I'm begging you: please don't take the bait...

First, a little context: I wrote by PhD thesis on the Satanic Panic of the 1980s, and how it was hijacked by the ascendant Evangelical New Right to both push back against the rising tide of secularism in public education, and to demonise the nascent childcare sector as a means of foregrounding the traditional "mother-stays-at-home" model of parenting. I didn't write the book on this stuff by any means, but I have certainly read every one ever written.

I spent four years, all day every day, reading primary and secondary sources detailing the supposed vast network of Satanic child rape and child sacrifice that had infiltrated all levels of American life, from nurseries to the police to Democrat-held state and national offices.

The scenarios, framing, and language are identical to the "revelations" in these new Epstein leaks. After seeing their virality among liberal and leftist communities, I felt I had to at least try to convince you not to fall for the same wild conspiracy theorising that enabled Reagan and the New Right.

Why do you think these pages were released, unredacted? Why do you think these allegations come from unsubstantiated hotline tips, made long after the Epstein scandal was international news? Did a Justice Department that has been weaponised in service to one man, that has spent months scrubbing his name from the files, somehow overlook the most obscene, salacious allegations yet?

These were very deliberately curated, confident in the knowledge that the weight of countless creditable allegations already existent against Trump as a rapist and paedophile would invite his critics to jump on this fantastical fan-fiction as legitimate. They did this to insulate themselves for any actual, verifiable evidence that may leak down the line. How much easier will it be to dismiss this real evidence as just more wild-eyed conspiracy when those on the left already have previous for seizing upon even the most absurd fabrications?

I'm begging you: please do not take the bait. Keep an open mind, certainly, but please don't post and share these allegations as though they are some kind of "gotcha". When Trump's moment of reckoning finally comes, let's make sure we hold the high-ground, arguing from a place of rationality and evidence-based conclusions, and make explicit the difference between our case against an inveterate rapist and sexual predator, and the incel, 4-Chan ramblings of QAnon-inflected conspiracy. Leave the hysterical moral panics to MAGA.