Te problem is that in '93–'94 I got sick with depression […] and I did not know what to do, as conventional drugs kept me sedated but certainly not happy. One day, as I knew a doctor in my hospital who practiced acupuncture, an anaesthetist […], I got curious. I wanted to see if I could fnd a way out through acupuncture. It wasn't really acupuncture [that helped me], it was a decoction of Chinese herbs. After four days of therapy, I was fne, I was really fne. […] So, I got curious, I started studying and I studied Chinese medicine for ten years. I also got a Chinese massage degree since, as a nurse, I am not allowed to do acupuncture, much less Chinese pharmacology. Later, […] I began to be interested in other visions: Ayurvedic; then I read some orthomolecular books, I became interested in herbal medicine, until one day in a summer bookshop here in our area, I found a book by Claudia Rainville […] on the psycho-somatic meaning of symptoms. […] In this book I found a reference to Dr Hamer: 'Who the hell is he?' [I asked myself]. […] I went to read some news online about Dr Hamer, I began to grasp the meaning of what he was trying to disseminate and, oh well, I realised that this was the answer. In the sense that Chinese medicine gave me many answers, but it did not give me the ultimate answer, which is [the answer to the question]: 'Why is this happening to me? Why me?' (Franco/5BL)

Tis narrative touches on several elements which show up very frequently in the personal stories of those embracing refused knowledge. Tey testify to complex trajectories in which circumstantial events act as triggers for choices coming from afar and taking root in people. Like Piera's story, Franco's account starts with 'a problem' (depression). Such transitions often originate from problems (usually health related) that people encounter in their lives. As Michael Bury has argued, health problems often elicit more profound biographical disruptions involving 'a fundamental re-thinking of the person's biography and self-concept' (Bury, 1982, p. 169). An event presents as 'a problem' not only because it constitutes a nuisance or a danger but also to the extent that conventional medicine cannot fnd a quick and efective response to it. Otherwise, it would not be a problem. Tose involved thus start taking note of those recommending alternative remedies—in this case, acupuncture. Te interest in remedies that are alternative to allopathic medicine leads to individuals meeting other people belonging to social worlds in which criticism of conventional medicine is widespread and shared and in which information on alternative medicines is promoted and facilitated. Tus, in a crescendo, individuals encounter new bodies of knowledge rejected by Western science increasingly radically (in this case, Chinese, Ayurvedic, orthomolecular and herbal medicine, and then the 5BLs).

Awareness of the progressive nature of embracing refused knowledge allows us to avoid the simplistic juxtaposition of science and pseudoscience, scientifc and anti-scientifc approaches to problems. Amit Prasad (2022) recently suggested that investigating anti-science claims requires examining not only what these claims afrm but also how they are discursively framed and circulated, as it is only then that we discover that such claims are only rarely truly anti-scientifc and generally critical of 'certain institutional relationships of science' (Prasad, 2022, p. 90). I maintain that the lengthy and complex processes involved in embracing refused knowledge confrm this thesis, as they imply constant negotiation with science. Membership of a particular refused knowledge social world is not defnitive and, neither, frequently, is it complete. Te individual life stories show that, for laypeople in particular, adherence to a body of refused knowledge is often simply a transitory stage towards another and diferent body of refused knowledge better resonating with individual values and expectations: one might believe in the vaccination-autism link as an intermediate step along a path leading to the endorsement of New Germanic Medicine which, in turn, may be an intermediate step on the way to South American shamanism.

Moreover, individuals' adherence to refused knowledge is subject to change and second thoughts and often only partial, in the sense that it does not necessarily imply a willingness to believe all the theoretical statements or defnitions of the facts encompassed by a certain body of knowledge. Quite the opposite, many interviewees place very clear boundaries around the feld of knowledge worthy of belief, excluding not only knowledge accepted by science but also opposing arguments. Olga, a pro-vaccine choice mother and graduate, argued:

Taking sides [in the vaccine quarrel] is exhausting; you need a clear understanding of who people are, their reasons. I feel I have distanced myself from both sides. I don't like the extremism of some people who are critical of vaccinations because I feel that though they do [a lot of] sharing, sharing is a very easy task, all you have to do is click, you just read a few lines and... Over the years some [of them] have labelled people like me—who actually feel extremely moderate—as irresponsible. Tey have exposed themselves to several legitimate criticisms.  (Olga/Pro VC)

Several other interviewees showed a similarly cautious approach. Angelo, an expert on, and professional promoter of, alkaline water producing devices, said:

I'm saying a very important thing, and it should be emphasised: we are not talking about water that cures, heals or prevents or anything like that. As they taught us, you need to have a healthy diet, drink healthy water. And then it's our own body which heals. […] Tis is a necessary aside, because unfortunately there are all sorts of things on the web. Just think, there are even people who say that water heals tumours and the like. […] Well, it's not part of my ethics and individuality. (Angelo/AW)

Hence, joining a refused knowledge social world is often combined with rejecting certain parts of that body of knowledge and social world. As Olga repeatedly stated, defending a refused knowledge argument is a challenge and not just because it is rejected by science and mainstream communities. Adhering to refused knowledge implies constant renegotiation of one's position in the world.

For the reasons examined here, the metaphor of sudden conversion after a revelation, spiritual enlightenment, awakening is not particularly useful in understanding the process of embracing refused knowledge. It is certainly an element in RKCs' founding narratives (see Chap. 4 by Paolo Bory), but this fact regards the birth of such communities rather than individual adherence to them. It is also widespread among academics criticising what they see as pseudo-scientifc theories (as shown by Harambam, 2020, pp. 182–187), but this is just a clear case of scientifc 'boundary work' (Gieryn, 1983): it says a great deal more about the science which rejects certain bodies of knowledge than the social worlds accepting them.

I will thus now cast aside the religious tropes and examine the transition process, attempting to identify its main drivers.

#### **3.4 Transition Drivers**

As observed above, certain disruptive biographical events appear to act as triggers for the turn to refused knowledge. Yet the outbreak of a 'problem' is usually a trigger, not a driver in the turn. It is the circumstance that causes a number of pre-existing factors to develop and associate into a new assembly that becomes remarkably signifcant in an individual's life.

Certain refused knowledge claim-makers (see Chap. 7 by Stefano Crabu) have a clear understanding of the contingent nature of 'problems' and, simultaneously, their relevance in triggering a possible turn. Indeed, they leverage these to acquaint potential newcomers with their new insights—that is, to enrol them into the alternative social world. Tey act as spokespersons of the new association (Latour, 1987, pp. 70–74). Tis is the case of Giovanni, an expert and trainer in the feld of alkaline water, who himself turned to holistic medicine and salutogenesis (see Mittelmark et al., 2017) following a signifcant 'event' in his life—that is, his father's death from a stroke. Speaking of typical clients, he said

My typical client was someone who had already bounced between one specialist and another without fnding a solution to her problem. So, my protocol is mainly about identifying the cause. Ten I use investigation tools to fgure out what's wrong. Most of the time it all starts from the intestine. […] Te person who turns to me most is somebody who has a problem and cannot solve it. So, what's my job? *It is to bring out the problem*. So, I suggest some tests, which can be a test for evaluating any gut dysbiosis. (Giovanni/AW, my emphasis)

Giovanni leverages a possible problem by 'bringing it out', which implies two aspects simultaneously: making a problem visible and turning it into 'the problem'. By making certain intestinal pH alterations visible via measurements and data, Giovanni brings out what appears to be the 'real' problem that the client was unable to solve and pushes him or her towards an efective solution by means of a diet that includes drinking alkaline water, thereby enrolling the client in the respective social world.

Tis story also highlights that the original problem prompting the client to contact Giovanni had become a problem because conventional medicine had not been able to solve it and led to the client trying a range of specialists without success. Te enrolment in the new association was facilitated by an *interessement* elicited by science itself, which therefore actively contributed to the transition to refused knowledge. Tis is one of a number of factors that occasionally become agents in the *interessement* and enrolment (Callon, 1986) of individuals in a refused knowledge social world. I will examine the most relevant factors below.

#### **3.4.1 Tests, Treatments and Protocols**

In many of the stories told by refused knowledge followers, illnesses and diseases become 'problems' when medicine turns out to be incapable of producing the expected response. For our interviewees, this is mainly due to the following three factors.

Firstly, and most obviously, medicine is seen as incapable of solving patients' problems when it fails to give *quick* and *certain* answers. As Piera and Franco's accounts above testify, interviewees very frequently describe the origin of their 'problem' as the outcome of an attempt to treat a disease through medicine, which turned into an exhausting sequence of visits, tests, uncertain and delayed diagnoses and therapies replete with side efects. When diagnostic tests and medical treatments do not work, when they go 'on strike' (Latour, 1988, p. 298), the whole conventional medicine framework begins to run out of steam.

Secondly, medicine's hyper-specialisation is at fault because it pushes doctors to focus on the disease, or even the symptoms, rather than take care of the patient and heal the body. Protocols are the main actants in this approach to illness. Experts who embrace refused knowledge, especially medical professionals, often see protocols as the main faw in the conventional approach to illness, as the following excerpt makes clear (see also Chap. 7 by Stefano Crabu):

I am absolutely against certain protocols because I maintain that they are not applicable to everyone. Tat is, I am for medicine based on a person's needs. I mean, a guideline is fne, a protocol is fne, but then the protocol must be applied specifcally to that person, it must be contextualised to what we are doing. (Iacopo/AW)

Tirdly, medicine lacks empathy. Patients are not listened to and emotional support is not given. Tis accusation is levelled against medicine by many interviewees, but it is especially evident in the case of electro-hypersensitivity suferers. Tis condition—which emerged from our study of the Stop 5G social world—is not recognised by the World Health Organisation (WHO), which considers it a syndrome of psychological origin arising from a nocebo efect: if you see an antenna and feel sick, it is because you are somaticising your fear of electromagnetic felds. Tis is the 'tragedy' experienced by electrosensitive people, as Luigi—the president of the Italian association of EHS suferers (AIE)—emphasises: 'By not recognising EHS, WHO efectively prevents national health systems from carrying out adequate diagnostic, prognostic and therapeutic processes. Tere is a segment of the population totally abandoned, which partially—in one way or another—joins us' (Luigi/Stop 5G). Te 'state of abandonment' in which health systems leave patients sufering from symptoms that they attribute to electromagnetic felds pushes them to turn to those who listen to them and take their concerns seriously, that is, to institutional subjects of refused knowledge social world, such as AIE.

#### **3.4.2 Social Relationships and Family Background**

Tus, it is no surprise that joining an RKC generates a magnetic feld which reinforces individuals' interest in, and adherence to, that body of refused knowledge. Te above 'state of abandonment' drives people into the arms of AIE, which not only provides emotional support but also urges them to take an interest in the refused knowledge itself.

Yet individual actors may play a key role here as the network's spokespersons, to an even greater extent than communities and groups.  Tey are often friends, as in the case of Beatrice, an independent 5BLs populariser, who told us:

At forty I was really a disaster: always sick. After a trip to India, I had furunculosis for four years. And there, in fact, some friends told me: 'Look, try to make some changes. Watch your diet!' Until I was forty I had never linked up diet and state of health, therefore, all of a sudden—this friend was a raw food vegan—[…], the transition to raw was incredible: in a week I felt like I had never been so well. (Beatrice/5BL)

In some cases, these actors are charismatic claim-makers—that is, experts recognised by a community of followers who acknowledge their right to set the correct interpretation of a given situation. An interesting case of this type is Térèse Bertherat (see Bertherat & Bernstein, 1980), a French physiotherapist who invented anti-gymnastics and steered Piera to the discovery of the 5BLs community. As a charismatic fgure, Térèse was a point of reference for her community of followers, in terms of values and norms. When Piera was faced with an emergency—a severe pain in her shoulder that Arnica could not treat at a time in which she was unable to contact her homeopath—she turned to a friend who was also an anti-gymnastics teacher and this friend told her, 'Térèse would tell you: don't remain in pain. Because pain isn't good for you, it doesn't allow you to be clear headed. [...] I'm sure Térèse would tell you to take a painkiller' (Piera/5BL). As an actant, the fgure of Térèse exerted infuence on her followers even in her absence, as an 'entity that does not sleep' supporting 'associations that don't break down' (Latour, 2005, p. 70).

In many cases, the part played by the environment of origin is an important one via the infuence of parents, other family members or friends, who prepare the way for the growth of interest in refused knowledge. For example, Carla, a 5BLs follower, talked of a sister interested in 'mystical things' who, like her mother, became a Buddhist. Her sister was the intermediary who introduced her to Hamer's theory and to a number of New Germanic Medicine experts as well. Similarly, Nunzia, a provaccine supporter whose father abandoned a family of four children, grew up in the care of a wealthy aunt who was extremely interested in 'natural nutrition, shiatsu, meditation, all these things' (Nunzia/Pro VC).

