Candace Owens and the Comfort of Conspiracy

If the Candace Owens show is the worst novel ever written, why do people keep turning the pages?

My mind has been uneasily occupied this week with dark thoughts of two murders, one old and one new. The new news is the shocking murder of a British Catholic politician, Ann Widdecombe, a lovable Old Tory battleaxe who staunchly held unpopular views in public, but did so with such panache and force of personality that even political opponents admired her. She was 78 years old and unmarried, enjoying her retirement in a quiet rural home, where it now appears the killer hunted her down in a targeted assassination.

The old news is the assassination of Charlie Kirk, back in the discourse cycle as the public has been processing a just-closed preliminary hearing before his alleged killer goes to trial this fall. While not all the evidence shown has been publicly released, various clips are circulating, along with reports of the emotion in the courtroom as family and friends watched high-definition footage of the murder. It’s hard to fathom what an ordeal this has surely been for Kirk’s widow and parents. My heart has broken to read about how they literally clung to each other through the worst moments. And through it all, unnervingly, young Tyler Robinson betrayed no signs of human emotion. He simply sat there, dead-eyed, as the evidence against him piled higher and higher.

These murders are uncannily similar in their suddenness, their viciousness, and the matching viciousness of the reactions they’ve inspired from people who hate what the victims stood for—reactions that sit in grotesque juxtaposition with the warmth, good humor, and generosity of spirit both Kirk and Widdecombe showed even their enemies in life. In their different ways, they exuded a zest for life that felt unquenchable. It boggles the mind and oppresses the soul to think that in each of their cases, a wretched lone killer had the means, motive and opportunity to snuff them out, just like that. It doesn’t bear thinking about. But the evidence is undeniable.

Or at least, it should be. Yet in Charlie Kirk’s case, certain powerful media figures are betting the future of their brands on people’s inability to weigh evidence, and they appear to be winning big. Candace Owens has accused everyone in Kirk’s inner ring of conspiring in the crime, including his widow, together with usual suspects like The Jews. This summary of the preliminary hearing surveys just a sample of the insanity she’s been peddling. Tucker Carlson, unlike Owens, will at least admit that Tyler Robinson is the killer…though of course brainwashed/recruited by You Get Three Guesses Who.

I’m uninterested in plumbing the depths of these people’s psychology. They are soulless ghouls, hollowed-out shells of people who are surely not under any actual illusions about the truth. It is simply convenient for their purposes to build an empire on lies.

I have, however, been thinking about why it is that a Candace Owens figure can command such large audiences. I asked Grok to give me a few quick and dirty statistics about the measure of her success: Consistently charts in the top 10-50 on various platforms like Apple Podcasts, peaked at worldwide #1 for downloads/views per episode in the immediate wake of Kirk’s murder, and racks up millions of views per channel clip. Fans plan watch parties around new episodes as if it’s an unfolding Netflix drama. Women seem especially invested, including many married women. Bored housewives compare notes and chatter about what Candace might drop next.

In other words, these aren’t a handful of sad losers frittering life away in Mom’s basement. These are people who in Internet slang would be called “normies” — regular decent Americans with families and jobs and productive lives. So why are they buying what Owens is selling?

There are many possible answers, but I submit one underexplored answer: When Owens sells conspiracy, she is really selling comfort.