The Fourth Horseman's Henchmen: The Origins, Roles, and Effects of AIDS Conspiracy Theories Todd Ferguson (9833181) Sociology 166-309T Derek SteeleINTRODUCTION It would not be unreasonable to state that AIDS has had a greater impact on a global scale than any other emergent disease of the past fifty years. From seemingly out of nowhere, this catastrophic illness has effected well over 17 million people worldwide (Weitz, 1996: 96) and shows no signs of abating. Perhaps more alarming has been it's inequitable distribution, with homosexual men, IV drug users, Haitians and, more recently, Africans and African-Americans bearing the brunt of the epidemic's onslaught. Unlike most diseases, when the medical establishment began positing theories as to the origins of AIDS, they were not taken entirely at face value. Shortly thereafter, alternative scenarios for the creation of HIV began appearing. Pigden defines a conspiracy as "a secret plan on the part of a group to influence events partly by covert action." (1995: 5). Many of these scenarios took the form of conspiracy theories. The purpose of this paper is not to examine and weigh all the evidence of competing theories and pass judgment on which is the most plausible. Instead, my intention is to examine the AIDS conspiracy theories themselves to illuminate why they came into being, what purpose they serve, and what their effects have been or may be. CONFLICTING THEORIES OF AIDS The dominant theory of the origin of the AIDS virus has been that HIV, much like the simian SIV, was carried by monkeys, whom it did not affect, and somehow "jumped" species, transmitting to humans in Africa through contact of some sort (Morrissey). But by the mid-1980's, competing theories, none of which seemed to come from medical authorities, began to emerge. Many of these competing theories postulated that HIV had been intentionally created in a laboratory. While there are an endless variety of HIV/AIDS conspiracy theories in existence, most tend to agree on a certain number of points or follow a particular trajectory. Most pick up the trail of the alleged conspirators at a U.S. Congressional Hearing on Chemical and Biological Warfare on July 1, 1969 (one week after the Stonewall riots in New York), where one Dr. Donald M. MacArthur requested $10 million in funding for a five-to-ten year research program whose objective was the development of a genetically-engineered "super germ" "...refractory to the immunological and therapeutic processes." (Cantwell, 1998). The program took place in the U.S. biological warfare lab at Fort Derrick, Maryland and was then transmitted by a number of possible means: World Health Organization polio and smallpox vaccination programs in Africa and Haiti; with U.S. prisoners inoculated in an experiment and subsequently released; and with an experiment involving a hepatitis B vaccination that used homosexual men in New York and San Francisco as test subjects (Morrissey, ibid.; Cantwell, ibid.). The rationale for unleashing one of the most terrifying infectious diseases ever to be seen? The conspiracy theorists, who feel that it is no coincidence that AIDS has most impacted those populations that could be considered "marginal" or "troublesome" by right-wingers in government, view its purpose as a means of social control, likening it to eugenics ("AIDS Authority"); or else as a way to solve the problem of over-population in developing countries (Morrissey, ibid.). What is described above can be termed a conspiracy theory of malicious intent. But the reactions of the authorities to the emerging AIDS epidemic may be better termed a conspiracy theory of benign neglect (Sassoon, 1995: 267), as the Reagan administration in the U.S. treated AIDS as a "distasteful moral issue," (Weitz: 28) forbidding Surgeon General C. Everett Koop, M.D. from speaking publicly about AIDS until 1987 (Henderson) and the World Health Organization is compelled to offer a public apology for its inexplicable delay in "assessing the dimensions of the AIDS threat." (Nichols). THE REASONS FOR AIDS CONSPIRACY THEORIES It would be impossible to separate AIDS conspiracy theories from the social status of their proponents. AIDS conspiracy theories are prevalent in those very socioeconomic groups most afflicted by the epidemic - "socially marginalized groups who have little economic, political and social power." (Henderson). One baffling element of AIDS is it's peculiar confinement to people of colour and gay men - no other epidemic has been similarly confined in such a way (Cantwell, ibid.). As Theodore Sasson notes, "conspiracy theories are often advanced in groups whose members feel vulnerable to or threatened by outsiders. They are especially prevalent in groups that have endured malicious assaults by outsiders in their pasts." (265). Homosexuals and racial minorities certainly meet this criteria. For this reason, it should not be surprising when, faced with the sudden outbreak of a mysterious and fatal illness that seems to affect only their group, for which there appears to be no proven origin, and the blame for which is being firmly placed by the dominant majority onto the victims' "irresponsible behaviour," conspiracy theories are formulated and disseminated. To document the occurrences that have caused the very groups most vulnerable to AIDS to feel vulnerable or threatened by outsiders would require an entire term paper to itself. But the AIDS conspiracy theorists often point to the same documented government and medical conspiracies to demonstrate that their belief that