Big Lie Research Articles

Conspiracy Theories and the Manufacture of Dissent: QAnon, the ‘Big Lie’, Covid-19, and the Rise of Rightwing Propaganda

This paper examines the impact of partisanship, rightwing media, and social media on attitudes about contemporary conspiracy theories. Mainstream scholarly views that ‘both sides’ of the political aisle indulge routinely in such theories are challenged. I adopt a Gramscian hegemonic framework that examines rising rightwing conspiracy theories as a manifestation of mass false consciousness in service of a political-economic system that serves upper-class interests. Issues examined include the QAnon movement, ‘big lie’ voter fraud conspiracism, and Covid-19 conspiracy theories, and the way they related to partisanship, rightwing media, and social media. I provide evidence that Republican partisanship, rightwing media consumption, and social media consumption are all significant statistical predictors of acceptance of modern conspiracy theories.

Lawyers and the Theory of the 'Big Lie'

Lawyers and the Theory of the 'Big Lie'

The Political Branding of the Big Lie

The Political Branding of the Big Lie

Rebels in the Making: The Secession Crisis and the Birth of the Confederacy

In Rebels in the Making: The Secession Crisis and the Birth of the Confederacy, William L. Barney reveals that southern separatists, namely young Breckinridge-aligned planters, succeeded in seceding by propagating “utopian visions” and conspiracy theories that amounted to a nineteenth-century Big Lie, writes reviewer Daniel W. Crofts. In sum, “Barney contributes to the twin causes of racial justice and historical truth,” Crofts concludes.

The Attack on the US Capitol: An American Kristallnacht

Abstract The attack on the US Capitol on 6 January 2021 was the first such attack on the US Congress since the British-American War of 1812. It was also the event leading to the highest number of injured first responders from any single event in the US since 9/11. What led to it? To respond this question, this article places this event within the broader crisis of Western democracies and the rise of populism that has been its hallmark. It explains the attack on the Capitol as a result of the “Big Lie”, that is, the assertion that the November 3, 2020, presidential elction was stolen from Donald Trump. The remarkable resonance this unfounded claim has found among the US population, in turn, can be traced back to the huge division by race, class and geography currently affecting the United States, a division that makes for a highly polarized polity.

Disrupting the Big Lie: Higher Education and Whitelash in a Post/Colorblind Era

James Baldwin (1998) described whiteness as “the big lie” of American society where the belief in the inherent superiority of white people allowed for, emboldened, and facilitated violence against People of Color. In the post-Civil Rights era, scholars reframed whiteness as an invisible, hegemonic social norm, and a great deal of education scholarship continues to be rooted in this metaphor of invisibility. However, Leonardo (2020) theorized that in a post-45 era of “whitelash” (Embrick et al., 2020), “post-colorblindness” is more accurate to describe contemporary racial stratification whereby whiteness is both (a) more visible and (b) increasingly appealing to perceived injuries of “reverse racism.” From this perspective, we offer three theoretical concepts to guide the future of whiteness in education scholarship. Specifically, we argue that scholars critically studying whiteness in education must explicitly: (1) address the historicity of whiteness, (2) analyze the public embrace of whiteness, and (3) emphasize the material consequences of whiteness on the lives of People of Color. By doing this, we argue that critical scholars of race in higher education will more clearly understand the changing nature of whiteness while avoiding the analytical trap of invisibility that is decreasingly relevant.

Medicine’s ‘Big Lie’

While today “The Big Lie” mainly refers to the actions of the prior President, an older and bigger lie that has a real effect on every American is one perpetrated by our very own health care conglomerate.

Contributors

Contributors

Debunking the “Big Lie”: Election Administration in the 2020 Presidential Election

AbstractThe democratic process in the United States was sorely tested in the aftermath of the 2020 presidential election. Our electoral institutions survived that test, but the fragility of our democracy was exposed by a concerted effort to overturn the results of the presidential election, first in the courts and then with an insurrection at the nation's Capitol on January 6, 2021. We examine how this happened. Specifically, we will attempt to answer the following questions: How did the big lie evolve and what were its claims? How did the COVID pandemic and foreign interference complicate the voting process and contribute to the claims of fraud? How did the courts adjudicate the claims of fraud? Finally, how do we restore trust in the voting process?

