M74 entries

• 15-Minute Cities Conspiracy TheoryConspiracy theory claiming that 15-minute city urban planning initiatives are a World Economic Forum scheme to create 'open-air prisons' that restrict citizens' movement through surveillance technology and punitive fines, reframing sustainable urban design as authoritarian control.
• MACK, John E.Harvard Medical School psychiatrist whose research into alien abduction experiences legitimized the phenomenon in academic circles while sparking controversy over his acceptance of extraterrestrial contact claims.
• Madison Guaranty Savings and LoanArkansas savings and loan institution whose 1989 failure became entangled with Bill and Hillary Clinton's Whitewater investment, prompting extensive investigations.
• MADOFF, BernardAmerican financier who operated the largest Ponzi scheme in history, defrauding investors of approximately $65 billion over two decades.
• Maharishi EffectThe Maharishi Effect is a claim originating with the Transcendental Meditation movement holding that group meditation practiced by a number of people equal to the square root of one percent of a population measurably reduces crime and violence in that region, a claim whose supporting studies have been criticized by independent statisticians for methodological flaws including post-hoc data selection.
• Main Core DatabaseMain Core is the name reported by investigative journalists for an alleged federal database, said to originate in Cold War-era continuity-of-government planning, purportedly containing information on Americans considered potential threats to national security in an emergency, a program whose existence has never been officially confirmed or documented in released records.
• Mainila IncidentThe Mainila incident was a November 1939 artillery shelling of a Soviet border village, staged by the Soviet Union and falsely blamed on Finland, providing the pretext the USSR used to abrogate its non-aggression pact and invade Finland in the Winter War.
• Majestic 12Alleged secret committee of government officials formed in 1947 to manage extraterrestrial technology recovery, based on documents that appeared in 1984 but were determined by FBI analysis to be forgeries.
• Malcolm X AssassinationThe assassination of civil rights leader Malcolm X at the Audubon Ballroom, with two of the three men convicted later exonerated after evidence emerged of FBI and police misconduct.
• Malmstrom AFB UFO-Nuclear IncidentA reported UFO encounter at a U.S. nuclear missile facility that allegedly resulted in the simultaneous failure of multiple intercontinental ballistic missiles.
• MANDELA EFFECTPhenomenon describing widespread false memories shared by large groups, explained by psychology as memory confabulation rather than evidence of alternate realities.
• MANN, MichaelAmerican climatologist and geophysicist whose 1998 "hockey stick" temperature reconstruction became a focal point of climate change debates, defended against accusations of data manipulation in multiple investigations including the Climategate controversy.
• MANNING, ChelseaFormer U.S. Army intelligence analyst who provided WikiLeaks with classified military documents, including the 'Collateral Murder' video and diplomatic cables.
• Manson FamilyThe Manson Family was a real commune led by Charles Manson in late-1960s California whose members carried out the confirmed 1969 Tate-LaBianca murders, a case whose subsequent CIA and mind-control connections were investigated in Tom O'Neill's book Chaos, though a definitive alternative-motive account was never conclusively established.
• MANSON, CharlesManson, Charles (b. Nov. 12, 1934, Cincinnati, Ohio, U.S.—d. Nov. 19, 2017, Bakersfield, Calif., U.S.), American cult leader, led the commune known as the Manson Family and was convicted of conspiracy in the 1969 Tate-LaBianca murders carried out by his followers, a confirmed case built substantially around Manson's own "Helter Skelter" race-war theory, later itself the subject of alternative-motive investigation in Tom O'Neill's book Chaos.
• Mantell Incident1948 death of Air Force pilot Thomas Mantell during pursuit of an unidentified flying object over Kentucky, later determined to have been a classified military balloon, becoming one of the first widely publicized UFO-related fatalities.
• MANTI TE'O CATFISHING SCANDALOnline romance deception involving Notre Dame football player Manti Te'o and a fabricated girlfriend persona created by Ronaiah Tuiasosopo, bringing widespread attention to the phenomenon of 'catfishing' and online identity fraud.
• ManticoreThe Manticore is a legendary creature of ancient Persian origin, described in classical sources as having a lion's body, a human head, and a tail of venomous spines, a mythological figure with no basis in zoology likely inspired by exaggerated or garbled early accounts of tigers.
• Manufacturing ConsentMedia analysis framework developed by Edward Herman and Noam Chomsky arguing that structural filters systematically shape mainstream news coverage to serve elite interests, presented as a scholarly model rather than a conspiracy theory.
