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The Bunker – News without the nonsense

Just asking questions – How conspiracy theories took hold in Britain

The Bunker – News without the nonsense

Podmasters

News, Government, Politics, Society & Culture

4.61K Ratings

🗓️ 4 September 2025

⏱️ 28 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Conspiracy theories used to be confined to fringe internet discussions and the guy you’d avoid in the pub. Now, thanks to figures like Donald Trump, they’ve gone mainstream. But where’s the line between healthy scepticism and believing the Royal Family are lizard people? Today in The Bunker, Alex von Tunzelmann is joined by Daniel Jolley, social psychologist and Associate Professor at the University of Nottingham, to find out how the UK embraced conspiracy theories and what we can do to sort fact from fiction.  Follow us on BlueSky: https://bsky.app/profile/bunkerpod.bsky.social  Written and presented by Alex von Tunzelmann. Producer: Liam Tait. Audio editor: Robin Leeburn. Managing editor: Jacob Jarvis. Music by Kenny Dickinson. Group Editor: Andrew Harrison. THE BUNKER is a Podmasters Production. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0

This edition of The Bunker is sponsored by Naked Wines. I'm Seth Tevall.

0:04.8

And I'm Zoe Grunewold.

0:06.4

And here at the bunker, we don't believe in guesswork. We go to the experts for the best insights into news and politics. And why should wine be any different?

0:15.1

That's why we're pleased to recommend Naked Wines. I enjoy their Bariccas Gallaudoro Reserva from Portugal. Well, I'm trying their small and

0:23.9

small Savignon Blanc from New Zealand. Seth, tell me, what's your wine knowledge like? Very specialised,

0:30.6

so pretty good on things Portuguese, but non-existent on those other things. How about you, Zay?

0:35.5

I drink most anything, but I have to say I'm really enjoying the savenient blanc. It's citrusy, it's got notes of gooseberry. I could just drink the whole bottle. What makes naked wines so convenient is that they deliver top quality wines right to your jaw from world-class winemakers from across the globe, whether it's a French rosé, a New Zealand reisling, or even the Lebanese

0:54.8

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0:59.0

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1:04.0

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1:09.7

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1:16.7

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1:26.0

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1:30.5

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1:40.9

Hello and welcome to The Bunker, News Without the Nonsense.

1:49.2

Five days a week. I'm Alex von Tunselman.

1:52.7

Now, not that long ago, conspiracy theories were mostly to be found on fringe internet forums

1:57.6

and in a pub chat, if you accidentally got stuck talking to the smelly guy in the

2:01.7

corner. But now they're everywhere. Normalised by such figures as the President of the United

2:07.6

States, Donald Trump, who rose to political prominence questioning whether Barack Obama was even

2:12.5

born in the United States, they're now proliferating across politics and the media.

2:22.7

But where's the boundary between a bit of healthy skepticism and going all the way down the road to do the royal family being giant, shape-shifting lizards?

...

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