Top 10 Most Popular Conspiracy Theories of 2022

Can Lea Michele read? What started as an inside joke between Glee fans eventually caught fire outside the Gleek community. Content creators started posting long-form videos using dubiously edited footage to add credibility to their stories. Allegedly, the Funny Girl was too busy being a successful Broadway star and never actually learned how to read. Some folks pushed back on the theory by pointing out that actors do need to read and memorize their lines. But according to the theorists, Lea was either fed her lines via an earpiece or had them read to her beforehand so that she could memorize them. When someone also pointed out that one of her published works was half-picture-book and half-journal, it didn’t immensely help Michele’s case. Lea shut down the rumors and, at one point, even felt comfortable joking about them.

In 2022, Avril Lavigne saw something of a comeback. With an album release and an engagement, she’s been in the public eye more often than usual. And yet despite this, there’s a conspiracy theory about her that rears its head in the pop culture zeitgeist every few years. And it all started with a Brazilian fan blog. While the exact year of the rumor’s origins has been placed as early as 2005, 2011 is the most accepted or at least reported year. The Avril Lavigne replacement conspiracy theory posits that the Avril we know today is actually a body double or lookalike named Melissa. That’s because the real Avril passed away in 2003 and her record label hired someone to carry on the punk-pop star’s career. If that wasn’t spooky enough, her lyrics are supposedly laden with coded messages that cry for help. Despite the original blogger stating that the claims were false in 2015, the theory gained American popularity in the mid-2010s, and Lavigne was once again asked about it in 2022.

It’s a bird! It’s a drone! Maybe it’s both? According to the Birds Aren’t Real movement, birds are government drones used to spy on US citizens. Between 1959 and 1971, the federal government killed all birds and replaced them with disguised drones. This all sounds like something straight out of a Monty Python sketch. But don’t worry: the originators of this theory and many of its supporters are actually in on the joke. While it was created in 2017, this satirical conspiracy theory heavily spread throughout the internet in 2022. Its real purpose was eventually revealed to be to highlight how misinformation can spread like wildfire. There have even been protests organized to playfully mock the idea. Seriously, there might be one happening in your city right now.

Past decades have often seen young pop stars accused of joining forces with the enigmatic Illuminati. Some call it a rite of passage. Most have succeeded in ignoring these accusations altogether. In the case of Doja Cat, these rumors are the perfect tool for media fodder. The rapper threw a birthday party seemingly inspired by Stanley Kubrick’s “Eyes Wide Shut.” Conspiracy theories ran amok when media from Doja’s party hit the internet. Even her birthday cake was donned with gold occult imagery. As a true child of the internet, Doja never misses an opportunity to poke fun at something like this. Or perhaps that’s exactly what they want us to think…

From the OJ Simpson trial to the Free Britney campaign, Hollywood legal drama has always been subject to surreal speculation. The defamation trial between Amber Heard and her ex-husband Johnny Depp had one of the most anticipated verdicts of 2022. Thanks to a viral TikTok, it has been suspected that Amber Heard’s lawyer is a secret Johnny Depp fan. As Depp takes a stroll in front of his fans, the theorist focuses on someone in the background. The person in question does bear a striking resemblance to a member of Heard’s legal counsel, Elaine Bredehoft. As the theory goes, she embedded herself in her legal team and sabotaged Heard’s case from the inside. Crazed fanatics have done a lot for their idols, but if this were true, then this takes the cake - especially considering that Bredehoft stepped down from Heard’s team after the trial ended.

Beyonce Giselle Knowles-Carter has had popular culture in a chokehold ever since her debut with Destiny’s Child. But with great power comes unhinged conspiracy theories linking you to demonic forces. In 2022, Bey released her seventh studio album to wide critical and commercial acclaim. The cover of Renaissance features a barely clothed Bey atop a silvery outline of a horse. This inspired a TikToker to theorize that Beyonce is projecting subliminal images referring to the four horsemen of the apocalypse. Ever since hitting superstardom, there have been several conspiracy videos dissecting supposedly ominous messages hidden in Beyonce’s body of work and this certainly wasn’t the first conspiracy theory people have tried to link her to (the Illuminati, anyone?).

The impact Covid-19 had on the health of billions of people cannot be ignored. The global event also affected several folks’ ability to accept the authority of medical professionals. In 2020, the World Economic Forum introduced the idea of the Great Reset. It was meant to give guidance on how to shape global economic recovery from the pandemic. But the lack of clarity in the details gave room to conspiracy theorists to fill in the gaps themselves, such as that all measures and restrictions put in place weren’t for people’s health and safety, but rather to orchestrate financial collapse and a change in government. Then, in 2022, a Monkeypox outbreak hit the scene. Conspiracy theorists online claimed that the Covid-19 vaccine was a tool for the global elites to somehow advance their plans of world domination, falsely connecting where it was administered with the proliferation of Monkeypox.

The Academy Awards is widely regarded as the most esteemed recognition of cinematic talent in the world. But at the 2022 Oscars, Will Smith walked onstage to slap Chris Rock in the face. According to a journalist with shaky credibility, the slap was eerily timed during the on-going conflict in Eastern Europe. Could this be a method to distract the American people from the Ukrainian War? If so, The Fresh Prince was not successful. That’s not all! There’s also speculation that the infamous slap was a ruse to increase the program’s ratings. Admittedly, this theory is a little more plausible. Televised award shows have been waning in popularity in recent years. At any rate, we’ll be watching the next Academy Awards with bated breath.

Post-Trump America has been a hotbed of false claims to uncover the true motives of what’s known as the Deep State. For the uninitiated, the Deep State refers to the alleged influential figures that covertly manipulate government policy. Donald Trump has spent the aftermath of his presidency circulating false claims of voter fraud. During the 2022 midterms, he put forth the idea to his followers on Truth Social that the same fraud was happening yet again. He was likely referring to the malfunctioning ballot boxes, but that does not mean dubious work is at play. Theories like this do more than put fact-check algorithms through unbearable stress. They make it difficult for voters to make well-informed decisions.

Queen Elizabeth II reigned over her subjects for seventy years. She lived to see the first moon landing, the birth of the internet, and Bennifer 2.0. When she tragically passed away in 2022, it seemed that the UK was at a standstill and the world paid its respects. However, conspiracy blogs suggested that The Queen had died months prior and was replaced by a hologram. The QAnon community also threw their tin-foil hat into the ring with a ham-fisted point. The date of The Queen’s passing was 1,776 days since QAnon first appeared. Why does that matter? Well, aside from coincidentally matching the year the US won independence from the UK, nobody knows!