We'd like to thank our top tier patrons. Hunter Winter, Cecilia Lufkin-Dumas, Ashley Wright, George Arion, Quang Ja Moon, and Edward Bradford. Thank you so much for helping us. If you want to join this... cadre cadavers go to patreon.com slash dark side of soul and starting at just five dollars a month you get a lot of extra amazing content and now here's our show And welcome to the Dark Side of Soul podcast. This is Joe. This is Sean. Or so.
The authorities want you to think. We'll see. We'll see. The authorities would also like you to... I'm front-loading right now. Follow us on Facebook and Instagram. Look for Dark Side of Soul. Also, if you have any questions for us, contact us through those channels or at info at darksideofsoul.com. And we would love to answer your... their questions or, or any comments you have on this show. Yeah. That's good. At the beginning of the show, maybe.
Not specifically Darkseid, but... Subscribe and share with your friends. Tell your friends. If you like this show, tell your friends and your enemies. And your enemies. Especially your enemies. Maybe we can mention two, just quick, not Darkseid related, but Buamdong. Maybe, yeah. We have the Zen Kimchi as a new tour starting spring 2025. Right. Exploring some of the history, very interesting history of generally a little...
Little explored neighborhood for tourists called Buam Dung. Really tiny, really nice place. Super historic. It was right on the border of Old Soul. We need to state what makes Buam Dung interesting. Why would someone want to go there? it's it's a charming charming area it's technically part of soul but it feels like a whole different world out there yeah And very good views of the city from there. When you go up in the hills, you look south towards Seoul. Really good views. You can see Seoul.
Nam Sen, of course, and you can see Lotte Tower if it's clear, if it's a clear day. And you get great views of the southern ridges of Pukanzan National Park in the area. It's lovely. Good, good. good restaurants, good coffee shops. Um, the, it was right on the border of old soul. So parts of the city wall, the walls there, um, go through there. There was a gate.
There's a gate. One of the minor gates. Yeah. And there's some young universities where I was doing that teaching camp. So I saw the gate. Yep. Yep. Yep. So yeah, we have a tour starting there. So we're just March 23rd. I just had a thought and I know it's controversial because I know you wouldn't like this, but okay. Comparing because Buomdong is also an area for rich people. Yeah. Yeah.
And contrast that with Gangnam is, I would say Gangnam is where the tacky rich people live. Yeah. And Buandong is where the rich people with taste live. Yeah, I would probably say that with a bit of rich people with culture. Yeah. So, yeah, Gangnam is for the snooty rich people that want you to know that they're rich.
it's the people that yeah that everything has to be gold-plated it's a tacky donald trump style yeah yeah yeah they feel like look at me i'm rich and then boom dong if you you'll have if you see their homes you're like fuck this place looks like a dump but they're they're multi-million dollar places they're gorgeous places yeah and and the people that i've known that live there or that i know that live there they tend to be artists
Very cultured people. They dress in traditional, not in Hanbok, but they do dress a little more traditionally. Just something about that area. It feels like a magical little brigadoon in Seoul. Yeah. So we have, um, we have a, the company, so not, it's not a dark side tour, but it's a Zen kimchi international tours and kimchi experiences. This promote who's doing it, John.
So John has joined the company and he designed the tour. We've done a run through some beta tests and we're like, yeah, this tour is great. So let's set it up. um i don't oh no no by the time this comes out i'll be done because we're doing kind of like a celebratory launch on march 1st that's kind of the first Yeah, it will be the first tour. Yeah, we have a few that are coming up. So, there you go.
That is no conspiracy theory. That is true. There will be a boom dome tour that we are going to launch. It's coming up. So check it out. Check it out on our website. Zen kimchi. All right. So yeah, Joe, we're, we're talking about funny stuff today. I like funny stuff. Like funny stuff. I like funny stuff. I am a funny man. So we're talking about talking about conspiracy theories. And I'm not sure why. I think we've mentioned conspiracy theories.
as examples in different episodes, but we've never done a full episode dedicated to conspiracy theories. That's a good idea. We should do that sometime. What's that? Do an episode on conspiracy theories. We should do that sometime.
because we're not doing one now. This is not an episode. Oh, okay. Well, they're good. Good thinking. Glad we're doing one now then. All right. Let's do one now. Let's do one now. So, so yeah. And, and I think, cause there's a lot of, What brought it to my mind was there's a lot of talk currently in Korea about conspiracy theories and they're very interesting.
I thought, oh, yeah, we can do an episode finally on one. So that's what we're going to do today. And it is interesting. Conspiracy theories. I think a lot of people don't recognize this or just aren't sure about it. It is a genre of folklore. It's a type of folklore. Yeah. I mean, if you throw in an urban legends are form of folklore, then of course, well, they are, they're a genre. That's right. Yeah. Yeah. So conspiracy theories are, they move. Yeah. Definitely.
there is crossover with urban legends, contemporary legends, just crossover, but they are different, but we won't really get into that. But, um, conspiracy theories. Yeah. Or genre of folklore. They're usually, I think people tend to think they're associated with the West, especially the U.S., but it's not. Entirely true. They're common everywhere. You can go way back where they were quite common. They're often weaponized. Conspiracy theories are weaponized, especially by politicians.
especially in more recent years to garner kind of support or dumb down their voters. So kind of increase partisanship. So if they have partisan voters. Politicians left and right will weaponize conspiracy theories to continue getting support from their partisans, their partisan voters. Growing in Korea, very prominent right now.
And it's always very interesting, very interesting conspiracy theories. But first thing, I think we should start with a definition. So generally, conspiracy theories are... events where or the belief that an event has been instigated or is the responsibility or or has been created by some sort of authority either a known authority or a secret one a secret society type of authority and uh they are they're keeping it a secret that that's the general view so
An authority, either known or secret, is responsible for some sort of event. Right. But more broadly, they're described things that are kind of generally improbable. There's no real solid evidence for it, for some sort of action or an event, something like that. It would usually involve a cover-up. Yes. So...
It could involve a cover. That's generally a point of it. There is a cover-up. Oh, it's in the notes. You were throwing the notes. I just said that. I didn't even see that. Yeah. It generally does involve cover-ups, but there is... there are points that coverups can be real and then they're not actually conspiracy theories. So this is an important distinction. So conspiracy theories generally.
are events that are believed to be true by certain people and that the events are being manipulated created by some sort of authority either secret or known for the benefit of that authority of some sort. So, um, but there's no evidence for it or no solid evidence. So that, that's the key thing. That's the key thing. So I, Generally, conspiracy theories aren't true. They aren't true. So things that end up people say like, oh, this is a conspiracy theory, then it ends up.
being true then it never was a conspiracy theory it was just it was misidentified right it's extremely important that's an important thing to to to keep in mind but most of them are bullshit So they're just, they're not true. And we'll get into that. So it usually involves the government or politicians or a sector of the government or the idea of a shadow government and things like that.
The idea of the truth is a central motif. The truth is the key motif in most conspiracy theories. You're describing every episode of the X-Files. Well, I'm going to get into the X-Files in a second. Love the X-Files, by the way. So it also really usually involves confirmation bias.
This is a big thing. People who follow conspiracy theories follow them because they have an idea, and then they hear this theory, it confirms their biases, and then they support it. But they don't care if there's evidence or not. They just support it. Yes. People always believe pizza places were havens for child porn. Pizzagate. Yeah. Pizzagate's a big conspiracy theory. Yeah. A big one in modern US. When was that? 20?
That was 17, 2017, 2017 or something. Hillary Clinton and stuff like that. So I had been around, it might have been before then, then. So, because when Clinton and Trump were, were, were. in the race. This is okay. Sidetrack. This is one thing I didn't, I don't care. Whenever there's a female politician running, they always use the first name. Have you noticed it wasn't.
It wasn't Clinton versus Trump. It was Hillary versus Trump. It wasn't Harris versus Trump. It was Kabbalah versus Trump. Anyway. I don't know. I've never thought about that. Females, when women are running for office, people use their first name and not their last name. Not in Korea. No, not in Korea. Yeah, no, I've never really thought about that. I don't know if that means anything. I think it's a little sexism. And I think it's unintended.
sexism by even feminists it's like it's like well i just think i ever thought just now that i've said that um now you you're not going to unsee it you're not going to unhear it It just feels like it kind of, it makes them look less authoritative by calling them by their first name. We'll return to the podcast after this message.