#### **3.4.3 Education**

Education is a notoriously important driver in the dissemination of knowledge refused by science, not because adherence to refused knowledge is fostered by scientifc illiteracy but, quite the contrary, because it correlates with a high educational level (McCright & Dunlap, 2011; Veldwijk et al., 2015; Yang et al., 2016). Tis is confrmed by our research, though within the limits of a qualitative approach. Having interviewed several highly educated subjects, the role played by higher education in the process of embracing refused knowledge becomes visible, especially in relation to medical or nursing education, which several of the interviewees had. Te knowledge of these latter on human physiology, chemical reactions, various medical doctrines, physiotherapy practices and so on is a resource that experts as well as laypeople can easily draw on to justify their adherence to refused knowledge. We have already met Franco and Iacopo, who base their refused knowledge expertise on their previous nursing and medical education.

Yet, formal qualifcation is not the only way of acquiring knowledge strong enough to support resistance against scientifc rejection. Several members of these social worlds with varied educational backgrounds have, over the course of time, developed wide-ranging competence in medical or physiological matters to strengthen their adhesion to refused knowledge. Tus, their biographical turns are rarely based on blind faith and pure trust in individuals or institutions. More often, they are founded on arguments rich in technical data and specifc information that is occasionally syncretistically derived from fragments of specialised training and otherwise from self-education and constant netsurfng.

#### **3.4.4 The Media**

Obviously, media is a fundamental driver in such transitions, particularly since, for many, the internet is their primary source of information in the process of *interessement* for refused knowledge. Yet, it does not work as a guide. In Chap. 5, Simone Tosoni argues that the 'university of Facebook'—as an interviewee (Nunzia/Pro VC) calls the immense wealth of information stored on the internet or actively available through social networks—must be understood as primarily a narrative ecosystem (see also Innocenti & Pescatore, 2017). Tis means that the internet works as a repository of news, discourses, arguments, symbols and everyday events that can be appropriated to interact in a specifc social world, such as an RKC, or to justify non-conformist choices to those who either do not share them or oppose them. Accordingly, in the turning processes, the media system complements social relationship networks and extends and supplements the information circulating ofine. A turn to refused knowledge mainly or exclusively based on media information is not a pattern. Obviously, the media system also ofers newcomers a space of interaction in which enrolment can be activated, practiced and made known.

#### **3.4.5 Personal Dispositions**

Pre-existing factors also include personal dispositions, specifc attitudes, even the reprocessing of experiences dating back to childhood or family relationships, as the following excerpt makes clear:

My mom had a difcult delivery. [...] So I was born with a broken collarbone, and my mother really sufered and was always telling me 'Tey stitched me up to the rectum'. In short, I didn't understand that the problem was me being big, because I was born weighing 4.2 kilos. [...]  (Nunzia/Pro VC)

Nunzia resorted to this narrative, which evokes a powerful emotional charge in her relationship with her mother, to make sense of her 'problem': a miscarriage followed by a curettage that she refused to have done. Te bridge she built between the accounts of her own birth and her decision to refuse medical aid after her miscarriage is revealing of a disposition against surgical intervention in a context related to giving birth. Clearly, the origins of this disposition date back to previous experiences that escape sociological observation.

Other interviewees occasionally resorted to conspiracy theories, which however appeared to be a general framework designed to make sense of the world rather than a specifc interpretation of their 'problem'. Such a framework is then activated in the turning process and applied, for example, to frms considered to be at fault for pursuing their economic interests rather than meeting the real needs of sick people: pharmaceutical companies, grouped under the Big Pharma umbrella concept, or communication companies, especially in the case of the Stop 5G community.

#### **3.5 The Turning Process Is Not Driven by an Anti-scientifc Stance**

Just as the awakening metaphor is not an appropriate way to describe the turn to refused knowledge, interpreting individuals' refusal of science by means of categories such as anti-scientifc attitude, irrationalism, spiritualism and esoterism is equally inappropriate. Te dominant attitude within refused knowledge social worlds is characterised by a marked rationalism, in accordance with the standards of Western science. As Michael Lynch has argued, contrasting 'objective facts' and 'appeals to emotion and personal belief' fails to capture the nature of refused knowledge communities: 'Instead of an outright rejection of science and objectivity, what is involved is an efort to produce adversarial claims to objectivity and institutional supports for those claims' (Lynch, 2020, p. 50).

RKCs' ambivalent attitude—characterised by bitter criticism of institutional science and enthusiastic emulation of its procedures, repertoires and language—is particularly visible in the work of refused knowledge experts. As Chap. 2 by Federico Neresini illustrates, several strategies for legitimising and building epistemic authority are widespread in refused knowledge social worlds, from boundary-work to syncretism and mimicry. Experts resort to such strategies to create and strengthen their epistemic authority.

In this context, what is particularly relevant to this chapter's topic is the fact that this compliance with the framework of practices and values typical of Western science is characteristic of the attitudes not just of experts but also of their followers. In fact, this is a sign that the turn towards refused knowledge is not dictated by a fight into the irrational, but by a profound dissatisfaction with the practice of scientifc and medical research and the constraints imposed by the knowledge such research generates. Te case of Davide, who is vaccine hesitant and rejects the ofcial COVID-19 pandemic statistics, can be considered an adequate representative of the opinion of numerous interviewees.

Originally from Uruguay and father of two, Davide sufers from diabetes and hypertension and thus had to lose over 30 kilos in weight. He moved away from institutional medical advice because, he says,

today's doctors, [...] you go there, and frst of all they tell you: 'What's wrong? Take these [pills], two in the morning.' It doesn't work like that. First you have to know what you eat, what you do, what you are. Try to eat less than this, and then we'll see. Don't immediately prescribe medicines. [...] Tat's why I started to change my life. (Davide/Pro VC)

Davide began consulting various experts on the web, thereby building his own knowledge of human metabolism and experimenting with various weight-loss stratagems. He considers it very important to rely on an expert, 'because he knows more', but he also argues that 'you need to evaluate what [the expert] tells you, not shut your eyes and say okay, I'll do this. We are capable of reasoning and saying, 'No this guy is telling me lies'. Try and try again. I tried with nutrition until I found what was right for me' (Davide/Pro VC). What was right for him was a Scientology expert and author of several YouTube videos.

Terefore, Davide's biographical turn is not a rejection of critical thinking but is based on a strengthened form of it. Te fact that the experts he relies on are outsiders to the world of science originates from a profound distrust in the honesty of scientists and the impartiality of their institutions, rather than a distrust of the scientifc method per se. Tis attitude often relies on a distinction and juxtaposition between good and bad science, authentic science and degenerate science—the former ready to accept refused knowledge, but a minority at the institutional level, the latter hostile to refused knowledge because it is corrupted by economic interests. As Harambam has shown (2020, pp. 187–198), the opponents of science often argue that it falls far short of the ideal of sound objective science, because the connection between research fndings and fnancial interests makes it difcult to consider scientists truly disinterested. According to the opponents of science, published scientifc research is manipulated and those calling themselves scientists are traitors to the authentic scientifc spirit. Tis attitude comes across in Davide's words, attributing responsibility for medicine's degeneration to the economic interests of pharmaceutical companies.

Tere is a huge interest from pharmaceutical companies in keeping patients customers.  If you die, I lose a customer; if you fnd an efective cure, it's not even useful. (Davide/Pro VC)

#### **3.6 The Role of a Para-Scientifc Legitimisation of Knowledge**

Briefy, refused knowledge social worlds refer to a widely shared model of knowledge which is basically rational and closely resembles scientifc practices in its structure. It is consistent with, and leveraged by, the legitimisation strategy defned in Chap. 2 as mimicry, as it often deploys the same argumentative frameworks and scientifc communication rhetoric (see, e.g., Lee et al., 2021), although it misunderstands the social dynamics that science works in accordance with and, obviously, does not share some of its contents. I will call this model of knowledge 'para-scientifc' to avoid the prefx 'pseudo', as this implies a distinction between orthodox and deviant science, which is not purely descriptive and involves a normative stance (Dolby, 1979, p. 11). Te prefx 'para' emphasises an afnity with science, rather than the diferences from it.

Discourses supporting or justifying the transition to refused knowledge by leveraging a para-scientifc model mainly pertain to three arguments: (a) the reasons for believing it; (b) the reasons for adhering to it; (c) the reasons for not believing parts of it. I will now closely examine these arguments, focusing on the stories of three 5BL interviewees— Carla, Maria and Piera.

#### **3.6.1 Reasons for Believing in Refused Knowledge**

Respondents describe refused knowledge as logical, convincing and capable of explaining situations. For example, Piera, who joined the 5BLs movement by way of anti-gymnastics, described her biographical turn in the following manner:

Anti-gymnastics helps people rediscover that the body has an intelligence. If it sends signals, these signals always make some sense. So, when I then came across the 5BLs, it clearly ftted. It all added up, taken together, and gave everything an ever richer, ever more stable meaning. (Piera/5BL)

Refused knowledge is convincing to Piera for two reasons: (1) because it is capable of making sense of the 'signals' coming from the world, and people's personal experiences in particular, and (2) because it shows consistency, robustness, a capacity to explain situations in an intelligible and relatively simple manner: 'It all added up'. Tis, incidentally, highlights that her discourse leverages two fundamental arguments of the classical theory of truth: correspondence (of representation to reality) and consistency (of theory in itself).

In certain cases, the intelligibility of refused knowledge takes a logical form that is typical of scientifc knowledge and recognisable by laypeople. For example, Carla accords great explanatory power to the argument 'as if' derived from Alejandro Jodorowsky's psychomagic (see Jodorowsky, 2010), since she sees a compelling logic in it:

I go [to the osteopath] and he tells me, 'Your stomach is so upset because you are tense, [...] it's as if you're being punched in the stomach'.  So, he said, 'It's as if you're being punched in the stomach, when you get punched, what do you do? You take it!' So, I was hunching over and I thought it was [a problem with] my shoulder, instead it was just a consequence of my posture: I took the punch and hunched up. So, she unlocked my diaphragm, straightened my stomach, and I have miraculously got straight again. In two sessions! (Carla/5BL)

While medicine often attributes discomfort to impalpable (e.g. microorganisms) or abstract (e.g. stress) causes, the unconventional explanation appears more convincing to Carla because it is more directly bound up with her personal lived experiences, such as a punch in the stomach. As Chap. 2 illustrates, this recurring refused knowledge attitude involves contrasting authentic and erroneous approaches to empirical evidence (see also Crabu et al., 2023). While the authentic method consists of appealing to experiential knowledge—i.e. the subjective, personal evidence of the individual who experiences a certain situation (illness, healing)—degenerate medicine usually resorts to statistical or experimental data, an impersonal form of knowledge which remains opaque, particularly for patients, who are not experts. Ultimately, the para-scientifc model of knowledge legitimisation is based on 'the self as the source and arbiter of all truth' (van Zoonen, 2012, p. 56), which is the fundamental characteristic of an epistemic approach that, according to van Zoonen, is widespread in today's popular and political cultures, but whose relevance was identifed by scholars long ago as patients' need to supplement the knowledge gained from scientifc sources with their own biographical experiences (Comarof & Maguire, 1981).

#### **3.6.2 Reasons for Adhering to Refused Knowledge**

Carla's story introduces the second cluster of discourses in which the rational and refective character of the turn to refused knowledge emerges: the reasons for adhering to it. While the reasons to believe in refused knowledge fall within the sphere of logic and deduction, the reasons for adhering to it pertain to the sphere of evidence and efcacy. Te strongest evidence for knowledge claims pertaining to health is obviously recovery from a disease. Tus, why turn to refused knowledge? Because it works. People agree to adapt their choices and behaviour to the dictates of refused knowledge because they feel it is efective ('I have miraculously returned straight. In two sessions!') and clearly responds to their needs. According to Maria:

it brought me to recovery [because] when I left hospital I started asking myself questions and doing research. And found out about the New Germanic Medicine. I understood that there was something else, you know, because it was like I healed myself. (Maria/5BL)

Tis is perceived as evidence, as she then says, 'I'm crazy, you know, but I also want the scientifc thing'.

