The Microsoft billionaire has been the target of many different false rumours about vaccines. The Rashtriya Kamdhenu Aayog, part of India's Ministry of Agriculture, confirmed there will be trials for a Covid treatment combining cow urine, dung, butter, ghee and milk - but not a vaccine. There were no photographers in 17th-century Virginia.). The theory eventually inspired an armed man in search of the nonexistent children to enter Comet Ping Pong. For these reasons, most Earth scientists ignored or even debunked the idea of continental drift for the better part of half a century after Wegener’s theory was presented. Of course, this is an average, and different states had different levels of slaveholding. While it makes some intuitive sense that a person would be rationally motivated to take care of his or her “property,” as the Economist’s reviewer suggested, historians have found that American slaveholders were apt to provide minimum levels of food and shelter for enslaved people. A .css-1xgj2ad-InlineLink:link{color:#3F3F42;}.css-1xgj2ad-InlineLink:visited{color:#696969;}.css-1xgj2ad-InlineLink:link,.css-1xgj2ad-InlineLink:visited{font-weight:700;border-bottom:1px solid #BABABA;-webkit-text-decoration:none;text-decoration:none;}.css-1xgj2ad-InlineLink:link:hover,.css-1xgj2ad-InlineLink:visited:hover,.css-1xgj2ad-InlineLink:link:focus,.css-1xgj2ad-InlineLink:visited:focus{border-bottom-color:currentcolor;border-bottom-width:2px;color:#B80000;}@supports (text-underline-offset:0.25em){.css-1xgj2ad-InlineLink:link,.css-1xgj2ad-InlineLink:visited{border-bottom:none;-webkit-text-decoration:underline #BABABA;text-decoration:underline #BABABA;-webkit-text-decoration-thickness:1px;text-decoration-thickness:1px;-webkit-text-decoration-skip-ink:none;text-decoration-skip-ink:none;text-underline-offset:0.25em;}.css-1xgj2ad-InlineLink:link:hover,.css-1xgj2ad-InlineLink:visited:hover,.css-1xgj2ad-InlineLink:link:focus,.css-1xgj2ad-InlineLink:visited:focus{-webkit-text-decoration-color:currentcolor;text-decoration-color:currentcolor;-webkit-text-decoration-thickness:2px;text-decoration-thickness:2px;color:#B80000;}}new YouGov poll of 1,640 people suggests that 28% of Americans believe that Bill Gates wants to use vaccines to implant microchips in people - with the figure rising to 44% among Republicans. The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation told the BBC the claim was "false". The BBC is not responsible for the content of external sites. A few places. During the AIDS epidemic, he said, conspiracies arose that HIV came from contaminated polio vaccination in Africa. The head of the Russian Communist party this week said that so-called "globalists" supported "a covert mass chip implantation which they may in time resort to under the pretext of a mandatory vaccination against coronavirus". : According to the 1860 census, taken just before the Civil War, more than 32 percent of white families in the soon-to-be Confederate states owned slaves. He does not "admit" 700,000 will die from a vaccine. Here is a list of our 724 fact-checks in English so far, starting with the most recent: (AFP Graphics) 724. In Arkansas, just 20 percent of families owned slaves; in South Carolina, it was 46 percent; in Mississippi, it was 49 percent. Coronavirus: Bill Gates ‘microchip’ conspiracy theory and other vaccine claims fact-checked. We asked Dr Rajni Kant, a biologist and head of research at the Indian Council for Medical Research, about the use of cow urine or dung as a treatment. We don't have significant evidence or study to quote anything.". Slate is published by The Slate Group, a Graham Holdings Company. Is it true? Join Slate Plus to continue reading, and you’ll get unlimited access to all our work—and support Slate’s independent journalism. But slaves were hardly in a better position. All contents © 2021 The Slate Group LLC. One popular Italian video, which has been viewed more than 700,000 times on Facebook, has a caption claiming that the pandemic has been "invented". “You cannot make soldiers of slaves, or slaves of soldiers,” declared Howell Cobb, president of the Provisional Confederate State Congress that drafted the Confederate States of America constitution. VideoLong watch: Is this Russian cult leader a fraud? “Slaves were better off than some poor people working in Northern or English factories. Indentured servitude was difficult, deadly work, and many indentured servants died before their terms were over. In the UK, the claim led to harassment of telecoms engineers and vandalisation of mobile phone infrastructure. But, as historian Marcus Rediker writes, the “ancient and widely accepted institution” of enslavement in Africa was exacerbated by the European presence. And if slaves seem good soldiers, then our whole theory of slavery is wrong.”, The myth is a product of the post-war period, when former