# Conspiracy Theories That Proved True? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [November 19, 2015, 1:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conspiracy-theories-that-proved-true/737975 "2015-11-19T13:42:03Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![theorange](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/dfb087/32.png) [@theorange](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/theorange)\ **Post date:** [November 19, 2015, 1:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conspiracy-theories-that-proved-true/737975/1 "2015-11-19T13:42:03Z")
So I’m looking for conspiracy theories that actually turned out to be true. Here’s how I define conspiracy theory. It’s a theory of events that: a) before it was proven was heavily rumored among a minority who were seen as wrong/crazy by the mainstream b) seemed extremely unlikely by the tenets of common sense of the time Does anyone know of any theories that meet both criteria? ---
**Author:** ![Horatius](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/horatius/32/3572_2.png) [@Horatius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Horatius)\ **Post date:** [November 19, 2015, 1:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conspiracy-theories-that-proved-true/737975/2 "2015-11-19T13:45:31Z")
> [@theorange](#): > > Does anyone know of any theories that meet both criteria? No. But you’ll probably have a few CT types come in here with their usual list, but you’ll find that none of them meet your condition a. ---
**Author:** ![Oly](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/oly/32/8255_2.png) [@Oly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Oly)\ **Post date:** [November 19, 2015, 1:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conspiracy-theories-that-proved-true/737975/3 "2015-11-19T13:49:38Z")
Quantum physics. Plate tectonics. Meteor killing the dinosaurs. Heliocentric solar system. Dietary cholesterol is bad for you. Dietary cholesterol is not bad for you. ---
**Author:** ![John\_DiFool](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_difool/32/19543_2.png) [@John\_DiFool](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_DiFool)\ **Post date:** [November 19, 2015, 1:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conspiracy-theories-that-proved-true/737975/4 "2015-11-19T13:52:46Z")
Those aren’t conspiracy theories, but rather (at the time) speculative ones. ---
**Author:** ![Smapti](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/smapti/32/17938_2.png) [@Smapti](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Smapti)\ **Post date:** [November 19, 2015, 1:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conspiracy-theories-that-proved-true/737975/5 "2015-11-19T13:55:06Z")
> [@John\_DiFool](#): > > Those aren’t conspiracy theories, but rather (at the time) speculative ones. Come on, we all know the _official story_ of where that meteor came from is full of holes. ---
**Author:** ![Colibri](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/colibri/32/1841_2.png) [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)\ **Post date:** [November 19, 2015, 2:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conspiracy-theories-that-proved-true/737975/6 "2015-11-19T14:12:52Z")
> [@Oly](#): > > Quantum physics. > Plate tectonics. > Meteor killing the dinosaurs. > Heliocentric solar system. > Dietary cholesterol is bad for you. > Dietary cholesterol is not bad for you. The Illuminati created the solar system?:dubious: A [conspiracy theory](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conspiracy_theory) generally requires a conspiracy. ---
**Author:** ![kk\_fusion](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kk_fusion/32/15276_2.png) [@kk\_fusion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kk_fusion)\ **Post date:** [November 19, 2015, 2:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conspiracy-theories-that-proved-true/737975/7 "2015-11-19T14:18:27Z")
Digital surveillance? ---
**Author:** ![Diceman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/22d042/32.png) [@Diceman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diceman)\ **Post date:** [November 19, 2015, 2:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conspiracy-theories-that-proved-true/737975/8 "2015-11-19T14:38:49Z")
[This website](http://www.infowars.com/33-conspiracy-theories-that-turned-out-to-be-true-what-every-person-should-know/) lists 33 conspiracies that turned out to be real. Most of them, I don’t know how widespread rumors were before they were outed, but #8 (The Tuskegee Syphilis Study), #14 and #26 (CIA drug smuggling) were rumored for years before we found out that, yes, they rumors were substantially true. ---
