Opinion: I created the FunVax conspiracy theory. Now I’m trying to kill it
In 2011, I created a story called FunVax.
To be more accurate, it was a collaboration between me and a successful Silicon Valley entrepreneur. And rather than a simple story, it was an idea for a mockumentary.
In 2004, a scientist named Dean Hamer discovered a gene that predisposes people to become more religious. Hamer called his discovery the “God Gene.” The scientific name for the God Gene is VMAT2. You know those little molecules in your brain that make you happy? Dopamine and serotonin? Well, VMAT2 is responsible for packaging those little molecules and delivering them to synapses in your brain.
This real-life discovery was the basis for my film.
The premise of my story was that if a gene can control one’s religiosity, then that gene can be manipulated and turned on and off at will. In the film, the government uses this idea to create a vaccine to “cure” religious fundamentalism, which would help gain an edge in Iraq and Afghanistan. No Islamic extremists, no jihad, no war.
As part of the filmmaking process, I released a fictional video on YouTube showing a scientist pitching the FunVax proposal to a small audience at the Pentagon. In the film itself, I then dissected this YouTube video and proved that it had been doctored. At movie’s end, the lead character, Joey Lambardi, admits to making up the FunVax conspiracy.
Unfortunately, nobody ever saw the film’s conclusion, because it was never released.
After seven test screenings and ambivalent responses from dozens of film festivals in 2013 and 2014, I came to the conclusion that the film was nonviable. After three long and hard years of working on the film, I had to move on to something else. My short-lived film career had ended.
FunVax, however, lived on.
Releasing the FunVax YouTube video laid the seeds to what would become a full-blown conspiracy theory — one that continues to spread across the internet.
Just as the FunVax conspiracy began to wane, it reemerged last year as COVID-19 spread across the globe. Millions of people shared my original FunVax YouTube video, with added commentary implying that COVID was actually FunVax.
I should have come out then and stated the obvious: FunVax is fake. But so many websites and news agencies nailed the truth about FunVax, even mentioning me by name and describing the film project, that I didn’t feel the need to say anything. I somewhat naively assumed that the worst that could come from COVID being confused with FunVax was that it would encourage religious people wear to masks and use more caution when interacting with other people.
I was wrong.
Early in the pandemic, someone created a new conspiracy from my YouTube video and spread the false narrative that it was Bill Gates who gave the FunVax lecture to the Pentagon. In reality, the person in that video was my Silicon Valley entrepreneur friend. Although there are similarities in the way they look, it seemed pretty obvious to me that they are different people. So, again, I didn’t say anything.
But now that COVID vaccines are widely available, anti-vaxxers and other conspiracy theorists are using FunVax as propaganda against vaccination. Social media is ablaze with FunVax misinformation, and this time it is having deadly consequences. I can’t be quiet any longer. So I’m saying it:
FunVax is fake.
Here’s the thing: I don’t think the people who believe in FunVax will care what I have to say. They’ll come up with thousands of reasons to discount my confession.
Maybe I am paid by Bill Gates. Maybe I’m a government plant. Maybe I am part of big media, manipulating them. It’s like arguing over the validity of Christianity, Islam or Mormonism. People who believe will continue believing. Conspiracy theories are a matter of faith.
We can talk about cognitive dissonance until we want to shove pencils in each other’s eyes, but I would like to suggest that there is something deeper at play.
As I watched the spread of FunVax over the years, I noticed an interesting phenomena unfold; religious people tend to promote FunVax more than others. This makes sense considering that the idea of FunVax represents an attack on their core beliefs. But many of these same people also believe in the wholly secular QAnon conspiracy.
Religious organizations themselves have identified associations between their own practitioners and a belief in conspiracy theories. The author of a 2020 Baptist News Global article titled, “Why are Christians so Susceptible to Conspiracy?” cites a American Journal of Political Science study to argue that a belief in the supernatural — and in a worldview that forces reality into black-and-white distinctions of good versus evil — predisposes people to believing in conspiracy theories. The author argues that Christianity encourages this type of thinking, and then goes on to say that the second coming of Christ actually resembles a conspiracy theory.
A recent study published in the Journal of Personality and summarized by the New York Times explains that specific personality types are more predisposed to believing in conspiracy theories than others. Personality types are, of course, influenced by our genetic makeup.
My experiences with FunVax lead me to take things one step further. Most scientists believe genetic makeup and environmental factors combine to influence human behavior. If religiosity is somehow programmed into our genetic code, through the God Gene or other personality-related genes, then after centuries of self-selection — of religious people marrying other religious people — have we bred a group of people predisposed to believe in fiction? Could this be the root cause of our inability in America to agree on basic facts?
These questions are obviously impossible to answer. But for the sake of a thought experiment, where would answers in the affirmative leave us?
It would leave us with two groups of people who will never understand the other. One group bases decisions on evidence and logic and the other group follows faith and belief. With each passing generation, those differences would widen. In 100 years, would these groups even be capable of living in the same country together?
The purpose of the FunVax project was to change people’s understanding of religion. Even though the film was never released, I think that goal was achieved. Although certainly not in the way I intended.
Unfortunately, like most conspiracy theories, FunVax offers no answers. Just more questions.
Ryan Harper created the FunVax conspiracy. You can email him at FunVax@gmail.com.
*** This article has been archived for your research. The original version from San Francisco Chronicle can be found here ***