Confederate leaders worked to retroactively redefine secession from a movement to preserve slavery to a fight for abstract “state’s rights” and a hazy “Southern way of life.”, Bottom line: Even if there were black soldiers in the Confederate army, it doesn’t change the truth of the Confederacy: Its goal was the protection and expansion of slavery. In April, we took a look at an emerging conspiracy theory alleging that 5G mobile networks had caused the Covid-19 pandemic. Continental drift was a revolutionary scientific theory developed in the years 1908-1912 by Alfred Wegener (1880-1930), a German meteorologist, climatologist, and geophysicist, that put forth the hypothesis that the continents had all originally been a part of one enormous landmass or supercontinent about 240 million years ago before breaking apart and drifting to their current locations. Winter Issue. : This is certainly true. We don't still whine about it. All Comments (0) + Characters … Some researchers refer to it as the North American Great Ape, though the species is, of course, theoretical. They considered black people’s palates to be less refined than white people’s, and this justified serving a monotonous diet of pork and cornmeal. As historian and public librarian Liam Hogan writes in a paper titled “The Myth of ‘Irish Slaves’ in the Colonies,” “Persons from Ireland have been held in various forms of human bondage throughout history, but they have never been chattel slaves in the West Indies.” Nor is there any evidence of Irish chattel slavery in the North American colonies. Last year, in an unsigned (and now withdrawn) review of historian Ed Baptist’s book The Half Has Never Been Told, the Economist took issue with Baptist’s “overstated” treatment of the topic, arguing that the increase in the country’s economic output in the 19th century shouldn’t be chalked up to black workers’ innovations in the cotton field but rather to masters treating their slaves well out of economic self-interest—a bit of seemingly rational counterargument that ignores the moral force of Baptist’s narrative, while making space for the fantasy of kindly slavery. View comments () Post a comment. It claims that the coronavirus pandemic is a cover for a plan to implant trackable microchips and that the Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates is behind it. In 1640 John Punch, a runaway servant of African descent, was sentenced to lifelong slavery in Virginia, while the two European-born companions who fled with him had their indentures extended. But the two types of historical guilt aren’t mutually exclusive. A slave named Peter, Baton Rouge, Louisiana, April 2, 1863. a June column on the legacy of Robert E. Lee, The Myth of ‘Irish Slaves’ in the Colonies, brought a cargo of Africans from Barbados to Boston in 1634, sentenced to lifelong slavery in Virginia, considered black people’s palates to be less refined than white people’s. Carl Benjamin (1979–), better known as Sargon of Akkad, Carl I of Swindon or The Thinkery, is a YouTube talker, failed UKIP candidate for the South West England constituency of the European Parliament, right-wing reactionary and trend setter in the exciting new scene of dairy based fashion.Although Benjamin claims the mantle of "skeptic", his commentary often features theories of a … Newsmax host Sebastian Gorka cut off guest Mike Lindell on-air after the MyPillow CEO started to spread a conspiracy theory about voting machines. AFP Factcheck has been debunking disinformation as it emerges along with new cases across the world. February 27, 2011. You’ve run out of free articles. Versions of this theory posit that 5G electromagnetic waves poison cells in the body, thus creating the … And in an August obituary of civil rights leader Julian Bond, the Times called his great-grandmother Jane Bond “the slave mistress of a Kentucky farmer”—a term that accords far too much agency to Bond’s ancestor and too little blame to the “farmer” who enslaved her. The North American Great Ape. .css-po6dm6-ItalicText{font-style:italic;}Additional reporting by Laura Gozzi, Shruti Menon, Olga Robinson and Shayan Sardarizadeh. Whether or not Anthony Johnson was the first American slaveholder, he was certainly not the last black person to own slaves. Neither of the authors “bother to inform the reader, in a coherent manner, what the differences are between chattel slavery and indentured servitude or forced labor,” writes Hogan. Rumours took hold in March when Mr Gates said in an interview that eventually "we will have some digital certificates" which would be used to show who'd recovered, been tested and ultimately who received a vaccine. The video shows … And you'll never see this message again. If you value our work, please disable your ad blocker. Politifact has debunked that claim, saying in 2015 that the theory started with Clinton supporters