How ‘Kate-spiracy’ Took Hold
Emily Amick of @EmilyinYourPhone on the broader implications of the internet speculation spiral.
As we process the royal news from the last several weeks, revisiting what happened in light of Catherine’s cancer announcement, two aspects in particular feel worthy of more consideration: the Internet’s precipitating role and the palace’s botched response.
Today I want begin digging into the first bit, to look at the depth, degree, and damage of conspiracy theories surrounding the Princess of Wales. When I first saw this spiral on X/Twitter in late February, my gut was to ignore it. I didn’t want to do anything to encourage the frenzy I saw taking hold. While some found it fun or funny, I suspected — based on what we have seen happen to royal women in the past — that something more sinister was at play.
But the “Where is Kate?” rumors sank and spread in such a way that within a few days I felt obligated to address it. Then came the release of the edited photo and…well, things got immeasurably worse. A certain segment of the internet, which I’ll call Green Screen Crusaders, now had proof that something was amiss. The conspiracies reached new, deranged highs. On Friday, with Kate’s heart-wrenching video announcing “cancer had been present”, the conversation came crashing back to earth.
As the dust began to settle, I came across a Reel from
, creator of @EmilyinYourPhone. Amick called herself a “Debbie Downer” when it came to the Kate rumor mill — not because she is interested in the royals (she told me she is an anti-monarchist) but because it added to what she calls the “conspiracy scaffolding” online.
Amick is a lawyer, former counsel to Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and founder of For Facts Sake. She grew up in Texas, went to the University of Alabama, and began noticing the rise of disinformation during the Trump administration. “I saw my network reposting tons and tons of right-wing propaganda, QAnon, conspiracies, all different types of stuff,” she said. “But it was beautiful in watercolor and in the aesthetics and vernacular of the platform.” She started @EmilyinYourPhone in 2019 as a way to discuss politics on social media.
An avid consumer of news, Amick remembers hearing about Kate’s surgery as soon as the first statement was released in January. From the start, she wondered: “Is this going to start a conspiracy?” Below, Amick talks about what unfolded, the TikTok incentives that encouraged it, why conspiracy theories are so appealing, and the dangers of a “post-truth era.”
I have seen a lot of scolding and shaming out there, which is not my aim with this newsletter. Rather, I hope that by understanding what happened we can do better going forward. One question Amick asks that I think is especially useful: What are you going to do next time? Are you going to jump on the bandwagon again?
PS: Democracy in Retrograde: How to Make Changes Big and Small In Our Country and in Our Lives, Amick’s new book with Sami Sage of Betches Media, comes out July 2. You can pre-order it here. And check out her Substack,
— her piece on Kate is here.ICYMI: My earlier newsletters on Kate’s cancer announcement, the edited photograph, the internet speculation, and her initial abdominal surgery.
@EmilyinYourPhone on How ‘Kate-spiracy’ Took Hold
Please note: This conversation has been edited and condensed.
When did you first hear that Kate was facing health issues? What was your early read?
Emily Amick: I heard about the Kate news when it came out in January. From a very personal perspective, I had abdominal surgery last year and had a terrible time recovering. It gave me tons of sympathy. I wish I had gotten three months off. Thinking contextually about women in America having C-sections and not being able to take paid time off of work, the lack of health insurance in this country, the lack of sick leave — that was also really on the top of my mind.
As a news consumer, I am generally forgiving. When people say they are sick, I assume they are really sick. But I immediately started seeing “Where is Kate?” type of content.
Why do you think it happened so fast?
We love a missing white women in America — and I think that people have been hankering for a toppling with these people.
As an outside voyeur, there seems to be Team Meghan and Team Kate. I continue to not be aware of the intricacies of everything that happened but the feedback that I got was a lot of people talking to me about Meghan: “Meghan never would have been allowed this” or “This is only fair because of what they did to Meghan.” In America, we love our football, we love our tribalization, we are seeing it in politics, we are seeing it everywhere. To me, it felt very much like Team A wanted to topple Team B.
Do you think it was all ill-intended?
When you look at the vast majority of content that was created and consumed, the vast majority of people, when I talked to them, were merely gleeful and entertained.
