The Christian Science Monitor has interviewed me about my book The United States of Paranoia. Here's a snippet:
If you find your name hidden on the cover, blink three times to establish contact.Q: What do we need to have in place for a conspiracy theory to develop?

A: Conspiracy theories emerge where three things collide.

The first is our natural tendency to find patterns and create narratives, to try to turn all these stray signals we receive into some sort of coherent order.

Second is a situation that we're suspicious of and makes us fearful.

And third is the fact that there are actual cases of people conspiring. There's a reason why there's a legal offense called conspiracy. It's not like being afraid of some supernatural monster that people talk about but never shows up.
In related news:
• The Iron Mountain Daily News (no, not that Iron Mountain) has reviewed the book.
• I talked about the book on WNYC in New York yesterday. You can listen to that conversation here.
• NPR's Scott Simon recorded an interview with me about the book earlier this week. It should air on Weekend Edition tomorrow.

end quote from:

The United States of Paranoia in The Christian Science Monitor

When I was a little kid in the U.S. in the 1950s paranoia was about nuclear strikes of communists with Hydrogen bombs. As little kids they made sure we knew we could die under our desks any day at school. The girls were petrified and the boys (as usual made jokes about it) "just bend over and kiss your ass goodbye" they would say as they crawled under their desks on their knees and put their heads in their laps and covered their heads with their hands to "keep the glass breaking out of the windows from killing them during the nuclear blast".

Now I would say paranoia is caused a lot by things like wearing seat belts in cars. On the one hand the 1 time in 5000 you need them they might save your life. But the rest of the time they are only going to give people clautrophobia and make them crazier than they need to be. So now, we have more imaginary problems and are more neurotic but what is actually and really the problem? People aren't sure because they are too screwed up to know most of the time because of conditioning that hasn't been useful to them really.

So, even though people are supposed to be more culturally advanced than the 1950s, in actuality they are only now just crazy in a different way. (PS I was growing up in the 1950s).