Within this narrative, the comparison with medicine is an essential step, as we have seen. People embrace a specifc body of refused knowledge because it works, whereas prevailing medical treatment has not worked for them. Carla emphasises that the alternative solution worked immediately and unequivocally, while medicine does not provide defnitive answers, envisages relapses and does not conceal the tentative nature of its treatment. Similarly, Piera emphasises that it works cleanly, while medicine has side efects, harms the body physically and emotionally and poisons it (with chemotherapy). In this context, Davide's comment gets straight to the point:

If I know that the results [of my own weight loss method] are good, even if the Nobel prize winner tells me it's not good, I don't give a damn, I look at this. Watch me! (Davide/Pro VC)

#### **3.6.3 Reasons for Not Believing in Parts of Refused Knowledge**

Finally, the para-scientifc model of knowledge is tangible in discourses supporting the turn to refused knowledge by giving reasons not to believe in certain refused-knowledge claims. RKC adherents often place rather precise limits on the feld of knowledge worthy of trust, rejecting knowledge claims which appear to be unreliable or, at least, unconvincing, even if opposed to ('degenerate') science. Carla, who attributes great explanatory power to the 'as if' argument, considers Jodorowsky mad when he suggests stranger therapies:

For example, Jodorowsky suggests treating warts by cutting it into slices, take a red onion, cut it into slices and place the onion on the wart! (Carla/5BL)

Maria resists fully joining the 5BLs because they are not entirely clear, as she sees it:

With the [New] Germanic Medicine this is the problem: it is downplayed partly because there is little clarity in New Germanic Medicine. Te reason why I am waiting to go to the [5BLs] doctor in Cosenza is precisely this that I haven't found answers. (Maria/5BL)

Piera makes a similar point, having decided not to follow her doctor towards quantum and vibrational medicine, because this development did not 'resonate' with her:

Some things that she proposes do not resonate with me and I have never used them, I have never experienced them. For example, she is a fan of Reconnection, have you heard of it? It's a method that comes from America. (Piera/5BL)

Ten she adds, implicitly explaining what it means if something does not 'resonate' with her:

Well, all these things, even the name, leave me very perplexed. (Piera/5BL)

Tus, there are several reasons not to believe in certain refused knowledge claims: because they are not plausible, barely believable, illogical, they leave people perplexed (unconvinced), and appear to lack a scientifc basis. Or, fnally, because refused knowledge cannot solve all kinds of problems. While she is ready to tackle tumours through refused knowledge, Piera describes her newly acquired awareness that alternative medicines cannot solve all problems as making things clearer:

Over the years it's got clearer to me. So, today I know that if I happen to break my leg I'll go to the hospital, absolutely, and I will thank all those doctors who help me with surgery, with cortisone, or any other remedy they know to get my leg back to normal. (Piera/5BL)

Briefy, the set of practices on which the para-scientifc model of knowledge is based (deductive logic, empirical evidence and systematic scepticism) closely resembles and almost replicates that of science. However, in adopting this model, those adhering to refused knowledge adopt a vision of scientifc work based on the idealisation of science performed by epistemological enquiry, disregarding the more contorted trajectory taken by real science, made up of controversies and alliances, theoretical uncertainties and empirical inconsistencies, material constraints and economic drivers—a set of activities which nevertheless work well in stabilising useful knowledge.

Te fact that the para-scientifc model is leveraged not only by experts when they represent refused knowledge in public but also by laypeople stating their reasons for adopting refused knowledge indicates that mimicry of the scientifc approach is not merely a strategy with which to strengthen one's epistemic authority and legitimise a professional feld. Tese discourses are not merely boundary work tools but also impact on the motivations underlying individual transition processes. In other words, they shore up biographical turns.

# **3.7 The Moral Career of Refused-Knowledge Supporters**

As we have seen, medicine is a fundamental driver in the turn to refused knowledge: it fosters adherence to the very same bodies of knowledge it deems unreliable, wrong or fake. In fact the transition is often driven by a centrifugal force that prompts people to distance themselves from common medical practices they consider inconclusive, dangerous and dehumanising. Hence, in some respects the gradual turn to refused knowledge resembles the structuring of a moral career. Without overstating the appropriateness of this analogy, I believe that the theory of moral careers can help to highlight how science's institutional context actively participates in the process of structuring adhesion to the very same knowledge it refuses. In fact, it behaves somewhat like the social institutions responsible for the social control of deviance studied by Erving Gofman (1959) and Howard Becker (1963). Like in deviance, certain social factors channel personal biographies in a direction that is by no means predetermined by the original condition of a subject and is, therefore, the outcome of processes which are superordinate to them.

To begin with, science cultivates an impersonal approach to knowledge. When knowledge is closely bound up with people's lives, as in the feld of medicine and the human body, the impersonal approach cultivated and performed by doctors feels like cold indiference to people's fate, an indiference which makes scientifc knowledge seem detached, distant and useless. As we have seen, hyper-specialisation and lack of empathy are aspects of medicine which interviewees stressed in their explanations of the reasons behind their adherence to refused knowledge. Tey create the breeding ground on which refused knowledge social worlds grow, made up of a desire for acceptance and personal relationships, a need to value personal experiences, a yearning for a harmonious relationship with one's body and a search for certain answers—all aspects which are lacking in conventional medicine and, therefore, pursued outside it.

Moreover, science boundary work confnes refused knowledge to the non-scientifc sphere, thereby building a wall which is then exploited by this same refused knowledge to legitimise itself as true science. In Chap. 2, Neresini argued that the boundary work necessary for the construction and maintenance of a body of knowledge involves a complementarity between what is inside and what is outside its confnes. Te existence of a boundary implies the existence of a territory beyond it, an 'other' social world. But this holds true in both directions. Tus, the very same boundary work by which science preserves its purity and builds its epistemic authority pushes those who feel uncomfortable with this purity to join RKCs. Tis is even more evident when science takes up legal weapons, as is the case of the Italian Medical Council's authority to strike doctors failing to abide by the profession's code of ethics of the medical register. Since the register is mandatory for medical practice in Italy, the Medical Council has great power to direct the profession and put pressure on individual practitioners to meet certain standards. Tis power materialises in the construction of a clear and rigid border between conventional medicine and alternative forms of medicine, the latter being considered inefective by the Council and, therefore, rejected. In our feld of enquiry, this specifc power of science emerges with great force in the case of the 5BLs, given that several former doctors have been struck of the Register for treating cancer patients according to the principles of New Germanic Medicine. Tus, the Council has become the main target of 5BLs experts. In a video interview published on YouTube, Paolo Sanna, a 5BLs populariser who did not complete his medical studies, has said very explicitly:

I could complete my studies now, but there are two reasons why I won't. First, because […] I don't have the time. And, secondly, because as soon as I qualify as a doctor I would be immediately struck of, so it would be absurd, it wouldn't make any sense. Terefore, I'm studying the subject without graduating. I don't practice medicine because I'm not [a doctor], I disseminate this knowledge as an operator. (Sanna, in Ballarini, 2020)

Hence, science contributes to the structuring of RKCs. Adherence to refused knowledge is a step-by-step process in which pockets of resistance persist. Tis is precisely why rejection by science facilitates the structuring of a moral career: it classifes and standardises what is inherently nonstandard. Not only does it exclude a certain body of knowledge from the sphere of what is legitimate thinking, but it also automatically generates the categories of pseudoscience and anti-science, which individuals are ultimately labelled with, thereby hardening what is changeable and still in the making (Bowker & Star, 2000). Moreover, this structuring efect of classifcation is not solely a consequence of constraints exerted externally (for example, being struck of), but also of identity-building processes (Matza, [1969] 2010, pp. 165–180). Classifcation implies normalisation, generating labels by which individuals self-identify and make sense of their life paths, and creating social worlds characterised by a range of expected behaviours, shared frameworks with which members make sense of reality, and legitimate models with which they organise their experience.

In sum, it is the social interpretation of an intrinsically ambiguous experience, such as dealing with a problematic health condition, that transforms it into something defnite and makes it conform to a specifc pattern of action—such as embracing refused knowledge and joining an RKC. Te turn to refused knowledge often originates from a 'problem' that fnds a solution outside the canons of science. But this is just an event in life, a single experience, it still does not make defnite sense. Te mainstream typifcation of such an experience as 'adhesion to refused knowledge' (in common parlance, faith in pseudoscience) helps to give it recognisable meaning. Boundary work, as we have said, is reciprocal and complementary.

#### **3.8 Conclusion**

Tis chapter enquired into the trajectories that lead people to trust knowledge refused by science. Implicitly, I assumed that science has great epistemic authority in today's Western societies (Hendriks et al., 2016), thus the structuring of stable forms of dissent is by no means obvious and requires explanation. I observed that the biographical turn to refused knowledge is not unforeseen and sudden, but sometimes lengthy and often complex; that this process usually passes through various knowledge terrains not accepted as valid or trustworthy by the scientifc community; and that it frequently reveals a progressive radicalisation trend towards bodies of knowledge that are increasingly alternative and less compatible with recognised scientifc knowledge.

I then described several drivers of this turning process and focused on the triggering role often played by specifc health events in individual biographies, as well as on the reasons why medicine contributes to translating such events into 'problems' that only refused knowledge can help to solve. Tis translation of health events or conditions into problems enables them to exert specifc agency, shoring up the turn to refused knowledge. I also argued that turning processes of this kind are not normally driven by anti-scientifc stances because they actually rely on a powerful faith in a simplifed understanding of the scientifc method based on a para-scientifc interpretation of a number of practices typical of Western rationalism, such as deductive logic, empirical evidence and systematic scepticism. Finally, I attempted to interpret the role of conventional medicine in these processes in the light of the theory of moral careers in order to show that the turn to refused knowledge is not simply a matter of the characteristics of the individuals involved, nor it is only due to the RKCs' magnetic force, but it must also be traced back to the structuring of individual trajectories prompted by science, in particular by medicine, precisely by virtue of its institutional nature.

Tis leads us on to the following concluding question: Why does the opinion of the scientifc communities—i.e. of socially legitimate and especially authoritative institutions in contemporary Western societies not deter certain people from embracing refused knowledge? Te stories collected and analysed above ofer a few possible answers, revealing that certain distinctive features of scientifc knowledge contribute to the scientifc failure to discourage those turning to refused knowledge.

Scientifc knowledge is not up to expectations because it is not based on individualistic knowledge validation criteria but rather on intersubjective criteria and institutionalisation processes. Adherence to refused knowledge is often based on an epistemology which emphasises experiential knowledge. By contrast, scientifc knowledge seeks legitimacy from a community of experts endowed with epistemic authority. Adherence to this type of knowledge is based on trust in this community and recognition of this authority and, therefore, requires laypeople to perform an act of entrustment, renouncing personal verifcation and also often accepting ideas and interpretations that confict with their personal experiences (such as accepting the idea that the sun does not revolve around the earth). In certain cases, particularly when our health is at stake, this renunciation is no simple matter.

Moreover, scientifc knowledge is not up to expectations because it is provisional and controversial by nature, which implies that scientists are used to conveying caveats regarding scientifc fndings. However, this is not always welcome to laypeople, as it 'throws individuals back on their own stock of knowledge and biographical experience' (Bury, 1982, p. 174). As recent studies have shown, preferences regarding the sharing of information on the uncertainty of scientifc results vary (Ratclif & Wicke, 2022), with multiple audiences existing. Some of these audiences are not ready to deal with the uncertainty of knowledge. By contrast, the refused knowledge mission is frequently assertive rather than investigative, as it arises to support a stance rejected by science. Refused knowledge experts can thus deliver the certainties that orthodox scientists cannot.

Furthermore, scientifc knowledge is not up to expectations because it is conveyed through impersonal forms of communication rather than interpersonal relationships. Tis is true, frstly, in the feld of scientifc writing, but it is also true of dissemination and, above all, of direct contact between experts and laypeople. Medical doctors normally put communication with patients on an impersonal plane because this is the plane on which their knowledge and epistemic authority are legitimised. Conversely, disseminators of refused knowledge often leverage emotional bonds to convey concepts and ideas.

Finally, scientifc knowledge is not up to expectations to the extent that scientifc institutions, which are the custodians of such knowledge, contribute to structuring the moral careers of the supporters of refused knowledge. Tere is a contradiction implicit in science's role in stabilising socially useful knowledge: when it draws a boundary between what is scientifc and what is not, it weakens the trustworthiness of knowledge classifed as scientifc in the eyes of those who consider knowledge classifed as unscientifc or pseudoscientifc as personally useful.

In introducing this chapter, I argued that studying the transition to refused knowledge is a tool with which to increase our understanding of the stabilisation of knowledge that is accepted and legitimised by scientifc communities. Indeed, the reasons leading people to refused knowledge—insofar as they are not irrational motives but replicate the scientifc posture simply by translating it into alternative, para-scientifc practices and reasoning—constitute a very rich basis of data and food for thought with which to revisit our understanding of science.

#### **References**

**Open Access** Tis chapter is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/ by/4.0/), which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence and indicate if changes were made.

