Editorial Director of Conspiracy Watch, Rudy Reichstadt has published widely on conspiracy theories and online hate speech, including “Extending the domain of denial: conspiracism and negationism”. He is the author of two non-fiction books (in French), “L’Opium des imbéciles” (2019) and “Au cœur du complot” (2023). A regular contributor to the French newspaper Franc-Tireur, Rudy also co-hosts “Complorama”, a bi-monthly podcast on public radio France Info. He founded Conspiracy Watch (see the French edition here) in 2007.
‘Pogrom’, ‘raid’, ‘terrorist attack’: regardless of the name eventually agreed upon, the massacres of civilians perpetrated by Hamas and its allies in Israeli territory on October 7, 2023, will remain a significant event in the history of anti-Jewish violence. As American historian Deborah Lipstadt pointed out, it constitutes “the most lethal assault against Jews since […]
Rarely have conspiracy theories and their dangers been so much in the spotlight. From the “stolen election” (coming from Donald Trump and his insurrectionist acolytes who stormed the US Capitol on January 6, 2021), vaccines and COVID-19, QAnon and flat earth theories, to invented claims that prominent women are really men, wild assertions about eclipses, […]
It is one of the most sinister and enigmatic true crime stories of the early 21st century, featured in the Netflix series Unsolved Mysteries. The Dupont de Ligonnès affair began on April 21, 2011, when police discovered the decomposing bodies of five people buried under the terrace of a house in Nantes, a city in […]
A unique product "100 per cent Made in France" has gone global. Except there is no cause for celebration in Paris. The successful export is a vile slander, catapulted across social media by an international extreme right cabal that spans the Atlantic and specializes in French-bashing. Picking up on the repugnant falsehood accusing Brigitte Macron, […]
As the dust settles in the aftermath of devastating terror attacks, one would naturally expect a nation to come together in grief, unite against extremism, and seek justice for the victims. However, a disconcerting trend has emerged in recent years: the proliferation of conspiracy theories that threaten not only the truth but also national security. […]
“In June 1942, a German officer walks up to a young man and says, “Excuse me, sir, where is the Place de l’Étoile?” The young man points to the left side of his chest. (Jewish history.)” Patrick Modiano, La place de l’étoile, Gallimard, 1968 Meditating on the unfathomable nature of the Holocaust, the historian Alain […]
