult groups, such as the Mormons, Steiner schooling and Alcoholics Anonymous. I was expecting a mixed bag, as comedy is hard to do well, but the comedians did a really great job and if the laughter on the night is anything to go by, the audience seemed to really enjoy it. I had a chat with Jonas about his comedy, and he said that his tactic when it comes to countering the Jehovah's Witnesses is to humanise the idea of God, and show just how sad and pathetic God is if viewed through a human lens. He figures that by making people feel sorry for God in this way, it might make it easier to shake off any belief.
While society was healing from RaptureTok, a new Christian TikTok trend was stewing around the corner - and it was all around a (admittedly expensive) combination alarm clock with light and sound machine. Specifically, the controversy involved multiple devices sold by Hatch in the United States.
TikTok is an interesting social media platform. As a host of short videos that anyone can make these days pretty easily with just a mobile phone, an interface that makes it easy to scroll through hundreds of videos, and an algorithm that attempts to feed you content that will keep you engaged, many kids use Tik Tok as their main social media platform. The platform allows viewers to easily engage through not just their likes, but also through posting their own opinions in response videos.
A couple of months ago, the YouTube algorithm (correctly) decided that I would be interested in several videos where YouTube content creators dunk on TikTokers. But instead of spilling cold tea on influencer gossip, YouTube gave me a conman magic show that would make Randi spin so fast in his grave that he would be considered a renewable source of energy.
Recently I was messaged by one of our “spies” - someone who was still in the Discord group for Global Flourishing, the claimed Rationalist group that looked more like a proto-cult that I'd looked into last year, based in Auckland. The spy let me know that the group's leader, Paul Bryant, was shutting it down, and had sent everyone this message:
Okay, so maybe cats aren't cryptids, but we own two of them and sometimes I wish they were mythical beings rather than very real little monsters who regularly tear holes in my furniture.
It started innocently, with a late-night doom scroll through Instagram stories when the following reel, cross-posted from TikTok, appeared:
Recently two different mobile AI devices have been released, and given all the overhyping of AI these days they've fared about as well as you'd expect them to - which is not very well at all.
I wrote a couple of weeks ago about how we had one of our YouTube videos removed from YouTube, due to Google mistakenly deciding that it was promoting medical misinformation - a rookie mistake, given that it was critiquing medical misinformation. I expressed my doubt that an appeal would change the outcome, but I was pleasantly surprised just after we recorded our last podcast episode to receive an email from Google letting us know that they had reversed their decision:
A few weeks ago I wrote about the Save Marsden Point Refinery efforts, spearheaded by conspiracy theorists who are trying to convince Channel Infrastructure, by hook or by crook, to stop the decommissioning of the refinery and restore it, while also converting it to be able to process our own crude oil. The main driver behind this effort, Karl Barkley, suffered a mishap recently when his van (which is covered in billboards for The Cause) was towed away from a loading zone by Hamilton Towing Services.
A couple of weeks ago I wrote about the demise of RCR - Reality Check Radio, Voices for Freedom's media outlet that specialises in content for conspiracy theorists.
This past Tuesday the NZ internet was confronted with the sad news that Reality Check Radio - RCR as it's known - was “off the air”. On Tuesday morning, arriving in my mailbox that I use to monitor the thing, came this news:
I'm a bit of a fan of internet drama - at least the kind where someone is accused of wrongdoing. The to and fro of accusations, rebuttals, evidence, and eventual apology video, with a backdrop of hundreds of eager new YouTubers hoping to gain followers by creating reaction videos, giving their own commentary, or even adding to the investigation, is fascinating to watch, and its online nature means that everything is easily accessible from the comfort of my living room. I can watch half a dozen videos, then go searching for background information, piecing together my own picture of who the main players are, how they're perceived within the online community, and just how screwed their internet “careers” are.
I'm lying, they didn't actually say that - but they might as well have done. What they did do was run with a headline of “'Doughnut-shaped disc': Is this a UFO over Christchurch?”. As far as I'm concerned, if they'd seriously suggested that Father Christmas may have flown over Christchurch in a sleigh pulled by magical reindeer it would have been no less ridiculous than what they actually did, which was suggest that aliens decided to expend huge amounts of energy, effort and time crossing light years of space in order to very visibly visit New Zealand's South Island. This kind of credulous reporting is not the kind of content that serious news outlets should be generating!
