Off the Edge
Flat Earthers, Conspiracy Culture, and Why People Will Believe Anything
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Narrated by:
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Xe Sands
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By:
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Kelly Weill
About this listen
“A deep dive into the world of Flat Earth conspiracy theorists . . . that brilliantly reveals how people fall into illogical beliefs, reject reason, destroy relationships, and connect with a broad range of conspiracy theories in the social media age. Beautiful, probing, and often empathetic . . . An insightful, human look at what fuels conspiracy theories.” —Science
Since 2015, there has been a spectacular boom in a centuries-old delusion: that the earth is flat. More and more people believe that we all live on a pancake-shaped planet, capped by a solid dome and ringed by an impossible wall of ice.
How? Why?
In Off the Edge, journalist Kelly Weill draws a direct line from today’s conspiratorial moment, brimming not just with Flat Earthers but also anti-vaxxers and QAnon followers, back to the early days of Flat Earth theory in the 1830s. We learn the natural impulses behind these beliefs: when faced with a complicated world out of our control, humans have always sought patterns to explain the inexplicable. This psychology doesn’t change. But with the dawn of the twenty-first century, something else has shifted. Powered by Facebook and YouTube algorithms, the Flat Earth movement is growing.
At once a definitive history of the movement and an essential look at its unbelievable present, Off the Edge introduces us to a cast of larger-than-life characters. We meet historical figures like the nineteenth-century grifter who first popularized the theory, as well as the many modern-day Flat Earthers Weill herself gets to know, from moms on vacation to determined creationists to neo-Nazi rappers. We discover what, and who, converts people to Flat Earth belief, and what happens inside the rabbit hole. And we even meet a man determined to fly into space in a homemade rocket-powered balloon—whose tragic death is as senseless and absurd as the theory he sets out to prove.
In this incisive and powerful story about belief, Kelly Weill explores how we arrived at this moment of polarized realities and explains what needs to happen so that we might all return to the same spinning globe.
©2022 Kelly Weill (P)2022 Algonquin BooksListeners also enjoyed...
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Critic reviews
"Veteran narrator Sands is an ideal voice for this nonfiction title. Her careful pacing favors that of natural speech, which helps the listener stay connected . . . Sands brings just enough of the author's opinions into her narration to convey the tone without going overboard, even as sometimes disturbingly outlandish claims are recounted. A pleasant and engaging presentation of a topic that will be high on the list of contemporary concerns for many library patrons." —Booklist
“A deep dive into the world of flat Earth conspiracy theorists . . . that brilliantly reveals how people fall into illogical beliefs, reject reason, destroy relationships, and connect with a broad range of conspiracy theories in the social media age. Beautiful, probing, and often empathetic . . . An insightful, human look at what fuels conspiracy theories.” —Science
"This provocative book is sure to inspire debate about conspiracy theories as well as how citizens of a fractured world can learn to overcome their fear of radical planetary change. A timely and disturbing study of flawed, dangerous thinking." —Kirkus Reviews
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Kinda interesting but incredibly repetitive
- By Lizz on 05-14-15
By: A. Brad Schwartz
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Gaslighting America
- Why We Love It When Trump Lies to Us
- By: Amanda Carpenter
- Narrated by: Kirsten Potter
- Length: 7 hrs and 30 mins
- Unabridged
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"Can you believe what Donald Trump said?" In Gaslighting America, Amanda Carpenter breaks down Trump's formula, showing why it's practically foolproof, playing his victims, the media, the Democrats, and the Republican fence-sitters perfectly. She traces how this tactic started with Nixon, gained traction with Bill Clinton, and exploded under Trump. Where some people see lies, Trump's fierce followers see something different. A commitment to winning at all costs: There is nothing he could say that would erode their support at long as it's in the name of taking down his political enemies.
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Right Winger Whines False Equivalency
- By B. D on 05-03-18
By: Amanda Carpenter
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Inside Scientology
- The Story of America's Most Secretive Religion
- By: Janet Reitman
- Narrated by: Stephen Hoye
- Length: 15 hrs and 40 mins
- Unabridged
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Scientology, created in 1954 by a prolific sci-fi writer named L. Ron Hubbard, claims to be the world's fastest-growing religion, with millions of members around the world and huge financial holdings. Its celebrity believers keep its profile high, and its teams of "volunteer ministers" offer aid at disaster sites such as Haiti and the World Trade Center. But Scientology is also a notably closed faith, harassing journalists and others through litigation and intimidation, even infiltrating the highest levels of government to further its goals.
