Jenna’s Side

Jenna’s Side

If You Thought Pizzagate Was Bad, Wait 'Til You Get a Load of Jerkygate

(Don't worry, it's 100% not about cannibalism. The media says so.)

Jenna McCarthy's avatar
Jenna McCarthy
Feb 18, 2026
∙ Paid

Here it is—the single post of the week reserved exclusively for generous paid subscribers. Upgrade today and you’ll be one of them! If you believe, like I do, that what you put out into the universe comes back to you ten-fold, consider it a deposit in the karma bank. ;)

*Annual subscribers get a free signed book and ALL supporters get my eternal gratitude, the honor of being an actual Patron of the Arts, and the opportunity to bask in the glory of my one-of-a-kind Subscriber Spotlight.

Wikipedia defines a conspiracy theory as “an explanation for an event or situation that asserts the existence of a conspiracy when other explanations are more probable.” Take, for example, the collapse of Building 7, the third World Trade Center tower that wasn’t even struck by a plane on 9/11 but disintegrated in a matter of seconds in what looked suspiciously like a controlled demolition. Only crazy “conspiracy theorists” watched it melt into its own footprint and thought it was shady, because the official explanation—fire-induced structural failure after debris damage—was obviously more probable.

Ahem.

The latest Epstein conspiracy theory making the rounds is sort of like that. It seems the files are littered with hundreds of references to “jerky,” mostly in strange, out-of-context ways that make you wonder if English was anyone’s first language. Think “I’m going to walk the jerky over to Jeffrey,” and “How’s your jerky situation?” and “Somehow I have no jerky again,” and “The jerky needs to be in a cold, insulated bag” (when the whole point of jerky is that it doesn’t need refrigeration). People—crazy people, surely—have concluded, without even a whisper of evidence, that jerky is a code word for human flesh, even though the official explanation—Epstein was super into protein!—is obviously more probable.

I mean, I may regret this, but I need to keep reading.

This post is for paid subscribers

Already a paid subscriber? Sign in
© 2026 Jenna McCarthy · Privacy ∙ Terms ∙ Collection notice
Start your SubstackGet the app
Substack is the home for great culture