Take a walk through Seoul's 500 years of ghastly murders, forbidden history, and hidden scandals. Listen to tales of Korea's deepest, darkest secrets. What lies under the concrete? Or who? The Dark Side of Soul Ghost Walk at DarkSideOfSoul.com Book now, if you dare. Yeah, I've never thought about that. I'm trying to think. Well, the two big ones. I mean, those are just two examples. Okay, how about this? India, Indira Gandhi.
I mean, every other male has been known as Gandhi. But the one who was actually a female president of India is known as Indira Gandhi. I mean, all the other Gandhis, you just say Gandhi. Mahatma Gandhi. Mahandas Gandhi was. Well, he was the Mahatma. Yeah. That was his title. Yeah. Yeah. I don't know. I don't know if there's ever been research in that.
I mean, I don't think that's a conspiracy theory. No, it wasn't a conspiracy. That was a sidetrack. That was a total sidetrack. Right, right. I don't know. Yeah, that's interesting. Yeah, I don't know. Not really within my realm of interest. No, I'm just throwing it up there. I'm curious about that now. Yeah, interesting. Okay. Because in Newfoundland, we often would say people's surnames, men or women.
when you're really close to them. But I think generally people will say, they'll say the first name. I'll often say first name, but it's strange because if they're not Newfoundlanders, I'll often say their surnames either jokingly or out of disrespect. I see what you mean. Yeah, my all-male boarding school, we tended to...
call each other a bit by their other last names a lot. Right. Yeah. And then I'm Morrissey. So I was called young Morrissey with my, by my father's friends. So, so anyway. All right. Okay, so, yeah, and then, yes, as we just said, conspiracy theories are the idea of a cover-up. is also centered to it it may generally cover-ups are part of it so like the u.s government um and maybe other governments also are covering up contact with aliens for example right
So Roswell, New Mexico, Area 51 and things like that. And those concepts, especially Area 51 and Roswell. And the idea of the government covering up aliens was really made popular by Unsolved Mysteries in the 80s and then X-Files, but continued by the X-Files in the 90s. So really important stuff. False testimony is another key thing. And an example of this is the Nairia testimony. Nayira, she claimed, so this is back in the early 90s, she claimed that Iraqi soldiers...
removed babies from incubators and left them on the floor to die. I vaguely remember this. Yeah, she gave a testimony. And then this was used as more reason. for the U.S. to start the Gulf War. The first Gulf War. The first Gulf War, yes, in the early 90s. George Bush, senior. Senior. Yeah. So, of course, it turned out to be... This is called atrocity propaganda. But we're not exactly sure if the U.S. government knew. Did Bush know?
at the time that it actually wasn't fake or did he believe did he believe uh at the when he was being told this did he believe it so that so we don't know yeah i don't know i mean w Yeah. Junior, right? Junior. There's a plausible case that he didn't know. He believed it. But seniors. uh past as a cia head kind of wonder oh yeah there you go so anyway so that's a good example that's really worth reading up on if you've never looked into that before it's there's a lot of information on that
You can find articles from, from the time. And I guess, yeah, a lot of, you probably find some YouTube videos, people talking about it. And another thing about. Conspiracy theories may involve designs to harm enemies. So there was the shampoo conspiracy in the 90s. In Egypt, there was a conspiracy theory that... Israel produced shampoo to, to sell in Israel that would cause Muslims hair to fall out.
nonsense right i guess i guess islam is a you have to have d again dna yeah right yeah so so that so that was so some theories are designed like that That you, you know, something has been designed, your enemies have designed something to harm you specifically. Through a little matzah in the shampoo. Yeah, yeah. So. So things like this, these are some of the key things. Now, there are reasons to behind why people may become conspiracy theorists or believe conspiracy theories generally.
um and this is similar across cultures there isn't isn't there isn't really a deep cultural um or deep yeah there's nothing different within cultures that that makes people more susceptible to believing conspiracy theories. It's just a human tendency. So a key thing I think is interesting is that a lot of people who really believe in conspiracy theories, like this is true.
This one, aliens. This one, Israel produced shampoo to make Muslims' hair fall out. Oh, and stuff like this. The people who believe these kind of things tend to have a lack of motivation. they don't they have a lack of motivation so they follow conspiracy theories to satisfy motivational needs interesting i never heard that one yeah so and
So I personally know a few people who are conspiracy theorists and they reject the term. They hate it. They hate being called that. And they're people who really lack motivation. So I know a couple of people that they're very intelligent, very, very smart. So the wrong thing for people to do is to suggest that conspiracy theorists are dumb. That's a terrible, ridiculous thing to say and assume about.
about people they're not stupid there's something else going on and this lack of motivation might be a reason for a lot of people and so like i said and i know certain people who are conspiracy theorists, hardcore, and very intelligent, very skilled in various things, but they just have no motivation. They don't really do anything. They sit around their lumps, really. So this is a reason what psychologists believe could be a reason for believing in conspiracy theories to a very wide degree.
Not just believing like one thing, but to a very wide degree. The stereotype of the guy sitting in his parents' basement. Yeah, right, right. Yeah. And so... I should... It just occurred to me, I should promote this. Uh, the original podcast I was on, uh, that later became the soul podcast was called soul survivors. The host was a gentleman named Carl Maymer. When he moved back to Canada, he started the Conspiracy Skeptics podcast, which grew and is actually...
There's now a book you can buy. He just made a couple of years ago, published a couple of years ago, called The Conspiracy Skeptics Book of Lists. I saw recently he's now one of the talking heads on documentaries. And so he's now considered an expert. It's really fascinating to see them grow in this. And so look him up. Carl Maymer with a K.
Carl with a K famer, the conspiracy skeptic. And he's very entertaining. He's a very entertaining speaker. Very funny. Cause he just, he just, he just snickers at everything. He thinks everything is hilarious. Anyway, I think I may have. seen an interview that he's done possibly and something maybe when the when the book came out maybe i think it was on like on on cbc good morning or something like likely he he's he just he never he's never
How does it describe it? He's not an angry person. He just finds everything to be surreal, ironic. He just finds irony in everything. I like his sense of humor. So great guy to follow. Okay. Yeah. I'll look it up later. It sounds familiar. Sounds familiar. So, okay. So personality is another thing. There is.
for a lot of conspiracy theorists, uh, superiority, superiority complex where they, they feel they're, especially in their intellect, they're more intelligent than ever everyone else. Yeah. And read up sheeple. Yeah, yeah. So they distrust authority, which I think is fine, because honestly, I distrust authority too. But they do it to the degree that they think.
everything is everything is is us everything's a lie everything's a secret or like the majority of things or if some event happens then authorities can manipulate the event to their advantage yeah because there's no way i mean There's got to be some conspiracy of why you're still living with your parents. All right. So again, the stereotype.
Their arguments are often ad hominems. They usually make ad hominem arguments. They attack the arguer instead of the argument. And, of course, that's designed to the man. Yeah. So to, they do that to discredit, they think that discredits the argument by attacking the person. And this comes back to the idea of like, oh, well, you're not educated, right? So you're, you don't know because.
you're not educated. So they do that to discredit the argument. So you, or you're not reading the right websites. Right. Right. Or it's worse or they do it in worse ways. Um, So, yes, and then the idea of appealing to authority, of course, that is an argumentative fallacy, a logical fallacy. It's a faux pas in arguments. You don't appeal to authority. Just because someone says something and there is certain authority doesn't mean they're 100% right. You have to check with somebody else.
You have to verify it. That's a process. That's what research is. You don't take a claim on face value. Even when one person says it, that's the appeal to authority. That's a fallacy. You shouldn't do that. You should listen to it because they are experts and then see what other experts say. Yeah, okay. Because I was going to say, when it comes to vaccinations and such, I...
Just as a shortcut, because our lives are complex. We have to come up with mental shortcuts or we will not get through anything. So one of the ways is appeal to authority. And so I'm more likely to, as far as vaccines go,
trust dr fauci over joe rogan right right yeah but that's interesting yeah and i'm not i'm not a rogan supporter but joe rogan definitely he he propagates conspiracy theories but a conspiracy theory was made around him by the left when he said he he was taking what was it ivervectin and to kind of help with the symptoms of COVID. And then they were coming off and saying, it's just horse tranquilizer or something like that. But there's actually...