• Marco Polo Bridge IncidentThe Marco Polo Bridge incident was a July 1937 skirmish near Beijing between Japanese and Chinese troops whose disputed origin, possibly a staged provocation, precipitated the outbreak of full-scale war between Japan and China.
• MARK HOFMANN MORMON DOCUMENT FORGERIESDocument forgery scandal in which Mark Hofmann created fake historical Mormon manuscripts and artifacts, culminating in two murders when his fraud was about to be exposed in 1985.
• MARRS, JimMarrs, Jim (b. Dec. 5, 1943, Fort Worth, Texas, U.S.—d. Aug. 2, 2017, Fort Worth, Texas, U.S.), American journalist and author, wrote Crossfire (1989), a critical examination of the Warren Commission's Kennedy assassination findings that served as a primary source for Oliver Stone's 1991 film JFK, and later wrote broadly across UFO and New World Order subject matter.
• Martian Canals HoaxLate 19th and early 20th century astronomical misconception in which observers, particularly Percival Lowell, claimed to see artificial canals on Mars built by intelligent life, later revealed to be optical illusions from telescope observations.
• Martin Luther King Jr. AssassinationThe assassination of civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. on April 4, 1968, in Memphis, Tennessee, for which James Earl Ray was convicted despite later recanting his confession.
• MASHINSKY, AlexFounder of Celsius Network who pleaded guilty to commodities fraud and securities fraud and was sentenced to 12 years in prison in 2025.
• MASTERS, Michael P.Masters, Michael P., American biological anthropologist, proposes in his book Identified Flying Objects that reported alien abduction experiences are better explained as encounters with time-traveling future humans returning to study their own evolutionary past than as extraterrestrial visitation.
• MATAMOROS CULT MURDERSSeries of ritualistic murders committed by Adolfo Constanzo's narcosatanic cult, including the torture-killing of American college student Mark Kilroy, which led to the cult's discovery and downfall.
• Maui Fires DEW TheoryConspiracy theory claiming the devastating August 2023 Maui wildfires were caused by directed-energy weapons (DEW) rather than natural causes, often citing cherry-picked images of blue objects allegedly 'spared' by laser attacks as evidence of government orchestration.
• MAX HEADROOM SIGNAL HIJACKINGSTwo documented interruptions of Chicago television broadcasts on November 22, 1987, by intruders whose identities remain unknown.
• MAZZETTI, MarkMazzetti, Mark, American journalist, shared a Pulitzer Prize for reporting on the Central Intelligence Agency's post-September 11 drone and paramilitary operations, and wrote The Way of the Knife (2013), a history of the agency's shift toward military-style covert action.
• MCKENNA, TerenceMcKenna, Terence (b. Nov. 16, 1946, Paonia, Colo., U.S.—d. Apr. 3, 2000, Marin County, Calif., U.S.), American ethnobotanist and lecturer, was the leading popularizer of psychedelic-plant advocacy in the late 20th century, originating the Stoned Ape hypothesis of human cognitive evolution and the numerological Timewave Zero model, neither of which is accepted by mainstream science.
• MCMARTIN PRESCHOOL CASEDaycare sexual abuse case from 1983-1990 that became the longest and most expensive criminal trial in American history and emblematic of Satanic ritual abuse moral panic.
• McMinnville UFO PhotographsThe McMinnville UFO photographs, also called the Trent photographs, are two images of a disc-shaped object taken by farmer Paul Trent near McMinnville, Oregon, in May 1950, long regarded by ufologists as among the least easily explained photographic UFO evidence and by skeptics as a suspended model.
• MEIER, BillyMeier, Billy (b. Feb. 3, 1937, Bülach, Switz.), Swiss farmer, has claimed since the 1970s to maintain ongoing contact with extraterrestrial beings from the Pleiades star cluster, producing photographs later widely identified by analysts as depicting scale models, making him one of the most prominent and most disputed figures in the modern contactee subculture.
• MELLON, ChristopherFormer Pentagon intelligence official who became a prominent advocate for UAP disclosure, serving as a key figure in releasing Navy UFO videos and pushing for government transparency on unidentified aerial phenomena investigations.
• MemphreMemphre is a lake-monster reported in Lake Memphremagog on the Quebec-Vermont border, with sighting reports dating to the early 19th century, an unsubstantiated regional variant of the lake-serpent legends common to the northeastern United States and eastern Canada.
• Men in Black PhenomenonRecurring reports within UFO culture of mysterious black-suited figures who allegedly intimidate or silence UFO witnesses, first described by ufologist Albert Bender in 1953.
