Boulder Councilwoman Shared Video Claiming That 5G Is An ‘Extinction Level Event’

from the post-truth dept

Editor’s Note: After publication, we were alerted the that key story about the councilwoman, was actually from a few years ago, not recently. We regret the mistake and will make efforts to avoid such mistakes in the future. We’re leaving the original article below.

On the one hand, you have a wireless industry falsely claiming that 5G is a near mystical revolution in communications, something that’s never been true (especially in the US). On the other hand you have oodles of internet crackpots who think 5G is causing COVID or killing people, something that has also never been true. In reality, most claims of 5G health harms are based on a false 20 year old graph, and an overwhelming majority of scientists have made it clear that 5G is not killing you (in fact several incarnations are less powerful than 4G).

In the post-truth era, none of this ever seems to matter. Case in point: the city of Boulder, Colorado recently debated a 10-year lease for Verizon Wireless for a local 5G tower. During the process, numerous 5G conspiracy theorists came out of the woodwork, including, apparently, city Councilwoman Cindy Carlisle, who circulated a video with peers claiming 5G was an “extinction level event”:

“The video makes mention of “chemtrails” — a debunked conspiracy theory regarding the condensation trails left behind by aircraft — and was published by New Earth Nation, “a fellowship of sovereign nations and micro-nations founded in recognition of the primacy of consciousness, the unity of all life and the undeniability of the individual sovereign condition.”

Carlisle later claimed in an interview she sent the video to colleagues as a “tongue-in-cheek” and “ironic question.” Though she then proceeded to admit she didn’t know if the video (which also references “chemtrails”) was conspiracy theory or not. Random Americans are one thing, but that politicians increasingly don’t know what’s true and what isn’t — seems like kind of a problem.

Still, Carlisle at least did the right (and rare) thing in asking questions about Verizon’s request for tower placement, even if they were probably the wrong questions.

Debates like this over 5G tower placement are taking place all over the country without much fanfare. They’re usually dominated by two discourses: one the conspiratorial, and two, telecom giants that don’t want local towns and cities having much say in where towers are placed, whether towns and cities will get a cut of the proceeds if they’re on public land, or much of anything else.

The debates are too boring to usually make headlines, but they are fairly representative of how in modern U.S. policy and discourse, the one-two punch of corruption and conspiracy theory often leaves fundamental citizen welfare and basic factual reality far outside of the loop.

Filed Under: 5g, cellular, cindy carlisle, conspiracy theory, florida, wireless