But there's evidence of it, that it was being used on humans in other medical situations. So Joe Rogan actually wasn't wrong. So the left created... conspiracy theory around Joe Rogan. I don't like, yeah. So neither side is free from blame. In conspiracy theory, both sides, like I said, it's a human thing. It isn't a cultural thing. It isn't a political thing. One side or one group or one culture isn't more susceptible.
to it than another so uh you can find it if you look deeply and this is why you have to be careful of the confirmation bias because if you sit on one side of say a political spectrum You are more likely to believe people who confirm your biases instead of looking it up, instead of researching. You have to be very, very careful. Or you will start believing.
conspiracy theories and you won't know that they're conspiracy theories right so be very very cautious with this kind of thing so um but um but yeah so you should uh like reject appeal to authority but They kind of, they often reject it, but conspiracy theorists, I mean, they often reject appeal to authority, but then sometimes you'll hear conspiracy theorists use it.
maybe unknowingly, hypocritically. So for example, for 9-11, someone might say, oh, well, my uncle is a pilot. So therefore he knows what... happened with the planes on 9-11. Like, that's ridiculous. So that's an appeal to an authority and one that especially doesn't make any sense. And I'm going out to say that that is one conspiracy theory that's more sided with the left than with the right.
Which one that the government was involved. Yeah. Yeah. That's a leftist conspiracy theory. Yeah. Generally. Yeah. I think so. Yeah. Yeah. Because it was a conservative government at the time. It was a conservative government covering everything up, and they were trying to do that to get a war for oil. Yeah. Yeah. Because, yeah, one very smart person I know who kind of doesn't fit that stereotype because he's a very motivated person.
Uh, it was my ex boss over at the hog one, uh, Canadian guy, um, smart guy, engineer, very smart. And he really believed it was an inside job and he needs the whole jet fuel cannot melt steel argument. Yeah. Yeah. So you're such a smart guy. How are you believing this? Yeah. So yeah, don't, don't, uh, like I said, don't, uh, don't assume that people who.
follow conspiracy theories um have something wrong intellectually they usually don't they're usually very intelligent people very very amazing person too i mean it's just this one thing he believes that it's one thing Everything else is cool. Yeah. Interesting. So of course, some conspiracy theories, actually a lot of them, maybe most of them don't make sense.
So, like, why would something be covered up? Like, why would a certain thing be covered up? Why would Israel want Muslims hair to fall out? Like, why? Why the government really want to kill that many people in the Trade Center? I mean. For one thing, that's their supporters, the business people in the trade center. Right. In the Pentagon.
Right. And other places that were planning to go to, you know, they were supposed to go to the government. You know, why would the government attack themselves? Attack itself. Right. So anyway, it's things like that. So it doesn't make any sense when you really break it down. It doesn't really make any sense when you look at it logically. Some do make sense. Others do make sense. So like we just said, like a government does such and such a thing to garner public support for a war like that.
does cut that that within itself like the bay of tonkin incident the second one the bay of tonkin incident that as a cover-up and then and then the idea of it being conspiracy theory for ages makes sense because It didn't attack the public, right? The Bay of Tonkin incident involved the military and they wanted to go to war and to, you need, really need public support after really after world war two, when.
people started seeing images of war, really World War I, but more so in World War II. Public support of war really decreased. They're like, fuck, this is... awful look what these men and some women really are experiencing this is terrible so public support for war dropped when images of war started to get to people and started to hit the media so it was harder to get public support for war so you the idea of the government doing something to gain support
When you think about it, it does make sense. That doesn't mean that it actually happened. That doesn't mean that the government actually did that. But from a perspective, from a logical perspective, it does make sense. But again, it isn't evidence for the events being real. So some of them don't make sense. Others, you're like, yeah, actually, it does kind of make sense if you look at it.
And again, to be fair, some cover-ups that were called conspiracy theories to remove public interest or create public ridicule against people who talked about the events.
uh actually were true yeah it's really hard to cover something up when you get a lot of something really big because yeah not everyone's gonna walk lockstep people that's right loosely people just talk yeah i mean that's right and we can see uh uh watergate that didn't last very long um deep throat broke that pretty fast um and you know yeah it's just
And then there's like Bob Lazar and all these people who are involved with the cover-ups of alien contact and things like that, which in itself could be either as well. There's documentaries upon documentaries and books upon books about that kind of thing. We're not going to go into it now. It's not related specifically to Korea either. But people, whistleblowers who come out, but still, they don't really have evidence.
if deep throat was able to really support the you know uh break what's what was happening if if snowden was able to break what was happening why didn't why hasn't area 51 been broken wide open right and right that's a big one that's a big one aliens aliens so yeah so anyway So it's interesting. But certain things like the My Lai Massacre in Vietnam, that was a cover up. But it was only covered up for like a year or something like that. And guess who was really instrumental in covering it up?
the korea uh a young man named colin powell well there you go yeah the u.s government yeah so and then it broke pretty fast and like if i'm remembering right soldiers who were who were there ended up doing interviews on talk shows and stuff like that and so yeah there's the speakers will appear and they have evidence so um The Iran-Contra scandal could have been a conspiracy theory, but it came out, evidence. It was a cover-up. Yeah. Right. So sometimes conspiracy theories can actually...
be created by the authorities who did do something bad. They create the idea of it being a conspiracy theory in order to maintain the cover. Yeah, but it also helps support other conspiracy theories because they saw, oh, well, they covered this up. Why didn't they cover this up? Right, right. And then the government or the authorities, they're completely fine with that. It just supports their cause.
It's, it's you know, it's, it's a self replicating system. So anyway, but anyway, most of them are nonsense though. But anyway, yeah, so currently in Korea with all these political problems, there are a lot of conspiracy theories.
happening right now and uh yeah we're going to go into a few of them so now first of all i'm going to say we'll probably get some pushback from people um we don't i don't think we have a broad korean listenership but i'm certain we have a lot but we have a lot of uh expat listenership or overseas not you know 400 people living overseas who who may also support these
conspiracy theories that we're going to bring up so um i i wouldn't be surprised if we get some pushback um oh good we get letters yay but i don't care i mean So, I mean, part of a folklorist's job when it comes to contemporary legend is to present them as contemporary legend and show that they're not real, they're not true.
The North Koreans did not have horns and tails, as Korean kids were told in the 50s through to. Weren't North Koreans told that the Americans had that too? Yeah, it was all around, yeah. yeah so government produced propaganda so anyway um so but but i'm fine because conspiracy theorists are usually a very loud minority and
But but at the same time, they might think they're they are a might they are a majority. And the fact that they are a majority is being covered up by the media. So it just it just gets so it's it's very.
actually the clandestine webs was was a conspiracy theory that was the what was sorry i didn't hear that concept of the liberal media uh came um now this one has proof uh that came from a memo uh from from republican uh uh organizations uh in the early 70s saying there's a memo there's a memo that said start start using the talking points that there's a liberal media liberal media liberal media
and now people believe that the media is liberal yeah that's interesting yeah yeah so um so some of these things yeah so they're like i said loud minority um uh And then they'll often resort to like, what about isms? Like if, if you push back, they're like, well, what about this? And they're like, this person did that. And this person did this and things like that. So, uh, you know, me, the white just showed up.
what about conspiracy cat yeah um you might hear him meowing in the background um that's a great name by the way conspiracy cat conspiracy cat yeah um punk band conspiracy cat female fronted punk band conspiracy there you go yeah with a k totally listen to that conspiracy cats with a k and a z i would totally crush on the bass player until they will i know that um so
So, yeah. And then, of course, like doing what we're doing now, we're kind of pushing back and highlighting things as conspiracy theories results in criticism. People with pushback, with accusations, they'll say what we've already said. You don't know what's actually going on. You're on their side. You're paid. This is a really common one.
especially these days you're paid to say what you're going to do especially if we have even though this is a comparatively a pretty small podcast um we could still people might say oh you're a paid actor I mean, if you want to, if you want to pay us to say what you want us to say, our patron is a patron.com. What do you think of that? Yummy. Good idea. So, um, And you're influenced by the mainstream media and things like that. So it all breaks down in that kind of way. Anyway, so some of them...
So some of them that... Yomi there. Yomi's great. Keep Yomi in. I like Yomi. He's going to try to jump up on my bookshelf. Get down. Don't jump up there. You're going to knock my books down. Now he wants to play. No, no. Stop it. Stay there. I'm busy. okay i'll play with you after okay so some of the the the pro the the conspiracy theories that are becoming really popular now and currently on as we're recording yeah i'm going and they have to do with the with the you
protests. Yeah. And either, um, uh, in support of or opposed. to him so the anti-une side and the pro-une side both of them are full of conspiracy theories and um so for example okay he's let him out hold on all right oh i'm curious about this one i haven't i haven't even I haven't even checked on this one. Ever since we did our... Okay, I was just... I can't fill it in. It was like, ever since we did our martial law podcast, I've been kind of...
