March 8, 2023 • 36 mins
Disney parks receive millions of visitors per year, seeking fun, adventure, and magic... but what happens when something goes wrong? What's the deal with all the rumors that "no one dies at Disney?" In celebration of International Women's Day, guest hosts "Codename: Doc Holliday" and Lauren Vogelbaum take over to explore a strangest, pervasive conspiracy theory about one of the largest entertainment companies on the planet.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
From UFOs to psychic powers and government conspiracies. History is
riddled with unexplained events. You can turn back now or
learn the stuff they don't want you to know. A
production of iHeart Radio. Hello, and welcome back to the show.
(00:26):
My name's Lauren, they call me Dot. We are joined
as always why our superproducer palmission control a decade. Most importantly,
you are you. You are here, and that makes this
stuff they don't want you to know. If you are
listening to this the day it comes out, it is
March eighth, which, in addition to being James Vanderbeek's birthday,
(00:46):
shout out anybody wow of sense Creek all right, eighties babies,
it is also International Women's Day. Yeah. The way that
I Heart likes to celebrate that is to have some
of the lady co hosts takeover for some of the
dude co hosts for the day. And so that is
why you may have noticed that Ben Matinoll are not
here or their voices are just sounding a little bit
(01:08):
higher today. Who's tiny bit? Yeah? Yeah, I can try,
I can try to do a vocal fry. Oh I won't,
but yes on this episode today we are returning on
the show to a ludicrously gigantic, successful entertainment conglomerate, a
company that has built their own autonomous city state in Florida,
(01:34):
which has been talked about on the show before. The
Guys covered it back in twenty seventeen in their episode
about the creation of the Reedy Creek Improvement District. Yeah,
you'll very often hear them refer to it as the Mouse,
which is actually one of my favorite nicknames for anything
in recent history. But the official name of it is Disney,
which there's just unless you're under a rock or under
(01:57):
the sea, there's really no way that you have in
about Disney at some point in your life. So there's
actually a lot of different conspiracies that float around about
Disney that I find to be incredibly entertaining. For example,
that Walt Disney's head is frozen and they're going to
unfreeze it at some point. I don't know what they
(02:17):
would do with it, yeah, because I don't think that
cryogenic freezing. I'm sure that there's an episode on that too.
I don't think that actually works. I'm pretty sure that
fan froze it. They would be like, well, this is
some interesting meat that is here. Head for dinner. Yep,
slow cookers, right, But okay, so there's that. There's also
that just his entire body is frozen. I don't know
(02:39):
why they are are different, separate conspiracies for the freezing
of his body versus the freezing of his head, but
that is something that I have found on the internet.
In terms of Disney conspiracies, there are also some other ones,
like that Disney helped fake the moon landing. Oh oh,
I don't think I've heard about that one. Yeah, that
one's that one's interesting to me. And I mean also
(03:01):
we could have a whole other conversation about whether, like
there's so many conspiracies around the moon landing. Again, just
really funny to me. I'm actually surprised that I haven't
heard about more of these because I actually grew up
in South Florida, and you know, like like I went
to Disney all the time as a kid, Like we
took school field trips to the Disney theme parks. You
do not have that level of childhood familiarity, do you.
(03:23):
Most people don't well with me being from Detroit. Like
our field trip thing that we did was Cedar Point,
which is in Ohio. That was our theme Park. I
missed those days. But I actually I did visit Disney
quite a few times when I was a kid, just
on family trips, and also when I was in middle school,
I was in marching band and we I don't really
remember the specifics of this, but for some reason we
(03:45):
took a trip to Disney and we had the opportunity
to march through Disney World. Yea, our marching band, along
with other marching bands from other schools all over the country.
So that was fun. Again, I do not remember the
details are specifics, but I have been to Disney World
quite a few times. Yeah. Yeah, But I would say
that neither of us are are a Disney human, like
(04:05):
like one of those Disney adults. Yeah. Like, it's not
like a like a planned destination for me on a
on a semi annual basis or anything like that. Nope.
And in fact, I have an entire soapbox about how
I feel about Disney movies and how they sort of
perpetuate this sort of feeding this idea of love and
romance to women is children to get them to fit
into this machine. But we don't have time. We don't
(04:27):
have time for that today. That that is not the
theory that the fringe theory or conspiracy realism that we
were talking about today. Today we are talking about the
idea that no one dies at Disney, which is also
a really interesting conspiracy theory to me, Specifically, this idea
that no one at is ever pronounced dead at Disney,
(04:49):
because Disney is this a magical place where no, that
doesn't happen again only yeah mothers, yes, I mean in
the movie, in the movies, every single mom, but every
single I don't noticed that. How just everybody in Disney
is an orphan. It's actually sort of like trite at
this point. There has to be stories where it's interesting
to have your parents be alive. I don't know anyway, Okay,
(05:11):
can we do the thing? Can I do the ben thing?
Here are the facts. Excellent job. I actually thought that
had been was in here for a second. Phenomenal, phenomenal
voice work. Yeah. So the Walt Disney Company to sort
of go through the history really quickly. It started small enough.
It was founded on October sixteenth, nineteen twenty three, by
(05:31):
Walt and roy O Disney, two brothers. And I just
want to say that if I was roy out of
this brother situation, I would be a little bit peeved.
And now my name has been a race throughout history
because I have never heard it before actually doing research
on Disney. And so yeah, when they first started it
in nineteen twenty three and a burst of creativity, they
originally named the Disney Brothers Studio and after that it
(05:54):
would go through several different name changes over the following decades,
and then it ultimately became the Walt Disney Company in
nineteen eighty six. What a different world we would live
in if it had been the Roy Disney Company. But okay,
all right, so there is We are not a history
of Disney podcast. There are I am positive podcasts you
(06:17):
could find about that. We're just going to cover the
high points here, okay. So Walt was an artist who
began messing around with sell animation during his time at
the Kansas City Film Ad Company, which I think is
great because I'm like, oh, that background in advertising and
marketing would certainly pay off. And he started a company
(06:38):
before he started Disney called the laugh A Graham Studio,
which went bankrupt in nineteen twenty three. So remember that,
ladies and gentlemen, if you fail at something, try try again,
because if Walt had given up. Followed, Watt had given
up after that bankruptcy, where would we be now, No
Disney Princesses, no Disney World, say. In the aftermath of
that bankruptcy, Walt decided to move to la to join
(06:59):
his brother Roy, who was out there recovering from tuberculosis.