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My cup of tea.
- By MWMcCabe on 08-09-11
By: Janet Reitman
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The People Are Going to Rise Like the Waters Upon Your Shore
- A Story of American Rage
- By: Jared Yates Sexton
- Narrated by: P. J. Ochlan
- Length: 10 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
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The People Are Going to Rise Like the Waters Upon Your Shore is a firsthand account of the events that shaped the 2016 presidential election and the cultural forces that powered Donald Trump into the White House. Featuring in-the-field reports as well as deep analysis, Sexton's book is not just the story of the most unexpected and divisive election in modern political history. It is also a sobering chronicle of our democracy's political polarization - a result of our self-constructed, technologically assisted echo chambers.
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Undercover in Trump's America
- By David Larson on 09-06-17
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Age of Ambition
- Chasing Fortune, Truth, and Faith in the New China
- By: Evan Osnos
- Narrated by: Evan Osnos, George Backman
- Length: 16 hrs and 41 mins
- Unabridged
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As the Beijing correspondent for The New Yorker, Evan Osnos was on the ground in China for years, witness to profound political, economic, and cultural upheaval. In Age of Ambition, he describes the greatest collision taking place in that country: the clash between the rise of the individual and the Communist Party’s struggle to retain control.
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Come back when you have a warrant!
- By Neuron on 11-06-15
By: Evan Osnos
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1959
- The Year Everything Changed
- By: Fred Kaplan
- Narrated by: Joe Barrett
- Length: 10 hrs and 20 mins
- Unabridged
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Acclaimed national security columnist and noted cultural critic Fred Kaplan looks past the 1960s to the year that really changed AmericaWhile conventional accounts focus on the 60s as the era of pivotal change that swept the nation, Fred Kaplan argues that it was 1959 that ushered in the wave of tremendous cultural, political, and scientific shifts that would play out in the decades that followed.
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Facinating look at a neglected moment in history
- By James on 05-25-11
By: Fred Kaplan
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Going Clear
- Scientology, Hollywood, and the Prison of Belief
- By: Lawrence Wright
- Narrated by: Morton Sellers
- Length: 17 hrs and 24 mins
- Unabridged
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A clear-sighted revelation, a deep penetration into the world of Scientology by the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The Looming Tower, the now-classic study of al-Qaeda’s 9/11 attack. Based on more than two hundred personal interviews with current and former Scientologists—both famous and less well known—and years of archival research, Lawrence Wright uses his extraordinary investigative ability to uncover for us the inner workings of the Church of Scientology.
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Shockingly Great
- By Michael on 01-27-13
By: Lawrence Wright
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Clowns to the Left of Me, Jokers to the Right
- Opinionated Columns on American Life
- By: Michael Smerconish
- Narrated by: Michael Smerconish
- Length: 13 hrs and 36 mins
- Unabridged
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Opinionated talk show host and columnist Michael Smerconish has been chronicling local, state, and national events for the Philadelphia Daily News and the Philadelphia Inquirer for more than 15 years. He has sounded off on topics as diverse as the hunt for Osama bin Laden and what the color of your Christmas lights says about you. In this collection of 100 of his most memorable columns, Smerconish reflects on American political life with his characteristic feistiness.
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All about Smerc and who cares about the victims
- By Mark J. Rosen on 12-10-20
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Troll Nation
- How The Right Became Trump-Worshipping Monsters Set On Rat-F*cking Liberals, America, and Truth Itself
- By: Amanda Marcotte, David Talbot - foreword
- Narrated by: Teri Schnaubelt
- Length: 5 hrs and 58 mins
- Unabridged
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The election of Donald Trump in 2016, like most of his campaign, came as a shock to many Americans. How could a man so lacking in capacity, so void of any intellectual heft, become the president of the United States? How could a man with no detectable personal qualities outside of resentment and the will to dominate appeal to millions of Americans, enough so that he was able to win the highest office in the land? With this book, journalist Amanda Marcotte will outline how Trump was the inevitable result of American conservatism’s degradation into an ideology of blind resentment.