Donald Trump's Big Lie and the Future of the Republican Party

AbstractDonald Trump’s bid to nullify Joseph Biden’s victory in the 2020 presidential election was a grotesque assault on American democracy that ultimately provoked an invasion of the Capitol by a right‐wing mob trying to derail certification of Biden’s victory. Although most Americans were appalled by his actions, Trump retained the support of nearly three quarters of ordinary Republicans, most subscribing to this big lie of a stolen election. This poses dilemma for Republican leaders hoping to hold Trump’s base without narrowing their party’s appeal to the broader electorate. This article investigates the parameters of their dilemma by examining how the public in general and Republican voters in particular have responded to Trump’s attempt to steal the election from Biden and what these reactions imply for the party’s future.

Identifying and Minimizing the Risk of Election Subversion and Stolen Elections in the Contemporary United States

The United States faces a serious risk that the 2024 presidential election, and other future U.S. elections, will not be conducted fairly, and that the candidates taking office will not reflect the free choices made by eligible voters under previously announced election rules. The potential mechanisms by which election losers may be declared election winners are: usurpation of voter choices for President by state legislatures purporting to exercise constitutional authority to do so, possibly blessed by a partisan-divided Supreme Court and acquiesced to by Republicans in Congress; fraudulent or suppressive election administration or vote counting by law- or norm-breaking election officials; and violent or disruptive private action that prevents voting, interferes with the counting of votes, or interrupts the assumption of power by the actual winning candidate. Until recently, it would have been absurd to raise the possibility of such election subversion or a stolen election in the United States. Few cases have emerged in at least the last 50 years in the United States of actual election subversion by election officials, leading to an election loser being declared the election winner, despite other unique pathologies of American election administration. Ironically, the conduct of former President Donald J. Trump in repeatedly and falsely claiming that the 2020 election was stolen has markedly raised the potential for an actual stolen election in the United States. Millions of Trump’s Republican supporters now believe the false claim of a stolen election, and some Republican elected officials have pursued bogus sham “audits” and taken other steps that undermine voter confidence in the fairness of the election process. Threats of violence and intimidation have led to unprecedented attrition among election administrators, and some exiting officials are being replaced by those who may not have allegiance to the integrity of the election system. Those Republican election officials who stood up to Trump in 2020 and saved the United States from a potential constitutional and political crisis have been censured, stripped of power, and challenged for office by those embracing the “Big Lie.” Together, these actions serve both to delegitimate the election of Democrats including President Joe Biden in 2020 and to open the door to election manipulation in future elections. Elected officials, election officials, and others believing or purporting to believe the false claim that the 2020 presidential election was stolen may seek to justify subverting future election results in response to earlier purported fraud. The solutions to these problems are both legal and political. Legal changes should include: (1) paper ballot, chain-of-custody, and transparency requirements, including risk-limiting audits of election results; (2) rules limiting the discretion of those who certify the votes, including Congress through reform of the Electoral Count Act; (3) rules limiting the over-politicization of election administration, especially by state legislatures; (4) increased criminal penalties imposed on those who tamper with federal elections or commit violence or intimidation of voters, elected officials, or elected candidates; and (5) rules countering disinformation about elections, particularly disinformation about when, where, and how people vote. In addition, it will be necessary to organize for political action to reenforce rule-of-law norms in elections. This means advocating for laws that deter election subversion and against laws making stolen elections easier; politically opposing would-be election administrators who embrace false claims about stolen elections; and preparing for mass, peaceful protests in the event of attempts to subvert fair election outcomes. Part I of this Essay describes the path to this unexpected moment of democratic peril in the United States. Part II explains the three potential mechanisms by which American elections may be subverted in the future. Part III recommends steps that can and should be taken to minimize this risk. Preserving and protecting American democracy from the risk of election subversion should be at the top of everyone’s agenda. The time to act is now, before American democracy disappears.

Big and Small Lies

Big and Small Lies

Regeneration Through Violence? The American Family in Ray Donovan and Big Little Lies