Dan Ryan wrote an article a few weeks ago about our visit to a Freedoms NZ event, where Brian and Hannah Tamaki, Sue Grey and others extolled the virtues of their new umbrella political party. Currently Freedoms NZ consists of the member parties Vision NZ (Destiny Church's political wing), Rock the Vote, New Nation, Yes Aotearoa and almost the Outdoors and Freedoms Party (Sue just hasn't signed on the dotted line yet).
A New Zealand focused anti-vaccine “documentary” has recently been released, called Silenced. It focuses on broadcaster Peter Williams, as well as ex-GP Anne O'Reilly and sociologist Jodie Bruning, with much of the talk centering around COVID vaccination, the mainstream media and alternative treatments such as ivermectin. It also talks quite a bit about Dr Simon Thornley, past winner of our Bent Spoon award, although the footage the documentary makers shot of Thornley is not used in the documentary beyond a couple of silent clips, as apparently his lawyers recommended after filming that he shouldn't be a part of it.
I've had a wee break off writing the newsletter for the past couple of weeks, as Brownyn and Mark have contributed lots of content, but it's my turn again this week - thankfully with some great contributions from the aforementioned Bronwyn - with a continuation of her look at the life of Christian Evangelist Ray Comfort, and also previous contributor Alistair Blenney, who takes a look at NESARA.
I have a friend who I've written about before who, although she's always had pseudoscientific ideas (like giving her children homeopathic remedies), since the pandemic has fallen down the rabbit hole and is currently at the bottom of said hole, picking up more and more daft ideas as she sits there, wallowing. I haven't seen her in a while now - not since I bumped into her at the parliament protest in February - but I do hear about her recent high jinks, and I see her Facebook posts which suggest that she's given up any effort to think critically.
In her “purest form”, a traditional wife (or the more hashtaggable Tradwife) is a woman who takes a traditional gender role in their marriage and household, and forgoes a career to focus on their family and raising children. One could be forgiven for wondering what makes tradwives different from housewives, for which the answer is the emphasis placed by tradwives on submission to their husband, as well as a heavy dose of 1950s aesthetics or rural landscapes, along with a variety of homey and benign hashtags like #homemaker or #cooking, and the occasional scripture if Jesus is on your speed dial.
Back in the distant past of … *checks calendar*… March 2022, I first wrote of a long running scheme of Scottish souvenir plots. In brief, you pay a bit of cash for a square-foot of land, and in return you get a certificate declaring you a laird or lady and the dubious privilege of buying branded kitsch. You can read more about the loopholes that companies that sell souvenir plots exploit in that original newsletter.
It's me again, Mark, for a third week running - as Craig is unavailable to do the newsletter again. This time it's COVID, and I can't blame him at all for not wanting to write a newsletter while getting over it.
The title of this one's a mouthful, and it's an interesting one to pick apart - it includes some of my favourite technologies, one that I think is going to be an important part of our future and the other which I think is a storm in a teacup, and unlikely to disrupt anything of note.
I received an email last week with a stern warning:
Now for a bit of an amusing item.
It would be hard to miss that there has been some controversy in the science community in Aotearoa/New Zealand around the role of Mātauranga Māori (translated as Māori knowledge) in the school curricula.
With the Russian invasion of Ukraine, propaganda raises its head. Propaganda has always been a tool of war (and peace) but we're seeing escalation to new levels.
Speaking of Voices for Freedom, last weekend investigative journalist Melanie Reid from Newsroom did a video piece on the protest - Visit to Freedom Village - which featured the Voices for Freedom leaders in a very positive light.
Sue Grey and Dr Matt Shelton have made some astounding claims about contamination of the Pfizer COVID vaccine. The specific claims are that there are undeclared nanoparticles in the vaccine.
Dr Sam Bailey has been in the news this week, which involved in a court case petitioning the High Court to stop the New Zealand Medical Council from investigating her.
So I want to talk about an interesting arrest that happened yesterday, but not the arrest of Brian and Hannah Tamaki.
