Flat Earth

Haha wow... So I was up late by myself, scrolling through Netflix for some documentaries, and I came across one called "Behind the Curve", which is about the "flat Earth" theory. Feeling curious, I thought I'd give it a go and I watched it.

At first, I thought it was in favor of the whole conspiracy, but then as I watched it through to the end, I realized that it totally wasn't supporting it at all. And the very last few seconds of it? I laughed so hard, it cracked me up. Not that I'm saying that documentary is funny, but that one particular part was.

So it's about this guy who somehow ended up believing in the idea that the Earth is flat, and he started a snowball effect with a lot of the other loons out there in the world who buy into the same idea. And his poor Mother, you can tell she doesn't support the idea, but she supports him. Now THAT is a good Mom. Unfortunately you can't choose how your children turn out to be as adults, so I feel sorry for her, but admire her at the same time.

And where is the proof? All they have are theories. There's no proof. The movie was basically about a bunch of people following this instigator and his concubine without offering any actual evidence. Actually, wait... Scratch that. There WAS some proof that their belief in this idea is bullshit. There were two experiments done in the movie by these believers that backfired on them.

One was to determine if the Earth is rotating. They did a test and bought an expensive gyroscope to find out of the Earth was drifting at 15 degrees, which it was, which showed that the Earth is rotating on it's axis, which means it's not flat. So then they thought they would try to prove their results wrong by saying that the gyroscope must be picking up something else that's rotating, like the stars above the Earth. So then he tries putting in into some special chamber to block out anything that might interfere with the results, just to get the same results.

Another experiment they did was to have 3 boards lined up along the land at the same height, and they would shine a light from one end to the other. If the light made a straight line, it would show that the Earth is flat. If the light was different in the middle because of the curvature of the Earth, it would show that it's round. What made me laugh so hard at the end was when they got the results of this experiment, and the guy was dumbfounded. Needless to say, the Earth curved. His reaction and the tone of his voice cracked me up.

Can people not see that it’s like a cult? Complete with a ringleader who’s making profit off of people’s curiosity and ignorance? I’m shocked that people are buying into his crap. And some of them are dead serious about it, too. They even stopped talking to their family members or have spent so much money on this dream that is just not going to come true. And they treat this guy like he knows what he's talking about when he's wrong, and it's actually pretty sad.

This is the level of stupidity that we have in the world. Not just one isolated area, but all over the globe. And while I'm glad that I can say I'm smart enough to know better, I'm also a let down that we actually have people that dumb in the world, after all the advancements we have made. It feels like we take one step forward and two steps back sometimes. You would think they would at LEAST have basic common sense. I used to think I was just average in intellect compared to my peers, but damn... If I thought I did so poorly and I'm able to see the scientific proof and the common sense and logic - and these "flat-Earthers" don't - what does that say about them?

Logic and common sense are your friends, people. Don't do "the dumb".