• MENZEL, DonaldMenzel, Donald, American astrophysicist and director of the Harvard College Observatory, was the most prominent scientific skeptic of the early UFO era, publishing books attributing virtually all sightings to natural atmospheric and optical phenomena, a public skeptic role made more notable in retrospect by his own later-disclosed high-level security clearances and intelligence-community consulting work, which some researchers have cited as grounds for suspicion without documented evidence that it affected his stated views.
• Mermaids: The Body Found HoaxAnimal Planet television specials broadcast in 2012 and 2013 presenting fictional evidence for the existence of mermaids through staged interviews and fabricated footage, prompting an official denial from NOAA.
• Merovingian Bloodline TheoryThe Merovingian bloodline theory holds that the Merovingian kings of Frankish Gaul descended from Jesus and Mary Magdalene and that this bloodline survives in secret to the present day, a claim built substantially on documents fabricated by Pierre Plantard as part of his 1960s Priory of Sion hoax rather than on any genuine genealogical or historical evidence.
• METZGER, KurtMetzger, Kurt, American stand-up comedian and podcaster, co-hosts The Mystery Boys, a program devoted to conspiracy and true-crime subjects, and is known within that community for popularizing the "Garth Brooks is a serial killer" theory as a running bit later discussed alongside MK-Ultra.
• MILKEN, MichaelAmerican financier who pioneered the high-yield bond market and was convicted of securities violations in the 1980s junk bond scandal, becoming a symbol of Wall Street excess during the Reagan era.
• MILLEGAN, KrisMillegan, Kris, American publisher, founded TrineDay press to release books on what he terms "deep politics," the study of covert influence by intelligence agencies and secret societies on historical events, and has appeared as a guest discussing this framework across multiple conspiracy-oriented interview programs.
• Milli Vanilli Lip-Sync ScandalMusic industry fraud involving the pop duo Milli Vanilli, whose Grammy Award was revoked in 1990 after it was revealed they lip-synced to vocals recorded by other singers, exposing widespread deceptive practices in popular music.
• Minot AFB UFO IncidentThe Minot AFB UFO incident refers to visual and radar contact with an unidentified object by numerous Air Force personnel, including a B-52 bomber crew, over Minot Air Force Base, North Dakota, in October 1968, a case documented in Project Blue Book files and never definitively explained.
• MinotaurLegendary creature from Greek mythology with the head of a bull and body of a man, said to have been imprisoned in a labyrinth beneath the palace of King Minos in Crete, representing an ancient cultural narrative rather than a cryptozoological claim.
• Missing 411Conspiracy theory developed by former police detective David Paulides suggesting that unexplained disappearances in national parks follow mysterious patterns possibly involving paranormal or extraterrestrial phenomena, lacking scientific evidence for supernatural explanations.
• MITCHELL, Hulon Jr. (Yahweh ben Yahweh)American religious leader and black supremacist who founded the Nation of Yahweh, a Black Hebrew Israelite movement linked to 23 murders and convicted on federal racketeering charges for ritual killings and extortion.
• Mitrokhin ArchiveCollection of secret Soviet intelligence documents smuggled to the West by KGB archivist Vasili Mitrokhin, revealing extensive details of Soviet espionage operations and foreign intelligence networks during the Cold War.
• MK-ULTRAMK-Ultra was a covert human experimentation program run by the United States Central Intelligence Agency from 1953 to 1973 to develop methods of interrogation, behavior modification, and mind control, primarily through the undisclosed administration of drugs, including LSD, to unwitting subjects.
• MKNAOMIMKNAOMI was a confirmed joint program between the Central Intelligence Agency and the U.S. Army's Special Operations Division, running from 1953 to 1970, that developed and stockpiled biological agents and delivery systems, functioning as a companion program to the CIA's better-known MK-Ultra mind-control research.
• MMR Vaccine-Autism ClaimDiscredited theory linking the measles-mumps-rubella vaccine to autism spectrum disorders, based on a fraudulent 1998 study that has been contradicted by extensive subsequent research involving millions of children worldwide.
• Moa Survival ClaimsMoa survival claims hold that the moa, a large flightless bird endemic to New Zealand generally accepted by scientists to have gone extinct following Polynesian settlement, persisted in remote areas into the 19th or 20th century, a fringe cryptozoological position unsupported by verified physical evidence.
• Mokele-mbembeAlleged large herbivorous creature said to inhabit the Congo Basin swamps and rivers, described by local folklore as resembling a long-necked dinosaur but lacking scientific evidence despite numerous cryptozoological expeditions.