in 2008, not the candidate herself. The 10,000 experiment rule, first coined by Medium, requires taking the scientific method – develop a hypothesis, test it out, analyze the results, develop another hypothesis – and using it in every day life. That response led to one widely shared article, under the headline: "Bill Gates will use microchip implants to fight coronavirus". Is it true? Bottom line: This is another case of the “two wrongs” fallacy. Since very few laws regulated slaveholders’ treatment of enslaved people, there would be no guarantee that the next place the enslaved person landed would be equally comfortable—and the enslaved had limited opportunity, short of running away or resisting, to control the situation. waves, some scientists say—they adapted to. You can cancel anytime. Above all, indentured servitude wasn’t hereditary. Slavery was at the foundation of economic and social relations, and slave-ownership was aspirational—a symbol of wealth and prosperity. It turns out that Young and the organisation that held the conference where he made his claims have a history of spreading unfounded conspiracy theories. The Big Pharma conspiracy theory is a group of conspiracy theories that claim that the medical community in general and pharmaceutical companies in particular, especially large corporations, operate for sinister purposes and against the public good, and that they allegedly conceal effective treatments, or even cause and worsen a wide range of diseases. And when it was threatened, those whites—whether they owned slaves or not—took up arms to defend their “way of life.”. But, as historian Ira Berlin writes, the slave South was a slave society, not just a society with slaves. He didn't mention Mr Gates by name but in the US, Roger Stone, a former adviser to Donald Trump, said Bill Gates and others were using the virus for "microchipping people so we can tell 'whether you've been tested'.". The cybersecurity company CrowdStrike, which has been at the center of false conspiracy theories since 2016, is once again in focus after a White House transcript published on … : Here is a case where rhetorical precision is key. .css-1xgx53b-Link{font-family:ReithSans,Helvetica,Arial,freesans,sans-serif;font-weight:700;-webkit-text-decoration:none;text-decoration:none;color:#FFFFFF;}.css-1xgx53b-Link:hover,.css-1xgx53b-Link:focus{-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline;}Read about our approach to external linking. Believers of the oft-debunked Pizzagate theory falsely alleged that Hillary Clinton, then the Democratic presidential nominee, and her aides were involved with a child-sex-trafficking ring at a pizza restaurant in Washington called Comet Ping Pong. Even if an enslaved person in the United States landed in a relatively “good” position—owned by a slaveholder who was inclined to feed workers well and be lenient in punishment—he was always subject to sale, which could happen because of death, debt, arguments in the family, or whim. Whites who couldn’t afford slaves wanted them in the same way that, today, most Americans want to own a home. Bottom line: Often, this line comes from Southern defenders, who want to emphasize Northern complicity. Find out more. At least they were given food and a place to stay.”. By most measures, this isn’t “small”—it’s roughly the same percentage of Americans who, today, hold a college degree. To elide this is to diminish the realities of chattel slavery, which—perhaps—is one reason the most vocal purveyors of the myth are neo-Confederate and white supremacist groups. Up and until Kenya was formed in 1963, it was known as the “British East Africa Protectorate”. If you … This is an important point. But even involuntary laborers had more autonomy than enslaved Africans, and the large majority of Irish indentured servants came here voluntarily. Conspiracy theory connects 5G to Covid-19. .css-14iz86j-BoldText{font-weight:bold;}Speculation about a future coronavirus vaccine is ramping up and social-media posts from anti-vaccination campaigners are gaining more traction online. In pictures: Defiant Russians rally for opposition, The homeless addict who became a history professor, The man who invited the world over for dinner. It’s no coincidence, for instance, that New York City was among the most pro-Southern cities in the North during the Civil War; slavery was key to its economic success. Advertising. A small number of black soldiers were trained, but there’s no evidence they saw action. “Only a small percentage of Southerners owned slaves.”, “The vast majority of soldiers in the Confederate Army were simple men of meager income,” rather than wealthy slaveholders, writes the anonymous author of a widely-circulated Confederate History “fact sheet.”