<p>Celem pracy jest zbadanie, jak mitologiczny motyw odrodzenia przez przemoc, który Richard Slotkin opisał jako „metaforę nadająca strukturę amerykańskiemu doświadczeniu”, jest wykorzystywany we współczesnej amerykańskiej kulturze popularnej. Artykuł przedstawia obrazy rodziny w dwóch amerykańskich serialach telewizyjnych: serialu kryminalnym Ray Donovan (2013–2018, Showtime) i miniserialu Wielkie kłamstewka (Big Little Lies, HBO, 2017). Analiza narracji w omawianych tekstach filmowych pokazuje, że oba twórczo wykorzystują motyw odrodzenia przez przemoc. Chociaż narracje te osadzone są w różnych założeniach ideologicznych i reprezentują inne gatunki telewizyjne, w obydwu najważniejszy temat to przemoc jako główna przyczyna kryzysów w rodzinie. Przedstawienie rodziny w serialu Ray Donovan zbudowane jest w obrębie paternalistycznego, neokonserwatywnego dyskursu. Obraz ten opowiada o losach bohatera, który skutecznie zajmuje się wybawianiem z kłopotów przedstawicieli bogatej i niemoralnej elity Los Angeles, ale który nie radzi sobie z rozwiązywaniem problemów swojej dysfunkcjonalnej rodziny. Wielkie kłamstewka to historia pięciu kobiet z północnej Kalifornii należących do ostentacyjnie liberalnej i postępowej elity społecznej. Każda z nich musi się jednak zmierzyć z poważnymi problemami rodzinnymi. Niniejsze badanie dowodzi, że choć narracje w obydwu serialach podporządkowane zostały tematowi odrodzenia przez przemoc, to ich wymowa znacznie się różni. Ray Donovan konsekwentnie pokazuje, jak bezowocne i nieskuteczne jest uciekanie się do przemocy w próbach uratowania rodziny. Narracja w Wielkich kłamstewkach, chociaż osadzona w progresywnym i liberalnym dyskursie, zdaje się wskazywać, że przemoc, jako kara za zło, może prowadzić do katharsis i odrodzenia.</p>

Punishment Motives for Small and Big Lies

Corporate fraud typically involves deceptive financial statements that are harmful for some stakeholders. We analyze how preferences for honesty and economic fairness shape the punishment of such untruthful statements. Our laboratory experiment disentangles the crucial confound that, for deceptive financial statements, larger deviations from the truth imply both a stronger violation of the honesty norm and an increase in economic harm. Our study measures how people punish increased dishonesty controlling for the corresponding economic harm. We find that punishment increases with the size of the lie. This behavioral pattern is driven by people who are honest themselves. Our results suggest that popular demand for punitive measures in case of financial scandals reflects a genuine interest in the enforcement of social norms.

Big Lie. Little Lie., and: Nowhere: A Study, and: At the Seaside Cemetery in Blue Hill, Maine, and: The Last Happy Hour

Big Lie. Little Lie., and: Nowhere: A Study, and: At the Seaside Cemetery in Blue Hill, Maine, and: The Last Happy Hour Daniel Anderson (bio) Big Lie. Little Lie All summer long, outside Duke’s Pony Keg, at the chili parlor and mall, I listened, half in envy, half in awe, each time a kid came back from Hayseed, Indiana, or the beach, New Hampshire or some faraway lake in Podunk, Arkansas. All hot Ohio summer long at Putt-Putt Kingdom and the zoo, and in the mildewed, humid locker room at our public pool, I heard about farm girls and college girls, the easy, the insatiable, and the fast. All boring, hot Ohio summer long, I never doubted—not once— things I couldn’t contradict myself about redheads and brunettes, or the proven scientific facts about green eyes and hazel eyes, gymnasts and ballerinas. Or what Jack Barton told us once at Dairy Queen. Shit, ladies, listen up!I’ve done it with a housewife. In her car. It was a Cadillac. Goddamn, one of us said. Jack was two years ahead of us in school. Goddamn! Sometimes I can still smell the heavy, sweet, almost vanilla air of fresh-cut Cincinnati grass. I can still see the blue-green evening cast [End Page 55] the moment I, before I even knew I was about to lie, had lied. In West Virginia. At my cousin’s house. This older girl. You wouldn’t know her. I can still hear that ratchet-ratchet song of katydids and the insistent spank and rubber echo of the basketball. Goddamn! Even if they didn’t believe me, they let me live that lie. But it was five years later, actually, in March of 1983. By then two of those friends had moved. By then the third had died. I was skinny and a little shy with lots of feathered, soft brown hair. Rain rattled on the corrugated roof of her stepfather’s cabin in the woods. Candles in old wine jugs. Candles in jelly jars and ashtrays blown from amber glass and green glass. Candles fragrant with cinnamon and pine. The whole room bloomed. A dusty sofa. The shotgun on the wall. Bookcases and a hi-fi stereo. Our faces and our naked bodies bloomed in nervous, pale gold candlelight. Why lie? Whatever happened then was brief. A sudden shudder into bliss. Then gratitude. Then something close to guilt. Sometimes, I can still see her blonde hair rinsing down on me. She wore a slim, delicate chain that fell in silver twists and wrinkles like the rain. Why lie? Whatever happened then was nothing like it should have been. Whatever really is? I haven’t told this to a soul, and even now, in telling you, I’m not sure what I make of it. [End Page 56] But something has troubled me for years. Our whole time in that candle-driven light she had an almost angry look, some inward rage or bothered kind of fire. It flashed across her face. For just a little while that night it darkened Paradise, and glittered in her blue unblinking eyes. [End Page 57] Nowhere: A Study If anywhere is nowhere then this is truly it, a Texaco in Kansas where interstate and county road have crossed. A metal fan blows lukewarm air against the sun-toasted face of Gus whose desk looks out on fields of platinum and tasseled wheat. Out in the garage the grease-gun pops and sighs. A fumbled monkey wrench smacks on the concrete floor. You pissant son-of-a-bitch! And then another falls. Gus rolls his Holstein eyes. The office smells of burned coffee, rubber, and old coins. How long has it been, how many presidents since anything in here was new? The once-white phone on the wall, a Coke machine and water cooler, Gus’s Daily Telegram, everything seems thumbed and blessed with smears of motor-oil blue, that same deep thunder-colored hue gathering over grain crops in the west [End Page 58] where savage lightning maps the charcoal and unstable atmosphere. A man on Gus’s radio says the inner-city poor aren’t...

