--- title: "4 Conspiracy Quotes By Kurt Andersen" description: "4 Conspiracy quotes by Kurt Andersen. Plus more from Kurt Andersen and more Conspiracy sayings from other authors." image: "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/a6d/kurt-andersen-8221_around-the-corner_whether-an-individual-s-conspiracism-exi_898045.png" --- > [“Whether an individual’s conspiracism exists alongside religious faith, psychologically they’re similar: a conspiracy theory can be revised and refined and further confirmed,…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/kurt-andersen/whether-an-individual-s-conspiracism-exists-alongside-religious-faith/) [Kurt Andersen](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/kurt-andersen/) [Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/a6d/kurt-andersen-8221_around-the-corner_whether-an-individual-s-conspiracism-exi_898045.png) > [“Szasz opposed any involuntary psychiatric intervention and, along with the Cuckoo’s Nest portrayal, paved the way for the disastrous dismantling of U.S.…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/kurt-andersen/szasz-opposed-any-involuntary-psychiatric-intervention-and-along-with/) [Kurt Andersen](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/kurt-andersen/) [Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/05d/kurt-andersen-8221_climate-change_szasz-opposed-any-involuntary-psychiatri_1030661.png) > [“it was the sudden, shocking exposure of actual conspiracies starting in the 1970s that made Americans overcorrect, to assume that anything bad…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/kurt-andersen/it-was-the-sudden-shocking-exposure-of-actual-conspiracies-starting/) [Kurt Andersen](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/kurt-andersen/) [Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/c41/kurt-andersen-8221_conspiracies_it-was-the-sudden-shocking-exposure-of-a_1934949.jpg) > [“JONES IS BOTH symptom and cause of how knee-jerk, florid conspiracism has become rampant and normalized in America, a fixture of the…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/kurt-andersen/jones-is-both-symptom-and-cause-of-how-knee-jerk-florid-conspiracism/) [Kurt Andersen](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/kurt-andersen/) [Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/716/kurt-andersen-8221_air-force_jones-is-both-symptom-and-cause-of-how-k_2093908.jpg) ## Other authors on Conspiracy - [ ![](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/wp-content/uploads/sms4s/authors/processed/b003/author-aaron-russo-8709.jpg) Vincent Bugliosi 8 quotes ](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/about/conspiracy/vincent-bugliosi/) - [ ![](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/wp-content/uploads/sms4s/authors/processed/b008/author-edward-livingston-31867.jpg) Tomas Adam Nyapi 8 quotes ](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/about/conspiracy/tomas-adam-nyapi/) - [ ![](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/wp-content/uploads/sms4s/authors/processed/b024/author-umberto-eco-92726.jpg) Umberto Eco 7 quotes ](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/about/conspiracy/umberto-eco/) - [Ralph Waldo Emerson 7 quotes](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/about/conspiracy/ralph-waldo-emerson/) - [ ![](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/wp-content/uploads/sms4s/authors/processed/b025/author-woodrow-wilson-96331.jpg) Woodrow Wilson 6 quotes ](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/about/conspiracy/woodrow-wilson/) - [Thomas M. Nichols 6 quotes](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/about/conspiracy/thomas-m-nichols/) - [ ![](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/wp-content/uploads/sms4s/authors/processed/b020/author-robert-anton-wilson-79494.jpg) Robert Anton Wilson 6 quotes ](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/about/conspiracy/robert-anton-wilson/) - [ ![](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/wp-content/uploads/sms4s/authors/processed/b007/author-david-rockefeller-27896.jpg) David Rockefeller 6 quotes ](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/about/conspiracy/david-rockefeller/) - [ ![](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/wp-content/uploads/sms4s/authors/processed/b025/author-winston-churchill-96197.jpg) Winston Churchill 5 quotes ](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/about/conspiracy/winston-churchill/) ## More by Kurt Andersen > [“Since the turn of the century, American fundamentalists had reveled in their sense of persecution by an infidel elite, but in the 1960s the…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/kurt-andersen/since-the-turn-of-the-century-american-fundamentalists-had-reveled-in/) [Kurt Andersen](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/kurt-andersen/) > [“If I think it’s true, no matter why or how I think it’s true, then it’s true, and nobody can tell me otherwise.”](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/kurt-andersen/if-i-think-it-s-true-no-matter-why-or-how-i-think-it-s-true-then-it-s/) [Kurt Andersen](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/kurt-andersen/) > [“Libertarianism used to have a robust left wing as well. Both disliked government. Both were driven by a fantastically nostalgic conviction that a country…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/kurt-andersen/libertarianism-used-to-have-a-robust-left-wing-as-well-both-disliked/) [Kurt Andersen](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/kurt-andersen/) > [“But what other place on Earth has been more congenial to believers and promoters of mad dreams and schemes of so many