And so while he was there, like once he got there,
finally sold a short film that was produced by laugh Agraham,
the company that went bankrupt, Alice's Wonderland, and then signed
a contract to make six more films. Yeah, And so
with the success, the brothers went on founded their company,
(07:21):
persuaded some of their collaborators to join them in Hollywood,
and this group of films, called the Alice Comedies, were
a success, as was another series based on another one
of Walt's characters, Oswald, the Lucky Rabbit. And so then
after that the story is probably going to become a
little bit more familiar to all of you, because this
is when Disney began work on what would be sort
(07:42):
of the most famous or like the impetus of the
Mouse as we know it today, with the nineteen twenty
eight release of Steamboat Willie, which was when the world
was introduced to Mickey Mouse, and all of you all
are still seeing this little steamboat Willie animation before Disney
movies today because that's how integral it was to forming
the company. So, yeah, as you are clearly aware, Mickey
(08:06):
Mouse is one of the most recognizable cartoons in history,
and this is when what Disney really sort of sort
of took off. This success allowed Walt to kind of
conceive of the idea of making a feature film, and
what a feature film it was going to be. Snow
White in the Seven Dwarves. You've probably heard of it.
They started making it in nineteen thirty four, and it
(08:29):
actually like like three years into it, it was four
hundred percent over budget. They had like three hundred animators
and artists and assistants on the payroll. But somehow it
turned into this beautiful film and was its success. And
we now have all of these countless princesses and etc.
To thank for those early successes that came a little
(08:51):
bit of a surprise to everyone, indeed. And so after that,
as you know, multiple features, short films that ultimately grew
and grew, sprinkled in some casual races, and then we
got the Disney that we know and love today. And
so with the success of all of those things, ultimately
Disney started moving into the realm of theme parts. And
this is really where we're going to start getting into
(09:13):
what we're what we're looking at today, right because Okay,
in nineteen fifty five, Disney opens Disneyland in Anaheim, California.
And this was the first of the companies now five, five, six, six,
I don't know, it's a number, a bunch of theme parks,
and it was the only one designed and constructed entirely
(09:35):
under Walt's direct supervision. Meanwhile, the Walt disney World Resort
or disney World opened in nineteen seventy one in Florida.
And this is the one that I'm familiar with. It
is mind blowingly large. The resort is formed by four
separate theme parks, the Magic Kingdom, Epcot, Disney's Hollywood Studios,
(09:57):
and Animal Kingdom. There are also two water parks, thirty
one themed hotels, nine non Disney hotels on the campus,
golf courses, a camping resort, and Okay, in Florida, y'all,
this was all built within what has since its inception
been a politically independent, corporately run district called the Ready
(10:21):
Creek Improvement District, And this has been in the news
a lot over the past year or so as these
like clashes between the Disney Company and Florida's Governor Ron
de Santis, among perhaps many other factors have led to
that district losing some of its autonomy, including coming under
the purview of this governor appointed board rather than their
(10:44):
own appointed board. So it's now called the Central Florida
Tourism Oversight District, which, yeah, rolls off a tongue, like
like a cannonball off a duck. I don't have a
good metaphor there rolls off the time, like all of
these ketchy songs that we've come to know and love.
But yeah, I'm sure that you all have heard about
this because it's been really big in the news and
(11:05):
it's something that has come up, like the guys did
an episode about Reedy Creek a couple of years back,
I want to say, in twenty seventeen. And then yeah,
it's been in the news recently because of this whole
back and forth with the Scantis about the Don't Say
Gay bill, because Disney came out against that bill and
then the Santis was life well, I tell you what
(11:27):
I'll do. I will take over Disney World. In fact,
there's a quote from the bill signing ceremony for this
which is just likely hysterical to me, so I must
include it. Yeah, today, today, the corporate kingdom finally comes
to an end. The santist said at a bill signing
ceremony in Lake Buena Vista, There's a new sheriff in town,
and accountability will be the order of the day. I'm sorry,
(11:48):
I just have to include that because the idea of
Rhonda Santis saying I'm the new sheriff at Disney World
is just so deeply unseerious to me that I just
have to I have to read it on air. But yeah,
with you know, all political thoughts aside between his time
banning books and trying to legislate LGBTQ people out of existence,
(12:09):
run de Santis decided to take over the corporately run
district where Disney World is currently become the new sheriff
in the district. Sure there are there are other theme
parks that are not, Thank Goodness, under the control of
Run de Santis. They also have parks in Tokyo, Hong Kong,
(12:29):
Shanghai and Paris. Indeed, and then as of twenty two,
the company reported that the parks make something like twenty
eight point seventy one billion dollars per year. So what Yeah,
over twenty eight billion dollars a year from these combined
theme parts. Wow. I always felt like those waters were expensive.
(12:51):
But okay, Oh fun fact. By the way, if you
go up and ask for a couple of water at
any kiosk, at any Disney Park, they will give one
to you for you do not have to buy a
bottle of water. You can just ask for a cup
of water and they will give you one. Where does
the water come from though? Is it bottled water that
they're giving people or is it just like faucet water.
