Thinking Sideways: The "Steve Is Dead" Hoax

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and as I said, it's a very special episode. It's not one of those very special episodes where say Devon discovers that she has dyslexia, or Joe finds out, he has as No, it's not special in that sense, but it's special in the sense that we have decided to come out of retirements just this one time to address some of the insane rumors on the internet and in the tabloids. I'm sure you've all heard them. We're here to clear the air and set the record straight, all right,

So let's get rolling. And by the way, of course, I am Joe and I'm Steve, and of course we are talking about a story that you've probably all seen about a conspiracy involving us. Manly Steve, who's sitting across the table from me, was killed in a car wreck and replaced by a double who looks and sounds just like Steve. So thinking sideways, swapped in a new me and continued honest if nothing happened for a year, and then discreetly wound down the podcast. Why would they do

this or why would we do this? Well, I think it's because we were making a lot of money off advertising, and Joe and devon us I knew that if there was no Steve Steve sitting across from me, that they'd lose like their listeners, yeah, and all of our revenue. Yeah, yeah, but then the stories started to appear in the tabloids. So we that is team Sideways since which way the wind was blowing, and decided to stick a fork in it before we got well and truly busted for our fraud.

So this is the basic narrative that we've all heard. You guys are all familiar with. It's you know, in all the tabloids on thousands of websites. But is it true? Well no, uh, And so we have come out of hiding to give this ludicrous story the SmackDown is so richly deserves. So let's go back to the beginning here. This conspiracy theory popped out first in about March when Ready user me Caru that's m why ka e R

you put up a post about it. He was a longtime listener to the podcast, and he said that he'd noticed some odd things about Steve in recent months, such as what well. He said that Steve was sounding subtly different in the last six months or so the podcast. I don't know, I mean, do you know, I just wasn't going through a second puberty or something. You don't need to convince me. I mean people go through puberoty all the time, all the time. Yeah, but this is

what the tinfoil hacked crowd is saying. Yeah, I mean also me. Caru pointed out some other things, like the character of the story Steve covered had changed. For example, he devoted an entire episode to some very obscure South American big folip. Oh yeah, I interesting thing with the mouth in his stomach. You've never would have done that, Spranish, you would have told l S big foot of I've always loved a big foot. Plus plus I forget Steve does love diversity. It is true. Well, he did some

more digging and found some more air quotes. Evidence. For example, of photos of Steve published after summer two thousand and seventeen appeared to be out of date and probably actually predate his demise. For example, there's a picture on the Thinking Sideways fa Facebook page dated May two thousand and seventeen, and then another photo appeared on Twitter in early two thousand eighteen. In the two pictures, Steve's hair is the

same length. Shouldn't it have been longer in two thousand eighteen? Point? Actually it's a haircut. I got a haircut. Guys, you don't have come again. You're not you don't have to convincess it's okay. All the Reddit users got into the game. You history seven seven seven listened to every episode of the podcast backwards, and they found that in the Lake City Quiet Hills EPISO, so you can hear a ghostly word or ghostly phrase, Steve has been snuffed out like

a lucky button, among other things. What it's crazy, I mean, it's it's just something we put in the background of the podcast all the time. Well, apparently it also says by Americans several times, and something about bomba socks, something about they're so comfortable. Yeah, I know it's but I don't know why they would be backwards in the podcast subliminal advertising. I have to be totally honest with you guys. I have no idea how to listen to a podcast backwards,

I mean, neither to fluence. Yeah, and listening to our entire catalog backwards, Oh my god, that that guy must have brain. Yeah. So then finally, somebody who had deleted their user profile so you know, I don't know who what their user name is, posted that Steve had been involved in a fatal car crash on August eleven, two thousand seventeen. He was extremely light on details, but claim to have a copy of the police report, newspaper clippings,

and etcetera. As anybody seeing any of this evidence. No, but the general consensus on Reddit is is why would this user lie on the internet? In general? Yeah, but in this case, I questioned his credibility. Okay, Well, for one thing, I mean, to me, the idea that Steve lost control of this car and skin it off the road and over a cliff. It's kind of ridiculous because isn't that what guardrails are for? Yeah? Yeah, And it's a certain to think the car rolled seven times and

then burst in flames. I mean, the car would have had to be moving really fast to roll seven times. And Steve was not a fast or reckless driver, is amm Yeah, Steve is not a fast driver. Yeah. I'm not a fast driver. I obey the laws of the road scrupulously. It drives the cops crazy, follow me around waiting for me to somebody over. So is there, I mean, is there any more evidence to back this clean up? Yeah? There is that famous picture of the three of us

crossing Hawthorne Street. That's the one where Steve is Yeah, I do remember that. Yeah, you know, I just hearded little athletes foot that day and the aarramund we were going to go in the studio, and is this like is this like a like a like a condition Paul is dead sort of premonition of exactly exactly like the that's the dumbest thing I've ever heard, But it was like it was like foreshadowing of this of demise. Apparently that's the Many people have interpreted that the little foot