I'm intentionally staying out of touch because I'm not listening to any news these days. No, life is already stressful enough. I don't want to listen to anything. I'm following just the basics of the news, but I'm interested in... conspiracy theory side of things because I find that interesting. so yeah, I've been trying to follow that. Um, now a lot of these two, so Bart, our friend, um, Bart's, uh, who does the I go Bart's or I go Bart's two interviews with him yet more than two.
both of us did more than two no no no on our show oh on our shore on our show yes yes the dark side so we did a two-parter with bart that's right um and uh uh and so He did two episodes of his series, the Welcome to My Dong series. One was in Hannam Dong, and then he interviewed the mostly... pro-Yoon side. And then he did, because he was at the protests and the demonstrations, the rallies near Yoon's house. And then he did Gangnam, not Gangnam, sorry, Gwanghwamun.
And that's where a lot of the anti-Yun protesters are. So he interviewed them. So he got all types of all types of interviews and whatnot. And so you go through the comment sections on those videos. And it's pretty funny stuff. Yeah. So it's YouTube comments. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So which are exaggerated, of course, the whole thing is exaggerated by these by these comments. So I guess it's one of the few comments on his videos from Korea that say this foreigner knows more about Korea than I do.
Yeah, there's always like 100 people that say that. But these two videos are pretty high. I'm not sure what kind of numbers Bart got. I'd imagine they're pretty high. He probably got a lot of views. Anyway, so some of the comments that people are saying, which are, you know, things are exaggerated. For example, like I said, this is a prelude to civil war. It's going to happen in South Korea. It's nonsense. Civil war is coming.
and things like that um now there's a lot of discussion there of ideological civil war now that's probably true and i think i think there's massive division in korea right now the two sides aren't talking to each other yeah They're ridiculing each other. So an ideological civil war for whatever that means, that's probably true, but it doesn't mean actual conflict. That's just, if you believe that, that's silly.
I mean, just listen to our intro episode. I mean, this is more of what's been happening all the time. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Now, some of the actual conspiracy theories. Big one. massive chinese influence in the korean government oh wow ancient chinese secret huh yeah so uh this has been happening for years the ccp is infiltrating korea
The opposition, currently the opposition, the Democratic Party here, the left part, they're not left, they're centrists, centrists kind of leaning left. They're installing. or helping Chinese and communist spies into the Korean government, things like that. That's weird because it's always, since the conservatives are kissing Chinese, but all right.
No, you go way back, especially, say, Moon Jae-in and No Mu Hyun and things like that. There was discussion of them allowing China to infiltrate Korea. Silly stuff. Sorry, silly. So, and of course, this was part of Yoon's argument for establishing martial law. And the spies are aiming to gain control of the Korean government and absorb Korea into China. So. It's like, what are you talking about? This is silly. Why would they absorb Korea? So they'd have to take on the United States as well?
military turn into a war? When you break it down, it's ridiculous. They did already absorb part of Koguryo. Those other ones. Yeah. 2000 years ago. Yeah. Yeah. So 2000 year old conspiracy. Okay. Yeah. Okay. When, when, when this Korean drama called Jumon came out maybe 18 years ago and it was this big.
big uh nationalist pride going around and people started going on the cook because he expanded the koguro kingdom and they're like but why don't we have that anymore it's now part of china so you started i started hearing a lot of that back then Right. Right. Yeah. Yeah. This is silly. They're just read the history. Like, I don't know. Anyway, so this is all silly stuff. It is playing speaking China though. Yeah. Right. Yeah.
So the opposition, they're saying the opposition is leading these attacks on Yun in order to continue support for China so China can get its way in. is standing against the infiltration of China's infiltration into Korea. And then the left, the opposition party, is helping with this infiltration. So conspiracy theory nonsense. um, Chinese spies are at the pro youn, uh, protests and, um,
And also at the anti-Yun protests, both sides say that there are Chinese spies there, which is really, really strange. And then they are attempting to manipulate Korean views of the president. um like one of them at the the end especially for the anti-une um uh the anti-une protest they'll say in order to go through the the the protest you'll have to be able to speak Chinese and stuff like that so just really silly stuff sorry Joe just a second Yomi's going nuts Yomi's going nuts
I blame the Chinese for that. Yeah. And so you have to speak Chinese to go to anti-Yun protest. Okay. okay well i mean i was there and they weren't speaking chinese you can you can cut that out maybe no no i'm talking no i'm talking okay all right i had i had to he kept scratching. He wants to play. I'll play with them after. Yeah. Okay. So, um, anyway, so where was I? Oh yes. You have to speak Chinese to go to, go to the inside. Right. Right. And, and remember,
These are all comments from Bart's videos. So people are actually saying these things. So you'll need to speak Chinese if you want to go to the anti-Yun protests and things like that. But then they say on the opposite side too, right? So it's really, really strange. It's weird because I've not heard any Chinese from any side during this protest. It's because they're not there. So, yeah, and then...
There are just foreigners generally are at the protests, like Chinese pretending to be Koreans. But I've always told Koreans always say, no, we look very different from Chinese. Right, exactly. So. these things get pushed aside when, when, when it suits their, their, their biases. Right. So, uh, so, and then, and then of course, Foreigners cannot go to protests in Korea.
They can actively protest. They can actively protest. Right, right. You can't march. If it's a march or a rally, you're not supposed to do that. You can walk through. It's not enforced. No, I don't know anyone. And I've marched in Korea and stuff like that. But it is illegal. You could technically get arrested. You could get arrested. They're not interested in doing it.
No, but you could. So there are people saying in the comments on the videos that there are foreigners there. You should catch them, expose them so they can get arrested. These are the comments that people are making. Interesting stuff. Another one, Russian spies are also infiltrating Korea and they're working in tandem with China to take over South Korea. And I guess they're pretending to be Korean. And then their ultimate idea then is that they will take over the South, reunify with the North.
And then it'll be China, Russia, and a unified Korean peninsula as a power in this part of the world. So they're replying that Putin is a leftist? It's, yeah. Yeah, it's just, it's ridiculous. And so it's very, very strange. Very strange. But then sometimes like, like none of it makes sense. Right. But then some people will say, no, it's just.
it's chinese spies and they're they're infiltrating the government through the left and like why would they do that i mean it's just it's so silly because they think they think they're communists and this is the next they're they're uh the cold war is still alive here it never went away yeah yeah so and this is a thing so they're saying the opposition the centrist party is communist um
which is called balcony and you can hear a lot of people saying this in parts videos and you can see it if you look at a lot of um comment sections or other just korean youtube videos people discussing this they're they're they're using this word and um Val, of course, means red. So the reds, they are the reds. And the union supporters are fighting against the descent into communism. That was one of the comments on the videos. Does South Korea really have that risk? Really?
really samsung cell phone korea the republic of samsung yeah has any risk of going into communism yeah it's ridiculous this is one of the most happily capitalist countries in the world yes Yeah, yeah. And the idea that they go into communism is just ridiculous. So see, when you break it down and you think about it, it doesn't make any sense. So it's nonsense. It's a conspiracy theory.
So communist anti-state forces, they say, I don't want anyone to get a sound bite of me saying this. They say that. There are communist anti-state forces influencing Korean politics. Nonsense. Again, he just made the capitalist argument against it, which completely annihilates that concept, that idea. People also saying in the comment section that the protests are literally a fight between good and evil. Yeah, there we go. This is where you dehumanize your opposition. That's right.
yeah and then this is where you make it ideological yeah you turn it into yeah so then you can't even talk to the other side you can't do anything to their side which is another weird aside i'm going to say really fast john stewart daily show There's a podcast now, and I just recently watched the first one, and it just stumbled upon. And it was an hour-long conversation with New Jersey Governor Chris Christie.
Okay. They're both very opposite sides of the aisle, but they had a wonderful conversation and they looked like they were good friends. Oh, Christy. Yeah. He's a. He's a Republican, right? He's a Republican. Yeah, he used to be a Trump supporter. He used to be, and they still, and it was great is that John and Chris, there were some parts where they disagreed, but the way they disagreed was kind of like,
okay, well, the way I'm seeing it is from this way and you're seeing it from this way. And, but if I did see it from your way, I would agree with you. And a lot of times they were agreeing with each other, but not like you're right. Yeah. It was just, but it's, it's not this whole, you're, you're, you're the other.
side so you're dehumanized you're evil you know it was totally like yeah it looked like it sounded like they were going to go out for drinking drinking beers later on and that's i just like seeing that change because We've been dealing so much with this dehumanizing the other side. I mean, I got people I love who are Trump supporters and I'm not going to cancel them because of that.