The Big Lie by Julie Mayhew

The Big Lie by Julie Mayhew

Big Governments, Big Lies

Big Governments, Big Lies

The Big Lie of Strategic Planning

The Big Lie of Strategic Planning

Protecting their paymasters

Three fundamental questions arise from this excellent paper 1: how independent is independent; who should be responsible for providing health information about harmful products to the community; and is there any role for organizations such as Drinkaware and Drinkwise beyond promoting the interests of the alcohol industry? First, independence. Both Drinkaware and Drinkwise proclaim repeatedly that they are ‘independent’ 2, 3; but both organizations were established and are funded by the alcohol industry. Their Boards include substantial alcohol company membership. They support approaches that cause the alcohol industry no discomfort, and appear to avoid positions or policies that research has shown over the years might harm the industry's sales or interests—no support, for example, for the kind of action on tax recommended by health authorities, curbs on alcohol advertising and promotion, effective health warnings, strong, hard-hitting public education or measures that significantly reduce access. They imply medical support, naming a few doctors and researchers who are willing to participate in their committees. Drinkwise refers to committee members as ‘community representatives’ 4, although these are simply individuals chosen through methods that are opaque (an issue common to both organizations in relation to committee membership), usually in receipt of substantial fees, and representing nobody other than themselves. These organizations are not independent. Their repeated claims of ‘independence’ fit well with the principles of the ‘Big Lie'—‘when one lies, one should lie big, and stick to it’ 5. Second, responsibility for providing health information about harmful products. Alcohol and tobacco companies (like their junk food counterparts) increasingly seek to present themselves—both directly and through funded organizations—as objective providers of health information about their products, and appropriate sources of educational resources for both adults and children. Tobacco has a long history of lying about health, and yet again has recently been stepping up its efforts to play a role in health information, education and policy. Alcohol companies develop, produce and promote products for the youth market; junk food companies are even more overt about targeting children; and all three industries are closely linked. They all want to be seen as reliable sources of health information through their own websites, materials and programmes and industry organizations such as Drinkaware (‘Our aim is to be a leading provider of information and education on alcohol for consumers, parents, professionals and other stakeholders’; ‘We've got the answers’) 2; and Drinkwise (‘Get the Facts—Drinkwise.com.au’) 3. The education programmes run by these groups are clearly intended to pre-empt the kind of hard-hitting campaigns that have worked so well in tobacco as part of a comprehensive approach—especially in the absence of tobacco promotion. The last people who should be given any responsibility for education on alcohol or tobacco are the very companies that spend billions of dollars marketing their products to potential consumers of all ages and seeking to avoid any curbs on their promotional activities. Governments that support such exercises know perfectly well that they are conniving in a pretence. Health information and messages should come from health authorities, not the 21st century's most successful drug peddlers. Third, the role of Drinkaware and Drinkwise. Nobody—governments, health authorities, consumers—should have any doubt that these organizations exist solely to serve the interests of their alcohol industry funders. Far from being ‘evidence-based’ 3, they avoid involvement in key policy areas where the evidence shows that action would reduce alcohol harms. Their role is to protect their paymasters through ineffective programmes, involvement in policy discussions and distraction from measures that work. They are a sham, with as much claim to independence or credibility as the ‘Coca Cola Company Beverage Institute for Health and Wellness’ 6. Anyone involved with them should bear in mind that they are supporting an alcohol industry promotional programme, and both directly and indirectly helping to prevent the implementation of effective, evidence-based policy. None.

Contemporary Psychiatry and the Big Lie of Postmodernism

Contemporary Psychiatry and the Big Lie of Postmodernism