. The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation says: "The reference to 'digital certificates' relates to efforts to create an open-source digital platform with the goal of expanding access to safe, home-based testing.". Dec. 21, 2012, wasn't the end of the world, and here's why. It has not been rolled out yet, would not allow people to be tracked and personal information would not be entered into a database, says Ana Jaklenec, a scientist involved in the study. “Black people enslaved each other in Africa, and black people worked with slave traders, so …”, In a piece published in Vice magazine in 2005 (and still available on the Vice website), comedian Jim Goad offers a series of “feel better about your history, white kids” arguments. The term “white slaves” emerged in the 17th and 18th centuries, first as a derogatory term for Irish laborers—equating their social position to that of slaves—later as political rhetoric in Ireland itself, and later still as Southern pro-slavery propaganda against an industrialized North. Hogan cites several writers—Sean O’Callaghan in To Hell or Barbados and Don Jordan and Michael Walsh in White Cargo: The Forgotten History of Britain’s White Slaves in America—who exaggerate poor treatment of Irish indentured servants and intentionally conflate their status with African slaves. There were a large number of Irish indentured servants, and there were cases in which Irish men and women were sentenced to indentured servitude in the “new world” and forcibly shipped across the Atlantic. He said: "We don't have any significant evidence or study to quote that these have any efficacy against Covid-19. While working on our Slate Academy podcast, The History of American Slavery, we encountered many types of slavery denial—frequently disguised as historical correctives and advanced by those who want to change (or end) conversation about the deep impact of slavery on American history. How the pandemic has changed the world economy, The paper that helped the homeless. “The day you make a soldier of them is the beginning of the end of the Revolution. Video. The children of servants were free; the children of slaves were property. The most common theory about Bigfoot is that he is some kind of undiscovered species of primate, ape-like but more intelligent and more evolved than any we currently know of. The South’s production of cotton drove industrialization and fueled a massive commodities market that transformed the world. : It was undeniably hard to be a factory worker in the 19th century. Absolutely: As enslaved people, countless black Americans cooked, cleaned, and worked for Confederate regiments and their officers. All rights reserved. Bottom line: Why should this matter? @Jon_theSage - Actually my ancestors were Irish slaves here. .css-1hlxxic-PromoLink:link{color:inherit;}.css-1hlxxic-PromoLink:visited{color:#696969;}.css-1hlxxic-PromoLink:link,.css-1hlxxic-PromoLink:visited{-webkit-text-decoration:none;text-decoration:none;}.css-1hlxxic-PromoLink:link:hover,.css-1hlxxic-PromoLink:visited:hover,.css-1hlxxic-PromoLink:link:focus,.css-1hlxxic-PromoLink:visited:focus{color:#B80000;-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline;}.css-1hlxxic-PromoLink:link::after,.css-1hlxxic-PromoLink:visited::after{content:'';position:absolute;top:0;right:0;bottom:0;left:0;z-index:2;}Eleven pulled out alive in China mine rescue. : There’s no question that this is true. By Jack Goodman and Flora Carmichael BBC Reality Check The theory is that if enough people are naturally exposed to the virus, the population could build up enough immunity to resist continued spread among the "herd" of people. 2010. If so few Southerners owned slaves, goes the argument, then the war had to be about something else (namely, the sanctity of states’ rights). This is a classic “two wrongs make a right” ethical proposition. Read about our approach to external linking. “Our new government is founded upon … the great truth that the negro is not equal to the white man; that slavery subordination to the superior race is his natural and normal condition,” said Confederate vice president Alexander Stephens in his “Cornerstone Speech.” “This, our new government, is the first, in the history of the world, based upon this great physical, philosophical, and moral truth.”