Squaring The Strange

This week, Ben is skeptical of the History Channel bland promise to be transparent and do more investigation on their recent Amelia Earhart fiasco (spoiler: they haven’t). For the main topic, the copycat effect, Ben talks about behavior modeling versus ideation, covering everything from fears of anorexia to the artistry of crop circles. Moving onto serious crimes, the guys discuss the church fires during the 1990s: after President Clinton addressed the issue and formed a task force, the fires actually quadrupled—most set by juveniles who had no clear motive. As parents know, the drive to copy and gain attention is clearly present in children, but some people never grow out of it. Certain instances were a perfect storm of copycatting: the Anthrax scare of 2001 resulted in tremendous anxiety and costs, as it was cheap and easy to fake with talcum powder while being expensive and time-consuming for authorities to deal with. The clown panic of 2016 was a less harmful (but to some, even scarier) example of copycat