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# **4**

# **Us and Them: Martyrs, Prophets and Mythic Narratives of Refused Knowledge**

**Paolo Bory**

## **4.1 Introduction**

In the public debate, refused knowledge communities (RKCs) openly contesting the scientifc community and expertise are usually labelled as marginal, fragmented and/or minoritarian aggregates of people. Te claims and demands of such communities are rarely accorded space in the mainstream media, such as national newspapers and TV. Even when widespread opposition to ofcial science is publicly acknowledged (e.g. in political debates and talk shows), it is usually depicted as the extemporary and irrational response of misinformed people to certain issues of public concern. During the COVID-19 pandemic in Italy, for example, the contestation of scientifc institutions was portrayed as a spontaneous reaction triggered by fear and panic, rather than the outcome of a longstanding process by which people share everyday practices, information sources and social and cultural beliefs. During the pandemic,

P. Bory (\*)

Department of Design, Politecnico di Milano, Milano, Italy e-mail<EMAIL_ADDRESS>
communities opposing mandatory vaccines or emergency laws, as well as alleged violations of constitutional rights and individual freedoms, were relegated—by the mainstream media in particular—to the domain of irrational, hysterical and feeting reactions typical of the populist hype emerging in crisis contexts (Mede & Schäfer, 2020; Tomasi, 2021).

However, contrary to this partial and monolithic perspective, not only do most RKCs share certain key social practices, experiences (Crabu et al., 2022) and information on an everyday basis but the members of these communities also share stories (i.e., anecdotes, key characters and historical events) which may contribute to their epistemological and cultural foundations. Both distant and recent, these narratives provide RKCs with a set of common beliefs and reference models from the past and the present. But most of all, shared narratives bond communities more closely together, thus strengthening their members' sense of belonging, and drawing—as I will argue—on the boundaries between RKCs and other social worlds.

Te purpose of this chapter is to enquire into RKCs' mythical narratives to highlight the relevance of certain key fgures, events and objects around which these communities weave their common goals, visions and sense of belonging. By analysing the construction of, and tropes surrounding, mythic narratives—both scientifc and religious—the sections which follow will also emphasise the ways such narratives stimulate everyday discussions, practices and even ritual forms within RKCs. In addition to martyrdom stories, a special focus on the myth surrounding Dr Ryke Geerd Hamer and the foundation of German New Medicine will also serve to display an archetypal story in which mythic science and the religious prophet trope interweave.

Tis chapter is divided into four sections. Section 4.1 focuses on the relationship between science, myth and narratives and shines a special spotlight on the 'mythic science' concept in historical and popular accounts of scientists' lives. Section 4.2 dwells on RKCs founding and mythical narratives, listing a series of recurring patterns characterising the RKC 'martyrs'. Section 4.3 enquires into the archetypal intertwining of mythic science and religious/prophetic narratives within one of the communities under scrutiny, the 5BLs community, also focusing on the key tropes surrounding the biography of its founder Ryke Geerd Hamer, revolving around this prophet/scientist's revelation, conversion, persecution and exile, his commemoration and the dissemination of 'false prophets' and internal schism within the community. Te last section summarises the main contents of this chapter in order to highlight the relevance of these founding and mythic narratives as bonding stories contributing, on one hand, to internal RKC cohesion and their positioning within a specifc social world and, on the other, to demarcating these communities from the rest of society. As I will show, this opposition should not be understood purely from a scientifc perspective but also seen in all its socio-cultural, political and anthropological diversity.

#### **4.2 Scientifc Myths, Mythic Science and Founding Narratives**

In recent decades, mythical science and technology narratives have been analysed not only by historians but also in Science and Technology Studies (STS) and by media scholars, who have emphasised the importance of recurring tropes, anecdotes and characteristics of the birth, emergence and co-shaping of technologies and scientifc innovations within a variety of socio-cultural contexts (e.g. Flichy, 2007; Jasanof & Kim, 2015; Ortoleva, 2009). As these scholars argue, in common with geographical and archaeological discoveries, techno-scientifc achievements and revolutions have been often narrated from the starting point of founding stories, or myths, which provide a simple explanation of certain crucial steps in the history of science and technology. Recently, in his *A Final Story*, historian Nasser Zakariya stressed the longstanding complexity of the relationship between the terms 'science' and 'myth', seeing two main ways of ensuring dialogue between the two.

On one hand, ''scientifc myth' is presented as an enlightened and reasonable tale, a self-interrogated superstition, the rational submission of reason to the need for meaning' (Zakariya, 2017, p. 9). Scientifc myths frequently oversimplify the process underlying scientifc inquiry—for example, mishaps, mistakes and empirical or theoretical failures during research—to provide laypeople with an accessible, easy-to-understand (and use) story. In other words, scientifc myths are user-friendly stratagems with which the history of science can be made more universally understandable, familiar and immediate. Scientifc myths are generally very simple and rely to a greater extent on storytelling than the complexity and potential contradictions emerging from historical sources. Tink, for example, of the anecdotes surrounding scientifc discoveries, such as the apple falling on Isaac Newton's head and inspiring him with the formulation of the universal theory of gravity or of the decoding of Nazi codes by a lonely Alan Turing stubbornly working away at his Enigma machine or, once again, to the many stories surrounding the discoveries of such polyhedric geniuses as Tesla and Pasteur.1

On the other hand, although meaningful per se, such anecdotes do not always stand alone, but can act as lynchpins for wider narratives contributing to what Zakariya labels mythic science which he sees as entailing more salient tensions and cultural resonances. Mythic science is an already tamed, if multivalent phrase, the adjectival form of myth bearing little suggestion of 'objectively false', but rather the sense of 'epically scaled' or 'famously successful' (Zakariya, 2017, p. 9).

Mythic science is based on more than simply anecdotes and stories emphasising the ingenuity of inventors and scientifc fgures but also showcases a longer, more troubled story of struggle between geniuses and their theories/discoveries and a hostile system which, in order to preserve the status quo, even went as far as rejecting the clear empirical proof he provided. In this regard, mythic science presents scientifc achievements and innovations as an epic fght between brilliant minds and a system that resists the threat they pose to normal science, and not only on the scientifc but also on the political and economic interest planes. Tere is nothing accidental about the fact that, in narrative terms, mythic science usually melds with epic, for example hybridising inventors' histories with the hero's journey narrative trope (Natale & Bory, 2017), as outlined by Joseph Campbell in his famous book on recurring patterns in worldwide mythologies and epics (2008).

<sup>1</sup>Te life of Pasteur is a case in point of the struggle between scientifc myths and mythical science and historical enquiry (see Cavaillon & Legout, 2022; Latour, 1987).

#### **4 Us and Them: Martyrs, Prophets and Mythic Narratives…**

On their part, historians have bitterly criticised the production and dissemination of these narratives. For example, Douglas Allchin (2004) labelled scientifc myths 'pseudo-histories', comparing the lack of reliability of their sources to the empirical fallacies of pseudoscience. By contrast, several authors have emphasised that myths and, in turn, mythic science should be read through a range of lenses. Rather than seeing these narratives as false or fctional tales, it is more helpful to shed light on the meanings conveyed by founding myths and narratives, especially the possible reasons underlying their long-term persistence in the social imaginary. In this regard, since myths are socio-cultural sense-making tools, they act as 'bridges between the human and the cosmos' (Ortoleva, 2019) and should be studied less in true/false dichotomy terms than as living or dead beliefs (Mosco, 2005) prevailing over historical enquiry or empirical revisionism.2

Where RKCs are concerned, scientifc myths, and mythic science in particular, are extremely widespread and serve as precious narrative resources within their social worlds. For example, certain key mythic science concepts are used as analogies with which to justify these communities' struggle with the academic, economic and political elites preserving the status quo. In the Italian RKC social world, infuential fgures such as Giordano Bruno and Galileo Galilei are often described as RKC predecessors whose aim is to overturn current conceptions of science and scientifc truths. It is worth noting that, unlike other prominent fgures in the history of science, these men failed to reach their goals during their lifetimes. It is this which makes them not only heroes but also martyrs. Tey died or were punished—both psychologically and otherwise—for bearing witness to a faith or an idea. Tis contributes to a key demarcation between the founding narratives of certain RKCs and mythic science: As I will show, the stories surrounding RKCs' best-known characters—particularly those of the 5BLs community—and what is portrayed as the fnal destiny of most of their members, tend to confate

<sup>2</sup> It is worth noting that mythical science also serves scientifc communities, keeping their social worlds tightly bound up. For example, rituals and celebrations such as annual prizes and global events in honor of history of science heroes are a clear demonstration of the relevance of these fgures to scientifc community self-identifcation, thereby contributing to the mythologising of great scientists.

epic with religious content, thereby hybridising the hero and martyrdom and religious prophet tropes.

### **4.3 The Martyrs of Refused Knowledge**

Like Bruno and Galilei, three of the mythical characters of the communities under scrutiny in this book have been rejected by the scientifc community as well as publicly and formally condemned by the scientifc and legal institutions by means of 'exemplary punishments'. Dr Robert O. Young, one of the key fgures in the alkaline water community and author of the 'pH Miracle' series of books, was convicted of several crimes relating to practicing medicine without a license and widely discredited in traditional media. Andrew Wakefeld—a key Pro Vax Choice community fgure globally famous for his theory regarding the link between autism and MPR vaccinations—has been repeatedly attacked in magazines, newspapers and TV shows and was struck of the medical registers in both the UK and the US. In addition, Dr Ryke Geerd Hamer, the founder of the German New Medicine movement based on the 5BLs, lost his license to practice medicine in several European countries, was jailed in Germany and served a prison term in France for fraud and unlicensed medical practice. From the RKC perspective, all these public and formal punishments go hand-in-hand with the sacrifce that goes along with protecting not only their discoveries but also their moral and ethical values and, in turn, the community they belong to and represent.

Furthermore, these stories go far beyond contingency. Public condemnation of what the scientifc community sees as quackery, or pseudo or mock science, can trigger a boomerang response by RKCs. Sometimes with the support of media and political infuencers, such communities (Bory et al., 2022) generate brand new content and materials—such as petitions, documentaries and counterfactual documentations—to debunk the legal and scientifc proofs which discredit their founders and martyrs. Occasionally, RKC martyrs promote and distribute new materials regarding their unjust persecution, as in the case of the documentary *Vaxxed—From Cover-Up to Catastrophe*, produced and directed by Andrew Wakefeld in 2016 to demonstrate the accuracy of his research on the relationship between vaccines and autism, which circulated widely on social media platforms and is still a 'must-see' for the Pro Vax Choice community in Italy and abroad.3 Tis chain reaction between exemplary punishments and the production of counterfactual evidence underlies the construction of martyr fgures like Wakefeld.

However, martyrs are not necessarily transnational fgures. Tey can also emerge in local or national contexts. All the fgures mentioned above are reference models or founding fathers of RKCs in the West. However, in addition to internationally recognised men such as Wakefeld, Young and Hamer, RKCs also have local and context-specifc leaders who occasionally perform the same roles as mainstream international fgures. Maurizio Martucci, one of the leading fgures of the Italian Stop 5G scene, is a clear example of a leader who also acts as spiritual guide. Martucci's struggle against 5G in Italy is, in fact, not only political but also has a strong spiritual connotation which sees technocracy as contrary to mother nature's rules and inner dynamics. Tus, there is nothing accidental about the fact that, in his bio, Martucci describes himself as leader of Alleanza Italiana Stop 5G, and also a holistic discipline and age-old tradition enthusiast who practices Kundalini Yoga combined with an interest in the spiritual path taken by native peoples in symbiosis with nature. […] He is the founder of the natural information website OasiSana (AT: Healthy Oasis).4,5

Other Italian communities, such as Pro Vax Choice, together with a series of political and leaders generally labelled populist, rely on certain exemplary cases or genealogical anecdotes from the past. Some of these stories have made vaccination hesitancy history in the Italian context. An example of this is the story of the Tremante family, a major vaccination controversy, which made Italian news headlines from the 1970s onwards. After the death of his frst child in 1971, Giorgio Tremante lost two more

<sup>3</sup>Te sequel to *Vaxxed*, *Vaxxed 2*, was directed by Robert Kennedy Jr, the son of another US political history's martyrs and well known for his anti-vaccination beliefs and promotional campaigns worldwide.

<sup>4</sup>https://www.terranuovalibri.it/autore/maurizio-martucci-182514.html (accessed 6 October 2022). For an overview of Martucci's role, see Simone Tosoni's chapter in this book.

<sup>5</sup>From now on, all text excerpts from Italian blogs and websites, and in-depth interviews are translated by the author.

children, and another remained paraplegic, because of the adverse efects of mandatory vaccinations.6 After 14 years of legal battles, Tremante received state compensation for his children's deaths but no compensation for the damage, for which he fled an appeal at the European Court of Justice which is still awaiting trial. Tis exemplary story of loss, sufering and legal battles eventually led to the foundation of Comilva, one of Italy's most active associations against mandatory vaccinations.