authorities are intentionally harming socially "undesirable" groups is not so far-fetched. From the U.S. Army intentionally giving freezing Plains Indians smallpox-infected blankets in the 19th century (Taylor); to the Tuskagee syphilis study (in which black sharecroppers were denied penicillin in order to observe their agonizing deaths) (Morrissey, ibid.); to a six-day U.S. military biological warfare experiment in which clouds of potentially harmful bacteria were sprayed over San Francisco, injuring twelve and killing one elderly man (Cantwell, ibid.). Indeed, members of the marginalized groups most at risk for AIDS know that "...concerted and secretly planned social action is an everyday accomplishment of industries and government agencies (Waters, 1997: 122). It is hardly surprising, then, that homosexual men, African Americans and other minority groups harbour a great deal of mistrust towards the establishment. With African Americans, conspiracy theories "are rooted historically in the actual experiences of African Americans dating back to slavery." (Sassoon: 266). Indeed, these conspiracy theories have been found to be the only explanations that enjoy widespread support among African Americans (Ibid.: 274). What is most interesting is how little conspiracy theorists in the marginalized groups identified differ from nonbelievers of the same groups. Among African Americans, Sasson found no distinguishing characteristics of believers in conspiracy theories (273) and Waters notes that "...believers in conspiracy theories are not a special group in terms of socioeconomic status or demographic variables, except that believers tended to be better educated than their skeptical counterparts." (117). There are, however, some minor but interesting differences. While conspiracy theorists distrust government agencies, they remain more active and involved in the political process than do skeptics (Ibid.: 119-120). As well, social mobility seems to increase belief in conspiracy theories because upwardly-mobile individuals are more keenly aware of continuing disparities between the haves and have nots and are also more cognizant of the way in which powerful people are able to enjoy the undisturbed realization of their intentions (Ibid.: 121). This may be especially true in the case of homosexual men, whose lack of children tends to favour them financially, making them perhaps more affluent than the average heterosexual of their age, race, and class background. THE ROLE OF CONSPIRACY THEORIES Much of the existence of AIDS conspiracy theories can be attributed to medical science's inability to come up with satisfactory answers as to how the disease developed. Neither government, medicine, or religious authorities have been able to provide adequate and satisfactory answers to explain how AIDS came into being and why. As Pidgen points out, the conspiracy theory "...is the secularized version of a religious belief. The idea that what goes on in the world is due to the machinations of the men of power is the secular successor to the view that events are controlled by the conspiracies of the gods." (8). Conspiracy theories "...flourish because they provide explanations that fit the worldviews of African Americans better than the official accounts." (Sassoon: 274). They explain threatening circumstances like AIDS in a manner that resonates with a key element of African American popular wisdom - that racism persists in society (Ibid.: 277-278). The same could certainly be said of gay men and their perception of the persistence of homophobia. This is particularly relevant to AIDS because it's official causal/origin story has been hotly and publicly debated. As a crisis, AIDS is very confusing to the groups victimized by it, and conspiracy theories "...are generally advanced to make sense of crisis events or situations. They do so by attributing the crisis to the purposeful and clandestine actions of outsiders." (Ibid.: 265). The conspiracy theory is made more salient by the glaring discrepancies in the authorities' official version of events surrounding the origins of AIDS. The mystery that surrounds AIDS has been perpetuated by a media reluctant to do more than accept it's existence as a given and tow the official line of the species-jumping origin theory. But calling AIDS a conspiracy "...serves as corrective to the way in which ethnic inequality is often treated by European American writers as the outcome of accidental, inexorable social and political processes for which no one can, or should, be held accountable. The use of the conspiracy metaphor is a way of 'brining men back in' to the discussion of ethnic inequality." (Waters: 122). This is an especially important function of AIDS conspiracy theories because of the little power the marginalized groups that are most impacted by AIDS have access to in society. Conspiracy theories about AIDS are the logical outcome of a process by which the main groups affected - some of the most marginalized and powerless groups in society - struggle to come up with explanations that are not contradicted by their observations of the social world available to them. By describing conspiracy theories as a type of ethnosociology, Waters points out that they "...explain social misfortunes by attributing them to the deliberate, often secretly planned, actions of a particular group of people." (Ibid.: 114-115). THE SOCIAL CONSEQUENCES OF AIDS CONSPIRACY THEORIES AIDS conspiracy theories have real social consequences, both negative and positive. Proponents of AIDS conspiracy theories may