Direct MP3 download: https://www.buzzsprout.com/1934329/10068899-episode-2-real-conspiracies-that-actually-happened-part-1.mp3
Secret Grasp is a podcast all about the mysterious and difficult to explain aspects of life. We cover topics relating to the paranormal, occult, psychic, spirituality, conspiracy theories, urban legends, cryptids, UFOs, aliens, ghosts, demons, and other strange occurrences. Visit us at www.secretgrasp.com
This episode discusses 10 real conspiracies that are actually confirmed to have taken place:
– Project Sunshine
– MK Ultra
– COINTELPRO
– Watergate
– NSA Mass Surveillance (PRISM)
– Tuskegee Experiment
– Government poisoned alcohol during prohibition
– Cancer-causing polio vaccines
– Bayer Medicine caused AIDS
In Episode 3 we’ll continue on with Part 2 and cover around 10 more real conspiracies that actually happened.
Intro music:
50 by tobylane
Link: https://pixabay.com/music/beats-50-1280/
License: https://pixabay.com/service/license/
Outro music:
Half Mystery by Kevin MacLeod
Link: https://incompetech.filmmusic.io/song/5026-half-mystery
License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license
Show Notes:
Hello and welcome to Episode 2 of Secret Grasp.
Secret Grasp is a podcast all about the mysterious and difficult to explain aspects of life.
We cover topics relating to the paranormal, occult, conspiracy theories, urban legends, cryptids, aliens, ghosts, and other strange occurrences.
You can find us on all of the major podcasting apps.
In today’s episode we’re going to talk about real conspiracies that actually happened.
Before I dive into more unsubstantiated conspiracy theories, I thought this would be a great topic to cover.
It shows you that conspiracies are real and can actually happen. The government and other organizations are capable of covering things up, at least for a time.
Big Tech Companies like Youtube and Spotify have been deplatforming some shows like ours for misinformation. So if you want to be sure we can stay in touch, it’s best to go to our website at secretgrasp.com and sign up for the email list. I promise I won’t spam you, and I’ll only contact you via email regarding major updates to the show.
You can also find us on more censorship-resistant platforms like Bitchute, Odysee, and Rumble. Again, all of our links are available on our website at secretgrasp.com
Project Sunshine
Human Tissue Collected for Atomic Bomb Tests
Project Sunshine is probably the happiest and nicest sounding project name, so you might be horrified to find out what it really was about.
In the 1950s, the US government started secretly collecting tissue from dead bodies, without the permission of families.
The reason was to see the effects that radioactive fallout from nuclear weapons would have on them.
Over 1,500 samples were collected from around the world, many of which came from babies.
Obviously they didn’t tell families of the deceased. Because imagine telling people “hey, we want to nuke your baby”
MKUltra
MKUltra was the codename of a CIA program to experiment on humans. It started in 1953, was reduced in scope in 1964 and 1967, and eventually stopped completely in 1973.
The CIA did thing like test the effects of LSD on people during interrogations, and using psychedelics to psychologically torture or brainwash people.
Other forms of torture used in the program included verbal and sexual abuse, isolation, sensory deprivation, hypnosis, and electroshocks.
The US had secret detention camps in Europe and Asia where they carried out experiments on enemy agents or people deemed expendable. Ted Kaczynski, the unabomber, was allegedly the voluntary subject of MKUltra tests while studying at Harvard.
Documents declassified in 2018 also showed that the CIA was able to make dogs run, turn, and stop using remote controls and brain implants.
Attempts to investigate MKUltra were difficult as most of the related files were destroyed at the instruction of the CIA director.
One 1955 MKUltra document gives an indication of the size and range of the effort. It refers to the study of an assortment of mind-altering substances described as follows:[36]
Substances which will promote illogical thinking and impulsiveness to the point where the recipient would be discredited in public.
Substances which increase the efficiency of mentation and perception.
Materials which will prevent or counteract the intoxicating effect of alcohol.
