In 1964, the USS Maddox was attacked in Vietnam in what became known as the Gulf of Tonkin incident. This act convinced Congress to let the president put boots on the ground in Vietnam and essentially started the war. However, documents declassified in the early 2000s revealed this was actually a false-flag operation. -u/Looks_at_this_clown

That the first Sonic movie with that funky creature they tried to pass off as sonic in the commercials was only created as a publicity stunt, they always had the enhanced sonic but only wanted the attention to promote the movie. -u/coque18

I believe the moon landing was real, but they went out of their way to pack as many tv cameras on the mission as possible, so in the most literal sense it was staged as a media production almost more so than a scientific mission. -u/classyhwale

Dale Jr. winning the July NASCAR race at Daytona after his father was killed in an accident there in February. -u/IdahoPatMan

The War on Drugs. Once you read about how Harry J. Anslinger manufactured the marijuana scare just to keep his job, you’ll realize how crazy the entire situation is. Anslinger was the DEA version of J. Edgar Hoover, and before the DEA even existed. -u/ghostful86

Left shark. -u/Constant_Ad_2775

The Erfurt latrine disaster in 1184. I fully believe that Henry VI staged that to create a power vacuum his family was equipped to take advantage of. -u/Smrtihara

The Great Fire of Rome. But I’m not the only one that thinks this. People think Emperor Nero burned down swaths of the city just so he could buy up the land to make his mansion. The fact that that’s exactly what happened after the fire didn’t help his case. Dude was so evil people theorized he might’ve been the Anti-Christ. -u/BlackDwarfStar

I completely believe that James Earl Ray did not kill Martin Luther King Jr., instead, I believe he was an unknowing asset or the fall guy. An opinion that is actually shared with the King family (who were actually involved in a court case about it) and do not believe JER shot MLK. -u/TheRunicHammer

In the UK a spy was found dead in his apartment. He drowned in his bath, locked inside a North Face duffel bag. The lock was on the outside of the bag. Official verdict into his death… Suicide -u/zwifter11

The 2016 "coup" in Turkey was staged to solidify Erdogan's presidency. -u/leffe123

1999 Moscow apartment bombings. -u/Shawn_NYC

“Internet Backlash.” There are maybe a handful of real people and a million bots making all the news and all the decisions right now. -u/fishintheboat

Not an event per se, but the fact everyone still thinks that Banksy is just one guy, trust me, it’s a well-oiled machine that, even from the 99/2000 had a small team working on it all, it’s been one big money making exercise from the early days, the fact Robin and co are still getting away with it proves it works so good luck to them! -u/Puzzleheaded_Song_70

Janet Jackson and "Boobgate." -u/notthesedays

"Justification" for the Iraq invasion. -u/Constant-Squirrel555

Tbh, Flat Earthers. I truly can't believe for a second that with all the technology and photos proving that the Earth

The Hawaii missile alert false alarm has three possible scenarios that I'm tossed on:1: It really was a misclick.2: It was a drill to test the preparedness of a missile attack. They wanted to see what a population would do in that scenario.3: It was a real incoming missile attack but the US has top secret missile interception capabilities that nobody knows about; except whatever country actually launched the missile now. I bet the foreign country, in this scenario, would have even figured they did and was just testing to see the full extent of the technology. -u/InfernalOrgasm

Jeffrey Epstein committing suicide, way too convenient to be true. Same high security prison that housed El Chapo suddenly doesn't have camera footage of that night and the guards were unaware of what was going on, too? Smells of BS, lol -u/strikershiv95

The energy price crisis in the UK right now.I suspect that when Russia Invaded Ukraine the oil companies saw an opportunity to make an unthinkable amount of money and our government are corrupt enough to just let them get away with it. The fact Rishi and Liz seem unwilling to talk about it or sympathise with people is enough proof. -u/Jacorpes

Shakespeare's plays. -u/WillCharGames

The timing of the release of the Iranian hostages so that Reagan got the credit for it. 100% fishy. -u/Seguefare

The popularity of Call Me Maybe by Carly Rae Jepsen. I'm not saying it's a bad song. But I was pretty up to speed on both memes and pop music at the time, and I definitely saw the memes about the song (like the ones using Maeby from Arrested Development) absolutely flood every meme channel all at once a few weeks before the song was at all popular, not after. Now this sort of thing is pretty common, but I was bewildered that no one else at the time had questioned why this song they never heard was suddenly a meme, like… everywhere.The "staging" is that I'm pretty sure Carly Rae Jepsen's record label astroturfed the Internet hard in 2012 with regard to the popularity of her hit single Call Me Maybe, 4+ years before that sort of thing was really noticed or heard of. -u/film_composer

The Max Headroom incident obviously. -u/Puzzleheaded-Art7406