• Momo Challenge HoaxViral moral panic claiming a disturbing WhatsApp contact named 'Momo' encouraged children to perform dangerous tasks culminating in suicide, later revealed to be largely unfounded mass hysteria amplified by concerned parents on social media.
• Monsanto World Domination TheoryClaims that Monsanto (now Bayer) and other agribusiness companies control the global food supply through patent manipulation, seed monopolization, and political influence.
• MONTGOMERY, DennisAmerican computer programmer who sold fraudulent software to the CIA claiming it could detect terrorist messages in television broadcasts.
• MOON, Sun MyungKorean religious leader who founded the Unification Church in 1954 and proclaimed himself the messiah sent to complete Jesus Christ's mission.
• MOORE, William L.American ufologist and co-author of *The Roswell Incident* who later admitted to working with Air Force intelligence sources in a disinformation campaign.
• MOREHOUSE, DavidMorehouse, David, American former Army officer, served as a remote viewer within the military's Project Stargate program and recounted the experience in his 1996 memoir Psychic Warrior, becoming afterward a public commentator who has publicly disputed some later UFO whistleblower claims as inconsistent with his own knowledge of classified programs.
• Mormon FundamentalismSplinter groups that broke from the mainstream Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints to continue practicing polygamy and other early Mormon doctrines.
• Mormon Political Control ConspiracyAllegations that the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints exerts disproportionate influence over Utah's government and business sectors through coordinated member placement in positions of power.
• Moscow Apartment BombingsSeptember 1999 series of explosions in Russian residential buildings that killed over 300 people and provided justification for the Second Chechen War.
• MothmanWinged humanoid entity with glowing red eyes reported by multiple witnesses in Point Pleasant, West Virginia, between November 1966 and December 1967, later connected by author John Keel to various paranormal phenomena including the December 1967 Silver Bridge collapse.
• Mountain Meadows MassacreSeptember 11, 1857, killing of approximately 120 emigrants by Utah territorial militia and Paiute allies in southern Utah Territory.
• MOUSSAOUI, ZacariasMoussaoui, Zacarias (b. May 30, 1968, Saint-Jean-de-Luz, France), French national and self-described al-Qaeda member, was arrested in Minnesota in August 2001 on immigration charges after enrolling in flight training under suspicious circumstances, an episode cited as a missed pre-9/11 warning sign, and pleaded guilty in 2005 to conspiracy charges related to the attacks, though his direct operational role in the plot itself remains disputed.
• Movement for the Restoration of the Ten Commandments of GodThe Movement for the Restoration of the Ten Commandments of God was a real Ugandan apocalyptic Catholic splinter sect whose leaders orchestrated the deaths of more than 700 followers in Kanungu in March 2000, an event initially staged to resemble an accidental fire before subsequent investigation established it as mass murder tied to the group's failed doomsday predictions.
• Mukden IncidentThe Mukden incident was a 1931 explosion on a Japanese-controlled railway in Manchuria, staged by Japanese army officers and falsely attributed to Chinese saboteurs, providing the pretext for Japan's invasion and occupation of Manchuria.
• Multipolar World OrderA geopolitical theory describing an international system based on multiple competing power centers rather than single-superpower dominance; discussed both by mainstream analysts and alternative media as conspiracy theory regarding global governance transitions.
• Munich MassacreSeptember 1972 kidnapping and killing of eleven Israeli Olympic team members by Palestinian Black September terrorists at the Munich Olympics.
• MURARESKU, BrianMuraresku, Brian, American author and attorney, argues in The Immortality Key (2020) that psychoactive substances were used in secret sacraments of the ancient Eleusinian Mysteries and continued covertly into early Christian ritual practice, a thesis drawing on genuine archaeochemical residue analysis but extending its interpretive conclusions further than most classicists accept.
• Murder of Tupac ShakurThe murder of rapper Tupac Shakur, shot in a drive-by shooting in Las Vegas on September 7, 1996, and killed six days later, remained formally unsolved for more than a quarter century until Compton figure Duane "Keffe D" Davis was indicted in 2023, a case long fueled by theories connecting it to the mid-1990s East Coast-West Coast rap rivalry and to music executive Suge Knight.
• Mutual UFO NetworkThe Mutual UFO Network, or MUFON, is a nonprofit organization founded in 1969 that trains volunteer field investigators to collect, catalog, and investigate civilian reports of unidentified flying objects across the United States and internationally.
• MWERINDE, CredoniaUgandan religious leader and co-founder of the Movement for the Restoration of the Ten Commandments of God, whose apocalyptic Catholic splinter group ended in mass death at Kanungu in 2000, killing over 700 followers.