This weekend was our joint Australian and New Zealand conference, Skepticon 2021. Thank you so much to those of you who joined us, it was an amazing weekend with fascinating talks and I hope you enjoyed it all as much as I did.
Hot off the press, International Law lecturer Amy Benjamin has resigned from Auckland University of Technology this week. I wrote about Amy back in August, at the beginning of our second national lockdown, when she started up her YouTube channel called “American Spirit” where she posted videos about COVID and lockdowns. Her opinions seemed somewhat fringe, and she talked about how the threat to people's mental health in lockdown was worse than that of COVID, that Ivermectin and Hydroxychloroquine could treat COVID, and that the government had criminalised peaceful protest.
Astroworld is an annual music festival run by rapper Travis Scott in Texas. There was a tragedy at this year's festival, a few weeks ago, when a crowd surge caused a crush and resulted in the deaths of 10 people - the latest being a 9 year old boy who died a few days ago from his injuries.
There's a rumour going around in conspiracy circles that the UN, and/or Italian soldiers, are due to come to New Zealand at the end of November, or that they might already be here.
Most skeptics will be aware of the Steisand Effect - so called because of the unintended consequence of trying to suppress information - which happened to Barbara Streisand back in 2003 when she tried to suppress pictures of her Malibu mansion.
The not totally surprising result of these protests is that the police have been arresting protestors. However, they've not tried to arrest everyone, or to pick up just those who are the loudest or the most aggressive. Instead they have been carting away key members of the conspiracy/fringe movement.
There is an increasingly vocal sub-set of farmers around the country who are buying into conspiracy theories. A group called the Agricultural Action Group - AAG - have been touring the country in recent months warning people about what they consider to be the real issues facing not just farmers but all citizens of our country:
Apparently a UFO was seen in Hawkes Bay late last week. Several people reported seeing a large rectangular shaped object in the sky at dusk, with green and red lights, moving strangely.
A week ago I opened the LinkedIn app on my phone, and noticed a comment on a post that was made by someone in NZ who was an “EvoRich Consultant”. His profile didn't seem to match what I'd expect from a corporate consultant, so I quickly searched Google for EvoRich to see what it was all about - with the suspicion that it might be some kind of Multi Level Marketing scheme.
A video from “LADbible” has been doing the rounds recently, showing members of a Russian fitness group performing feats of amazing speed. The video shows several clips of them punching something or someone so quickly that you barely see any movement, punching in circles in front of their body with a speed that makes their arms blur, and repeatedly punching something in front of them at an unbelievable rate.
TV psychic Maurice Amdur, in the UK, has a video featured on his public Facebook page - Maurice's Psychic World - where he performs a psychic reading of a car salesman while he's picking up a brand new Jaguar XKS convertible, worth eighty thousand pounds:
An interesting video has appeared on YouTube which gives a rational explanation for a UFO video taken by US Navy personnel.
I'm a bit late to the party with this one, but there is footage on YouTube from last year where the pope gives a blessing from an upper floor window. After the blessing the pope turns around and starts walking away from the window. After a couple of steps, he suddenly just pops out of existence - disappears into thin air. Some people have taken this as evidence that the pope was never actually physically at the window, but instead had been replaced with a hologram - and that this hologram had been turned off prematurely, before it had moved out of sight. Maybe a decision was taken not to risk the pope's health during a pandemic. Maybe the pope is a lie? It does look pretty weird.
Graeme Hill, longtime broadcaster and a good friend of science, skepticism and common sense thinking, now has an evening slot on MagicTalk radio. As part of his show, Graeme usually interviews knowledgeable people about a wide range of fascinating topics. A few years ago I was lucky enough to have been invited to join Siouxsie Wiles as a regular guest to talk about skeptical issues, and I'm now privileged to have been asked back to talk on Graeme's new show as he hosts Magic Nights.
Today is the second anniversary of the horrific Christchurch massacre, and as skeptics it's sad to have seen over the last two years those in our country who have posted content denying that the attack was real, or claiming that it was a “false flag” operation. It's been hard enough over the last 20 years watching high profile conspiracy theorists, such as Alex Jones, engage in denial in the US for events such as the Sandy Hook massacre and the 9/11 attacks. But to see this kind of wrong headed thinking at home somehow feels worse. I guess we've been able to rest on our laurels watching America suffer from a spread of the conspiracy mindset, and at least for me it seemed implausible that the problem would ever reach our fair shores. I guess I was just too naïve.
