Self-proclaimed skeptical junkie, Susan Gerbic, will be speaking at Skepticon 2023, which runs over December 2nd and 3rd this year.

Susan has done some awesome things in the world of skeptical activism and is the founder of Monterey County Skeptics. In addition she founded and manages the About Time project, which you can check out here. Susan is a winner of the James Randi Foundation award for 2017 and a fellow of the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry. She also contributes to Skeptical Inquirer.

Susan could also see, not just the potential of Wikipedia, but the potential power in genuinely educating those who visit Wikipedia to access information on a topic. We all end up on Wikipedia at some time to read up on any number of subjects. In fact it’s a top hit in searches. Susan felt strongly about the quality of information on Wikipedia, and how it influenced decisions people might make.

So Susan founded Guerrilla Skepticism on Wikipedia (GSoW). This involves organising a team of people across the globe, that edits pages on Wikipedia in multiple languages. Consider this GSoW slogan:

The mission of the Guerrilla Skepticism editing team is to improve skeptical content of Wikipedia. We do this by improving pages of our skeptic spokespeople, providing noteworthy citations, and removing the unsourced claims from paranormal and pseudoscientific pages. Why? Because evidence is cool. We train – We mentor – Join us. 

GSoW was particularly relevant this year, with regards to unqualified and dangerous “naturopath”, Barbara O’Neill. An Australian, O’Neill is subject to a Permanent Prohibition Order from the NSW Health Care Complaints Commission. This hasn’t stopped her manipulating social media and exploiting opportunities to present harmful claims to audiences overseas, in pursuit of her lucrative scheme. Fortunately as her profile recently rose, so did hits on O’Neill’s Wikipedia page – one edited by GSoW.

Episodes of The Skeptic Zone on 18 June and 2nd July this year, featured Gerbic who discussed the spike in traffic to O’Neill’s Wikipedia page. In the wake of TikTok videos, hits on the page went from around 20 per day to 9,000 per day. No doubt, many were convinced to save their money.

Gerbic’s activism covers all areas of skepticism, particularly that of “Grief Vampires”.