I'm just genuinely curious. Great, great question. I'm not positive
(13:13):
that I've ever done this, and Florida water does tend
to have a very specific flavor profile, so I think
that I would remember if I knew the answer to
copy that. Okay, sorry, I have to as somebody who
works in film, it's really difficult for me to turn
off the copy that. So everyone, please forgive me. You're
gonna you're probably gonna hear you say it more than
once and just being being honest with you, No, I
(13:33):
love that it's hazard of the job. Yeah, so speaking
of like hazards of jobs, because Disney does not with
you to think that there's any hazards about working there
or visiting there, and that's certainly not of the whole Beyonce,
part of the whole vibe. So the parts really pride
themselves on having this high level of consistent experience. So
this means a ride performs exactly as planned, the same
(13:54):
characters interact with you, the restaurant serve the same food,
and most importantly, everyone is always going to have a
magical time. So there's no litter on the streets, no
unscheduled scary moments, and as a result, theoretically no deaths. Right,
So rumors grew and grew over the years that no
one died at Disney. This is a part of the
wholest magical experience that they're trying to concoct for you.
(14:18):
You can't die in this land of magic. And in
order to create the in order to do this sort
of magic trick, the theory goes that there was like
a subsidiary of Disney that had full authority to just
spear it away people like having heart attacks or an
allergic reaction, or a murder victim, or you know, like
(14:41):
like whatever it was, any kind of potentially deadly problem
that someone was having at Disney would just disappear, because
no one dies at Disney. And as we mentioned, this
is one of the numerous conspiracy theories to sort of
proliferate as it relates to Disney World World, and this
(15:01):
particular conspiracy theory got a new breath of life just
like Walt Disney's Frozen Head and last summer when a
TikTok went viral where a guy who used to work
at Disney World said that there was this whole situation
where somebody collapsed and a manager they were trying to
resuscitate him, even though it seemed to this bystander that
(15:25):
worked there that there was no hope for this or
that it wasn't going to go well. And a manager said,
no one dies at Disney World. Everyone is resuscitated or
attempted into resuscitation until they're off the property and then
they're formally declared dead. So this TikTok where a former
employee was saying this sort of went viral, and that's
why this conspiracy theory has gotten a new life again
(15:48):
like Walt Disney's Frozen Body in recent history. Okay, but
here's where it gets crazy. To be fair, there is
a vast behind the scenes network of tunnels and passageways
for employees of the Mouse to get around without being
seen by park guests. And there have been like documentaries
(16:10):
about this. You can even book a tour sometimes, so well,
let you see a little bit of it at Disney
at Disney's Magic Kingdom in Disney World. Like when they
built there in Florida, the company had so much more
land and time and money to throw at the project
than they had had in California, and so they planned
(16:30):
it to incorporate this unseen system to keep that magic running.
And it's called I love this the Utilador system. That
sounds so diabolical. It sounds like a villain layer. If
I ever become a super villain, which is entirely possible
for my life trajectory, I might have to call my
(16:50):
layer the Utilador. But yeah, if you've never heard about this,
system's wild. So like when you're like when you're in
Disney World, what you're walking on the ground that you're
walking on is almost like the second story of a
vast building, and the first story is a network of
tunnels and services and operations where they have infrastructure to
monitor and troubleshoet like everything that's happening in the park,
(17:13):
all right. So they also have they have golf course
down there that are transporting people like no, like seriously
dead as they have like golf courts that are traveling
around the like costume staff and they're handlers, and they
have a pneumatic trash system. Like it's crazy down there. Yeah,
that they can control everything in the park from down there,
(17:34):
and it's where like they have like locker rooms and
break rooms for the staff and you know, like because
it is Disney and it's proprietary, I guess, but perhaps
more because it's Disney and they like being secretive. They're
a little bit heck and secretive about how how all
of this works. Like even if you do take that tour,
you're not allowed to use your cell phone the entire
time you're on it. And the booking page for this
tour specifically refers to the utilatour. That's what it's called
(18:00):
the Utila door system. As an urban legend. Now you
said that this is like the first floor, and I
can tell you from personal experience having grown up in Florida,
it's not a basement because we don't have basements in Florida.
The water table there is so close to the surface
that you don't that would be an underground swimming pool,
and it wouldn't be a particularly sanitary one. So it's
(18:22):
technically not a basement. But hey, speaking of technicalities, we
were talking about dead people. Yeah, So the idea is
behind this conspiracy theory is that instead of people being
pronounced dead or dying at Disney World, that this cabal
is spiriting away people as they're dying through this network
of tunnels underneath Disney World and getting them off the property.
(18:44):
So they quote no one dies at Disney is sort
of what the guy was saying in the TikTok and
also just sort of a belief that people have. Is
this true? I don't know. I think we might have
to take a quick break. So we are going to
go to some as possibly about Disney World, who knows,
maybe if you're in Florida especially, and then we come back.
(19:05):
We're going to look at this idea for real, for real, like,
does anybody die at Disney? Has anyone ever died at Disney?
We'll find out more after the break and we have returned.
I hope you all enjoyed that. I hope you all
enjoyed that ad break. Oh yeah, I want you to
(19:27):
enjoy everything. I mean, it's not really up to me.
You can do whatever you want. I don't have any
real effect on it. But okay, spoiler alert, Yes, people
have died in Disney. People have probably died everywhere on
this planet that people can reach, So that has occurred,
and people have in fact legally been pronounced dead on
Disney property. Just for one example, in nineteen eighty four,
(19:48):
there was unfortunately a small airplane crash in an Epcot
parking lot where one person was pronounced dead at the scene,
and that is not the only one. Yeah, there's actually
a really interesting list. I don't want to say interesting,
because this is people, you know, being killed or dying
or getting injured, and so I don't want to use
the word interesting because that's a little insensitive to these
(20:10):
people's memories. But interesting in the sense that it completely
sort of just debunked this entire myth or conspiracy that
people are walking around is spousing because there have actually
been several people that have been pronounced dead on Disney property.
You're like at Disney World. Yeah, yeah. So for example,
(20:31):
February eighth, nineteen ninety a worker was killed at Disney
Hollywood Studios when he fell thirty three feet to his
death from a scaffold while working on an air conditioning duck.