Yeah, this pushing away from people because of their political views, instead of trying to understand why they have those views and speaking with them, doesn't make any sense to me. It's silly. yeah so i agree i agree 100 on that so anyway so um yeah so this is a big part of it they're not like i said earlier they're not talking to each other and this is why it's becoming ideological
Or it already has. It's deeply ideological now. Also, opposition spies are at the protests. It's another thing they say. They're in the comment sections to twist the truth, they say. There's the idea of the truth. Oh, you're not doing it? The person saying this is not doing that? Yeah, yeah.
So they're saying like, if you look carefully at these comments, these people, and they'll say in the comments, people making these comments are actually opposition and they're spies to really twist the truth. And so, yeah. That's a very typical argument of a conspiracy theorist. They're sabotaging the irony detectors. Right. So for the protests themselves, both sides claim...
that the other side's participant numbers are exaggerated, both of them claimed by the media or by themselves? Actually, I have a video. I have a video on my Insta. And it was when both sides were protesting in Guangdong Moon. And you see the camera, my cameras, you can just see it. I was on the rooftop of the museum. You could see the numbers of both sides. I mean, the anti-Yun were much, much bigger.
yeah but that's because much louder no no but those are two different there's two this is the the thing that i think this is why people are confusing it in guanghamun that is the That is the anti-Yoon protest. The pro-Yoon rallies are in Hannam-dong. Right. Now they are, but... Weeks ago they were. A month ago. Yeah, they were there. It was before Christmas. I was on the roof and there was...
There was the pro-Yun people because they were cursing a lot. It was all little people cursing. They were saying bad words and stuff. You wouldn't put kids around there. And then you see the anti-Yun ones, which turns into a music festival. Right. So that was the impeachment protests. Those were different. Okay. Those are different. Those are the impeachment protests. Now it is the support and the opposition protests.
So those are different. The pro-Yoon protests are big. They're very big, but they're not in Gwanghwun. They're near Yoon's house because they were there. to keep the police back from arresting you. Right. So that's why the police. Yeah. That's why they moved. They moved their protests there specifically. to support him and then they moved to the constitutional court and stuff like that right so um so anyway so both sides are exaggerating like uh how many people are at their protests so um
snowballing their conspiracy theories. Both sides claim that the other side is being paid to protest. Both sides claim that. Yeah, there is a background for that, though, because there are professional protesters. They do exist. The guy that slashed the American ambassador's face in 2015, he was a professional protester. He was trying to drum up new business by making this attack. Didn't work. Don't run. But it's like when you have to work and also when you have to.
we have a full-time job. We don't have time to protest. So we pay other people to protest, which is just part of that showing that when they were first after right off the martial law, when there was protesting over Yorido at the assembly. people were donating so much money to coffee shops because they couldn't have a nine to five, nine to five, an eight to six job. I cannot, I cannot be there. So I'm going to pay for the coffee. So in a way, I mean.
There's background. It's like saying the government has covered stuff in the past. Why are they not covering it up now? People have paid protesters in the past. Why are they not doing it now? Well, yeah. yeah so it's interesting but see but but the point of the claim is one side for example the left is saying we are not doing it but the the the
So the anti-une is saying we're not doing it, but the pro-une is. And the pro-une side is saying we are not doing what the anti-une is. So you have so much money to pay all that many people. Okay. So none of these. Yeah. Yeah. So it's a silly. Um, now I think the worst conspiracy theory linked to this that I came across was the Jeju air crash at the end of December, 2024.
The conspiracy theory says the government crashed the plane in order to distract the public from the protests and the political upheaval of the government of you. Yeah. It's pretty nasty. I've heard this before when North Korea bombed the naval ship.
China. Yeah. I'll talk about that later. Yeah. Oh, sorry. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That there's a few conspiracies around that as well. And so again, I'm not looking at the notes. I don't know what I was going to say. No, that's right. So anyway, so, and then.
other claims linked to that they're saying that the the pilot and the co-pilot were women and therefore the plane crashed and stuff so um yeah the people there are commenters online now that's not linked to you they're they're this is just a an extension I know but is it the other side that's doing this is the pro-youth side saying that well I don't they're not no so this isn't
That particular claim is not linked to the Yun protests. So I don't know who's saying that. It's obviously probably young men. Okay, because you were thinking of the incels that voted for Yun. that it's probably it's probably it's probably young men who are saying that yeah i would imagine who also a lot of them support you yeah yeah but they're but they're it's a separate claim
And so there's no women. Yeah. So, but, but the, the conspiracy theory itself is that the government crashed the plane. Pretty silly. So those are some of the conspiracy theories. Yeah, those are some of the conspiracy theories linked to the current political situation. Pretty interesting. Now, there's some other ones. A lot of conspiracy theories are very nationalist.
They surround a national view or the nationalistic view that people have of their countries. It becomes very interesting, and Korea has quite a few of them. So interestingly, these types of national conspiracy theories tend to tend to create national unity around something like the idea of an enemy, a shared enemy. And this is similar to generally the creation of myths in the past. They were created by authorities. I mean, long, long ago in Europe, especially the creation of myths.
What was often done by authorities to create union between otherwise separate peoples to show that they were similar. And then you create a union. Or you create a union around a national identity, which is often what's happened in Korea. Park Jong-hee era, they really did this kind of thing. The idea of creating national myths, national heroes, and stuff like that. Which they themselves are not conspiracy theories.
That's just an effort to create national unity. But conspiracy theories often have maybe unintended positive results of creating national unity. it's still probably bullshit. The reason or the theory itself is nonsense. So yeah, so a lot of the nationalist conspiracy theories focus on the Japanese occupation. Now, of course, like a lot of conspiracy theories, like I've already said, if you point them out to people, then you will get ridiculed.
And there's assumptions made about you. So when you point out that these Japanese occupation related conspiracy theories are theories. They're probably nonsense. There's no evidence for them or whatever. You'll get called anti-Korean, pro-Japanese, which is typical. Yeah, the ad hominem.
This is similar to a nationalist idea, and we've talked about this before, and we still sometimes hear it, which is silly, the idea that you need to understand Korea's history, or... uh korea's history is unique and you're a foreigner and therefore you don't understand it it's like history is just events anyway people can understand events so
And that's a very typical nationalist response when you point things out that are conspiracy theories. And of course, the key thing, too, is that the burden of proof. The onus is always on the person making a claim. So if someone says a certain thing, like what we'll get into, you just have to say, well, what's the evidence? What's the proof? We'll say, well, my grandfather told me. He's like, well.
And they'll say maybe something like my grandfather was alive during the Japanese occupation. Therefore, he knows that's an appeal to an authority, but an authority that isn't actually an authority. So an appeal to a pseudo authority. Interesting stuff. But like some of the conspiracy theories was that the Japanese inserted iron posts, large iron posts into the ground.
especially around the mountains and things like that. And they did this to like block off the flow of energy, the flow of ghee through the Korean peninsula. There's no evidence for this. Of course, of course there isn't. highly unlikely that the Japanese did this. The Japanese likely didn't have that belief at the time. So why would they spend money, resources, and time in order to do that?
Just to annoy and upset the Koreans doesn't make any sense. They already conquered them and took them over and occupied them and became colonizers, which was horrendous enough. Why would they put the effort into? Post planting iron posts or Koreans. It just doesn't make any sense. It's yeah. Likely did not happen. There were several posts that were found. And. They were very likely put in the ground by Japan, but they were survey posts. They were making surveys of the mountains.
It's just nonsense. And this particular point is perpetuated by media and most recently by the overrated movie Exuma. So that's a big, that's a kind of... a plot point in the film, uh, fairly minor one, if I'm remembering, but it's pointed out in, in the film, um, didn't happen. Um, it's a, it's conspiracy theory. Uh, this is my favorite one though.
Is this my favorite one? No, no, no. My favorite one. No, this is this is this is my favorite one involving Japan that Korea Japan changed the spelling of Korea from a C to a K. Oh, yeah. Yeah. We talked about this one. Yeah, so Japan would come first in alphabetical order in English. In alphabetical order in English. I think it's an amusing one, though. That one's so petty and amusing. Yeah, it's...
It makes assumptions. It assumes that the English speaking world cared and put relevance on which nation was listed first alphabetically in English. Why would we care if that was the case? English-speaking country would change its name to A. A-A-A. Triple A. Triple A country. Yeah. And then it's like, our country is 1A. That's the name of our country. We're 1A.
The Olympics. All right. Not O-N-E. It's always just the character. It's the letter one. Yeah. So nonsense. It's absolute nonsense. And also, this is you break it down when you look at it. Why would Japan go through that effort? Why would they consider that to be important? Why did Koreans in the past, and still some today who believe this, think that Japan found this important?