Materials which will promote the intoxicating effect of alcohol.
Materials which will produce the signs and symptoms of recognized diseases in a reversible way so they may be used for malingering, etc.
Materials which will render the induction of hypnosis easier or otherwise enhance its usefulness.
Substances which will enhance the ability of individuals to withstand privation, torture, and coercion during interrogation and so-called “brain-washing”.
Materials and physical methods which will produce amnesia for events preceding and during their use.
Physical methods of producing shock and confusion over extended periods of time and capable of surreptitious use.
Substances which produce physical disablement such as paralysis of the legs, acute anemia, etc.
Substances which will produce “pure” euphoria with no subsequent let-down.
Substances which alter personality structure in such a way the tendency of the recipient to become dependent upon another person is enhanced.
A material which will cause mental confusion of such a type the individual under its influence will find it difficult to maintain a fabrication under questioning.
Substances which will lower the ambition and general working efficiency of men when administered in undetectable amounts.
Substances which promote weakness or distortion of the eyesight or hearing faculties, preferably without permanent effects.
A knockout pill which can be surreptitiously administered in drinks, food, cigarettes, as an aerosol, etc., which will be safe to use, provide a maximum of amnesia, and be suitable for use by agent types on an ad hoc basis.
A material which can be surreptitiously administered by the above routes and which in very small amounts will make it impossible for a person to perform physical activity.
(Source: Wikpedia)
There were also two projects before MKUltra called Project Bluebird and Project Artichoke, also mainly centered around testing out interrogation techniques.
If the CIA was able to remote control dogs with brain implants in the 60s, it makes you wonder what they’re capable of today.
Cointelpro
Cointelpro stands for Counter Intelligence Program. It was a series of projects that the FBI ran from 1956 to 1971. The goal was to surveil, infiltrate, discredit, and disrupt various American political organizations.
Some organizations targeted included the Communist Party USA, anti-Vietnam war organizers, civil rights activists, environmentalists, and animal rights organizations. As well as right-wing organizations like the KKK.
Targets were discredited through psychological warfare, smearing people’s reputations with forged documents or false reports, harrassment, violence, wrongful imprisonment, and even assassination.
The intended effect of the FBI’s COINTELPRO was to “expose, disrupt, misdirect, or otherwise neutralize” groups that the FBI officials believed were “subversive”[55] by instructing FBI field operatives to:[56]
Create a negative public image for target groups (for example through surveilling activists and then releasing negative personal information to the public)
Break down internal organization by creating conflicts (for example, by having agents exacerbate racial tensions, or send anonymous letters to try to create conflicts)
Create dissension between groups (for example, by spreading rumors that other groups were stealing money)
Restrict access to public resources (for example, by pressuring non-profit organizations to cut off funding or material support)
Restrict the ability to organize protest (for example, through agents promoting violence against police during planning and at protests)
Restrict the ability of individuals to participate in group activities (for example, by character assassinations, false arrests, surveillance)
(Source: Wikpedia)
Watergate
If you’re like me, you’re probably too young to know what Watergate was directly. All I knew originally was that it was a big scandal. And people nowadays add the -gate suffix to any kind of breaking news story.
Ultimately it was the scandal that led to Richard Nixon resigning from the presidence.
Five men were arrested for breaking into the headquarters of the democratic national committee at the watergate hotel and office complex in 1972, which is where the name came from. 2 of the men had connections to Richard Nixon but denied being part of any kind of larger scheme.
The men were convicted and sent to prison, and at least one of them snitched and said they were working for the Republicans.
US Senate had hearings in 1973
Vice president was already recently forced to resign due to income tax evasion
Turned out that Nixon tape recorded everything that happened in the Oval Office, but refused to hand over the tapes. Instead he handed over edited transcripts of the recordings. Sued to release the tapes, supreme court said he had to release the tapes. Impeached him.
Compared to the kind of stuff that goes on today, it honestly seems like a pretty minor scandal.