focus is nothing to see here? Oh my god? So yeah, I mean, I guess I did here. Also on reddit um, people were pretty suspicious of Steve's beard. You remember the beards beard an obscured part of his face, which is the sort of thing that an impostor might do if only the top half of their face looked exactly like Steve for the automatical look. I don't make as much money at podcasting as I wish I did, and I took a job as a mall santa. It's it's pretty

much that's all right, okay, perfectly raginal explanations. What a joyce job that would be. I don't know. People thought the timing was weird, but I guess I'll I'll what timing was a little suspect, I got to admit, but it's just a coincidence. I mean, back, okay, so back to Reddit stuff Reddit. I mean, you know, the post on Reddit continued, and then it went viral on Reddit, and then you know, tabloids and everything else. We're picking it up in the rest of history that we all know. Yea,

by the way, fake history, yeah, fake history. Yeah, not true. None of it's true. None of it's true. Yeah. There are also some other variations on this story, um alternative theories. The Weekly World News ran a series of stories based on another hypothesis, which is as Steve staged a car crash, faked his death, and want to live in a foreign country. What foreign country? Steve doesn't speak any foreign language. I don't speak any foreign language. You have trouble even going

to Canada and not getting arrested. I mean, the video of the car crash does look pretty fake though. Oh yeah, it looks like somebody not lighter fluid on a plastic car model and torch it. I know, I mean, but but Steve I clearly couldn't have just gone faked his death and gone to a different country. I mean, I haven't gone a postcard, have you not? Have you got a postcard? Why would I send myself a postcard? Yeah? Yeah,

of course point guards. And also, you know, if Steve was pretended dead and living overseas somewhere sooner or later I know him, he would forget himself and post something on Facebook or Twitter or Instagram from Botswana, Guatemala or wherever he is. He hasn't done that, as I love Facebook. Yeah. Another theory that I have also heard is that Devin and Joe, you know, had Steve bumped off because they wanted to run more commercials and replace him with a

sound alike. Yeah that's yeah, that is that we wanted to run like twice three times as many commercials and you were against it. And so the thing that's ridiculous about this is the idea that the Devon and I would hire somebody to do it rather than doing it ourselves. I mean, what am I saying? I mean, I mean the thing about it is so it's like, you know, Devon and I have never been in it for the money. No, never never been about the money. No, not not for any of us. And so I think we can stick

a fork in this theory. What do you guys think, Yeah, it's obviously Yeah, I mean, even if you did, it's so ridiculous. Where would you, guys even find a replacement? Where would you even go to find a sound like I mean, I'm sorry, it's as hard as you think. No,

it's actually super easy to put an add on Craig. Yeah, but you know, not that that's got anything to do with this, but anyway, not for a human Yeah, yeah, yeah, I mean it's one thing that you can find something that looks like me, but it sounds just like me. I mean, you gotta admit if I'm Steve, I sure he'll have his exact voice. No, I I mean I know you just you sound exactly like Steve. Yeah, I mean like Steve. Yeah, yeah, Steve, the original Steve. Do

you have to smoke in here? Jail? Seriously? Got oh why did you do that? Just a little more, guys, if Steve was dead, would he be able to feel pain? Huh? It's a good point, and that did hurt a lot. Okay, Well, that's that's an important thing. We gotta we got to really make sure that that we convinced people with this. Yeah, the story is complete. B s Yeah, yeah, yeah it is. And it's just another one of these situations. I mean, it's similarly to the Boston bomber or we've seen this

on Reddit so many times. You guys think you know what you're saying, but you don't. You're just a group of idiots. And I love you, but you're a group of idiots who just have no idea what you're talking about. So just stop talking forever. Well, yeah, because I'm Steve, Steve, Yeah yeah, and uh, you know, you can't actually talk about how awesome we are. You don't stop talking about that. And I to talk about how much money you want

to mail to us, that's good too. Yeah, But overall, on this story, I gotta tell you, guys, this is a huge fail. Shame on you for spreading this Internet and shame on you for believing it. You she believe you up. That's right. So I guess that's the end of this. Yeah, it's a kind of a brief little thing, but this is such a stupid little story. Didn't did long to really smack it down. Yeah, so I guess, um. You know, our website is still up. It's Thinking Sideways

podcast dot com. Our social media is all still up and active to varying degrees. So we have the Facebook page in the group, we have the Twitter which is Thinking Sideways, and the Instagram of course, and of course also our subreddit, which the story seems to have kind of originated on. Red. Yeah, we'll see how read it treats this. Yeah, we will whom also emailing us? Uh, The email is still active Thinking Sideways Podcast at gmail

dot com. You can feel free to send us an email if you have any proof that Steve died in a car crash. Yeah, I feel one of those crazy reddit guys and you've got something for us. Let's see it? Yeah right? Is it? Put your money where your mouth is anyway? Yeah, thanks for stopping by. I hope everybody has an amazing April first. Yeah you guys, and uh, it's good talking to you again. And maybe we'll see you again one of these days real soon. St