About this episode

Professor James Crossland discusses the origins of modern conspiracy culture and the influence of Nesta Helen Webster.

The forgotten woman behind today’s global conspiracy thinking Conspiracy theories didn’t begin with the moon landing. They didn’t start with QAnon. And they certainly didn’t begin on Reddit. In this explosive episode of History Rage , Professor James Crossland returns to uncover the origins of modern conspiracy culture — and the overlooked figure who helped shape it. Long before talk of the “deep state,” the “New World Order,” or shadowy global elites, one British writer in the 1920s fused together Jews, Freemasons, Bolsheviks and secret societies into a single sweeping theory of world domination. Her name was Nesta Helen Webster — and according to Crossland, she is “patient zero for the plague of conspiracy-fed stupidity.” Drawing on his research into extremism, fascism and political violence, James explains how Webster inherited earlier myths about the Illuminati and the French Revolution and repackaged them for the post–First World War world. In an age of fear, upheaval and political instability, she offered something dangerously seductive: a simple explanation for complex events. We explore: The real history of the Illuminati in 1770s Bavaria Why the French Revolution became…

People in this episode

Host: Paul Bavill

Guest: James Crossland

Topics covered

• conspiracy theories
• history of conspiracy culture
• political violence
• extremism
• fascism
• American far right

Keywords

• conspiracy theory
• Nesta Helen Webster
• James Crossland
• political violence
• extremism
• Bolshevik Revolution
• French Revolution
• British Fascisti
• John Birch Society

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: British Fascisti, John Birch Society

Books & works: Protocols of the Elders of Zion

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