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Tin Foil Hat
by Zach Smith

There are many conspiracy theories; everyone seems to believe at least one of them. Roswell, some secret society controls everything, the Kennedy assassination, the list goes on and on. Even intelligent people sometimes believe in them.

“Obama was actually born in Kenya and he is working with the terrorists to bring down America.”

A friend of mine, who up until this point I thought was intelligent, told me this. I answered him with my standard answer for statements like that.

“Better put tin foil on your head so the government can’t activate the chip in your brain.”

I always used the tin foil hat line. Conspiracy theories take facts and restructure them in order to make a false statement seem plausible. However this restructuring can make the statement unstable, collapsible with a simple observation. The tin foil hat reference usually makes people realize just how crazy some of their theories may seem, and it usually leads to a withdrawal of the initial statement.

I started to think one day about the tin foil hat. I wondered if I put on the hat would I think any differently. Then I thought that idea was stupid, paranoid. Homeless people wear tin foil hats and they’re crazy. Then I thought that someone put that thought in my head, to stop me from finding out the truth.

I never had an internal argument with myself like that before; it gave me more proof that something was controlling my mind. I was strong, able to fight it somewhat, but the thoughts of someone else were there as well.

I went to the store and bought a role of tin foil. I thought the cashier gave me a strange look. Was I crazy, or was she one of them, working for the mind controllers? As soon as I left would she call who ever is in charge and tell them someone is going to make a tin foil hat? I should have bought something else with it, stupid, stupid.

On my way home I spotted a hand full of black cars that seemed to be following me, it was all coming together. I hit the gas to get away from them, and a cop pulled me over. I hid the tin foil under the seat.

The cop saw that I was nervous; and asked me open my trunk, but there was nothing incriminating in there so he let me go. I thought I saw him put something in the trunk, a tracker perhaps. When I got closer to my home, then I ditched the car, so I couldn’t be followed.

Finally I got to my apartment building, snuck in the door, everyone in the lobby seemed to be looking at me strange, did they know something I didn’t, I was going to find out. I pulled out the tin foil, crinkled it, and made it into the shape of a dome. When I slipped it on my head I immediately felt different. I now felt like a jackass, wearing a tin foil hat.