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16 event(s), 16 uncited and 0 outside stories on this page

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  1. c. 800 The Donation of Constantine forgery debunked 0 cit. The Donation of Constantine was a document, later proven to be a forgery, that claimed Emperor Constantine had granted the popes authority over Rome and the Western Empire. It was produced around the eighth century and used for centuries to support papal claims to temporal power. politics / religion ●●●●
  2. 1614 The Monita Secreta Forgery debunked 0 cit. A book called the Monita Secreta claimed to reveal secret Jesuit instructions for gaining wealth and power. It was a forgery, written by a disgruntled former Jesuit, and became a staple of anti-Jesuit propaganda. religion / society ●●
  3. 1851 Cartwright invents "drapetomania" to justify slavery debunked 0 cit. Physician Samuel Cartwright coined "drapetomania," a fake disease he said made enslaved people flee bondage. It is a stark example of pseudoscience used to defend slavery and deny the humanity of the enslaved. science / society ●
  4. 1885 to 1897 The Taxil hoax debunked 0 cit. Leo Taxil spent years spreading lurid fabrications about satanic masonic rituals, which anti-masonic and church audiences believed. In 1897 he publicly confessed the whole affair was a hoax invented to mock his critics. culture / religion ●●●
  5. 1903 The Protocols of the Elders of Zion Forgery debunked 0 cit. The Protocols of the Elders of Zion is a proven antisemitic forgery that falsely claims to record a Jewish plot for world domination. It was fabricated in Russia and has been used ever since to incite hatred and violence against Jews. politics / society ●●●●
  6. 1903 The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, a proven forgery debunked 0 cit. The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, first printed in Russia in 1903, pretend to be the minutes of a secret Jewish plan to control the world's finance and governments. They are a fabrication, plagiarized from an earlier French satire that had nothing to do with Jews, and were exposed as a forgery by The Times of London in 1921. The whole idea of a Jewish plot to run world finance rests on this fake document and must be rejected outright as antisemitic invention. politics / society ●●●
  7. 1913 The myth of Wilson the Freemason debunked 0 cit. Woodrow Wilson is often listed among Masonic presidents, but he was not a Freemason. A devout Presbyterian and the son of a minister, he held no Masonic membership; the claim is a persistent and documented error. ●
  8. 1916 The fabricated Federal Reserve regret debunked 0 cit. A quote widely shared online has Wilson lamenting that he had unwittingly ruined his country by creating the Federal Reserve. It is a fabrication, stitched from unrelated passages of his 1913 book The New Freedom, which never mentioned the Fed. Wilson recorded no such regret. ●
  9. August 1921 The Protocols Exposed as a Forgery debunked 0 cit. The Times of London demonstrated that the Protocols were plagiarized from earlier satirical writings and were a forgery. Despite repeated exposure, the fabricated text continued to circulate among antisemitic movements. politics / society ●●●
  10. 25 October 1924 Zinoviev Letter published debunked 0 cit. The Daily Mail published a letter purportedly from Soviet official Grigory Zinoviev urging British communists toward insurrection, four days before a general election. The letter was a forgery, and later research pointed to its likely fabrication by White Russian emigres and possible passage through figures with SIS connections. Its publication is widely believed to have damaged the Labour government of Ramsay MacDonald, though historians still debate exactly how it reached the press. politics ●●●
  11. 13 March 1962 Operation Northwoods Proposal debunked 0 cit. The U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff drafted and formally proposed a set of false-flag operations, including staged terrorist attacks and a fabricated Cuban attack on a U.S. plane, meant to be blamed on Fidel Castro's government to justify a military invasion of Cuba. Defense Secretary Robert McNamara rejected the plan and it was never carried out. The proposal is documented through declassified Pentagon papers released in the late 1990s, not through any executed attack. politics / war ●●●
  12. 1976 Stephen Knight publishes Jack the Ripper: The Final Solution debunked 0 cit. Writer Stephen Knight publishes a book claiming the Whitechapel murders were carried out to cover up a secret royal marriage, with Commissioner Charles Warren and fellow Freemasons conspiring to protect the killers and obstruct the investigation. Knight interprets the "Juwes" graffito as a coded Masonic reference. This is a debunked conspiracy theory: Knight's central source later admitted the story was a hoax, and the theory is rejected by professional historians of the case. culture ●●
  13. c. 1978 Joseph Sickert retracts royal-Masonic Ripper story debunked 0 cit. Joseph Sickert, whose account of a royal cover-up formed the basis of Stephen Knight's theory, tells journalists that his story was a hoax. His retraction is widely cited by historians as further evidence that the Masonic royal-conspiracy version of the Ripper case has no factual foundation. culture ●
  14. 21 November 2006 Botched raid kills Kathryn Johnston in Atlanta debunked 0 cit. Atlanta narcotics officers used a no-knock warrant to break into the home of Kathryn Johnston, a 92-year-old woman, who fired once in fear and was killed in the return fire. Investigators found the warrant rested on a fabricated informant tip, and officers later admitted planting drugs and lying, drawing federal convictions. The case became a widely cited example of how paramilitary drug raids on bad information could turn deadly for innocent residents. politics / society ●●
  15. 8 April 2016 Keith Harward exonerated after bite-mark evidence proven false debunked 0 cit. Keith Harward had spent 33 years in prison for a rape and murder conviction based on testimony from multiple forensic dentists that his teeth matched bite marks left on the victim. DNA testing identified another man as the actual perpetrator, and Harward was exonerated and released. His case, one of the longest-serving bite-mark exonerations, was cited by the American Board of Forensic Odontology and legal reform advocates as evidence the technique lacked scientific reliability. science ●●
  16. c. 2017 The digital astrology revival debunked 0 cit. Smartphone apps and social media drive a boom in astrology among a new generation, turning the ancient Babylonian art into a billion-dollar wellness industry. The oldest of pseudosciences finds its largest audience yet in the most modern of media. culture / economy ●●