find themselves increasingly marginalized. Society tends to not take conspiracy theories seriously. Typically, conspiracy theories are treated as light entertainment in movies (Conspiracy Theory), television (The X-Files) and even talk radio (The Art Bell Show). Conspiracy theories are widely regarded as ill-founded superstitions, "...inviting the shaking of heads and pitying looks from sophisticated colleagues." (Pidgen: 3). Subsequently, adherents of conspiracy theories "...are often seen as paranoid and delusional." (Waters: 113). This is magnified in the case of AIDS conspiracy theories because AIDS afflicts precisely those marginalized groups who are often blamed for their own problems, whose insistence that the epidemic is the work of an insidious plot to eradicate them is likely to be seen by the dominant majority as a bizarre way to deflect blame for the disease from their own "irresponsible behaviour." As one subject in Sasson's study noted, this reaction is "...designed to make us the kind of people that nobody would have any pity for...we're just no good!" (Sassoon: 270). AIDS conspiracy theories may make the marginalized groups most affected by the epidemic, who are already highly suspicious of the motives of the authorities, extremely reluctant to accept what the medical establishment tells them about the transmission or treatment of AIDS. AIDS conspiracy theories are largely motivated by fear. As Shlapentokh notes, "fear can be utterly false and propel people, groups and society to undertake unnecessary and often harmful actions." (1998: 169). While the necessity or harm is still debated, HIV-positive gay men and gay men with AIDS began refusing to be treated with AZT, the only known drug to alleviate AIDS symptoms during the 1980's. They had discovered that AZT had been banned in 1957 because of the high number of deaths attributed to it when used to treat cancer patients (Taylor: ibid.). Activists in groups such as ACT-UP began to suspect that AZT was responsible for many of the deaths attributed to AIDS and began questioning why doctors would use such a toxic treatment instead of exploring other options, such as acemannan (Ibid.). The lack of satisfactory answers to these questions led to the prescription of AZT being incorporated into AIDS conspiracy theories as further evidence of a plot to eliminate those groups most afflicted with the disease. ACT-UP is, in fact, a stellar example of how conspiracy theories may serve to organize and mobilize people into mass social action and social movements. Conspiracy theories can serve to shape behaviour by providing parameters for political and social action in conflicts (Waters: 112), parameters previously unavailable to the marginalized groups most impacted by the AIDS epidemic. AIDS conspiracy theories have flourished at least partly because of their ability to foster solidarity and collective action. Sasson noted that several of the participants in his study explicitly urged one another to engage in one form or another of resistance against white oppression (Sassoon: 278). The success of AIDS conspiracy theories in mobilization of marginalized groups has much to do with their fear of unknown forces conspiring to harm them. Ideologues such as religious and political sects and anti-government militias use fear of catastrophes such as AIDS to further their agenda (Shlapentokh: 166). It is not surprising, then, that the most prominent African American figure to espouse AIDS conspiracy theories is Louis Farrakhan, leader of the Nation of Islam. This fear that AIDS conspiracy theories engender "...can lead to actions which are necessary to prevent impending disasters. In many cases, fear played a mobilizing role, stimulating people to action and permitting them to avert disaster." (Ibid.: 168). If this is the case with any group, it is certainly true of the gay community, whose activism, public education, and awareness of the issues surrounding AIDS has led to a decrease in the rate of infection in their community. CONCLUSION Virtually all of the most feared social disasters can by wholly or partially caused by conspirators. Wars, famines, unemployment - all have historically been caused by conspiracies (Pidgen: 22-23). It is not entirely out of the question then, that one could add epidemics of disease to the list of catastrophes within the repertoire of conspirators, especially given that the technological means to do so have been within the range of any government whose military has a biological warfare program. When those governments harbour a long-standing and well-documented history of abuse towards certain sub-groups of its population, and when those sub-groups are suddenly threatened by a new and mysterious fatal illness, it is little wonder why conspiracy comes to their minds. Pigden notes, somewhat ironically, that "the consequences of failed conspiracies are often disastrous." (Ibid.: 13). If AIDS was designed as a means to control overpopulation in the 3rd world and eradicate or seriously weaken "undesirable" populations in the 1st world, it's transmittal to "worthy" populations (such as white, non-drug using heterosexuals) could be seen as the conspiracy's failure. Whether or not an AIDS conspiracy exists, the development of conspiracy theories to explain it was almost inevitable. The social impact of these theories may be nearly as important as the impact of the disease itself. SOURCES CITED "AIDS Authority" website. http://www.rdrop.com/~gnigh/agenda.html Author Unknown. 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