If the Tremante case is specifc to the Pro Vax Choice community, occasionally martyrs succeed in crossing the RKC boundaries into other RKCs, constituting temporary symbols in a common struggle for one social world (centred on various forms of refused knowledge) as opposed to another (usually led by the academic and scientifc élites). For example, during the COVID-19 pandemic, Italian doctor Giuseppe de Donno promoted an alternative cure based on the transfusion of plasma from healed to ill patients. De Donno argued that this would cost much less than other forms of treatment and would allow nation-states to remain independent of the oligopoly of pharmaceutic companies. Eventually this 'plasma-based cure' was rejected by the scientifc community on the grounds that there was no empirical proof or statistical data indicating that it worked (RECOVERY Collaborative Group, 2021).  Te plasma cure became a miracle artefact amplifying the centrality and public aura of its discoverer. In narrative terms, the miracle cure-persecuted scientist combination eventually spawned a new martyr. In fact, a few months after the public rejection of his fndings, De Donno committed suicide in his apartment. Shortly before his death his profle had been censored by social media platforms such as Facebook and he had been sidelined by the Italian scientifc and medical communities. Beginning on the day after his suicide, De Donno was hailed as a martyr by various communities, and became the human embodiment of the public value of the

<sup>6</sup>On his website, named 'Holocaust caused by vaccination practices' and displaying the dates of his children's deaths, Tremante has published all the articles and parliamentary questions regarding his legal case and other vaccine-related legal issues. See: http://www.tremante.it/ (accessed 6 October 2022).

sacred/miraculous artefact. De Donno's suicide was described on RKC social media as suspicious with some users suggesting that he had probably been assassinated by the scientifc/political élite to 'eliminate' a potential enemy. De Donno's sacrifce ultimately made him a symbol for numerous RKCs of the struggle for 'truth' against the power of the scientifc and political establishment.7 It should be noted that not all RKCs reacted in the same way to this episode. Te 5BLs community, for example, did not endorse the cures proposed by De Donno, but honoured his lonely fght against the 'system', while other communities agreed on the presumed evidence for the efcacy of the 'plasma-based cure'. Like De Donno, notwithstanding the diversity in their epistemic backgrounds, all the characters associated with RKCs—such as Hamer, Wakefeld, Young and many others—are fghting together in the front line of a shared struggle against scientifc elites. It should be noted that, unlike global martyrs such as Wakefeld, the stories such those of Tremante and De Donno are 'common man' stories of people heroically fghting for their rights, generating a mythical aura that is as powerful as other more common martyrdom stories.

#### **4.4 In the Name of the Prophet: The Ryke Geerd Hamer Archetype and the Birth of the Five Biological Laws Community**

In the RKC social world, certain myths have taken on such importance that they resemble the foundational myths which have long characterised human history and have occasionally equated scientifc myth with sacred myth in a hybrid part-scientifc-genius-part-prophet system. Tis is the case of Hamer and the fve biological laws. Of the numerous founding narratives of the Italian RKCs, the story of the discovery of the 5 Biological Laws (5BLs) is probably the most archetypal and fascinating. All the

<sup>7</sup>False prophets emerged during the pandemic as well. An example is Pasquale Bacco, one of the doctors who led the campaign against COVID vaccinations in 2020 and then changed his mind in 2021, withdrawing all his previous statements and making himself a 'common enemy' for several RKCs.

founding narrative traits and tropes listed thus far confate in the mythical fgure of German doctor Ryke Geerd Hamer, founder of German New Medicine (GNM), a blend of scientifc epic and spiritual implications, combining the story of a great scientist with the life of a prophet.8 Scientifc myth narrative tropes such as the eureka moment and scientists' fght for public acknowledgement of their discoveries are there in Hamer's life story, together with certain key life-of-the-prophets tropes. To summarise the stages in the prophet's journey, four tropes will be analysed in this section: revelation, conversion, persecution and exile, and the fght of the prophet and his followers against 'false prophets'.

#### **4.4.1 Revelation**

In 1978, while on vacation in Corsica, Ryke Geerd Hamer's 19-year-old son Dirk was shot in the leg by Vittorio Emanuele di Savoia, the former Italian crown prince. Dirk Hamer eventually died, and his father was later diagnosed with testicular cancer, which was operated on. Following these episodes, Hamer dreamt of his son, who guided him to the discovery that cancer is caused by sudden trauma leading to biological confict. In 1981, Hamer elaborated a theory according to which all diseases are caused by biological conficts and only profound understanding of the origin of the disease and, thus, of the confict itself can bring healing. He called this process the Dirk-Hamer-Syndrome (DHS) in homage to his son, thereby baptising the Five Biological Laws (5BLs). Hamer credits his son's appearance in his dreams for his discovery of the 5BLs. On one hand, Dirk's appearance in his father's dreams can be seen as a form of hierophany (Eliade, 1963)—i.e. a manifestation of the sacred. Te hierophany of Dirk Hamer partially fts with other anecdotes like the

<sup>8</sup>Te scientist/prophet dichotomy has already been examined in rhetorical and historical studies (Lessl, 2011; Walsh, 2013). For example, in her book *Scientists as Prophets* (2013), Lynda Walsh points to the prophetic role of contemporary scientists, analysing the scientifc rhetoric used. According to Walsh, contemporary 'great' scientists tend to not only forecast the future of society to strengthen their scientifc paradigms and discoveries but also to disseminate their personal views on political and societal issues. Unlike Walsh's contribution, the scientist/prophet parallel used in this chapter focuses more on the religious features and narrative tropes surrounding the stories and prophets and thus not only on their role as 'oracles' (Walsh, 2013, pp. 160-161), which is mainly based on their claims to foresee the future.

annunciation of Christ to Mary by Archangel Gabriel or the fnding of the Tablets of Stone in the Moses story. However, unlike these examples, Dirk did not reveal everything about the natural laws to his father, but provided his father with a series of clues and scientifc paths to it, for example,

this [the 5BLs] will cause a revolution in medicine. You can publish it in my name. But you will have to do more research. You haven't understood everything, you are missing two important things. (Post on Facebook from Hamer's testament, published on 17 March 2022)

According to this story, Dirk's revelation of the laws was not selfexplanatory. As a scientist Geerd Hamer had to follow his son's advice and study, research and prove the validity of the laws. Tis revelation story had a great impact on the 5BLs community. On one hand, Hamer was not the creator of the laws, but rather the scientist who translated the laws provided by Dirk for the people. In Geerd Hamer's words,

my Dirk deserves credit for not only initiating the knowledge of cancer correlations through his death, but also inducing it after his death and passing it on to me. (ibidem)

Te character of the son Dirk is essential to the 5BLs community, since he was both the frst source and the depositary, it might be said, of the 5BLs copyright. It is no accident that his picture is everywhere on GNM followers' social media profles and several magazines and books on GNM display Dirk's picture on their covers. However, if Dirk is the 5BLs saint, Ryke Geerd Hamer is the medium capable of conveying his word and simultaneously the scientist required to test and disseminate the laws and make them understandable and verifable worldwide.

#### **4.4.2 Conversion and Persecution**

Ryke Geerd Hamer's background was in theology and medicine. It is no accident that religious and scientifc reasoning and wordings are often used side-by-side in his writings. After the 5BLs discovery/revelation, Hamer took another important step along the path taken by many prophets: conversion to a new medicine and rejection of orthodox medicine and the elitist organisation of which Hamer himself was part. In fact, Hamer's conversion to German New Medicine went hand in hand with bitter criticism of medical practices and protocols and also of the medical establishment's organisations and infrastructures, such as hospitals and psychiatric facilities. Such criticisms were juxtaposed to a spiritual and evangelical mission: to help the weakest, poorest and most unfortunate victims of a cruel and dehumanised medical system. For example, in his account of a visit to a psychiatric hospital, Hamer argued that what I saw there was dreadful and horrifc. Patients, including young people with schizophrenia, who had dreams and hopes like you and I, were sitting in a closed facility like animals in a cage. Nobody knew what diseases these unfortunate people really had. Since that time, I had the strong desire to help those poorest of the poor. I believe that I have succeeded. (Hamer, 1987, p. 3)

Hamer's mission and conversion is consistent with those of other prominent fgures in the history of prophets. Tink of the story of Siddhartha, born into a wealthy family as a prince but moved by the world's sufering to give up his wealth for a life of poverty and help people fnd the true path to spiritual balance. Similarly, Hamer gave up his wealthy and authoritative role in orthodox medicine to help those in need. But, once again, this religious conversion confates with a radical change in scientifc practice, leading Hamer to a new vision regarding the role of technology in medical practice. Notably, Hamer's redemption from orthodox medicine went hand in hand with a shift from a hypertechnological job to a medical practice that excluded most medical artefacts and technologies. Te founding narrative recounts that before his conversion to 5BLs, Hamer was famous for patenting and selling innovative surgical instruments. Once redeemed from cold allopathic medicine, he was to use medical instruments—for example, X-ray machines—only to demonstrate the validity of his theories, while rejecting and condemning most of orthodox medicine's technological and pharmacological applications.9 Tis paradigm shift led Hamer to condemn medical practices such as chemotherapy on the grounds that they interfere with the natural progression of diseases. Tis rejection of technocratic medicine resonates in the discussions and posts of the 5BLs community, both orthodox and more fexible. For the 5BLs community, on top of various criticisms of vaccines, chemotherapy and other specifc technologies, the entire spectrum of allopathic medicine is also to be condemned:

Te average man continues to throw down pills for high blood pressure, blood sugar, cholesterol, prostate, and a variety of other reasons, without having any knowledge of the substances and their real 'usefulness', out of sheer confdence. And he continues to undergo often humiliating and invasive examinations, performed with increasingly cold and sophisticated machinery, out of sheer confdence. (AT Blog post by 5BLs expert, 20 June 2020)

Te conversion to 5BLs and rejection of the 'cold and sophisticated machinery' specifc to orthodox medicine was followed by a long series of trips and experiences through which Hamer evangelised his medicine, triggering a powerful reaction from the scientifc community which, according to the narrative, began persecuting him all over Europe:

In Chambéry and other places there were people coming from Spain and from Italy, you could see the queue of patients on three foors: and then he was convicted of illegal practice of medicine, you know? I witnessed all this process, and I saw how nobody listened to him. Eventually, they tried to kill him: he has a bullet hole in the windshield of the car. Tey tried to intern and lock him in an asylum. And, so, in short, my belief was at that time that Hamer was slandered, also because he had a view of the whole scientifc world that was appealing to his fndings, saying that they were Jewish Masonic lodges. (Interview with 5BLs expert)

Te persecution of Hamer, like those of religious prophets such as Christ or Jeremiah, turned into a series of ofcial and exemplary

<sup>9</sup> In particular, German New Medicine is against chemotherapy as a cure for cancer and also condemns the use of various forms of analgesics (particularly morphine) because they interfere with mental processes and are dangerous to patients' health.

condemnations. Hamer was jailed, colleagues from various countries criticised and publicly condemned his earlier work and he was disbarred from the medical profession and attacked by the mainstream media, especially in Italy. Te boomerang efect of this multipronged attack is that today, according to orthodox GNM followers, medical experts should follow Hamer, despite the risks involved:

From the outside, one practically expects that the system to which one belongs by duty, and with which one does not interact, must at some point implode. Hamerian doctors must ask to be disbarred and get out of the system to be honest with themselves. (Blog post by 5BLs expert 20 June 2020)

Furthermore, Hamer's conversion, subsequent persecution and consequent pain and sufering make the scientist/prophet extremely 'human', suggesting that anyone, not only scientists and doctors, can change their minds about health and medicine—irrespective of their age—and embrace the 'truth' revealed by the biological laws.

#### **4.4.3 Exile, Death and Commemoration**

Certain prophets' narratives end with a death penalty. When Hamer was persecuted, some members of the 5BLs community even went as far as to hope for such an end. Again, recalling the life of Galileo, one member of the community claimed

Even Galileo was targeted for his discoveries and yet it is still the earth that revolves around the sun. If we want to get to the juice, indeed, at the moment of the squeeze we discover that it is still 'love that moves the sun and other stars'. Why don't they just kill him and end this for good? I think the power that would create a martyr of this magnitude is truly infnite. (Posted by 5BLs member on Facebook group 12 December 2016)

However, Hamer was never killed. Te last part of his biography led him to another prophet trope, his lonely exile in Norway to take refuge against all the trials, journalists and other potential persecution from the European scientifc establishment. Soon, Hamer's home in exile became a place of pilgrimage and the followers of German New Medicine attempted on various occasions to reach out to the prophet, meet him and listen to his truth-speaking voice live. It is no accident that Hamer interviews during his exile, some of which are still available on YouTube, have become key social media content shared by the members of the 5BLs community. Even today, the followers of German New Medicine frequently discuss, re-post and comment not only on Hamer's medical and scientifc thought but also his incredible ability to foretell the future, as with the dangerous and elitist project that eventually led to the pandemic vaccination campaign.

