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What’s a conspiracy theory you actually find believable?

Every conspiracy theory has to start somewhere. Sometimes a small piece of truth gets expanded into a much larger story. Other times, there are enough unanswered questions that the official explanation leaves people wondering if there is more to the story.

The two most prominent examples in my lifetime are probably the JFK assassination and the various theories surrounding it.

We know one thing for certain: John F. Kennedy was assassinated. What remains disputed is exactly how and why everything surrounding the assassination happened. The Warren Commission concluded that Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone, but that conclusion has been questioned for decades. That has left plenty of room for theories involving the Soviet Union, Cuba, the CIA, the Mafia, or some combination of them.

Some of the theories are almost funny. There are claims involving everything from Kennedy’s policies on silver certificates to elaborate international plots. The problem is that JFK had stepped on a lot of toes. The Bay of Pigs, Cuba, the Soviet Union, organized crime, civil rights, and the growing conflict in Vietnam all created political enemies and complicated relationships.

That doesn’t prove any particular conspiracy.

But it does make the assassination one of those historical events where I have a hard time believing we know the entire story. The continuing release and review of government records has only kept the questions alive. For me, the more interesting question isn’t necessarily who pulled the trigger. It is whether there were people, organizations, or governments that knew more than they ever told the public.

I find that kind of conspiracy much more believable than the idea of one giant organization secretly controlling everything.

Take the Rothschild family, for example. The family has become a fixture in conspiracy theories claiming that it controls the world’s governments and financial systems. There is certainly a long and interesting history behind the family’s wealth and influence. Still, the idea that the Rothschilds secretly control the world’s money doesn’t hold up particularly well when you look at the modern global financial system.

The famous quote often attributed to Nathan Rothschild—essentially, “I don’t care who controls your government as long as I control the money”—is another example of how a questionable quotation can become part of a much larger story. Books such as The Creature from Jekyll Island have also helped fuel theories about who really controls the financial system.

There are certainly powerful people, powerful financial institutions, private organizations, lobbying groups, and governments that operate behind closed doors. That part isn’t a conspiracy theory. It is reality.

But that doesn’t mean they are all sitting in a room somewhere running the world.

The Illuminati is another example. The idea that a secret organization controls governments, entertainment, financial institutions, and world events is fascinating, but I don’t find it particularly believable.

The same goes for the New World Order—the idea that a group of political and financial elites is secretly working toward a single global government. Governments and powerful people certainly pursue their own interests, and international organizations certainly exist. That is a long way from a secret organization controlling the entire world.

Even secretive organizations such as the Freemasons, Bilderberg meetings, or Bohemian Grove are interesting without requiring a global conspiracy to explain them. Powerful people meeting privately is not evidence that they have a master plan for humanity.

For me, the distinction is pretty simple.

I can believe that people conspire. History proves they do.

I can believe governments hide information. History proves they do that too.

I can believe powerful people make deals behind closed doors. That probably doesn’t even qualify as controversial.

What I have a harder time believing is that all of these separate events are part of one enormous, perfectly coordinated plan.

Maybe that’s the real problem with conspiracy theories. The first question shouldn’t always be, “Is there a conspiracy?”

A better question for me

“How much evidence do we actually have before we turn unanswered questions into a conspiracy?”

That is where I think the line between healthy skepticism and conspiracy thinking begins.