Stay Woke: Study Shows a Lack of Sleep Makes You More Likely to Believe Conspiracy Theories

Popular Science - Poor sleep can make you susceptible to a wide range of physical and mental health issues, including heart disease, high blood pressure, and anxiety. But new research indicates it may also increase the chances of yet another unwanted outcome: embracing conspiracy theories.

A team from the University of Nottingham’s School of Psychology recently conducted two experiments on a total of over 1,000 volunteers. The results, published on March 12 in the Journal of Health Psychology, suggest adding bad sleep quality on top of existing issues like depression can make people more susceptible to patently untrue conspiracies. The odds for adopting such beliefs may especially increase if tired people are exposed to conspiratorial content from outside sources as opposed to coming to similarly false conclusions on their own.

If you ask me, this is a classic, "Chicken or egg?" situation. Did a severe lack of sleep and overall unhealthy lifestyle make my brain more susceptible to a conspiracy theory about LeBron James hosting celebrity-only child sex parties in the basements of Blaze Pizza? Or am I deep in a 4chan rabbit hole until 5am every night because I'm rattled by the fact that there's Blaze Pizza hosting child sex parties two miles from my house? I mean… they have an unmarked door in the back of the kitchen that I've never seen anybody open. One night I drove by after close and saw a guy standing outside who I swear looked EXACTLY like Rich Paul. And the other night Noosemayhem239 responded to my blind item saying the Blaze Pizza in Tucson has a similar door, and his ex-girlfriend's sister once saw a contestant from The Bachelor eating there. Which means it's very possible celebrities are fucking kids in there. So how can I, a concerned citizen, allow myself to sleep when every minute I spend sleeping is another minute spent not blowing the lid off this damn thing. 

Jokes aside, I will say, when one of my buddies was deep in his meth era (i.e. not sleeping a wink), he sent me a series of very long text messages in which he was very concerned about the possibility of Barack Obama being the antichrist. Something about "the mark of the beast" from a passage in the book of Revelations? Something about the anti-christ being a charming man of Muslim descent?

I said, "Wait Obama is a Muslim?"

To which he said, "His name is Obama"

To which I said, "Touché. Did Islam even exist during Bible times?."

I'm not sure what he said after that. I just made that dialogue. But he did very methily send me a long text with a bunch of links about the Barack Obama antichrist theory. That part is true. But in reality, I'm sure I replied with something more like, "Damn that's crazy". 

Next heard from that friend he had all his clothes stuffed in black trash bags and was taking them to the dumpster because he'd convinced himself he was infested with bird mites. I tried to tell him he was just itchy from the meth. But he wasn't having it. He thew his whole wardrobe away. I ended up having to buy him an outfit (LA Dodgers sherzey and pair of khaki shorts from Goodwill) because he had a job interview. Unfortunately I'm not making that part up either. But I'm sure all his insane beliefs had more to do with the meth than a simple lack of sleep. The correlation between heavy meth use and believing wild conspiracy theories probably doesn't need to be studied. Meth & conspiracy theories go together like pork chops and applesauce.

I don't want to shit all over the idea that there are conspiracy theories out there that might have some truth to them. I'd be ignorant to think I would know better than anyone else. I mostly just leave them alone. Although in general, my stance on conspiracy theories is that I know there's some shady shit going on, but by the time any conspiracy theory makes it to me, the facts of it have been probably altered and fantasticized so many times, that even if the conspiracy theory is rooted in truth, 90% of what I'm hearing is probably nonsense. My main rule of thumb is once I hear someone reference clues that the U.S. Government, or Ellen DeGeneres are intentionally leaving behind, the theory has probably gotten out of hand. 

"You don't get it. It's symbolism. It's about power. They get off on it." 

It's a god Off-White hoodie guys. You can bid on that sweatshirt it on StockX. 

And it's not like a god damn red devil face is some unique one-of-a-kind piece of art. A red devil face is extremely generic. Red devil faces are everywhere. It's also possible Ellen DeGeneres and Jay-Z just bought the same expensive trendy sweatshirt because they have more money than they know what to do with. Or maybe they just enjoy/want to be cool by pretending to enjoy the artwork of Jean Michel-Basquait.

Sorry I know I'm going to get myself in trouble here. I'm sure there's somebody right now just shaking their head in disgust at my ignorance. That's why I never go down this road. I'm not equipped to go to battle with someone who has their arguments in order. They'd make me look a fool. But just because you can arrange evidence in a way that could add up to a scary conclusion, doesn't mean that's the only possible conclusion.

Anyways… I guess the original study I referenced as an excuse to ramble about conspiracy theories makes sense. Honestly, I don't think it's very groundbreaking information. If you literally never sleep, and your brain isn't firing on all cylinders, you're probably more likely to believe whatever. Especially conspiracies where you can actually point to some type of evidence, whether the evidence is valid or not. But it still seems like a bit of a chicken or the egg situation. If you allow yourself to go down a rabbit hole, and take everything you read at face value, you'll certainly find some crazy shit that could cause you to lose sleep. Who among us didn't watch Loose Change and spend the next 8 hours going down a 9/11 rabbit hole. The longer you spend go down that road, the longer you go not sleeping. It's a vicious cycle. Soon enough you're Charlie Kelly hunting down Pepe Silvia. 

It's also just kinda funny that the term "woke" is applied to conspiracy theory people, and now there's a study that says being "too awake" causes people to believe such theories. It all kinda makes perfect sense if you think about it. 

That's my pointless Monday blog about conspiracy theories. The end.