kinds? California…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/kurt-andersen/but-what-other-place-on-earth-has-been-more-congenial-to-believers/) [Kurt Andersen](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/kurt-andersen/) > [“The antisharia movement lobbied states to pass statutes and constitutional amendments banning the use of sharia in their courts and legal systems, a fantasy…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/kurt-andersen/the-antisharia-movement-lobbied-states-to-pass-statutes-and/) [Kurt Andersen](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/kurt-andersen/) > [I'm comparing Americans to international peers in terms of GDP, educational system - the sort of benchmarks we used to designate a so-called developed…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/kurt-andersen/i-m-comparing-americans-to-international-peers-in-terms-of-gdp/) [Kurt Andersen](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/kurt-andersen/) > [TED was simply wonderful, an intellectual spa, a 21st-century Chataqua, superb and singular.](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/kurt-andersen/ted-was-simply-wonderful-an-intellectual-spa-a-21st-century-chataqua/) [Kurt Andersen](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/kurt-andersen/) > [“The early advocates of universal literacy and a free press…did not foresee…the development of a vast mass communications industry, concerned in the main neither…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/kurt-andersen/the-early-advocates-of-universal-literacy-and-a-free-press-did-not/) [Kurt Andersen](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/kurt-andersen/) > [“EVEN PAUL GOODMAN, beloved by young leftists in the 1960s, was flabbergasted by his students in 1969. “There was no knowledge,” he wrote, “only…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/kurt-andersen/even-paul-goodman-beloved-by-young-leftists-in-the-1960s-was/) [Kurt Andersen](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/kurt-andersen/) > [“IN ADDITION TO having become a distinctly Christian party, the GOP is more than ever America’s self-consciously white party. The nationalization of its Southern…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/kurt-andersen/in-addition-to-having-become-a-distinctly-christian-party-the-gop-is/) [Kurt Andersen](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/kurt-andersen/) > [“Sixteen hundred years ago Saint Augustine instructed, basically, Don’t be stupid. “Shall we say, then,” he wrote about Genesis, “there was such a sense…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/kurt-andersen/sixteen-hundred-years-ago-saint-augustine-instructed-basically-don-t/) [Kurt Andersen](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/kurt-andersen/) > [“After more than three decades and many hundreds of studies, the overwhelming scientific consensus is that GMO foods are safe to eat. The National…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/kurt-andersen/after-more-than-three-decades-and-many-hundreds-of-studies-the/) [Kurt Andersen](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/kurt-andersen/) > [“P. T. Barnum was the great early American merchandiser of exciting secular fantasies and half-truths. His extremely successful precircus career derived from and fed…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/kurt-andersen/p-t-barnum-was-the-great-early-american-merchandiser-of-exciting/) [Kurt Andersen](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/kurt-andersen/) > [I am proud to be American. We wouldn't have our big dreams without this quality, but if we can't agree on the shape of…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/kurt-andersen/i-am-proud-to-be-american-we-wouldn-t-have-our-big-dreams-without/) [Kurt Andersen](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/kurt-andersen/) > [“In 1848 the Homeopathic Medical College was founded in Philadelphia, eventually becoming the Drexel University College of Medicine. Homeopathic M.D. degrees were issued by…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/kurt-andersen/in-1848-the-homeopathic-medical-college-was-founded-in-philadelphia/) [Kurt Andersen](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/kurt-andersen/) ```json { "@context": "https://schema.org", "@graph": [ { "@type": "ItemList", "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/about/conspiracy/kurt-andersen/#itemlist", "name": "4 Conspiracy Quotes By Kurt Andersen", "numberOfItems": 4, "itemListElement": [ { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 1, "item": { "@type": "Quotation", "text": "“Whether an individual’s conspiracism exists alongside religious faith, psychologically they’re similar: a conspiracy theory can be revised and refined and further confirmed, but it probably can’t ever be disproved to a true believer’s satisfaction. The final conspiratorial nightmare crackdown is always right around the corner but never quite comes—as with the perpetually fast-approaching end-time. Like Christians certain both that evolution is a phony theory and that God created people a few thousand years ago, conspiracists are simultaneously credulous (about impossible plots) and incredulous (about the confusing, dull gray truth). 