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Disappointing
- By Steven Finkbeiner on 08-10-18
By: Amanda Marcotte, and others
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True or False
- A CIA Analyst's Guide to Spotting Fake News
- By: Cindy L. Otis
- Narrated by: Erin Dion
- Length: 7 hrs and 18 mins
- Unabridged
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In True or False, former CIA analyst Cindy Otis takes listeners through the history and impact of misinformation over the centuries, sharing stories from the past and insights that listeners today can gain from them. Then, she shares lessons learned in over a decade working for the CIA, including actionable tips on how to spot fake news, how to make sense of the information we receive each day, and, most importantly, how to understand and see past our own information biases so that we can think critically about important issues and put events happening around us into context.
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Disappointed
- By Jon M. Cefus on 09-27-20
By: Cindy L. Otis
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American Sketches
- Great Leaders, Creative Thinkers, and Heroes of a Hurricane
- By: Walter Isaacson
- Narrated by: Cotter Smith
- Length: 9 hrs and 26 mins
- Unabridged
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In this collection of essays, Walter Isaacson reflects on the lessons to be learned from Benjamin Franklin, Albert Einstein, Bill Gates, Henry Kissinger, Ronald Reagan and Mikhail Gorbachev, Hillary Clinton and Bill Clinton, and various other interesting characters he has chronicled as a biographer and journalist. The people he writes about have an awesome intelligence, in most cases, but that is not the secret of their success.
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Not Really Sketches
- By DAVID on 11-04-11
By: Walter Isaacson
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No Go Zones
- How Sharia Law Is Coming to a Neighborhood Near You
- By: Raheem Kassam
- Narrated by: Ruairi Carter
- Length: 8 hrs and 20 mins
- Unabridged
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No Go Zones. That's what they're called. And while the politically correct try to deny their existence, the shocking reality of these No Go Zones - where Sharia law can prevail and local police stay away - can be attested to by its many victims. Now Raheem Kassam, a courageous reporter and editor at Breitbart.com, takes us where few journalists have dared to tread - inside the No Go Zones, revealing areas that Western governments, including the United States, don't want to admit exist within their own borders.
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Wow
- By Stacie L Strader on 08-16-17
By: Raheem Kassam
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A Slobbering Love Affair
- The Torrid Romance Between Barack Obama and the Mainstream Media
- By: Bernard Goldberg
- Narrated by: Alan Sklar
- Length: 4 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
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According to Bernard Goldberg, the media crossed an important line in the 2008 presidential race, moving from their usual unthinking liberal bias to crass partisanship of the crudest kind, practically acting as spin doctors for the presidential campaign of Barack Obama. In A Slobbering Love Affair, his most provocative book yet, Goldberg demonstrates how the media launched an unparalleled effort to ensure the election of the man they regarded as the One.
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spot on!
- By Eunice on 05-28-09
By: Bernard Goldberg
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An Inconvenient Book
- Real Solutions to the World's Biggest Problems (Unabridged)
- By: Glenn Beck
- Narrated by: Glenn Beck
- Length: 6 hrs and 25 mins
- Unabridged
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The world is a mess. It seems that everywhere listeners turn, there's another problem. What is needed now are solutions. If only there was a man who could simplify things, cut through the rhetoric, and fix everything. Then, if he was just able to put all of that insight into something that people could buy...in a store and online...man, that would great. Wait a minute!
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Waste of Time and Money
- By Crystal on 04-11-09
By: Glenn Beck
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Rush Limbaugh
- An Army of One
- By: Zev Chafets
- Narrated by: Erik Synnestvedt
- Length: 8 hrs
- Unabridged
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Do you remember your first time? People tend to remember the moment they first heard The Rush Limbaugh Show on the radio. For Zev Chafets, it was in a car in Detroit, driving down Woodward Avenue. Limbaugh's braggadocio, the outrageous satire, the slaughtering of liberal sacred cows performed with the verve of a rock-n-roll DJ-it seemed fresh, funny and completely subversive.
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Enjoyed it, despite poor narration
- By David on 06-02-10
By: Zev Chafets
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The definitive book on QAnon from the reporter knows them best; Will Sommer explains what it is, how it has gained a mainstream following among Republican lawmakers and ordinary citizens, the threat it poses to democracy, and how we can reach those who have embraced the conspiracy and are disseminating its lies.