But there were people who had valid concerns [for Kate’s well being]. There were people who told me the palace is a place that has consumed and spit out women over and over again and disregards them.
When did you realize this conversation had spread?
Over a weekend in March, I had multiple friends who are news disengaged send me text messages to gossip about this. And I was like, “Oh my God — what?” It indicated to me the degree to which it had fully permeated the discourse. It was way outside of the normal. There are these types of inside baseball discussions that happen within the royal watchers community, and they never leave that echo chamber. And this discussion had clearly moved far beyond that.
“The thing about people who love to eat candy is you can’t suddenly start demanding they eat broccoli.”
What was happening on TikTok at this time?
One of the things that was interesting to me was to hear people be like, “It’s not that bad.” And I would always be like, “Are you consuming TikTok?’”
It started with “She’s growing out her bangs” and “She’s getting a BBL” then “She’s a victim of domestic violence.” That’s the infrastructure of social media commentary — and the degree to which conspiracy culture in particular is an effective means to get views. Conversations grow and grow and grow. Creators see this wave and wonder: How can I jump on it? A cacophony of people start picking it up, people who are not royal watcher accounts.
Why do you think this is so appealing to content creators?
There are multiple incentive structures. There is money. [TikTok] creators who have reached the threshold to be in the creator fund see it as a way to make money. All they need is view numbers.
There is also clout chasing and interest in participating in the discourse. People want to jump into a conversation. I think that it felt very low stakes.
Why was it low stakes?
Kate Middleton is a literal princess. There’s a greater disincentive to post negatively about normal human beings who are flawed, fellow walkers through the challenges of life. This woman is leading the most charmed life, representing an institution that people rightfully think should be taken down.
The other thing I kept hearing from people is the palace has a history of engaging in conspiracy and lies — so why wouldn’t they also be doing that?
Which brings us to the edited picture Kensington Palace released. What did you make of that?
People were asking for proof of life pictures on social media. It felt like that was the response to them. But Comms 101 is: Don’t give them anything to talk about. It was extremely detrimental to put out a Photoshopped photo. That picture was fuel to the fire. They should have known better. They perpetuated this post-truth era with their actions.
The large-scale criticism of the royal comms machine is highly warranted. They made monumental errors and those errors have detrimental impacts beyond the legacy of the royal family.
Let’s talk about the broader impact of this discourse — what has it done?
It’s two things: Further denigration of truth and further erection of the conspiracy scaffolding.
The first aspect is this communal nihilism where truth doesn’t exist anymore. The only thing that exists is your ability to comment. What I’ve noticed from talking to Gen-Z news consumers is they don’t believe anything is true anymore. They don’t believe things the government says are true. They don’t believe what experts are saying is true. And that’s problematic when you don’t believe in truth anymore. How do we move forward as a country, as a community? It’s very hard when everything is merely an alternative fact or everything is merely a joke.
The second thing is the conspiracy scaffolding. There are accounts on TikTok that learned that if you just put out conspiracy content — and it doesn’t have to be anywhere close to truth — it can rack up views and it can get you followers and it can gain you currency. And so what are these accounts going to do next time there’s a mass media event? Presumably run the same show, because it worked.
Is there anything to stop this, or keep it from happening again?
The thing about people who love to eat candy is you can’t suddenly start demanding they eat broccoli. It is way more fun to consume conspiracy news. You get to feel like you’re smarter. You get to feel a sense of control. You get to feel a sense of being in a special club.
I think House InHabit is very talented at producing this content in the same way that Candace Owens, who makes tons of conspiracy content, is also exceptionally talented. The only downfall that they can have is that it becomes stale and boring. Eventually people move on and do other things. Inevitably, QAnon was wrong enough times that people lost interest.
The problem is that the scaffolding is growing, not shrinking. I see a lot of political influencers starting to rely excessively on the language of conspiracies.
For example, take how people talked about the new Meta policy for users to turn on [visibility for] political content. I said, “You need to turn on political content.” With House Inhabit, there was this intimation that there was a conspiracy within Meta, to not let you access this very important information, and [suggesting] “I’m giving you the key for how to keep accessing it.” We are saying the same thing, just using a few different words here and there. But I see how as a consumer, her presentation style is a lot more catchy than the way I said it.