So thirty three feet not a good not a good
way to go. And then on June thirteenth, two thousand
and five, a four year old boy died of a
heart attack after riding the Mission Space ride at Epcot,
(20:53):
which is super sad a four year old boy. And
then some more. In two thousand and seven, a forty
four year old man offered a heart attack while on
a ride at Animal Kingdom, and the heart defibrillators were
available in the area. Two thousand and nine, a monorail
driver was killed on his train crash into another mona
rail and so he was pronounced dead. And then also
(21:15):
there have been some incidents of like stuntman being injured
and dying. A stuntman at Hollywood Studios died after suffering
a head injury while practicing a tumbling role. During a
rehearsal for the Indiana Jones Epic Stunt Spectacular show. Yeah,
I remember that one. Yeah. And then also there was
a boy, like a little boy that got eaten by
(21:35):
an alligator or drowned by an alligator, and that was
at a resort. And so I don't know how this
whole like, with this idea of no one dies at
Disney World. I don't know how technical we want to
be about what constitutes Disney World versus you know, the
larger part of the same. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I think
I think it's more like like in the theme park itself.
(21:58):
I think I think you're allowed to die wherever you
wherever else you want on the property. But they're like not,
You're like not within the purview of Cinderella's castle, Like
please move that along, Oh my god, but no, seriously.
So that's that's hilarious because um, that's sort of one
of the building blocks for this entire conspiracy, the idea
that nobody is physically allowed to die at Disney or
(22:20):
be pronounced dead at Disney because they'll be spirited away
through these seas or they'll do like unnecessary resuscitation on
you or something like that. Yeah. But but but there
are all of these examples of right, where people have
in fact died and been pronounced dead on Disney grounds,
on the Walt Disney grounds. So I feel like that
that's that's a clearer this is a clearer statement than
(22:43):
we usually get for any kind of fringe theory. It's
just like, oh no, that's untrue. Cool uh period. And
they're even like Snopes looked at it at some point,
and on the Snopes website they say, the claim here
is not that no one has ever actually died on
Disney theme park property, but whether Disney can legitimately make
the claim that no one has ever died at a
Disney park because they ensure that any declaration of death
(23:06):
takes place outside of park property. Uh. Tricky, tricky, Disney.
We see what you're up to. Um, you're trying to
make people have a good time. I guess, I guess right.
Like Like along those lines, I mean, they do have
plans for you for for should you encounter a medical emergency,
(23:29):
Like there's there's first aid centers with the with registered
nurses and over the counter meds that you can go to. Uh,
there's there's local urgent care and emergency facilities that they
will transport you too if you need it. Um, But yeah,
I mean more serious issues do happen. Like just from
the fourth quarter of twenty twenty one October through December,
(23:52):
Disney World registered nine emergencies requiring a hospital stay of
twenty four hours or more, including like stroke like symptoms,
cardiac symptoms, seizures. And I mean, like there's a there's
a nugget of truth to this idea of being whisked
away by you know, Cinderella's my sert snow whites, little
(24:14):
friendly forest friends, because like emergency services can access different
areas of the park through that utilidore system. Although, like
I'm thinking about it, and all of the reports that
I've read are that, like the emergency services that are
on call for this kind of thing, aside from any
in park staff were they previously went through the Reedy
(24:37):
Creek dispatch system, and since that no longer exists as
of about a week ago as of this recording, I'm
like wondering whether any changes will be implemented to emergency
systems with this new government governance happening. Yeah, that'll be
that'll be interesting to see, especially with ROUNDA Santis being
the new sheriff there, like, how that's going to handle
(24:58):
from here on out? Correct? But yeah, I mean it
makes sense. Obviously Disney's not gonna like advertise deaths or
emergencies being there, sort of the same with any large
corporation or organization of its size and nature that they're
going to seem to minimize liability or minimize bad news,
you know, So it makes sense that they're not widely reported,
(25:19):
but they're definitely Unfortunately for the people who believed or
like put stock in the idea that no one was
allowed to die on Disney property, like that is not
actually true. There's a little grain of truth there as
it relates to when somebody is quote like sort of
this nebulous idea of when somebody is pronounced dead or
like versus dying. But yeah, there have actually been people
(25:42):
declared dead on the property. And I guess at that
point you can also get into like, like what is
dying mean anyway? I mean, you know, we have different
no legit, I don't know the answer to either of
these questions. Um, and of course this isn't I mean,
(26:03):
if you want to look at other theme park or
theme park type environments. Again, people die everywhere. Um Like,
if you want to look at Vegas, about one thousand,
one hundred tourists die while visiting Vegas every year. And
I don't have I don't have really good sources of
(26:24):
this one for for this next fact, but I but
I read that, Like, if you die in a Vegas
hotel room, if the staff reported you dead there, they
would have to quarantine the room for two weeks. So therefore,
if anyone has such a serious emergency that they pass,
they will whisk you away, like like Cinderella's mouse friends,
(26:48):
to a different area of the hotel so that they
can keep that room open. Wow, that's disconcerting. I mean,
I completely believe it because capitalism and like money, But
I don't know, Like, if I died in a Vegas
hotel room, I would one hundred percent haunted for at
least the next two weeks. You know, once we get
the thirteen daymark, maybe I'll leave. So I guess I
(27:10):
understand the reasoning for quarantining it for fourteen days. But
I mean, yeah, it's wild because of course, if somebody
knew you know what I mean, if somebody was checking
into a hotel and knew that somebody died there the
previous day, they would probably be a little bit uncomfortable
about staying there. So I one hundred percent believe like
I said, you know, I know you said that you
don't have specific exact sources because this is also probably
(27:30):
not something that people would admit, but right, and see
that believe it? Yeah, right totally. And like the reason
that I don't have really good sources is that everywhere
that I saw that was kind of reporting this was
saying like, you can't get official confirmation of it because
the resorts won't talk about it and journalists will be
blacklisted if they talk about it. So again, I one
(27:54):
hundred percent believe that, just knowing what I know about
the world, I'm one hundred percent leave that. Yeah, yeah,
no doubt. But yeah, so just for comparison, right, Las
Vegas has about thirty eight point eight million visitors per
year as a twenty twenty, and then the Vegas metro
area has a standing population of just under three million
non tourists. Is what we're going to say, what we're
(28:16):
going to call the people that aren't visiting, which reminds
me is funny because I saw I think it was
on the Grammys where like bad Money or somebody was
singing it. It It was like speaking in non English, and
I just think it's really funny, or like singing in
non English. That apparently the two languages are English and
non English. So the two categories of people in Las
Vegas are like tourists and non tourists. That's what we're
gonna go with. But by way of contrast, Disneyland has
(28:39):
about like eight point five million visitors per year and
a Disney World has over fifty eight million per years,
So that's sixty million per year, not counting international parks.