Te scientist/prophet in exile must be met, touched and listened to by his followers, and this is exactly what three young members of the 5BLs community did when they embarked on a long trip to Hamer's house in Norway the following manner:

We are three friends, three colleagues, three scholars who have decided to draw from the source, the fundamental, the essential substrate, the energy behind the discovery. […] Te target is Norway, the target is a doctor, or rather, Te doctor. I'm talking about Dr Hamer himself. [….] I want to give this diary a magical and mystical note, as this journey has been and will be, magical and mystical. We are so grateful to Dr Hamer that despite the complexity of the situation we will pay visit to him without knowing if he will open the door. But we will meet him, despite all the obstacles ahead, we are too determined. (From the diary *A Discovery Journey to the Source*, published on 5BLs Facebook groups)

Te last mass pilgrimage to Hamer took place in July 2017. On 2 July Hamer died of a stroke and recordings of his funeral on 14 July 2017 show hundreds of people attending a magnifcent event whose ritual solemnity and sacredness were enhanced with fags, choruses and testimony. After his death, Hamer becameboth GNM and the wider 5BLs community prophet and martyr. Every year, on 2 July, members of the 5BLs community share Hamer's picture on social media accompanied by the words 'Tank you Dr Hamer',10 and prayers and comments on their

<sup>10</sup>*Tank you, Dr Hamer* is also the title of the most widespread and prominent Italian book about GNM.

founder's greatness, goodness and profound kindness and humanity. Once again, in this ritual, the prophetic and mythic science narratives confate, as users' posts like the one below show:

Ryke Geerd Hamer (Mettmann, 17 May 1935–Sandeford, 2 July 2017) Man, Doctor, Genius, Martyr. (Posted 2 July 2021 by 5BLs expert on a Facebook group)

Tis moment of commemoration has a twofold meaning. On one hand, the community congregated around its founder, commemorating him for his gift of the 5BLs. At the same time, as Marcel Mauss argued in his anthropology classic (Mauss, 1990), every gift brings with it the donor's identity and his human values. Commemorating Hamer's death serves both to give the community cohesion—it is a ritual of communitarian reunion—and facilitate the sharing of values and attitudes and a shared struggle against the status quo. Like Hamer, 5BLs followers have a mission to accomplish—to assert their right as human beings to return to nature, follow its rules and oppose elitist control over health and medicine practices by a small number of cold actors and technocratic institutions.11

#### **4.4.4 Schism and False Prophets**

Prophets' biographies generally discuss their struggles against those who attempt to mimic and overturn their teachings. False prophets are presented as impostors or traitors who distort the 'word of God', as in Catholicism's apocryphal gospels. Tis kind of struggle for the truth is also visible in certain scientifc controversies, particularly when scientists and inventors dispute their origins and empirical proof.

In certain cases, false prophets fnd their own followers who launch a new version of the cult, thereby provoking a schism that splinters the original community. Within the 5BLs framework, false prophets are guilty of three major sins: misinterpreting or mixing the laws with other

<sup>11</sup>On this topic, see Stefano Crabu's chapter in this book.

false claims; portraying themselves as new prophets, usually overshadowing the true prophet Hamer; enriching themselves with the sacred word and misappropriating the biological laws from their collective ownership.

Towards the end of Hamer's life and after his death, a number of adepts decided to establish their own schools and training programmes, triggering an internecine struggle within the community. Hamer himself disavowed a few of his pupils, particularly in Italy.12 For example, in a letter to the members of the frst Italian 5BLs association named *Associazione Leggi Biologiche Applicate–Association of Applied Biological Laws* (ALBA) Hamer wrote,

I want to have nothing more to do with the superiors of ALBA, who have betrayed me, the German New Medicine, and deceived our patients (by 'superior order'?). […] I consequently formally forbid ALBA executives, to defraud me and all patients in my name and under the banner of the German New Medicine. (Letter from Hamer to the members of ALBA, 16 March 2007)

Although the movement's founder/prophet has never been questioned as such by any associations or training schools promoting the biological laws, three sub-groups relying on Hamer's work but with various degrees of fexibility can be distinguished. Te frst, and probably the most apocryphal, of these, and also the largest, is made up of people who rely only partially on the 5BLs—for example, adding and mixing the contents of GNM to allopathic medicine or to other approaches such as Chinese traditional medicine and homeopathy, among others. For these people, Hamer is one of many charismatic fgures who have contributed to individuals' emancipation from a monolithic and elitist vision of medicine and science.

Te second can be labelled progressive and is led by a series of 5BLs experts, most of whom have a research background in felds such as psychology and alternative and/or complementary medicines. Tis group, like most scientifc communities, aims to promote Hamer's discoveries and combine the 5BLs with other approaches, whilst retaining 5BLs as

<sup>12</sup>Hamer condemned one of his pupils in particular. Te dissemination of false prophets here confates with another recurring trope of religious stories: the betrayer, the Judas.

the cornerstone of medicine. Some of these fgures—many of whom have renamed GNM, thus hiding Hamer's name from their promotional campaigns—claim that GNM, like science, needs to be explored further. Some of the progressives have been bitterly criticised by other followers of GNM, mainly on the basis of accusations that they are attempting not only to appropriate 5BLs but also to make money from it:

Tere are people who have based their wealth, their income, on the use of this information. (Sighs) Which is ok, it's not wrong to want to make money or create an economy around this thing: however, what I regret is not seeing anything given away. Nothing freely donated. Tat is, the fve laws are a heritage of nature, they are not a copyright. Tey are not a patent! Tey are not patentable. It's like wanting to patent gravitation, you know? I mean gravitation is gravitation. Whether you are walking or fying, there is always gravitation. And it's not patentable, so why do you keep it for yourself? All for yourself? I don't understand that. (Interview with 5BLs expert)

Te third group can be labelled the orthodox group—that is, those who trust and follow only Hamer's frst-hand writings and lessons. Tis group generally criticises false prophets, particularly those who attempt to 'update' the 'already perfect' GNM:

Tere are two methods of spreading the GNM: in one we talk about the 5BLs, we never go against ofcial medicine (on the contrary, the GNM integrates...), the 5BLs (which have no therapy) are mixed with the most disparate alternative 'therapies', and very little (practically never) is said about Hamer.  It is the same modality of the patient-doctor relationship in ofcial medicine. In the second method, we talk about Hamer's medicine, we talk about the propaganda, the lies, and the idiocy of the ofcial medicine; we do not mix the GNM with anything else because there is no need for that, because the SBS programs are already a therapy—the therapy of nature. (Blog posted by 5BLs expert on 20 September 2020)

#### **4 Us and Them: Martyrs, Prophets and Mythic Narratives…**

Tis dispute between adepts and false prophets notwithstanding, the prophet and great scientist trope that is the cornerstone of GNM contributes to the very survival of this approach. Te Hamer founding narrative ensures that the 5BLs are always discussed, reinterpreted and, in certain cases, questioned and updated. In this regard, rather than generating a paradigmatic shift in the 5BLs community the schism led only to a partial evolution in its genealogy, thereby widening its potential audience into new types of followers.

As one of its experts has argued, the most important schism in the 5BLs community in Italy notwithstanding, the biological laws will never disappear:

Five minutes after the advent of all the greats of the earth, the most disparate truth-claiming groups were formed within the very core of innovative thinking. Tus Christ's birth was followed by that of the Catholics, Protestants, Calvinists, Orthodox, Lutherans, Mormons […]: all claiming to have the best God. […] So, we have a God for Muslims, for Orientals, etc. […] So it happens a little bit to all currents of thought. [...] As far as Hamer's fndings are concerned, I feel particularly calm, because biological laws do not give a damn about internal divisions and, since they are laws that have always existed and will always exist, they fortunately continue to apply as natural processes. (Trupiano, 2015, p. 284)

Overall, the truth of the 5BLs will always prevail in any forms of schism. Just like scientifc and religious myths, scientifc truth and holy truth go hand in hand. Te comparison with religious systems here is not coincidental: like God, the laws of nature survive any kind of 'truthclaiming groups', and false prophets cannot even scratch the surface of the truth.

#### **4.5 Between Us and Them**

Te archetypal Hamer story, and the melding of mythic science with prophets, is a clear example of the contribution a founding narrative can make to the creation, stability and preservation of an RKC over time. In this narrative, ingenuity, spirituality, epics and sacredness are mixed up together, following tropes regarding scientifc achievements alongside religious contents, rituals and internecine confict between the community's followers. On one hand, the power of such narratives lies in their shareability and familiarity, in other words, its set of recurring patterns, metaphors and fgures which constitute the building blocks of epics and religious texts worldwide. On the other hand, additional intricacy, complexity and concurrent forms of resistance within the 5BLs community to external epistemologies go hand in hand with the quality, recognisability and solidity of its founding narrative regarding its scientist/prophet Hamer.

Simultaneously, other communities such as Stop 5G, Alkaline Water and the Pro Vax Choice community also have their own founding narratives and martyrs. However, these communities often recall their founding fathers, martyrs and key anecdotes in a more functional manner, depending on the struggle under way or the enemy targeted, as in the last pandemic. Unlike transitory martyrs (e.g. De Donno during the pandemic), founding fathers are heroes and, simultaneously, martyrs representing a common mission to revolutionise not only science, health and medicine but also politics and culture. In this regard, the 'us' and 'them' dichotomy is summed up by these characters and their biographical journeys, thereby also leveraging another recurring prophetic narrative trope—millennialism. Notably, founding fathers (and very rarely mothers) and legendary scientists—such as Galileo Galilei and Giordano Bruno—often do not achieve their goals. Rather, they anticipate and contribute to a long-term achievement that can be either a full 'evangelisation' of society or, more often in RKCs, an apocalypse, a fnal judgement, in which those who 'know' or have learned 'the truth' will be saved. Whilst the words they use may vary contemporary RKC prophets and leaders recursively share a common philosophy: 'As far as we know, our community will survive, while they will eventually pay or perish'.13 In a

<sup>13</sup>Tis is a rhetoric characteristic not only of scientifc and religious beliefs but also of conspiracy theories and populist narratives. In a sense, in RKCs as well as in science-related populism, the religious discourse revolving around the fnal judgement, according to which 'those without sin will be saved', intersects the resistance rhetoric found in political movements (e.g. partisan movements) and according to which the fnal liberation of the people will depend not only on an 'act of faith' but also on a daily struggle for survival or, in other words, on a constant act of 'resistance'. Te fact that the social world of refused knowledge communities appears to subsume religious beliefs and political views into a single system of thought and belonging certainly requires further analysis and empirical research, from both sociological and historical perspectives.

motivational post at the beginning of the pandemic, the most prominent Italian magazine on the 5BLs claimed:

Te crisis is not now, the crisis will not be later: think about it, the crisis started long before this phenomenon. We recognised it but we always gritted our teeth to adapt and survive and not only in economic terms. Before our life was survival not life, now our life is an opportunity to start living again, to change how our world works. Not with manifestations but by individually raising our vibrations. If we allow ourselves to transcend the manifestation of current reality and keep our new reality intentions for the future alive, on a daily basis, we have the ability and all the necessary talent to create it. Te 'how' will present itself at the right time along our way with new opportunities, new ideas and new actions which have never been tried before. If you are listening to this, it is because you have already set of on your personal path, also thanks to the fve biological laws. Now there is nothing you can do because you have already acquired the tools, and earned them with the sweat of your brow. (Posted on 5BLs Magazine on 18 April 2020)

As this quote shows, the pandemic amplifed millennialism's discursive presence as one of the most recurring tropes in RKCs and several religions worldwide (Lynch et al., 2021; Murru, 2022). Notably, the 'us and them' dichotomy is also a demarcation between those who believe in the inner eschatology of their scientifc, but also cultural and religious, paradigms and those who will be condemned for following the 'false prophets' of dogmatic science. Founding narratives, the martyrdom stories, prophecies of a future in which orthodox science will be overturned by a pure and human-centred science—these are all part of a common action plan designed to separate RKCs of from the rest of society, not only in scientifc but also in shared belief terms and, in turn, of political views and everyday behaviours. As Claude Levi-Strauss argued in his seminal study (2013), myths are designed to resolve the inner contradictions and uncertainties of a specifc society or community. Overall, the understanding of the values and the exquisitely political meanings of RKC mythical systems will not merely serve to bring down the refused knowledge 'house of cards' (i.e. revealing its 'false' myths). Such understanding is rather essential to shed light on what the house is built on, and also to explore the vulnerabilities, inadequacies, contradictions and communicative biases of contemporary science and of scientifc narratives.