An image that has been making its way round the internet recently purports to be a circuit diagram for a 5G chip which is inside COVID vaccines. However, those who are technically musical minded have pointed out that the image is actually that of a guitar effects pedal called Metal Zone from company Boss.
As Skeptics we're not very fond of scammers, and we often try to protect the public from those who would rip them off with dodgy devices and ineffective products. The video below documents a feat of engineering, a device that targets the problem in the US of people who steal people's parcels - and it targets them in a pretty funny way. Although theft is not really a scam, it's still enjoyable to see unethical people get their comeuppance - and it's mentioned later on in the video that this device has also recently been used against scammers. And to be honest, I needed a good excuse to share this video!
Thank you Mark Fletcher for letting us know that you had a copy of the video of James Randi's 1993 Christchurch talk. He'd even transcoded the video from VHS to DVD several years ago, which made it a lot easier for me to get it onto YouTube. Thanks Mark, I owe you a beer!
This week Richard Saunders, from the Australian Skeptics pinged me online with a video of relevance to NZ Skeptics. Back in the 1990s Australian journalist Mike Willesee did a piece on a New Zealander Don Brooker who ran a colour therapy clinic in Cambridge, Waikato.
Good news! We have found someone who has a copy of the video (VHS tape) taken of James Randi speaking at Canterbury University back in 1993. Next steps will be to check if it's good to digitise, and if so, we'll look to publish it to our YouTube channel. Keep posted.
Last week Craig promised that we would give you a link to a video Haunted NZ were producing about their recent investigation at a house in Pukekohe. We have now been sent a copy of the video that you can watch on YouTube. Craig also gave a good account to the NZ Herald of why the video, although slickly put together, contains no substantive evidence backing up Haunted NZ's claims that the house was ever haunted. Good work Craig!
Yesterday afternoon I met with a group of ex Jehovah's Witnesses.
A friend sent me a video the other day about a fuel saving device for your car. The video was quite well done, and like so many videos on FB had no voice over - instead having a soundtrack, along with large subtitles telling the story:
Yesterday afternoon I met with a group of ex Jehovah's Witnesses.
I've spent this weekend at the Jehovah's Witnesses convention, titled "Be Courageous", in Porirua. There were estimated to be 2,000 attendees. I ended up going this year because a couple of local Jehovah's Witnesses, both of which have come to my door over the last few years, made a point of visiting me earlier this week to invite me.
How to get your kids thinking critically… it's something I've thought about a lot.
7 Sharp have interviewed Marta Fisch on Waiheke Island, who has built an ugly looking metal box - three side walls - in her garden, to keep out "radiation". Radiation in this sense is the kind of electromagnetic energy that is used to send TV signals and offer WiFi, and also background radiation from nature.
Elon Musk's company SpaceX successfully launched their first Falcon Heavy rocket this week, after a recent successful launch in New Zealand by RocketLab. It's been a good time for private space companies.
Since I attended the opening of the new Scientology building in January, I have been called occasionally by a church member called Will who has been inviting me to Auckland Scientology events. However, I'm in Wellington and so I've been waiting patiently for a local event to be announced.
There is a one second shaky video of a Yeti, along with a higher resolution picture.
At first I thought this was a windup (my emphasis) – then I realised it was for real! (and happening in Auckland in September):
Shepherd Bushiri has claimed in a video that he is walking on air.
Mike Palin queries the judging criteria in a recent high school science video competition.
Charlene Makaza went into hospital with an acute Aids-related condition in the first week of 2007. By the time the 10-year-old Zimbabwean girl died 18 hours later, doctors had decided she'd been murdered (Sunday Star Times, 25 May).
A news item that Australian skeptics are considering video evidence of a "Bigfoot" sighting for a $100,000 prize should alarm all who have offered money for evidence of paranormal activity. I urge all NZ skeptics who have risked part of their fortune; if you have not already done so, insert a clause insisting that photographs, films or video will not be considered as evidence.