And by the way, just for comparison, the population of
Reedy Creek is twenty four not twenty four thousand, not
twenty four million, like twenty four people as of the
most recent US census. Wow, I had no idea that
(29:04):
that Disney World was comparable to Vegas in terms of
visitor visitor numbers. That's that's fine, that's okay. No, I
mean they're they're very similar. Like it's it's all, it's
all a show, right, what happens in Disney stays in Disney.
And then yeah, I don't know, like this this grain
of truth about this Disney theory is really compelling, and like,
(29:27):
comparatively speaking, given the numbers that we just gave about
the amount of people that die in Las Vegas, right,
like a hundred excuse me, eleven hundred tourists die while
visiting Vegas each year, is what we said, right, And
so if you look at that being reported versus just
the handful or so of deaths that we've been able
to list coming from the Orlando Sentinel and the Florida
(29:49):
Injury Law website, then it does seem like the Mouse
is sort of succeeding in continuing this whole idea of
no one dies at Disney. Comparatively speaking, if we look
at those two tourist destinations, sure, sure, And I mean,
of course, Vegas is a very different gig. I mean
there's a lot more drinking and debauchery, and says who,
(30:09):
I sure don't. I can't personally speak to the amount
of debauchery that's happening at Disney World. And I also,
I'm not going to say anything else because I don't
want the mouse to come after me. So no way
more drinking and debauchery Inas Vegas. Huh, you still can
only drink and I believe two locations in Disney's Magic
(30:29):
Kingdom because Walt wanted to wanted that to be a
place where kids were not subjected to that kind of behavior.
You can drink in the other Disney parks. They do
have like beer for sale at Chaos at the other
three in Orlando, but you cannot thee that the two
places are like wine or beer with dinner at Cinderella's
(30:52):
Castle and Bell's Castle. Wow. I actually did not know that,
so I just learned that today. Thank you. That's super interesting.
So you said that's that Magic Kingdom people can't drink,
but they can at the other ones. Okay, that's interesting. Yeah.
I have been to Disney World as an adult. They
have a drinking age, so that's not something that I
would have remembered, but that's sort of fascinating. But I
do definitely remember seeing, you know, for example, restaurants at
(31:13):
Epcot where I know as a child, I saw people
drinking there, like yeah, yeah, okay, yeah, it's it's as
going as an adult is a really trippy experience. Um,
I I enjoyed except for the people. I think if
I had a lot of money, I would like going
a lot better. If I could just like buy out
the park or something for a day, because just the
(31:35):
sheer number of humans, I'm like, oh, this is Mickey's great,
but why are there humans talking to me? I don't
like that. I mean, however, I will say, and like,
Disney isn't a sponsor that I'm that I'm personally aware of.
If they are, they're watching us. Um but uh but no, Um.
The magic is intact like they do such a wildly
good job of like pumping in sounds and and sense
(31:58):
throughout the park that you you don't really notice until
you start thinking about it, and then you're like, there's
no reason for like, like, no one is actually producing
candy on the street. It shouldn't taste, it shouldn't smell
like like candy is being made here. Why is that
bush playing music? I don't know? And so yeah, like
(32:19):
that sense of magic, it extends to not having corpses
littered the streets. I suppose. Oh my god, I'm sorry.
That was a really funny visual to me, and it
should not have been, because people dying is not funny.
I'm sorry everybody, really it's not. But people do die,
and according to sources that I've seen that's at a
rate at about approximately one hundred and six per minute
(32:42):
around the world. They're one hundred and six people dying
every minute. And so the fact of the matter is
is just given the stats, people are going to happen.
Some people are going to be taking their last breath
on Disney grounds. There's no hospital there, you know. So
again we talked about what this idea of the equal
definition of dying or you know, when somebody is dying
(33:03):
versus dead, But just with the numbers, somebody's taking their
last breath underneath Cinderella's Castle, and there have actually been
literally there have been people pronounced dead on Disney grounds. So,
like I said, unfortunately for those wishing to believe that
no one dies at Disney, that is not in fact true.
So now that we have established that, that is just
(33:26):
about going to do it for us. But we would
love to hear from you. What do you think about
all of this? Have you heard this conspiracy before or
any other conspiracies about Walt Disney? Have you personally died
at Disney World? Please tell us your story. And there
are a bunch of ways to reach us here at
stuff they don't want you to know, which I will
(33:47):
detail and just a moment. But first, Lauren, can you
please tell everybody where they can find you they want
to check you out after giving this a listen? Oh
heck sure, yeah if you want me to. If you
want to hear me talk about or dead people. Um,
I'm on a show called American Shadows. It's a historical
true crime kind of kind of show. Um. It's with
(34:08):
Aaron Menky's company Grim and Mild, so it's got that
same kind of vibe. And uh yeah, I'm also on
a on a short form science show called brain Stuff
and on a food show where we talk about dead
people more often than perhaps you would think. Um. Uh,
that's a one's called Savor and it's with I think
(34:28):
I think Annie Reese might have shown up on stuff
they don't even know before. Yeah. Yeah, a friend of
the show. I mean you're both friends of the show.