### **References**

Mauss, M. (1990). *Te gift*. Routledge.

**Open Access** Tis chapter is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/ by/4.0/), which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence and indicate if changes were made.

Te images or other third party material in this chapter are included in the chapter's Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the chapter's Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder.

# **5**

# **From Scientifc to Syncretic Patchwork Storytelling: The Discursive Ecosystem of Italian Stop 5G Refused Knowledge Communities**

**Simone Tosoni**

#### **5.1 Introduction**

Te relationship between RKCs as social worlds (Clarke & Star 2007; see also Chap. 2 by Federico Neresini) and the knowledge they profess must be conceived as inherently co-constitutive. On one hand, sharing knowledge refused by the scientifc community constitutes RKCs' 'principal afliative mechanism', 'both making and marking [their] boundaries' (Clarke & Star, 2007, p. 115). It is sharing a common system of beliefs which prompts individuals to join these groups, keeps RKCs together and potentially accords members specifc expertise-based status. On the other hand, this knowledge is not unchanging and pre-existing members' participation, but both pre-condition and outcome of their participation

e-mail<EMAIL_ADDRESS>
S. Tosoni (\*)

Department of Communication and Performing Arts, Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, Milano, Italy

<sup>©</sup> Te Author(s) 2024 **109**

F. Neresini et al. (eds.), *Manufacturing Refused Knowledge in the Age of Epistemic Pluralism*, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-99-7188-6\_5

itself: it is continuously produced and reproduced by RKCs themselves through ongoing discoursivisation practices performed in a range of 'situations' across a plurality of sites (Clarke, 2005). Tis is the case, for example, of live meetings or social media debates to which members contribute with new information or by contesting certain assumptions in favour of others. It is also the case of the production of articles, books, videos and other cultural artefacts in which RKCs' shared knowledge achieves a higher level of systematisation, becoming, however temporarily, more stable.

It is precisely to account for this co-constitutive relationship that the social worlds framework (SWF) moves beyond 'concepts of discourse analysis stemming from European phenomenology and critical theory' (Clarke & Star, 2007, p. 116) to address the discursive production situation (Strübing, 2019) where the social world and its discourses are simultaneously shaped. To this end, it adopts an ecological approach that conceives of the situatedness of social discourse production in an relational way, that is, as a form of interaction between a plurality of social actors and nonhuman actants (such as social platforms' algorithms, for example) participating to the same social world, and to the wider arena revolving around the same 'matter of concern' (Latour, 2004). Notably,

All the elements empirically found in the situation of interest […] are understood as co-constitutive—they help to make each other up and together constitute the situation as a whole [:] things have meaning only in relation to the situations in which they are found or occur. (Clarke, 2019, p. 15)

In what follows, I will adopt this perspective to address the discursive knowledge-production situations enacted by the Italian Stop 5G RKC throughout its history. Tis case study is, in fact, especially revealing regarding the 'situatedness and contingency, history and fuidity, and commitment and change' (Clarke & Star, 2007, p. 113) of the coconstitutive relationship between RKCs and their shared knowledge. In particular, I will focus on the strategies adopted by the Stop 5G RKC to mark the boundaries of its discursive practices in order to stabilise its shared knowledge, and the radical changes that took place in these practices during the COVID-19 pandemic. I will describe this turn—which is currently risking breaking this RKC up—in terms of a shift from a 'scientifc' to a 'syncretic' patchwork storytelling approach, the former based on selecting sources regarded as scientifc, the latter combining diverse and sometimes conficting discursive sources, such as scientifc knowledge, folklore, new age spirituality and conspiracy theories.

It is, however, impossible to address this turn without paying systematic attention to the role played by media—and social media in particular—in the concrete discursive knowledge production situation analysed here. As we will see, a signifcant part of RKC discursive practices are media-related (Couldry, 2004, 2012) and became exclusively so during the COVID-19 pandemic lockdown. Before we proceed further then, we need to adapt a methodological framework from media studies to support the ecological approach advocated by the SWF when dealing with media-related practices.

#### **5.2 A Media Ecosystem Approach to RKC Discursive Shared Belief Production**

Over the last two decades, an ecological methodological sensibility has emerged in various subfelds of research within media studies (such as journalism studies, media archaeology and media storytelling studies), prompting scholars to move beyond approaches centred on a single medium and an overly rigid compartmentalisation of their research interests into user-, content- and technology-related issues (Anderson, 2016; Fuller, 2005; Pescatore, 2018; Tafel, 2019; Zuckerman, 2021). However diferently—and sometimes inconsistently—understood by the various authors, the concepts of (media/news/narrative) ecology and (media/ news/narrative) ecosystems have been leveraged to acknowledge that media phenomena can only be tackled in a relational way, as an interplay of heterogeneous and mutually constitutive entities (Tosoni & Tarantino, 2013): symbolic and material, human and nonhuman, pragmatic and structural, and social, economic and technological.

Tis *rhizomatic* approach to media ecology, which should not be confused with the *environmental* media ecology tradition stemming from the work of Marshal McLuhan and Neil Postman (Anderson, 2016), developed independently of the SWF. Nonetheless, a number of shared theoretical inspirations—especially the work of Gilles Deleuze and Felix Guattari (2004, or. ed. 1980) and actor–network theory—mean that rhizomatic media ecology and SWF converge on some key methodological points. Sy Tafel (2019), in particular, has underlined the centrality of Deleuzian concepts of *rhizome*, describing the non-linearity of interrelationships between heterogeneous elements, and *assemblage* as:

A way of describing the process by which collective entities of humans, nonhuman biological organisms and nonliving actors (such as technologies) are composed. … Tinking in terms of assemblages means going beyond isolated objects-in-themselves, instead studying the confgurative relationships between entities. … Tings do not exist alone, or as connected individuals, but as entangled, intra-active assemblages. (p. 36)

For the purposes of this chapter, one of the most inspiring applications of this rhizomatic ecological approach regards narrative ecosystems. Addressing the specifcities of recent media products, Guglielmo Pescatore (2018) has described the way that the new forms of storytelling adopted by these are not only transmedia but also made up of modular elements that cannot be regarded as 'text-objects since their only narrative coherence constraints are local'1 and 'cannot be attributed to the strong intentionality of a subject governing the whole system' but are rather designed around an initial 'core set' of 'locations, characters, users and the properties deriving from them' (p. 28). Tis core set constitutes the common ground for the interaction of a plurality of human and nonhuman actors and actants (i.e. authors, audiences, platforms and media formats) that translate it into a plurality of narrative orientations in reciprocal synergy or competition. It is thus not possible to make sense of these products by means of content or narrative analysis alone. What is required is a focus on the dynamic structuring of the environment promoting the interaction between actors and actants from which they stem. One of the most fascinating examples discussed by Pescatore (2018) are two experiments in *swarming storytelling* by Kai Pata (2011) in which users equipped with

<sup>1</sup>All translations of other languages are the author's.

computers, cameras and smartphones were asked to produce bits of a story consisting of a picture and some comments. Tese collective endeavours, in which all participants acted as producers and audiences, generated hypertextual forms of storytelling characterised by the absence of a central text or 'grand master':

Tere are several access points to diferent stories. Users enter from the point that defnes their perspective. Perspectives are individual, but diferent shared perspectives create niches, clusters of narratives and plots that generate greater engagement and are more commented upon, shared and fed by other writing processes. Te system is polycentric, inhabited by narratives and [clusters] of stories 'scattered' across the ecosystem. (Bisoni et al., 2013, p. 20)

Clare Birchall and Peter Knight (2023) described the structure of the conspiracy theories that took shape and circulated on the Internet, especially during the COVID-19 pandemic and including those encapsulating refused knowledge about 5G, exactly in this way. Tis structure is described as a galaxy of modular bits of storytelling and pieces of knowledge lacking a grand master and accessible from several entry points—in which users were invited to 'do [their] own research' and 'fll in the dots' generating clusters of narratives of various degrees of persistence and intensity. Tis galaxy began to engage the Italian Stop 5G RKC and its arena during the COVID-19 pandemic. As Birchall and Knight (2023) underlined, 'ecology provides a potentially productive way of thinking about the complex interaction between the content, the users, the technological infrastructure and the social dynamics of the diferent digital platforms' (p. 53). From this perspective, the digital sphere can be seen as a vast interconnected discursive ecosystem (IDE), an environment in which diferent discourses and narratives can coexist and interact in multiple ways in their transmedia circulation, sometimes colliding and competing, sometimes adapting to each other and sometimes reassembling into new and broader ones.

Yet, the authors warn that the ecological metaphor 'is not free of its own unspoken assumptions' (p. 53). Within the current rhizomatic strand of research in media studies in particular, the metaphor tends to drive scholars to overlook the concrete discursive production situations generating temporary, however stabilised, assemblages, in favour of a broad overview of the functioning of the ecosystem as a whole. In journalism studies, for example, Chris Anderson (2016) observes that these studies often take

'a big data' approach to analysing a large corpus of digital material. Fewer of them study journalistic difusion in a more granular way, and almost none of these studies draw upon ethnographic or other forms of qualitative research in order to look at how these rhizomatic processes play out on the ground. (p. 420)

By contrast, the SWF always examines the system from one or more situated perspectives, focusing on 'the situation of production [as well as on] how discourses are produced, by whom, with what resources, and under what conditions' (Clarke 2005: 155), on the '[negotiations of] discourses in social relationships/interaction', and on the '[production of] identities and subjectivities through discourse' (Clarke, 2005, p. 155). We will therefore address the discursive knowledge production practices of the Stop 5G social world within the digital sphere as an interconnected discursive ecosystem ethnographically, with an analytical focus on the situatedness of their enactment.

### **5.3 Contesting 5G Deployment: From Scientifc to Syncretic Patchwork Storytelling**

As we have seen, in an ecological perspective, the structuring of RKCs' social worlds and of their wider arena, their forms of discursive production, their media-related practices and, ultimately, their shared beliefs are tightly intertwined: this means that transformation of one of these elements implies transformation in all the others too. From this perspective four phases in the Italian Stop 5G RKC can be distinguished:

As we saw above, this can also be read as a movement from a 'scientifc' to a 'syncretic' patchwork storytelling approach in the RKC's knowledge production practices. I will now move onto reconstructing the main stages in this turn by means of the tenets of the (media) ecological approach outlined above.

#### **5.3.1 RKC as a Network of Independent Scientists: the Adoption of a Scientifc Patchwork Storytelling Strategy (2017–2018)**

In the frst phase of challenge to 5G rollout, the Stop 5G RKC was largely made up of international 'independent' researcher groups (as the RKC defnes scientists not funded by the industry) pursuing a strategy already used to challenge 3G and 4G technologies (Soneryd, 2007). On the basis of a growing number of articles published in peer-reviewed journals, they resorted to public appeals published in scientifc journals and on the web to raise awareness in the institutions and public opinion on the nonthermal efects of non-ionising electromagnetic radiation. Tese efects were (and are) dismissed as scientifcally unfounded by organisations such as the International Commission on Non-Ionizing Radiation Protection (ICNIRP), an NGO tasked with defning safety guidelines for exposure to electromagnetic felds and recognised by the World Health Organisation. Tese guidelines–which consider the thermal efects alone– have been accepted by the EU and the US and set the limit at 61 V/m (Italy applies a more restrictive limit of 6 V/m).

In 2015, for example, several 'scientists engaged in the study of the biological and health efects of non-ionising electromagnetic felds' published an international appeal related to technologies preceding 5G. Tis urged 'the United Nations (UN) and all member states in the world to encourage the World Health Organization (WHO) to exert strong leadership in fostering the development of more protective electromagnetic felds (EMF) guidelines'2 than those put forward by the ICNIRP, which was accused of ignoring all scientifc literature on 'long-term exposure and low-intensity efects'. Two years later, in September 2017, Professors Rainer Nyberg and Lennart Hardell quoted this appeal in their *Te 5G Appeal*, 3 asking the EU to apply 'a moratorium on the roll-out of 5G'. Te appeal argued that the existence of low-intensity, long-term non-thermal efects had been proven by a vast amount of scientifc literature, and predicted that these efects would be even more severe with 5G. Moreover, it explicitly accused the ICNIRP of a confict of interest in its refusal to consider this body of knowledge, quoting an article written by Lennart Hardell (2017) himself, which called the ICNIRP an 'industry loyal NGO' in support of this. Te appeal received two replies in that same year (Hardell & Nyberg, 2020) from the European Directorate-General of Health and Food Safety and from the European Commission which dismissed the low-intensity non-thermal efect hypothesis and rejected the confict of interest allegations.4

<sup>2</sup> Scientists call for Protection from Non-Ionizing Electromagnetic Field Exposure, available at https://emfscientist.org/index.php/emf-scientist-appeal

<sup>3</sup>Te 5G Appeal, available at http://www.5gappeal.eu/appeal

<sup>4</sup>Te letter from the Directorate-General quotes 'the Ombudsman conclusion in case 208/2015/ PD5 concerning conficts of interests in a Commission expert group on electromagnetic felds is that there was no maladministration by the European Commission' (http://www.5gappeal.eu/wpcontent/uploads/2018/06/reply\_ryan.pdf).

