Off the Edge Flat Earthers, Conspiracy Culture, and Why People Will Believe Anything [Audiobook]

At once a definitive history of the movement and an enjoyable look at its expansive, absurd, and dangerous present, Off the Edge introduces us to a cast of larger-than-life characters, from 19th-century grifters to 20th-century small-town tyrants to the provocateurs of Alex Jones' early-aughts internet, whose rancor sowed the early seeds of our modern division. We accompany Weill to Flat Earther conferences, where we meet moms on vacation, hard-line creationists, scammy YouTube celebrities and their victims, Neo-Nazi rappers, and even a man determined to fly into space in a homemade rocket-powered balloon - whose tragic death proves as senseless and absurd as the theory he set out to prove. Incisive and clear-eyed, Off the Edge tells a powerful story about belief, exploring how we arrived at this moment of polarized realities and explaining what needs to happen so that we might all return to the same spinning globe.