The distinction I make for myself is not engaging in outrage olympics, which is constantly screaming about Marjorie Taylor Greene and Trump and that type of stuff — which is a very effective way to build an audience. We know this from what we have learned about the internet companies. They know that emotions pull people in and get more views and eyeballs and seconds and clicks.
“What are you going to do next time? Are you going to jump on the bandwagon again?”
What about the people that sort of skirt the idea of conspiracy? You recently posted about Caroline Burke, who writes for Katie Couric’s newsletter.
She is a great example of a conspiracy ladder. She started with Tradwives — that’s not a conspiracy. Tradwives are a real thing that is working to dismantle rights in this country. But [Burke] was pushing the boundaries of this discussion.
When she saw she got traction on Ballerina Farm, then she had to find another one to talk about. So she went after Nara Smith. [EH Note: Burke then posted an essay tying Catherine to the phenomenon, declaring: “Queen Tradwife is ‘missing.’”] After this Kate-spiracy, which is now seemingly over, she went private on TikTok and she said, “I have to figure out how I’m going to move forward.” And in my head, my question is: What are you going to do next time? Are you going to jump on the bandwagon again?
That’s a good question for us all. What can we do to be more responsible news consumers?
In my new book, out July 2, Democracy in Retrograde, we walk through what it means to create your own personal civic action plan. One of the steps is cultivating a news diet. Figure out sources that you trust, make active choices about from whom and from where you are going to consume news to make sure that you are getting information about the issues that you really care about.
We are in an election year here in the US. Given the conspiracy-minded discourse, how can we feel like we are standing on firm ground?
I have two answers to that. One: Truth does exist. We all know it exists, and we all have our lived experiences and we can look back and rely on that.
TikTok is very, very effective at pulling us into whirlwinds, where you lose touch with the conversation that people are having outside of that vortex. It’s like going into a casino where there’s no windows, you don’t know what time it is, you’re constantly hearing binging that other people are winning. You feel like you’re in a manipulated information environment. But you go outside of the casino for a couple minutes and then you’re back to reality.
The touch grass of it all! I have done that several times these last few weeks, stepped outside to literally clear my head. What’s the second?
The second thing, which we talk about in the book, is the hopelessness spiral that people get in and how the antidote to despair is action. That’s really why we wrote the book, because I constantly get DMs from people saying: “I’m totally hopeless.”
The book is really the response. It’s about figuring out issues that you care about and how you can get engaged and involved on those issues. And maybe it’s local, maybe it’s national, maybe it’s a newsletter, maybe it’s volunteering for a candidate. There are lots and lots of options.
My thanks to Emily! Make sure to follow her on Instagram at @EmilyinYourPhone, subscribe to her Substack,
, and pre-order her forthcoming book, Democracy in Retrograde.
I have been following Emily for quite some time. She is one of my trusted sources of news - along with Sharon McMahon, Jessica Yellin and Betches. You are my source for all things Royal and they are my sources for all things government/political. Notice how all are female? ❤️
I have seen a number of people criticize your coverage of this whole situation and I find I so strongly disagree with this take personally. It is always so helpful for me to have a few trusted sources who will tell me what is going on and help me make judgments about whether I need to engage with the information. I found this true with the Covid pandemic, where I deeply needed some calm and rational sources to tell me when the media and social media were taking flights of fancy following disinformation. I found that with your account, I could read your analysis, process your thoughtful take on what was worthy of discussion (the media strategy of the RF) and what was not (ridiculous speculation that Kate was in danger). It also allowed me to very carefully not encourage this speculation when anyone I follow started to engage with this. I feel like the criticism ignores one of the key points of your discussion here (finding reputable sources you can trust in this era of conspiracies and disinformation). You never once encouraged us to believe or engage with the ridiculous conspiracies regarding affairs or her safety, and always reminded us that she was exactly where she said she would be. Especially where mainstream media has shown itself willing to follow social media down the rabbit hole, I thank you for being one of my trusted sources so I can avoid fueling the conspiracy fires.