They didn't. It was very weird. They were going to change the name of Korea. I mean, they did change the name of Korea. Well, I'm going to get to that. Yeah. Yeah. So, but the other thing, other countries. who use the same alphabet the roman the roman alphabet say um still spell korea with a c yeah like france yeah spain yeah so it doesn't make any sense silly um
And if this was the case, why didn't Korea change it back to being spelled with a C officially after liberation? Yeah. I mean, it doesn't make any sense. So and apparently, you know, I can't confirm this, but I've seen people online state this, that they've had history professors in universities like Yonsei, Yonsei University.
state this as historic fact. Yeah, you get this a lot. I'll tell you about the lunch I had with the guy that believed that chili peppers came to Korea via unladen swallows, the birds. No, they're laden. They'd be laden swallows, not unladen because they're carrying something. I'm just, you know, Mighty Python. Birds brought seeds of chili peppers to Korea just so that you can't say that Japan brought chili peppers to Korea.
yeah it's a silly silly so um and then of course korea or japan called korea chosen anyway they called them chosen c-h-o-s-e-n Which begins with a C. Yeah. So, I mean, it's silly. It's very amusing. It's nonsense. So all you have to do, you hear a statement, start thinking about it, break it down, look into it. And you'll see conspiracy theory. This is nonsense. And so but of course, again, like I said, people will push back, will be called anti-Korean and pro-Japanese.
Paid by the Japanese government to say this on the Dark Side of Soul podcast and all this kind of stupid nonsense. Okay, this one's my favorite. This is my favorite Korean conspiracy theory. So this theory, very, very minor, not like the Japan changed the name of Korea from a K to a C to a K and stuff like that. This one is very minor. And this conspiracy theory, the root of it states that Korean, the Koreans of the past, ancient Koreans were actually explorers and conquerors.
They discovered the Americas long before the Vikings. So which means long before Columbus. They made contact with the First Nations peoples of the Americas. And they also ruled the Shandong Peninsula of China. So if anyone... looks at a map so if you look at seoul incheon then go straight across the yellow sea there's a big peninsula there which points directly at korea pointing east towards korea that's the shandong peninsula
They say that ancient Korea ruled the Shandong Peninsula and Manchuria, like all of Manchuria. It was actually ruled by Koreans, the Korean people. This can be linked to the other pseudo history that Korea is like 5,000 years old. The pseudo history Korea is not 5,000 years old for 5,000 years old. People have been.
The cultures that eventually became Korea, the unified Korea, which happened in the 7th century, they date way, way back. But as a unified place of culture, it's not that old. But all this kind of... stems from that concept. But the conspiracy theory comes in where it says this true history is being hidden. By, depending on who you ask, either China or Japan. So the world will not know that ancient Koreans were explorers and conquerors. And my favorite one.
which I've added to our media suggestions is that Korea invented pizza. And Marco Polo stole pizza from the Koreans and gave it to Italy. Oh, yeah. Yeah. It was invented in like Ulsan or something like that. Yeah. I posted that. It's a joke. It's a joke commercial, but it catches everything you're saying, though, because it makes fun of all the conspiracy theorists, all the stuff that goes around.
Yeah, and so I love it. It still holds up. This ad has got to be 15 years old by now. Right, right, right. It's still hilarious. Right, but clarify, it's not actually a conspiracy theory. It's a joke. It's making fun of conspiracy theories. Yes, making some of the conspiracy theories. But the evidence they use is so good because of the boxes on...
The headwear on the Buddha statues are supposed to be. They're actually pizza boxes. And the other one is the proof of the first free breadsticks order. That's awesome. It's still one of the most genius ads ever put up there. And people thought when it first came out, people thought it was real. Right. Not clever enough to realize it. Yeah.
Not initially clever enough. So, yeah, that's funny because it very likely does make fun of this concept. My favorite Korean conspiracy theory that the true history is being hidden, but ancient Koreans explored as far. around the world as to discover the Americas long before the Vikings were there a thousand years ago. The first non, but they came after the other Asians who did.
actually go there and establish civilization you are the first nations and things like that so uh just hysterical hysterical stuff nonsense um okay and here i'm gonna go through a list of um list of other ones that I think are really, really, really interesting. And I'm just going to kind of go through them quickly. So this is an interesting one. So Egan, he, who was the founder of Samsung.
electronics uh egun he died long ago now this was a conspiracy theory before he actually died so he died long ago but the family the e family With help from Samsung executives, like the top tier, the top brass of Samsung helped. Does Samsung help the E family? He was not the founder of Samsung. He's the son of the founder of Samsung. Here's the second one. Right, right. He ran it. You're right. He ran it for decades. He became chairman in 1987. Okay. So they...
So he died long before he actually died, which was three, four years ago, maybe. I remember when this was around, people thought that he was dead and they were just, it was a weekend at Bernie's thing they were doing with him. Yeah. And with the help of Samsung executives, the family covered it up to avoid the inheritance tax, which in Korea is huge. It's like 50%, something like that. Yeah. Which I think is too much.
Fuck rich people. They have too much money. Yeah, I'm pro-inheritance tax. So I'm pro-inheritance tax for millionaires. for over a certain amount over a certain amount yeah yeah so like and i don't like this family like the the current piece of shit who runs samsung who just got just got released from all the crimes that he committed. He's running his grandfather's company into the ground, some insiders are saying. Yeah, he's garbage, human garbage.
Anyway, so they're avoiding the inheritance tax, which did become a huge issue after he actually died. And then the alternative to the conspiracy theory was that he was being kept alive, but he was in a coma. Yeah. Yeah. Interesting. Interesting stuff. This was an interesting one, too. Kim Il-sung died before his rule. Before his rule actually started, before Kim Il-sung. Oh, I heard this one.
Yeah. Before he could actually start ruling in North Korea, he died. So another man was brought in to to to pretend to be Kim Il-sung. And run North Korea. Yes. And he was installed by the Chinese. Yeah, one of my favorite podcasts, Stuff You Should Know. They did an episode on North Korea, and they brought this one up. Right.
interesting so yeah so they say like the real kim il sung died before the north was established and then it was actually a different man that that we that the world saw for decades yeah so interesting yeah Another one, No Mu Hyun was murdered. I've heard that one. President No Mu Hyun, who leapt to his death in 2000. 2008? 2008? I can't remember. It was a couple years after he left office. Yeah. He was the former president of Korea and convinced suicide. Yeah. So...
You can't even say commit suicide anymore. Apparently it says died from suicide. Died from suicide, yeah. Yeah, I have thoughts on that kind of thing too. It's just retraining myself to say. Yeah. Honestly, I think it's just trying because the word commit increment. It's criminal. It criminalizes. Right. Criminalizes suicide. Right. So and but.
I think words change their meaning over time and it hasn't come to mean that anymore. So there's no need to change it. Yeah. Okay. I agree with that too. Yeah. Yeah. So I don't know. It's just overly viewing words. too much for as they appear instead of as they mean. So anyway, that's a different topic. So another one, celebrity scandals always break after corporate scandals. are being hidden in order to misdirect the public.
I've heard this a lot, and there's a lot of coincidences that kind of back it up. I guess so. I guess so. It is part of the weird adoration for celebrities, though, too. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So there's this strange love for like, I, like I love music. I love bands. Shit about the people in the bands. Well, yeah, and people say, well, this happens in other countries too. But yeah, every time you say that, take a Korea and multiply it by 10.
Right. And then my argument against that is that we're not talking about other countries. So it's saying that this happens in other countries, too, is a whataboutism. And then that ignores the argument. or just the discussion so sure So in my point, for me personally, my point is that, yes, I know what happens in other countries, but we're the dark side of soul. That's what we're talking about. We're all the billboards out there wishing Taylor Swift a happy birthday.
Yeah. I don't know. Maybe somewhere. Not sure. I'm sure. But in Korea, you go through every single person who had any appearance on TV. Big billboards wishing them a happy birthday. I know like billboards will be put up in areas, say after a musician, when Eddie Van Halen died in 2020, Pasadena put up a billboard.
The Sunset Strip put up a billboard and his old high school put up a billboard. But all that made sense because he was connected to all those particular places. Right. And you see people put up full page ads in the New York Times or something. Right, right. But those are being paid, yeah. But it's someone that is not as well known as Eddie Van Halen. Yeah. It's just their fan clubs are so intense that they will pay money for an expensive giant ad in Hongdae Station. Yep.