Oh thank you that I don't know I'm a friend
of me. Um. But yeah, so so that is that
is where you can find me, um or if you
want to look for me on Instagram. I am at
Vogel Bomb. That's Vogel Bomb because I was really feeling
(34:51):
myself the day that I made that user name Dope
and then as for me codenamed dot Holiday, I generally
don't want to be found. You know sort of what
we we're talking about this Disney and people. But you know,
if you're looking for me, you will be able to
find me in my super villain layer called the Utilador.
If you want to get in touch with the guys
or again reach out to us with any questions conspiracy
(35:12):
theories of your own, you can always reach us all
over the internet. We are Here's where it gets Crazy
on Facebook, that's the Facebook group and then conspiracy stuff
show on Instagram or TikTok conspiracy stuff on YouTube and Twitter.
You can also call the show directly at one eight
three three std WYTK. Make sure you keep in mind
(35:34):
that there is a three minute limit on those voicemails.
So if you have a lot to say, you may
want to just send us an email, which I will
tell you how to do in just one moment. But
as it relates to phone calls, you want to give
us a nickname that we can use. You might show
up on one of the listener mail episodes that I produce.
And then other than that, yeah, you can get in
touch with us the good old fashioned way, which before
(35:56):
I tell you, I want to thank you Lauren so
much for coming out and joining the show today. Thank
you us to have on board. They had a blast
bearing here and then for everybody else and those of
you that want to get in touch with the show
the old fashioned way can send us an email at
conspiracy iHeartRadio dot com. Stuff they Don't want you to
(36:36):
know is a production of iHeartRadio. For more podcasts from
my heart Radio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or
wherever you listen to your favorite shows.
From UFOs to psychic powers and government conspiracies. History is
riddled with unexplained events. You can turn back now or
learn the stuff they don't want you to know. A
production of iHeart Radio. Hello, and welcome back to the show.
(00:26):
My name's Lauren, they call me Dot. We are joined
as always why our superproducer palmission control a decade. Most importantly,
you are you. You are here, and that makes this
stuff they don't want you to know. If you are
listening to this the day it comes out, it is
March eighth, which, in addition to being James Vanderbeek's birthday,
(00:46):
shout out anybody wow of sense Creek all right, eighties babies,
it is also International Women's Day. Yeah. The way that
I Heart likes to celebrate that is to have some
of the lady co hosts takeover for some of the
dude co hosts for the day. And so that is
why you may have noticed that Ben Matinoll are not
here or their voices are just sounding a little bit
(01:08):
higher today. Who's tiny bit? Yeah? Yeah, I can try,
I can try to do a vocal fry. Oh I won't,
but yes on this episode today we are returning on
the show to a ludicrously gigantic, successful entertainment conglomerate, a
company that has built their own autonomous city state in Florida,
(01:34):
which has been talked about on the show before. The
Guys covered it back in twenty seventeen in their episode
about the creation of the Reedy Creek Improvement District. Yeah,
you'll very often hear them refer to it as the Mouse,
which is actually one of my favorite nicknames for anything
in recent history. But the official name of it is Disney,
which there's just unless you're under a rock or under
(01:57):
the sea, there's really no way that you have in
about Disney at some point in your life. So there's
actually a lot of different conspiracies that float around about
Disney that I find to be incredibly entertaining. For example,
that Walt Disney's head is frozen and they're going to
unfreeze it at some point. I don't know what they
(02:17):
would do with it, yeah, because I don't think that
cryogenic freezing. I'm sure that there's an episode on that too.
I don't think that actually works. I'm pretty sure that
fan froze it. They would be like, well, this is
some interesting meat that is here. Head for dinner. Yep,
slow cookers, right, But okay, so there's that. There's also
that just his entire body is frozen. I don't know
(02:39):
why they are are different, separate conspiracies for the freezing
of his body versus the freezing of his head, but
that is something that I have found on the internet.
In terms of Disney conspiracies, there are also some other ones,
like that Disney helped fake the moon landing. Oh oh,
I don't think I've heard about that one. Yeah, that
one's that one's interesting to me. And I mean also
(03:01):
we could have a whole other conversation about whether, like
there's so many conspiracies around the moon landing. Again, just
really funny to me. I'm actually surprised that I haven't
heard about more of these because I actually grew up
in South Florida, and you know, like like I went
to Disney all the time as a kid, Like we
took school field trips to the Disney theme parks. You
do not have that level of childhood familiarity, do you.
(03:23):
Most people don't well with me being from Detroit. Like
our field trip thing that we did was Cedar Point,
which is in Ohio. That was our theme Park. I
missed those days. But I actually I did visit Disney
quite a few times when I was a kid, just
on family trips, and also when I was in middle school,
I was in marching band and we I don't really
remember the specifics of this, but for some reason we
(03:45):
took a trip to Disney and we had the opportunity
to march through Disney World. Yea, our marching band, along
with other marching bands from other schools all over the country.
So that was fun. Again, I do not remember the
details are specifics, but I have been to Disney World
quite a few times. Yeah. Yeah, But I would say
that neither of us are are a Disney human, like
(04:05):
like one of those Disney adults. Yeah. Like, it's not
like a like a planned destination for me on a
on a semi annual basis or anything like that. Nope.
And in fact, I have an entire soapbox about how
I feel about Disney movies and how they sort of
perpetuate this sort of feeding this idea of love and
romance to women is children to get them to fit
into this machine. But we don't have time. We don't
(04:27):
have time for that today. That that is not the
theory that the fringe theory or conspiracy realism that we
were talking about today. Today we are talking about the
idea that no one dies at Disney, which is also
a really interesting conspiracy theory to me, Specifically, this idea
that no one at is ever pronounced dead at Disney,
(04:49):
because Disney is this a magical place where no, that
doesn't happen again only yeah mothers, yes, I mean in
the movie, in the movies, every single mom, but every
single I don't noticed that. How just everybody in Disney
is an orphan. It's actually sort of like trite at
this point. There has to be stories where it's interesting
to have your parents be alive. I don't know anyway, Okay,
(05:11):
can we do the thing? Can I do the ben thing?