. “[European] slave-ship captains wanted to deal with ruling groups and strong leaders, people who could command labor resources and deliver the ‘goods,’ ” Rediker writes, and European money and technology further empowered those who were already dominant, encouraging them to enslave greater numbers. More recently, Hogan notes, several sources have conflated indentured servitude with chattel slavery in order to argue for a particular Irish disadvantage in the Americas, when compared to other white immigrant groups. Nor does it change the fact that this institution left a profound legacy for the descendants of enslaved Africans, who even after emancipation were subject to almost a century of violence, disenfranchisement, and pervasive oppression, with social, economic, and cultural effects that persist to the present. Bottom line: Even if many Irish immigrants faced discrimination and hard lives on these shores, it doesn’t change the fact that American slavery—hereditary and race-based—was a massive institution that shaped and defined the political economy of colonial America, and later, the United States. Naturally, this meant that slavery was vital to Northern financial and industrial interests. And even this measure was divisive: Opponents attacked it as a betrayal of the Confederacy’s aim and purpose. Both MTN and Vodacom have also debunked the theories. Is it true? Typically, this fact is used to suggest that the Civil War was not about slavery. Long watch: Is this Russian cult leader a fraud? He made no mention of microchips. Coronavirus vaccine: When will we have one? We could compare levels of mistreatment of Northern factory workers and Southern enslaved laborers and find that each group lived with hunger and injury; both findings are dismaying. 3. Tribal chieftains often sold their defeated foes to white slave-traders.”. But European demand changed the shape of this market, strengthening enslavers and ensuring that more and more people would be carried away. Servants could even petition for early release due to mistreatment, and colonial lawmakers established different, often lesser, punishments for disobedient servants compared to disobedient slaves. Video, Vaccinated people may spread Covid, warns Van-Tam, A man who invited the world over for dinner, Star Wars supports host Arielle after racist abuse, Minister who promoted 'Covid syrup' tests positive, PM talks to Biden in first call since inauguration, many different false rumours about vaccines. is just one; … A conspiracy theory linking 5G mobile telecommunications masts to the spread of the coronavirus is baseless and fake, South Africa's telecom regulator said … Both the social structures and infrastructure that enabled African systems of enslavement were strengthened by the transatlantic slave trade. Skin color. Slate relies on advertising to support our journalism. Did blacks serve in the Confederacy? But they didn’t fight; there’s no evidence that black Americans—enslaved or free—fought Union soldiers under Confederate banners. There is no evidence whatsoever to support his theory that the pandemic is a hoax. These brave men fought in the trenches beside their White brothers, all under the Confederate Battle Flag,” reads a statement from the South Carolina chapter of the Sons of Confederate Veterans. The ship Desire brought a cargo of Africans from Barbados to Boston in 1634; these people were sold as slaves. : The image in the meme above isn’t of Anthony Johnson. The two mobile network operators began rolling out 5G across the country last year and aim to accelerate the roll-out once spectrum has been auctioned by the end of March 31. In fact there is no known cure for coronavirus. From the origins of the virus to how it transmits, an Australian health security expert and an immunology professor address some of the conspiracy theories and myths being shared about COVID-19. As the writer Saladin Ahmed pointed out, the concept of "alpha male" wolves that assert dominance over their pack through aggression comes from a debunked model of lupine social groups. Battling the 'homosexual agenda,' the hard-line religious right has made a series of incendiary claims. We've found no evidence to support these claims. Those who survived their terms received their freedom. However, the technology is not a microchip and is more like an invisible tattoo. We move forward...not backward. Rudy Giuliani’s New Theory on Debunked Georgia Video: They Were Handing Out Dope Rachel Olding 12/10/2020. Several experts told me the theory that the virus was meant to be a bioweapon doesn’t make sense, either. new environments in many ways. 10 Anti-Gay Myths Debunked . That phrase—“one of”—is crucial. Anthony Johnson, the black ex–indentured servant whose bio opened the first episode of our podcast, did sue to hold John Casor for life in 1653, and the resulting civil court decision remanding Casor to Johnson’s ownership was (as historian R. Halliburton Jr. writes) “one of the first known legal sanctions of slavery” in the colonies. The claim in the tweet, which has had more than 45,000 retweets and likes, is false and misrepresents Gates' words. Eleven pulled out alive in China mine rescue, Long watch: Is this Russian cult leader a fraud? The narrator of the clip is Stefano Montanari, an Italian researcher with a degree in pharmacology, who claims the end goal is to get everyone vaccinated. A Facebook meme announcing a "wonder drug to battle corona" and a "cow-dung vaccine" has been shared widely on Facebook in India.