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Great story — uneven performance
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In Where Tyranny Begins, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist David Rohde investigates the strategies Trump systematically used to turn the country's two most powerful law-enforcement agencies into his personal political weapons. Rohde also reveals how, during the Biden years, Justice Department non-partisan 1970s norms that Attorney General Merrick Garland reinforced inadvertently helped Trump, and could fail to deliver a trial and legal accountability by Election Day 2024.
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What listeners say about Off the Edge
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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Coherent analysis
Narration is more slowly paced than that needed to prompt attentiveness.
Content is well organized, persuasive, and truly describes abuse and disregard for ethics and fair play.
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- Amy B LaFrenz
- 03-12-22
Interesting But Not What I Thought
The description implies the book covers different radical or conspiracy theories and the reasons how and why people fall into these ideals. It really only covers Flat Earth with little on other topics. The book covers some of the “how” but it’s surface level only.
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- Douglas
- 03-18-22
Interesting read.....
Its sad to see how so many people are duped by religion and charismatic assholes. Too bad we have 30 % of America choosing Fox news, Trumpism, & religion over basic science, logic, and reason.
It's extremely sad👎🏻
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2 people found this helpful
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- Chad
- 05-15-22
Important topic
Interesting information on the history of the flat earth movement, with developments leading up to the present day.
The author points out that unfortunately, attention from "globe earthers" has inadvertently helped to propel the flat earth movement. People will dispute it, mock it, imitate it in jest, make documentaries about it, and that will just lead to more people joining the movement. But the author points out that it's still important to discuss, to make people aware of these false beliefs and the movements behind them.
In addition to such accidental publicity, social media has really helped to propel the rise of conspiracy theories in the modern era. Social media loves attention. They need eyeballs to sell ads. And guiding people down rabbit holes of conspiracy theory videos, or encouraging them to join more and more extreme groups, is a good way to do that. Some people would spend many hours each and every day watching conspiracy videos.
Also interesting notes about how easily conspiracy theorists get tricked by con artists, despite their intense paranoia of scientists and governments.
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- BRC
- 03-20-23
compelling story told with lots of vocal fry
Really enjoyed the journalism -- a very compelling listen. The narrator gave a sensitive reading but her vocal fry grated on my nerves.
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- Brian
- 06-17-23
Very interesting book
I really enjoyed this deep dive in how people fall over the edge of conspiracy theories. Great narration and interesting points taken.
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- Mike
- 04-30-22
Embrace the Truth of a Globe
a well written and informative book of the idiotic believe in a flat Earth. it seems that instead of making the world more informative and livable . the internet has made humans worse . the power of presenting a idea with no evidence allows such things as the flat Earth theory and trump to flourish and grow . the idea of no presention of evidence is a terrible affront to the thinking human. the Arthor shows this in the great work presented here. Hopefully this will allow you or someone you know to realize they believe in such things as this flat Earth has no sense and will bring people back to the common sense of the real world.
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- mybroker
- 11-11-23
Interesting
The story was thought provoking and interesting but the extreme left perspective soured it somewhat for me. It would have been much better if it had been politically neutral.
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- Daniel
- 02-26-22
Great information on flat Earth and conspiracies
If you wanted to know about flat Earth conspiracy theorists and conspiracies in general, then this book is for you.
The author accurately captures the stories behind some of the key players behind the flat Earth. She also addresses the real dangers behind all of the conspiracies, primarily flat Earth.
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2 people found this helpful
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- William C. Cohen-Kiraly
- 06-04-23
Weill treated Flat-Earthers as real people
I grabbed this book thinking it would be a light listen, something fun listening to stories about nutjobs.
Weill surprised me. She treated the subjects empathetically, as real people, not clowns. And in the process, she explores why people fervently believe in bizarre, illogical conspiracy theories, even at the cost of family and friends and respectability.
Weill argues that these flat earth true believers, like others in QAnon, Heaven's Gate, anti-vaxxer groups and other cults, often follow similar paths. They are not necessarily stupid, crazy, mean or delusional, but they often follow similar paths. Do listen if you want to be challenged, whatever your own beliefs,. Pass on it if you only want arguments for or against flat-eartherism. This is a book about people and psychology, not theories, and is so much better for that.
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1 person found this helpful