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But more generally they helped make popular and respectable the idea that much of science is a sinister scheme concocted by a despotic conspiracy to oppress the people. Mental illness, both Szasz and Laing said, is “a theory not a fact”—now the universal bottom-line argument for anyone, from creationists to climate change deniers to antivaccine hysterics, who prefer to disregard science in favor of their own beliefs.”", "creator": { "@type": "Person", "name": "Kurt Andersen" }, "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/kurt-andersen/szasz-opposed-any-involuntary-psychiatric-intervention-and-along-with/", "image": { "@type": "ImageObject", "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/05d/kurt-andersen-8221_climate-change_szasz-opposed-any-involuntary-psychiatri_1030661.png", "contentUrl": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/05d/kurt-andersen-8221_climate-change_szasz-opposed-any-involuntary-psychiatri_1030661.png", "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/05d/kurt-andersen-8221_climate-change_szasz-opposed-any-involuntary-psychiatri_1030661.png", "width": 1080, "height": 1080, "caption": "“Szasz opposed any involuntary psychiatric intervention and, along with the Cuckoo’s Nest portrayal, paved…” — Kurt Andersen", "creditText": "SMS4Smile Quotes", "creator": { "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/#organization" } } } }, { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 3, "item": { "@type": "Quotation", "text": "“it was the sudden, shocking exposure of actual conspiracies starting in the 1970s that made Americans overcorrect, to assume that anything bad is the intentional result of some conspiracy. Which may make it harder, ironically, to expose and dismantle the rare real ones. Our news and Internet-enabled media discourse are clogged more than ever with conspiracy theories. All the fantastical noise obscures the occasional signals. I’m thinking, for instance, of the Russian government’s interference in the last U.S. presidential election, to which too little attention was paid as it was happening. In the middle of 2016, it sounded like just one more wild speculation.”", "creator": { "@type": "Person", "name": "Kurt Andersen" }, "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/kurt-andersen/it-was-the-sudden-shocking-exposure-of-actual-conspiracies-starting/", "image": { "@type": "ImageObject", "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/c41/kurt-andersen-8221_conspiracies_it-was-the-sudden-shocking-exposure-of-a_1934949.jpg", "contentUrl": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/c41/kurt-andersen-8221_conspiracies_it-was-the-sudden-shocking-exposure-of-a_1934949.jpg", "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/c41/kurt-andersen-8221_conspiracies_it-was-the-sudden-shocking-exposure-of-a_1934949.jpg", "width": 1080, "height": 1080, "caption": "“it was the sudden, shocking exposure of actual conspiracies starting in the 1970s that made Americans…” — Kurt Andersen", "creditText": "SMS4Smile Quotes", "creator": { "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/#organization" } } } }, { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 4, "item": { "@type": "Quotation", "text": "“JONES IS BOTH symptom and cause of how knee-jerk, florid conspiracism has become rampant and normalized in America, a fixture of the way people now think and talk, eclipsing simpler Occam’s razor understandings. Let me repeat once again: I’m not saying that large secret plots haven’t existed in the past and don’t exist now. For decades, people in the U.S. government, especially those whose work involves high-stakes secrecy, did a lot to make Americans start imagining conspiracies everywhere. The Warren Commission investigation of the Kennedy assassination was full of bungles and became a growth medium in the conspiracists’ petri dishes for an infinity of bacterial theories—even though its essential conclusion was almost certainly correct. The government did lie about UFO sightings over the years—in order to cover up air force surveillance aircraft experiments. The Watergate burglary and cover-up were conspiracies—and promptly exposed, investigated, and punished. Among the most significant recent conspiracies, the cover-up by the Roman Catholic hierarchy and elite of its sexually predatory clergy was finally exposed—after we’d wasted vast resources and ruined hundreds of lives exposing and prosecuting a satanic sexual abuse conspiracy that didn’t exist.”", "creator": { "@type": "Person", "name": "Kurt Andersen" }, "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/kurt-andersen/jones-is-both-symptom-and-cause-of-how-knee-jerk-florid-conspiracism/", "image": { "@type": "ImageObject", "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/716/kurt-andersen-8221_air-force_jones-is-both-symptom-and-cause-of-how-k_2093908.jpg", "contentUrl": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/716/kurt-andersen-8221_air-force_jones-is-both-symptom-and-cause-of-how-k_2093908.jpg", "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/716/kurt-andersen-8221_air-force_jones-is-both-symptom-and-cause-of-how-k_2093908.jpg", "width": 1080, "height": 1080, "caption": "“JONES IS BOTH symptom and cause of how knee-jerk, florid conspiracism has become rampant and normalized in…” — Kurt Andersen", "creditText": "SMS4Smile Quotes", "creator": { "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/#organization" } } } } ] }, { "@type": "CollectionPage", "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/about/conspiracy/kurt-andersen/#webpage", "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/about/conspiracy/kurt-andersen/", "name": "Conspiracy Quotes by Kurt Andersen", "isPartOf": { "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/#website" }, "mainEntity": { "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/about/conspiracy/kurt-andersen/#itemlist" }, "primaryImageOfPage": { "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/a6d/kurt-andersen-8221_around-the-corner_whether-an-individual-s-conspiracism-exi_898045.png" }, "description": "4 Conspiracy quotes by Kurt Andersen. 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