**Author:** ![Catamount](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/catamount/32/2840_2.png) [@Catamount](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Catamount)\ **Post date:** [November 19, 2015, 2:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conspiracy-theories-that-proved-true/737975/9 "2015-11-19T14:46:16Z")
> [@kk\_fusion](#): > > Digital surveillance? I would say phone surveillance. Me and a friend used to joke about it. Imagine our surprise when we found out it was true. But we still take the time to say a few kind words to the person from Homeland Security who’s listening in to our calls. “Hey, how you doing? Heard any good gossip lately?” ---
**Author:** ![AK84](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/85e7bf/32.png) [@AK84](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AK84)\ **Post date:** [November 19, 2015, 2:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conspiracy-theories-that-proved-true/737975/10 "2015-11-19T14:53:07Z")
Government sponsored torture. Suez conspiracy 1956. ---
**Author:** ![OneCentStamp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/13edae/32.png) [@OneCentStamp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/OneCentStamp)\ **Post date:** [November 19, 2015, 2:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conspiracy-theories-that-proved-true/737975/11 "2015-11-19T14:58:05Z")
It wasn’t exactly a conspiracy theory (well, not in the popular sense, but maybe in the literal sense of the meaning of the words), and it wasn’t exactly proven _true_, but Sen. Joseph McCarthy’s insistence that the U.S. government in the 1940s-50s was riddled with secret communists and Soviet moles ended up being not quite as specious as we thought. ---
**Author:** ![Grrr](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/grrr/32/146_2.png) [@Grrr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Grrr)\ **Post date:** [November 19, 2015, 3:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conspiracy-theories-that-proved-true/737975/12 "2015-11-19T15:06:30Z")
> [@Diceman](#): > > [This website](http://www.infowars.com/33-conspiracy-theories-that-turned-out-to-be-true-what-every-person-should-know/) lists 33 conspiracies that turned out to be real. Most of them, I don’t know how widespread rumors were before they were outed, but #8 (The Tuskegee Syphilis Study), #14 and #26 (CIA drug smuggling) were rumored for years before we found out that, yes, they rumors were substantially true. The Tuskegee experiments was the first thing that came to my mind. ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [November 19, 2015, 3:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conspiracy-theories-that-proved-true/737975/13 "2015-11-19T15:16:21Z")
> [@OneCentStamp](#): > > It wasn’t exactly a conspiracy theory (well, not in the popular sense, but maybe in the literal sense of the meaning of the words), and it wasn’t exactly proven _true_, but Sen. Joseph McCarthy’s insistence that the U.S. government in the 1940s-50s was riddled with secret communists and Soviet moles ended up being not quite as specious as we thought. Considering that no one in America thought that the Soviets \*weren’t \*trying to spy on us, this is hardly a revelation. What McCarthy did was smear the reputation of anyone who had left-wing beliefs, a vastly different thing than saying that he had found communists in government. This is doubly horrifying because in fact [McCarthy never uncovered a single one of them](http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/mccarthy-charges-communists-are-in-the-cia). Conspiracy theories are not the same as conspiracies. Conspiracies exist, secrets are hidden, governments bury their dubious affairs, everybody spies on everybody else, the world is awash in blackness. Conspiracy theories don’t start out as “the government/Illuminati/Jews/Lizard People did a bad thing.” They start with the premise that small cabals can twist reality to their bidding, pressure the tens of thousands of people involved to keep quiet until death and beyond, spend billions of dollars without any trace, have ninja agents operate invisibly, and yet leave thousands of clues that nobody but themselves can find and weave into a proper story. Conspiracy theories are ludicrous because they are bad thinking. They are models of how not to get at truth. They can’t be proved true because they don’t operate within the world of facts and logic that are needed to discover truths. Secrets can be found out. We find them every day, big and small. Conspiracy theories are forever mockable. ---