Yeah. Just wishing they're the guy a happy birthday. It's usually males. It's usually males that they're wishing a happy birthday. Okay. And that person will never see that ad. Maybe a picture of it, but they will never go there and see it. It's not like he's taking the train through Hongdae. Well, thanks, guys. Thanks. So sweet. You guys are so sweet. I want it, man. I want your birthdays coming up.
My birthday is coming up in a month. Where's our fucking billboards? Yeah. You don't have to do it for us individually. Just both of us. Yeah. fifth anniversary of the launch the dark side of soul podcast is coming right i want to where's our fucking billboard i want to i want to see a billboard in front of guangwaman covering the whole gate and that's what i want
I'll check. I don't think our Patreon money is going to cover that. Increase it. Come on, Angel. Give us more money. Come on, Joel. Steve, come on. More money. the two devins no we're happy we're happy we're happy we love uh we have such a good group we just anyway so some other ones uh lots of conspiracy theory is about say well and we talked about this in the say wall um
episode that we did. Have we done two now? Maybe not a few, yeah, because we tried to do it on the anniversaries. Right, right, and the anniversaries coming up again. So, yeah, so one of them was... Pakkenay sank the Sewol as a religious sacrifice. Yes, I remember that one. Yeah. I don't remember if we mentioned that in. Maybe we did. Yeah, we did. Yeah. So.
I'm not sure. But yeah, she sank it as a religious sacrifice because she was being linked to the shamans, shamanism and stuff like that at the time and the cults and things like that. Right. Which is all silly because all of the presidents have links to shamanism.
It's a silly, I have articles that prove it way going back like 20 years. I thought it was kind of funny that conservative, this is tended to be conservative presidents that tend to be linked to shamans or publicly linked. I mean, Kim Dae-jung. very famously move the body of his allegedly move the body of his father. Yeah. In order to, to appease the appease his father spirit. We need to do a DJ episode. I keep forgetting about that.
fascinating guy yeah yeah so interesting um another conspiracy theory behind the sinking of the sail was it was hit by an american submarine heard that too yep yeah and then the submarine took off
rammed into it by accident, took off, and then it became a cover-up. That lines up with the 2002 U.S. military vehicles that ran over the two middle school girls two girls it wasn't a tank no it was an armed vehicle armed jeep or something yeah i've seen photos of it you know of the vehicle itself i've seen photos of the scene
Oh yeah. Yeah. I just came, I came across them. Yeah. I saw them accidentally. I really, sorry guys. I don't think we'll ever do an episode on that one. That's just to, that's. We'll see. Yeah. I don't know. I think. So anyway, let's we'll see. See, there's always something to talk about. Election fraud, election fraud, conspiracy theories. There's currently.
Youn claimed that there was election fraud in April 20. When was that? When they did the parliamentary votes. Because remember the opposition won. By a landslide, they took the seats back, took power back in the assembly, whenever that was. So he's claiming that there was election fraud.
Which is a big part of the talking points of his supporters. And there's a landslide that's really hard to pull that off. Yeah. So, but it goes farther back because they're the left. Some people on the left claim that Pakane won because of election fraud. So it wasn't that slide though. No, but she still, they say she still won because of election front. So, so interesting. And that was before Trump said it. Yeah. So, yeah.
So the Chanan, yeah, the Chanan, the ship, the Chanan, I guess it was a warship, the Chanan Ham. When was that? 2010? So if no one's familiar with that. March 26, 2010. Okay. Anniversary is coming from that too. So a South Korean warship sunk.
sank. And it was very likely North Korea that was involved in it. It became a huge, huge, huge problem at the time massive news that was the news for it was in the news cycle for like three months it was huge conspiracy theories broke out around that saying it was actually
sunk by Israel. I didn't hear the Israel one. I heard about America. Yeah. Oh, I, okay. I didn't hear that one. Or by the government, by the Korean government itself. Oh, the Korean government. Yeah. That's a very typical one. Yeah. Right. Right. Okay. Yeah. So job inside job. Yeah. The finger-pinching conspiracy theory, the feminist groups coding GS25 products with misandry. Yeah, explain this one.
We discussed this on one, didn't we? No, no, we discussed this on Soul Podcast. Yeah, so I'm not sure. We may have talked about it because when it was happening, we may have briefly talked about it. So... Anti-feminist groups, mostly men, mostly young men, but I think like parents. Yeah. Yeah. Who, who, who, you know, they're the ones who say that this is held chosen.
you know they they're they're also hungry and and they they they can only afford to buy one nintendo switch game every month and yeah and you know and there's no jobs out there that i think i deserve Right. And they were freezing cold last night with that massive snowstorm that hit and things like that. And they have no access to clean water. These poor guys. They're anti-feminists. They're pieces of shit. But they're anti-feminists. And they're saying that there was this GS25...
It was for a barbecue. Right. And there was a hand gesture of your finger and a thumb showing like as if you were to say, how much do you want? Like if you're going to pour me some beer and I put my hand up, I was like, just give me a little bit. Give me an inch. Give me a couple of centimeters. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Just a little bit. Let's have a little bit.
In folklore, that's called ostention. When you give a nonverbal response to a question and then the person understands it, that's called ostention. For example, like if I, if I, if we smoke and I just, and I point the cigarette pack at you, you understand that means I'm offering you a cigarette, but I don't say, do you want one? Right. So if you said you want more beer and I just put my, my index, my thumb up.
like an inch a little bit yeah you understand that means a little bit without me actually saying it so it's called what so but it's something else the these mouth breathers thought that it was it was It was misandry groups, not feminist groups. They call them misandrist. Misandrist groups were coding this into the posters as. as making fun of the size of these guys' dicks. Yes. The irony is guys with dicks that big would complain about that. Right.
Right. Like, how do they know? How do they know? Fuck that. What? So anyway, yeah. So that was a conspiracy theory. Nonsense. I still know. um, people who now and again, they'll bring this up and they'll talk about it. This is so sad is that the woman that, that did draw that she lost her job. Yeah. No silly. It was terrible. It was so silly. Um,
Going way back, going way back towards the end of the Chosun dynasty, the 1880s, 1890s, when more and more foreigners were coming into Korea. There was a conspiracy theory that foreigners, especially Westerners. Eight children. Yes. Also, they were kidnapping Korean children and grinding their bones to create film stock. Right. Yeah.
Yeah. So interesting. And also, you know, you said it yourself that the building of the streetcar system was disturbing the dragon that sleeps underneath the city. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So it's on my tour. Now I put that on my tour. Oh, did you? Yeah. I mentioned that because we crossed the street in front of the old tram. And then if we have time there when we're waiting, I'll sometimes share that. I'll do it while walking.
I cross right there in front of the tram. You know where it is in front of the museum? The old tram? Oh, that. Yeah, yeah. We used to go that way. That used to be our old route. I used to go by that.
Yeah, I cross right in front of it. So if we don't catch the light right away and if we have time, then I'll share that quickly. Yeah, that's a good one. That's a good place to do that story. Just like a nice bonus story. I do it on Cedro Dero because that's where they were. That's where the streetcar. was that that's well it was on yeah well it was an x not x it was like a plus sign it went there was north south and east west cars
Yeah, but they recently dug up when they were redoing Gangamun Square again. They dug up the tracks in front of Gangamun. Right, right. Yeah, yeah. So anyway, yeah. So. Yeah. So small dicks. Oh, no, no. We talked about, yeah, Westerners eating children. Yeah, yeah. Small dick Westerners eating children. Yeah. My mind is just.
bouncing around with conspiracy theories now uh another one that the the the kwangju massacre was orchestrated by north korea oh but the big conspiracy was that there was no massacre oh right and that's that's right that's let's cover up though yeah yeah yeah yeah so uh that's another one so and those are questionable that's questionable as a conspiracy theory because yeah i mean uh because it may be misdirection so
conspiracy theory that was purposely created to to draw attention away from the government the korean south korean government yeah so uh and an orchestrated coincidentally Ironically, an orchestrated conspiracy theory. Okay. So, and then another one, not entirely conspiracy theory, but fan death. Yeah. And. So it's it's an urban legend. Yeah, it's more of a legend because there's a cover up involved. Well, no, one of the explanations for it is a cover is is believed to be a cover up.
So this is where it there's cross. I said in the beginning that sometimes there's crossover between urban legends, contemporary legends and conspiracy theories if cover ups are involved. So the idea that a fan kills you. We're not talking about John Lennon, by the way. No. Or Dimebag Daryl. The idea that a fan kills you because it goes too fast or it gives you hypothermia and all this kind of nonsense. It chops up the oxygen molecules. Chops up the oxygen molecules. That's my favorite.
