This article part of a new series on commonly-believed Bay Area conspiracy theories.
From paranoiacs filming the skies above Oakland for evidence of chemtrails to Zodiac Killer obsessives, the Bay Area has more than its share of conspiracy theorists. A fear of the microwave oven is also oddly prevalent in the Bay Area — right up there with the fluoridated-water paranoia.
Here’s the thing: Cataracts, carcinogenic rays, voyeurism and radioactive hot pockets are all things that will not come out of your convenient kitchen appliance.
Even before Kellyanne Conway’s bizarre claims that Barack Obama was watching President Trump from the corner of the White House kitchen (like Donald would ever step into a kitchen unless Vladimir was awaiting him, stripped to the britches with vodka and caviar in hand), the humble and helpful microwave oven has repeatedly been maligned, slurred and bullied by conspiracy theorists for years.
Cancer
Microwave ovens have never given anyone cancer.
The radiation from a microwave oven is not ionizing, which means it does not carry the cancer risk associated with ionizing radiation found in things like X-rays. Studies done on mice have shown zero danger from microwave radiation at the level used in ovens.
That is not to say that a broken or modified microwave oven could not harm you. If you, say, launched a cocktail shaker at a microwave door while reheating some fondue, thereby smashing the door, and you then decided to put your face right up to the smashed door, you would get burned. Don’t do this.
The fear of microwaves may stem from the fact that they became popular during the era of nuclear and cold-war paranoia and were given science-like-sounding scary names that were popular at the time. Before “microwave” was popularized, the harmless kitchen appliance was named the “Radarange” by weapons-manufacturer Raytheon. The revolutionary kitchen aide may have seemed less suspicious if it had been named, say, “small oven.”
Cataracts
The Daily Mail, a publication that has never shied away from scaring old people for no good reason, recently published an article claiming that microwave ovens destroy your eyes. The article in question was so well proofed and fact checked that it contained this sentence, which I quote verbatim:
Our bodies are majority water so our bdoesi naturally absorb microwave radiation.
Quick, everybdoei, throw that nuclear heat box out the window at a passing immigrant.
Nutrients
Microwave ovens do not make food radioactive or contaminate it. Rather, they heat by producing radiation, which is absorbed by moisture in the food. This makes the water molecules produce heat by vibrating, cooking the food. Microwave ovens do not make any changes to food that aren’t made in any other methods of cooking.
The microwaves generated in the oven disappear when the oven beeps and the glass stops spinning. The waves do not remain in the food when the power is off any more than the sound of conspiracy theorists yelling, “Wake up, sheeple!” remains in your ear after the megaphone has been forcefully removed from their hands.
There is evidence that the nutritional content of some foods may be altered by cooking in a microwave oven, as opposed to using a conventional cooking method. The heating of moisture means that items tend to cook from the inside out rather than crisp on the outside. Even so, there is zero indication of health issues associated with microwaved food.
That’s not to say that you could not do yourself some harm with microwaved food. For example, if you take a bowl of piping-hot gazpacho out of the microwave and bury your face in it, you will burn your face off. Also, gazpacho should be served cold.
Spying
Microwaves do not and never have spied on people. Microwaves do not have cameras nor microphones, and they are not connected to the Internet. This was simply a lie told by a liar in an attempt to distract from the fact that her boss is an incompetent buffoon.
A microwave could be used as a spying instrument if it were totally modified and fitted with spying devices, in the same way that a baseball bat could be used as a telescope if you hollowed it out and filled it with glass.
Go forth and reheat in peace, sheeple.
This article is part of a new series, The Debunker, about common conspiracy theories in the Bay Area. Click here to read more.