**Author:** ![wevets](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/e9a140/32.png) [@wevets](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wevets)\ **Post date:** [November 19, 2015, 3:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conspiracy-theories-that-proved-true/737975/14 "2015-11-19T15:52:07Z")
> [@OneCentStamp](#): > > It wasn’t exactly a conspiracy theory (well, not in the popular sense, but maybe in the literal sense of the meaning of the words), and it wasn’t exactly proven _true_, but Sen. Joseph McCarthy’s insistence that the U.S. government in the 1940s-50s was riddled with secret communists and Soviet moles ended up being not quite as specious as we thought. Nah - read [The Sword and the Shield](http://www.amazon.com/Sword-Shield-Mitrokhin-Archive-History-ebook/dp/B004LLIPVA/ref=sr_1_2?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1447948162&sr=1-2&keywords=the+shield+and+the+sword), a history of the KGB written after the collapse of the Soviet Union and the Mitrokhin Archive of papers smuggled out of the agency’s records. The frequent ineptitude and limited abilities of the Soviet spy network was never what McCarthy or the John Birch Society ever thought it was. ---
**Author:** ![Senegoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/senegoid/32/6606_2.png) [@Senegoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Senegoid)\ **Post date:** [November 19, 2015, 4:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conspiracy-theories-that-proved-true/737975/15 "2015-11-19T16:00:32Z")
A couple of earlier threads asking more-or-less the same question: [Have their been any American Conspiracy Theories That Were True?](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=403422) [Conspiracy theories – confirmed](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=527847) (Similarly to the current thread, scientific theories were mentioned a lot.) I found the above by googling the words: site:boards.straightdope.com conspiracy theories proved true which also turned up numerous other threads discussing the truth of various individual CT’s. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [November 19, 2015, 4:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conspiracy-theories-that-proved-true/737975/16 "2015-11-19T16:14:08Z")
> [@](#): > > Quoth **kk fusion** : > > Digital surveillance? Fails the OP’s first criterion, in that everyone (or at least everyone paying even a modicum of attention) knew that it was going on. We might not know just how much capability the NSA has, but we know that whatever they do have, they’re using to the fullness of their capability. ---
**Author:** ![Siam\_Sam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d78d45/32.png) [@Siam\_Sam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Siam_Sam)\ **Post date:** [November 19, 2015, 4:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conspiracy-theories-that-proved-true/737975/17 "2015-11-19T16:18:19Z")
Guy Fawkes? ---
**Author:** ![Jackmannii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jackmannii/32/311_2.png) [@Jackmannii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jackmannii)\ **Post date:** [November 19, 2015, 5:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conspiracy-theories-that-proved-true/737975/18 "2015-11-19T17:00:36Z")
> [@Grrr](#): > > The Tuskegee experiments was the first thing that came to my mind. As has been pointed out ad ultra nauseum, this “research” was far from a conspiracy, since findings were published in at least one medical journal. Not being publicized in the news media is not the same as being a “conspiracy”. If the question in the OP is phrased as “what conspiracy theories generated by the general public in books/radio programs/on the Internet have turned out to be true”, it turns out to be a very very very short list. A rare example is the Dreyfus affair, heavily featuring brilliant amateur detectives and a lying, denying officialdom. ---
**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\ **Post date:** [November 19, 2015, 5:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conspiracy-theories-that-proved-true/737975/19 "2015-11-19T17:21:28Z")
[General Motors Streetcar Conspiracy](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Motors_streetcar_conspiracy) It’s not clear that the conspiracy to eliminate public transportation systems was effective, but there was a conspiracy and a conviction. I bet the $1 fine must have hurt. ---
**Author:** ![clairobscur](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/839c29/32.png) [@clairobscur](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/clairobscur)\ **Post date:** [November 19, 2015, 5:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conspiracy-theories-that-proved-true/737975/20 "2015-11-19T17:57:33Z")
I would think that early reports about extermination camps would qualify. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conspiracy-theories-that-proved-true/737975.md?page=2)