That's an urban legend, but there is for nuclear. Right. There's a form of energy there. So the atom. Right. everyone's blowing up when they have their fans running so that's the urban legend but there is a conspiracy conspiracy theory that tries to explain where it comes from. And it says that it was created by the media as a way to cover up suicides. So, but there's no evidence for that. It sounds suspect.
But I see why it's so believable. Yeah. Yeah. But I mean, you can find you can find Korean media that does say people died. People died from fan death. Yeah. But also Korean media does not hide suicides. Now, when I worked for a TV station, but there was a local television station, there was a rule that we do not report suicides.
Right. Just don't say it. Well, unless it was a celebrity, but if it was a regular Joe Schmo, you do not report a suicide. Right. Right. There's no need. There's no need to. Yeah, really. Unless it. I don't know, unless it involves something larger than the death itself. So like, I don't know, there was, I know they fell into a.
a bus or something like that or whatever. Part of the reasoning was is copycats, fear of copycats. And it's just because they're bad taste. It's not good for the family. Yeah. Yeah. So. Anyway, so yeah, so it's not entirely hard to believe that the media may have done this to cover it up, but still I don't.
I generally, I think it's a conspiracy theory. I don't believe it. And it's a minor one because generally the overall discussion of fan death is gone in Korea. No one, no one even brings it up anymore. So there you go. So those are, those are some of the. conspiracy theories in korea and there's more we can even we can do into a part two like down the line at some point if you wanted to and so all right so let's let's finish up and we're just going to finish up with some of our favorite
like non-Korean conspiracy theories. And I just have a couple that I want to put here that I think are really interesting. So first of all, almost 80% of Canadians believe in at least one conspiracy theory so they're not so this this comes back to what i said at the beginning where there are conspiracy theorists where they believe that this and this so many things are cover-up and everything is
Everything's being manipulated and their whole view of almost everything on that's under authority is a coverup. Those are conspiracy theorists, but people. will believe you just randomly you can speak to someone and they might say something that is a conspiracy theory they don't believe that there's all these different cover-ups going on like aliens and all this kind of stuff
But they'll believe something like Japan changed the spelling of Korea from a C to OK. And that'll be maybe like the only thing that they believe. So they're not conspiracy theorists. They just believe in one, maybe two. conspiracy theories. So at least 80% of Canadians believe in one, at least one conspiracy theory and one that's pretty funny. And this was a really big one. I remember when it happened in Canada was that.
Diana, Princess Di, was actually assassinated. She didn't die in the car crash. Right. She was assassinated and the car crash was a cover-up. Orchestrated by the Queen. Yeah. Yeah. So nonsense. Really, really, really interesting. Another one I think is funny. This is a big one in the US. Up to 20% of Americans believe the Apollo moon landing was fake. 20%. That's crazy. They really think the special effects were that good. Some people say it was CGI. I'm like, what? Oh, God. Yeah, it's so silly.
There's the conspiracy theory, too. It's like you see the CGI in the original star, the first one, you know, where they show the plans of the Death Star. That was... That was almost 10 years after the moon landing. And that was the best computers could make back then. Right. Was line graphs. Right. Pong. So, yeah.
So, yeah. And then there was the, the theory too, that Stanley Kubrick was hired by NASA to, to film it and stuff. I've heard that. Silly stuff. So those are, those are two things I think are interesting. What do you got? One I made up. When you made up. I made up a conspiracy theory. I don't believe it, but I like to believe sometimes. I like to play with the idea that there are bunkers under Soul Grand Park. We talked about it in a Soul Grand Park episode or Soul Land episode.
Yeah, I remember. Yeah, because it was temporarily considered as a place as a nuclear research, nuclear weapons research site. And in my, my little theory is like, they started, they started work on building it. And then the U S government, the U S military says, don't do that. So they abandoned it. And I still think they were like, they're abandoned. There's an abandoned military.
Or still operating military facilities. Still operating. So land. Interesting. Well, you know, they did find the big facility under City Hall last year. There's Yoito. They were making the IFC towers. Yeah. They found a bunker. Yeah. A really well-stocked, really well-preserved bunker that looked like a living room.
and you can you can visit it now didn't they turn it uh it keeps going up and down if that is open to the public okay i can't i can't remember i haven't seen anything about that recently i'm going to go check it out so Okay. I got a bunch of them. I'm just going to go through. I think it was funny that people believe that new Coke was created by the Coca-Cola company to get people back to drinking classic Coke. What?
Yeah, because they were losing market share to Pepsi. So, like, we're going to really ruin Coke so people would get nostalgic for Coke. That's bad business. Which is genius if that was true. I don't know. I think that would be genius if that was true. lose money to make money yeah yeah um Anastasia was of the Romanovs when they were assassinated that she survived she survived oh I've never heard that
That's interesting. I was really obsessed with her for a while. That's why I named one of my daughters Anastasia. No, Paul the Apostle was a spy from the rabbis, and he intentionally revised Jesus' teachings to insert pagan elements, like the concept of original sin and needing to be redeemed. And actually the Baha'i faith regards him as a false preacher. Regards Jesus as a false preacher. No, no, no. Paul, the apostle. Paul. Paul. Okay. Yeah. So the book of Paul, the gospel. Interesting.
Yeah. Now, I used to, before I came to Korea, I was co-producer for the Tom Hartman program, which is a big political talk show. I told you we had Bernie Sanders every Friday on our show. Tom, every Thursday, had a segment called Everything You Know Is Wrong, which he wouldn't come out and say that was the conspiracy theory time. And we didn't make fun of these people, but we didn't agree with them. We just...
You're just like, let's do something that's just under the radar, that very, very non-mainstream stuff that no one's ever heard of. Whether or not you believe it, just want to hear it. One is... The Federal Reserve was concocted by elites at a secret meeting on Jekyll Island in Georgia. Now, some of these might have happened. I don't know. My favorite one. Which I knew of before I was on the show. There was a fascist coup to remove FDR from power in the 30s. Franklin Roosevelt. Smedley Butler.
He was actually he actually testified in Congress about this plot. There was a plot, but it was very casual. It wasn't organized. It was just a bunch of businessmen wanted to overthrow because he was, you know. FDR was eating into their profits. And so they're trying to get this former military hero to basically roll in like Park Chung-hee and take over the government. And this is one that actually might have some evidence too. Corporate personhood was an accident in law.
In judicial law. An accident? Yes. It was an error by a court clerk. Wrote it in. Wrote the decision wrongly. And that decision has been used as the precedent for every corporate personhood suit until that day since then. Interesting. That's it. I mean, I was going to talk about The Machine, which is a secret society in the University of Alabama, similar to The Skull and Bones. Okay. But they really do exist. It's just a secret society, so it's not really a conspiracy theory. Right, right.
i just found it interesting that uh former governor george wallace which people know mostly from forrest gump as the guy who he was trying to keep african-american students from uh Joining, going to the University of Alabama. This is not a conspiracy theory. My grandmother dated him. Yes, they were in school together. Was she a spy? No, no, but it was interesting because I sat down and talked to my grandparents about this.
And my grandfather knew him as well. And they said that he was kind of an anti-machine guy. He was kind of the entire establishment guy back then. And he only became this. racist guy much later in his political... He's had a whole switch in his political thing. He used to be very... He used to be anti-segregationist. Then he became a segregationist. It's kind of funny. But anyway...
But then again, I'm going by authority. I'm going, I'm using my grandparents as examples, but my grandmother did date them. So I don't know. Anyway, that's all I got. Yeah, I mean, there's a lot. And yeah, maybe we'll come back to this, like I said, in the future. That's an interesting topic. And we'll leave it there for today then. All right. I thought the last one was going to be long. It turned out to be only going to be 39 minutes. Anyway.
The Dark Side of Soul podcast, well, today was mostly produced by Sean Morrissey. It was just a little bit of colorful banter by Joe McPherson. Our opening and closing music is by Stardust Sound, which is the final band camp under Jeju Digital. We also have the Dark Side of Soul comics, which you can get online at darksidesoul.com or at the Dyson Comics Cafe near Junghanpyeon Station.
Thank you for listening. Please write us, tell us about conspiracy theories that you find entertaining. Until next time. Stay spooky. The truth is out there. In our first comic, we explored ghastly Korean folktales while walking the streets of Seoul. This time, we are ambling the Korean highlands with Terror Tales set. in those storied landscapes. Welcome to The Dark Side of Seoul, Weird Tales from Korean Lore, Mountains of the Macabre.