NSA mass surveilance
Edward Snowden revealed the existance of a surveilance program called PRISM run by the National Security Agency. It collected internet communications from various US internet companies.
Basically the NSA has access to your email, voice and video chat, videos, photos, stored data, Voice over IP, file transfers, video conferencing, social network details, and more.
At first, the government tried to say that they were only collecting metadata. Basically what emails and video calls were happening between which parties and when. But further information revealed that the NSA was actually storing all of the data. And also that NSA agents had pretty much unlimited access to it. Snowden talked about how agents would show nudes they discovered to other agents, or use the technology to stalk loved ones.
I’m honestly surprised the news blew over so fast and people have basically forgotten about it, and the world goes on as if nothing ever happened, presumably we’re still all being spied on constantly.
Tuskegee Experiment
Basically the US Public Health Service and the CDC intentionally gave a bunch of black people syphilis between 1932 and 1972, about 400 of them. The point of the study was to observe the effects of the disease when left untreated. The subjects of the study weren’t informed about the nature of the experiment, and about 100 of them died. Even though by the end of the study, syphilis was entirely treatable. You can treat it with penicilin. We knew this by 1947.
Initially the men were told that the experiment would only last for 6 months, but it ended up going on for 40 years.
Bill Clinton apologized, and the study participants and their descendants were awarded $10 million in a class action lawsuit, about $50 million dollars today, plus free medical care for surviving participants, and family members infected as a consequence of the study.
Although it’s on a much smaller scale than most of the conspiracies I’ll discuss, it’s probably the most messed up.
The US Department of the Treasury poisoned alcohol during Prohibition
In January of 1920, the 18th Amendment took effect which banned the sale, transportation, and manufacture of alcohol. Although it didn’t ban consumption.
Despite prohibition, the consumption of alcohol actually went way up.
Sometimes bootleggers would make their own alcohol. Other times they stole commercially-made alcohol which had since been rendered undrinkable by adding methyl alcohol to them. Chemists were used to re-nature the alcohol and make it drinkable again.
The US government caught on to this game of cat-and-mouse by 1927 and started adding even more dangerous chemicals to the drinks. Including acetone, chloroform, and kerosene.
In New York City alone, about 400 people died from drinking poisonous alcohol. The year after, about 700 died.
Cancer-causing vaccines
I’m not going to talk about COVID-19 yet, maybe we can do an entire episode on that in the future. But what we do know is that companies have produced harmful vaccines in the past.
About 100 million Americans received a polio accine between 1954 and 1961 that was contaminated with SV40 simian virus, a potentially cancer-causing virus.
The original inactivated-polio vaccine came from cells of rhesus monkies that were infected with SV40.
SV40 can cause lung and brain tumors in both kids and adults.
Bayer Medicine Causes AIDS
In the mid-1980s, pharmaceutical company Bayer realized that their blood-clotting medicine was causing large numbers of hemophiliacs to become infected with Hepatitus C and HIV.
It’s estimated that between 6,000 and 10,000 hemophiliacs in the US became infected with HIV from using the product.
I’m not a doctor, but from what I understand, the product is called Factor VIII. It comes from blood plasma given by donors, and it’s a protein that helps clotting of blood. Hemophiliacs can inject themselves with it to stop or prevent bleeding.
The worst part isn’t that they unknowingly gave people AIDs though. What makes it a conspiracy is that after Bayer realized the medicine had a high risk of transmitting AIDS, they continued selling it in Asia and Latin America, while giving the United States and Europe a newer version.
This episode is getting long enough that I think what I’m going to do is break this up into two parts. In the next episode we’ll go over around 10 more real conspiracies that actually happened.
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In the next episode, I’m going to go over some real-life conspiracies that have actually been confirmed to have happened.
Just a reminder as well that if you have a strange, creepy, or weird real life story you’d like to share on the show, you can email me. Secretgrasp (at) gmail.com. You can either send an MP3 file of yourself telling the story, or write it out for me to read on the show.
We’ll be in touch soon.