Here are the facts. Excellent job. I actually thought that
had been was in here for a second. Phenomenal, phenomenal
voice work. Yeah. So the Walt Disney Company to sort
of go through the history really quickly. It started small enough.
It was founded on October sixteenth, nineteen twenty three, by
(05:31):
Walt and roy O Disney, two brothers. And I just
want to say that if I was roy out of
this brother situation, I would be a little bit peeved.
And now my name has been a race throughout history
because I have never heard it before actually doing research
on Disney. And so yeah, when they first started it
in nineteen twenty three and a burst of creativity, they
originally named the Disney Brothers Studio and after that it
(05:54):
would go through several different name changes over the following decades,
and then it ultimately became the Walt Disney Company in
nineteen eighty six. What a different world we would live
in if it had been the Roy Disney Company. But okay,
all right, so there is We are not a history
of Disney podcast. There are I am positive podcasts you
(06:17):
could find about that. We're just going to cover the
high points here, okay. So Walt was an artist who
began messing around with sell animation during his time at
the Kansas City Film Ad Company, which I think is
great because I'm like, oh, that background in advertising and
marketing would certainly pay off. And he started a company
(06:38):
before he started Disney called the laugh A Graham Studio,
which went bankrupt in nineteen twenty three. So remember that,
ladies and gentlemen, if you fail at something, try try again,
because if Walt had given up. Followed, Watt had given
up after that bankruptcy, where would we be now, No
Disney Princesses, no Disney World, say. In the aftermath of
that bankruptcy, Walt decided to move to la to join
(06:59):
his brother Roy, who was out there recovering from tuberculosis.
And so while he was there, like once he got there,
finally sold a short film that was produced by laugh Agraham,
the company that went bankrupt, Alice's Wonderland, and then signed
a contract to make six more films. Yeah, And so
with the success, the brothers went on founded their company,
(07:21):
persuaded some of their collaborators to join them in Hollywood,
and this group of films, called the Alice Comedies, were
a success, as was another series based on another one
of Walt's characters, Oswald, the Lucky Rabbit. And so then
after that the story is probably going to become a
little bit more familiar to all of you, because this
is when Disney began work on what would be sort
(07:42):
of the most famous or like the impetus of the
Mouse as we know it today, with the nineteen twenty
eight release of Steamboat Willie, which was when the world
was introduced to Mickey Mouse, and all of you all
are still seeing this little steamboat Willie animation before Disney
movies today because that's how integral it was to forming
the company. So, yeah, as you are clearly aware, Mickey
(08:06):
Mouse is one of the most recognizable cartoons in history,
and this is when what Disney really sort of sort
of took off. This success allowed Walt to kind of
conceive of the idea of making a feature film, and
what a feature film it was going to be. Snow
White in the Seven Dwarves. You've probably heard of it.
They started making it in nineteen thirty four, and it
(08:29):
actually like like three years into it, it was four
hundred percent over budget. They had like three hundred animators
and artists and assistants on the payroll. But somehow it
turned into this beautiful film and was its success. And
we now have all of these countless princesses and etc.
To thank for those early successes that came a little
(08:51):
bit of a surprise to everyone, indeed. And so after that,
as you know, multiple features, short films that ultimately grew
and grew, sprinkled in some casual races, and then we
got the Disney that we know and love today. And
so with the success of all of those things, ultimately
Disney started moving into the realm of theme parts. And
this is really where we're going to start getting into
(09:13):
what we're what we're looking at today, right because Okay,
in nineteen fifty five, Disney opens Disneyland in Anaheim, California.
And this was the first of the companies now five, five, six, six,
I don't know, it's a number, a bunch of theme parks,
and it was the only one designed and constructed entirely
(09:35):
under Walt's direct supervision. Meanwhile, the Walt disney World Resort
or disney World opened in nineteen seventy one in Florida.
And this is the one that I'm familiar with. It
is mind blowingly large. The resort is formed by four
separate theme parks, the Magic Kingdom, Epcot, Disney's Hollywood Studios,
(09:57):
and Animal Kingdom. There are also two water parks, thirty
one themed hotels, nine non Disney hotels on the campus,
golf courses, a camping resort, and Okay, in Florida, y'all,
this was all built within what has since its inception
been a politically independent, corporately run district called the Ready
(10:21):
Creek Improvement District, And this has been in the news
a lot over the past year or so as these
like clashes between the Disney Company and Florida's Governor Ron
de Santis, among perhaps many other factors have led to
that district losing some of its autonomy, including coming under
the purview of this governor appointed board rather than their
(10:44):
own appointed board. So it's now called the Central Florida
Tourism Oversight District, which, yeah, rolls off a tongue, like
like a cannonball off a duck. I don't have a
good metaphor there rolls off the time, like all of
these ketchy songs that we've come to know and love.
But yeah, I'm sure that you all have heard about
this because it's been really big in the news and
(11:05):
it's something that has come up, like the guys did
an episode about Reedy Creek a couple of years back,
I want to say, in twenty seventeen. And then yeah,
it's been in the news recently because of this whole
back and forth with the Scantis about the Don't Say
Gay bill, because Disney came out against that bill and
then the Santis was life well, I tell you what
(11:27):
I'll do. I will take over Disney World. In fact,
there's a quote from the bill signing ceremony for this
which is just likely hysterical to me, so I must
include it. Yeah, today, today, the corporate kingdom finally comes
to an end. The santist said at a bill signing
ceremony in Lake Buena Vista, There's a new sheriff in town,
and accountability will be the order of the day. I'm sorry,
(11:48):
I just have to include that because the idea of
Rhonda Santis saying I'm the new sheriff at Disney World
is just so deeply unseerious to me that I just
have to I have to read it on air. But yeah,
with you know, all political thoughts aside between his time
banning books and trying to legislate LGBTQ people out of existence,
(12:09):
run de Santis decided to take over the corporately run
district where Disney World is currently become the new sheriff
in the district. Sure there are there are other theme
parks that are not, Thank Goodness, under the control of
Run de Santis. They also have parks in Tokyo, Hong Kong,
(12:29):
Shanghai and Paris. Indeed, and then as of twenty two,
the company reported that the parks make something like twenty
eight point seventy one billion dollars per year. So what Yeah,
over twenty eight billion dollars a year from these combined
theme parts. Wow. I always felt like those waters were expensive.