#### **5 From Scientifc to Syncretic Patchwork Storytelling…**

Tat same year a number of Italian health- and science-related associations adopted this appeal strategy to put pressure on national and local government. Tis was especially the case of ISDE (International Society of Doctors for Environment) Italia which invoked the precautionary principle to demand a moratorium on 5G experimentation and an international appeal from ISDE International followed in 2018.

For their scientifc claims, these and other appeals relied on literature reviews and meta-analyses produced by independent researchers throughout the history of the challenge to mobile communication infrastructure deployment. A case in point is the BioInitiative report (BIR),5 published online for the frst time in 2007, reissued in extended form in 2013 and updated several times since then. Tis vast literature review constitutes one of the main references used by the RKC and its appeals. Te report has been strongly criticised by several independent and governmental research groups for a plurality of reasons, however, ranging from poor selection criteria concerning the studies included in the review to conclusions that are only partially grounded in the review itself. On the occasion of the publication of the 2013 edition, for example, a critical assessment by *Science-Based Medicine*, an online editorial project on scientifc controversies owned and operated by the *New England Skeptical Society* (an independent, non-proft organisation) reported several scientifc faws in the report and considered it an evident case of confrmation bias, or 'cherry-picking':

Te authors of the BIR commit exactly this error with EMF bioefects studies, by speculating at length about possible implications of studies reporting efects of EMF while saying little about studies that failed to fnd efects. Rather than taking a 'weight-of-evidence approach' to put all the studies together in a coherent picture, most authors simply listed numbers of studies reporting efects (of whatever nature at whatever exposure level) in comparison with those that found none. (*Foster & Trottier,* 2013)

**<sup>117</sup>**

<sup>5</sup>https://bioinitiative.org/

Tis discursive strategy—that I defne 'scientifc patchwork storytelling'—consists of the RKC assembling its shared knowledge by collecting disparate 'scientifc' sources all in support of the existence of non-thermal efects, where 'scientifc' is understood as 'published in peer-reviewed journals', regardless of their reputation within the scientifc community or of the reception of the individual articles in the existing literature. Moreover, these sources—dealing with diferent electromagnetic wave frequencies and reporting various types of biological efects—are neither assembled into a coherent picture nor consider studies reporting conficting results, even solely for the purposes of deconstructing them.

In this strategy, conficting studies are dealt with asymmetrically; to make sense of them, the RKC moves onto diferent epistemic ground and mobilises a narrative centred on the conficts of interest of adversarial scientists and groups of experts. In particular, the newest studies are dismissed as uproar deliberately produced through industry-funded research to generate a state of uncertainty that fosters the survival of the status quo—and facilitates the deployment of the new 5G infrastructure. Historicisation is a key discursive strategy here: rather than engaging in deconstructing and criticising opposing studies, the RKC deploys historical comparison to make sense of the present situation. Te slow recognition of tobacco's carcinogenicity, in particular, is used as a probatory example of industries' ability to deliberately manufacture scientifc uncertainty (Bero, 2005; Brandt, 2012) and considered proof of the plausibility of an alleged ongoing disinformation campaign within the scientifc community.

Te adoption of this discursive strategy by the RKC must be viewed in the light of its objectives in the broader 5G deployment arena: these groups of scientists aim to draw institutional and public attention to what is regarded as a deliberately ignored body of scientifc evidence. Yet scientifc patchwork storytelling, together with its complementary delegitimising narrative, played a pivotal role in shaping RKC knowledge in the subsequent phase as well, when activists entered the scene and engaged in 5G opposition at the local and municipal levels.

#### **5.3.2 The Activist Phase: Guarding the Borders of Scientifc Patchwork Storytelling (2018–2020)**

In September 2018 Arthur Firstenberg launched the international Stop 5G on Earth and in Space appeal,6 to the 'UN, WHO, EU, Council of Europe and governments of all nations' and signed by a number of 'scientists, doctors, environmental organizations and citizens'. Te appeal adopted the strategy employed by the RKC in its previous phase, with the issue of the deployment of the new communicative infrastructure being strictly framed as a health and environmental problem, and the appeal backed by a body of peer-reviewed articles proving the existence of nonthermal EMF efects. It accused public and private institutions of conficts of interest in refusing to take these into account in policymaking. Tis time, however, the appeal did not come from groups of independent scientists but from civil society: Firstenberg is an American activist afected by electromagnetic hypersensitivity, a condition triggered by EMF that is not recognised by WHO. Tis new central importance of the activist scene added extra complexity to the RKC's social world and marked a new phase in the opposition to 5G deployment.

An activist scene began to take shape in Italy this same year, when the 5G issue gained public visibility and was covered by legacy media, a process fostered by a plurality of events. Te frst of these was a sustained efort to promote public awareness by national associations and groups, such as Alleanza Italiana Stop 5G (AIS5G),7 an 'informal committee and a non-partisan network … standing up for the … precautionary principle' founded in 2018. Tis same year, to reach a wider audience than its blog and Facebook page followers, the committee launched a crowdfunding campaign and bought a national newspaper page in *Il Fatto Quotidiano* and some advertising space on the leftist radio station Radio Popolare. It also launched an awareness-raising campaign in various cities involved in 5G experimentation which relied on mobile billboards mounted on trucks, a communication strategy also used by no-vax groups and Pro

<sup>6</sup> International Appeal Stop 5G on Earth and in Space. Available at https://www.5gspaceappeal.org/ the-appeal/

<sup>7</sup>https://www.alleanzaitalianastop5g.it/442967936.html

Vita associations. Te committee's main promotor and spokesperson was (and still is) journalist Maurizio Martucci (see Chap. 4 by Paolo Bory), 'author of many investigative and crime books on soccer [who was now working] on health and environment, rare conditions and alternative medicine',8 and had just published a self-defence manual for electrosensitive people (Martucci, 2018), and later, in 2020 published *#Stop5G* (Martucci, 2020), a bitterly critical investigative book on 5G to which we will return. Tose named by the committee's blog as afliated and/or cooperating with the network were ISDE Italia, Associazione Nazionale Piccoli Comuni di Italia (Italian Association of Mayors of Small Towns), several infuencers who have, elsewhere, been defned as 'catalysts of scientifc dissent'9 (Bory et al., 2023) and Bologna's Istituto Ramazzini, a non-proft social cooperative operating in the feld of independent research on cancer and medical science popularisation.

Tis institute was also at the heart of a second key event. Until 2018, the knowledge assembled by the RKC through scientifc patchwork storytelling lacked a signifcant piece in its claims to public credibility. Although it included epidemiological and in vitro experimental evidence, and hypotheses on the biological plausibility of EMF efects, it lacked in vivo studies on a signifcant number of animals. Tis gap was flled by the fndings of two studies published by independent researchers: one from the American National Toxicology Program (National Toxicology Program, 2018) and one from Istituto Ramazzini (Falcioni et al., 2018). Both reported the insurgence of specifc kinds of cancers in mice and rats exposed to (non-5G) electromagnetic felds. Although part of the scientifc community cast doubt on the soundness of these studies and the signifcance of their results (including ICNIRP10), this research gained attention from legacy media, including national public and private TV channels. A case in point is the journalistic TV programme *Report*, screened on national public channel RAI3, which broadcast an alarming

<sup>8</sup>From his blog on *Il Fatto Quotidiano* (https://www.ilfattoquotidiano.it/blog/mmartucci/).

<sup>9</sup> 'A public infuencer who does not belong to the scientifc community and contributes to the dissemination of science-related populist narratives within a grassroots ecosystem of resistance to institutional science' (Bory et al., 2023, p. 1).

<sup>10</sup> See INCIRP (2018).

episode11 on the possible efects of 5G. Links to the episode were published on the AIS5G blog and Facebook page and in other RKC ecosystem 'owned spaces'12 (Penttinen & Ciuchita, 2022), becoming a reference point for many groups of activists who contributed to disseminating it.

Finally, from 2018 onwards, the attention of legacy media and the RKC was also captured by a series of public statements from European Union bodies such as the Scientifc Committee on Health, Environmental and Emerging Risks (SCHEER) which included 5G its list of 14 'emerging issues to bring to the attention of the Commission service' because 'the lack of clear evidence to inform the development of exposure guidelines to 5G technology [left] open the possibility of unintended biological consequences' (SCHEER, 2018, p. 14)13; the document '5G Deployment: State of Play in Europe, USA and Asia' (2019) commissioned by the European Parliament Committee on Industry, Research, and Energy stating that 'signifcant concern [was] emerging over the possible impact on health and safety arising from potentially much higher exposure to radiofrequency electromagnetic radiation arising from 5G'; and the 2021 report *Health Impact of 5G*, 14 commissioned to Dr Belpoggi by the European Parliament's Panel for the Future of Science and Technology (STOA), that raised several concerns. Tese were supplemented by several court rulings reported with considerable emphasis by

<sup>11</sup>*Onda su Onda*, Rai3 26/11/2018.

<sup>12</sup>From our ethnographic observation, digital spaces through which members of RKCs interact online can be classifed in *owned spaces* (Penttinen & Ciuchita, 2022) under their direct control such as—in our case—the constellation of Stop 5G public local Facebook groups and the related private WhatsApp groups; *spaces of resonance* that are perceived as sympathetic, such as the WhatsApp and Telegram groups of the same name (Te Walk of Change), whose focus is not exclusively 5G but which are bitterly critical of the scientifc community; and *spaces of confrontation* that, on the contrary, are perceived as hostile, such as the online spaces of tech magazines like *Wired*. Moreover, we defne *media territory* as the ensemble of media employed by the RKC to perform specifc practices (Tosoni & Ciancia, 2017, p. 44; Tosoni & Turrini, forthcoming) such as online and ofine activism practices. As we will see, the RKC's discursive strategies, tones and rhetoric vary in these diferent spaces.

<sup>13</sup>Later on the committee produced more reassuring statements on EMF. See, for example, https:// health.ec.europa.eu/system/fles/2020-04/citizens\_emf\_en\_0.pdf: 'there are no evident adverse health efects if exposure remains below the levels set by current standards'. Yet, some research results contradicting this were reported.

<sup>14</sup>Available at https://www.europarl.europa.eu/RegData/etudes/STUD/2021/690012/EPRS\_ STU(2021)690012\_EN.pdf.

the local and national press which recognised some types of tumours occurring in cases of heavy work-related use of mobile phones as occupational accidents. Notably, in the frst of these (2012), the Corte di Cassazione of Brescia was called upon to decide upon litigation between a manager and INAIL (the Italian occupational health institute). Te court dealt with the contradictory scientifc literature presented and decided to accord greater credit to studies produced by 'independent researchers', ofcially validating the delegitimising narrative that complemented the Stop 5G scientifc patchwork storytelling strategy.15

Te momentum of this rise in the visibility of the potential 5G risks led to the creation of two Italian groups on Facebook by the end of 2018, both of which adopted the title of Firstenberg's appeal: Stop 5G Italia and Stop Sperimentazione 5G. Te two groups soon amassed over 10,000 members each. Other groups followed, on both Facebook and WhatsApp, (e.g. No Elettrosmog) sometimes translocally addressing diferent categories of people (such as the Facebook group Mamme Stop 5G, for mothers). Concomitantly, a vast constellation of small local groups appeared in all the main Italian cities, all using the Stop 5G label. Most of these groups adopted a similar media territory16 for their activist practices centred around a Facebook group (e.g. Stop 5G Milano) for communication among members and sympathisers and a more restricted interactional space on WhatsApp for discussions and coordination between activists. Tese local groups organised their activities autonomously but were loosely and informally coordinated in national online groups, where they could also get in contact with national associations.

Local activist groups, national associations and committees adopted a twofold, synergic strategy. On one hand they engaged in awarenessraising campaigns consisting mostly of public conferences, leafeting, demonstrations and Facebook activities. In 2019 dozens of public conferences were held all over Italy organised not only by national associations and committees but also by local groups with the participation of one or more members of national associations and at which institutional

<sup>15</sup>Full sentence in https://www.bollettinoadapt.it/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/20121015-snciv@ sL0@a2012<EMAIL_ADDRESS>
<sup>16</sup> See note 12.

representatives were frequently invited to participate as speakers or attendees. Tese events were launched and advertised on the RKC's online owned spaces and reposted in its spaces of resonance. Tey were also often documented (sometimes via live streaming) to produce excerpts later published and circulated on the Internet.