(12:51):
But okay, Oh fun fact. By the way, if you
go up and ask for a couple of water at
any kiosk, at any Disney Park, they will give one
to you for you do not have to buy a
bottle of water. You can just ask for a cup
of water and they will give you one. Where does
the water come from though? Is it bottled water that
they're giving people or is it just like faucet water.
I'm just genuinely curious. Great, great question. I'm not positive
(13:13):
that I've ever done this, and Florida water does tend
to have a very specific flavor profile, so I think
that I would remember if I knew the answer to
copy that. Okay, sorry, I have to as somebody who
works in film, it's really difficult for me to turn
off the copy that. So everyone, please forgive me. You're
gonna you're probably gonna hear you say it more than
once and just being being honest with you, No, I
(13:33):
love that it's hazard of the job. Yeah, so speaking
of like hazards of jobs, because Disney does not with
you to think that there's any hazards about working there
or visiting there, and that's certainly not of the whole Beyonce,
part of the whole vibe. So the parts really pride
themselves on having this high level of consistent experience. So
this means a ride performs exactly as planned, the same
(13:54):
characters interact with you, the restaurant serve the same food,
and most importantly, everyone is always going to have a
magical time. So there's no litter on the streets, no
unscheduled scary moments, and as a result, theoretically no deaths. Right,
So rumors grew and grew over the years that no
one died at Disney. This is a part of the
wholest magical experience that they're trying to concoct for you.
(14:18):
You can't die in this land of magic. And in
order to create the in order to do this sort
of magic trick, the theory goes that there was like
a subsidiary of Disney that had full authority to just
spear it away people like having heart attacks or an
allergic reaction, or a murder victim, or you know, like
(14:41):
like whatever it was, any kind of potentially deadly problem
that someone was having at Disney would just disappear, because
no one dies at Disney. And as we mentioned, this
is one of the numerous conspiracy theories to sort of
proliferate as it relates to Disney World World, and this
(15:01):
particular conspiracy theory got a new breath of life just
like Walt Disney's Frozen Head and last summer when a
TikTok went viral where a guy who used to work
at Disney World said that there was this whole situation
where somebody collapsed and a manager they were trying to
resuscitate him, even though it seemed to this bystander that
(15:25):
worked there that there was no hope for this or
that it wasn't going to go well. And a manager said,
no one dies at Disney World. Everyone is resuscitated or
attempted into resuscitation until they're off the property and then
they're formally declared dead. So this TikTok where a former
employee was saying this sort of went viral, and that's
why this conspiracy theory has gotten a new life again
(15:48):
like Walt Disney's Frozen Body in recent history. Okay, but
here's where it gets crazy. To be fair, there is
a vast behind the scenes network of tunnels and passageways
for employees of the Mouse to get around without being
seen by park guests. And there have been like documentaries
(16:10):
about this. You can even book a tour sometimes, so well,
let you see a little bit of it at Disney
at Disney's Magic Kingdom in Disney World. Like when they
built there in Florida, the company had so much more
land and time and money to throw at the project
than they had had in California, and so they planned
(16:30):
it to incorporate this unseen system to keep that magic running.
And it's called I love this the Utilador system. That
sounds so diabolical. It sounds like a villain layer. If
I ever become a super villain, which is entirely possible
for my life trajectory, I might have to call my
(16:50):
layer the Utilador. But yeah, if you've never heard about this,
system's wild. So like when you're like when you're in
Disney World, what you're walking on the ground that you're
walking on is almost like the second story of a
vast building, and the first story is a network of
tunnels and services and operations where they have infrastructure to
monitor and troubleshoet like everything that's happening in the park,
(17:13):
all right. So they also have they have golf course
down there that are transporting people like no, like seriously
dead as they have like golf courts that are traveling
around the like costume staff and they're handlers, and they
have a pneumatic trash system. Like it's crazy down there. Yeah,
that they can control everything in the park from down there,
(17:34):
and it's where like they have like locker rooms and
break rooms for the staff and you know, like because
it is Disney and it's proprietary, I guess, but perhaps
more because it's Disney and they like being secretive. They're
a little bit heck and secretive about how how all
of this works. Like even if you do take that tour,
you're not allowed to use your cell phone the entire
time you're on it. And the booking page for this
tour specifically refers to the utilatour. That's what it's called
(18:00):
the Utila door system. As an urban legend. Now you
said that this is like the first floor, and I
can tell you from personal experience having grown up in Florida,
it's not a basement because we don't have basements in Florida.
The water table there is so close to the surface
that you don't that would be an underground swimming pool,
and it wouldn't be a particularly sanitary one. So it's
(18:22):
technically not a basement. But hey, speaking of technicalities, we
were talking about dead people. Yeah, So the idea is
behind this conspiracy theory is that instead of people being
pronounced dead or dying at Disney World, that this cabal
is spiriting away people as they're dying through this network
of tunnels underneath Disney World and getting them off the property.
(18:44):
So they quote no one dies at Disney is sort
of what the guy was saying in the TikTok and
also just sort of a belief that people have. Is
this true? I don't know. I think we might have
to take a quick break. So we are going to
go to some as possibly about Disney World, who knows,
maybe if you're in Florida especially, and then we come back.
(19:05):
We're going to look at this idea for real, for real, like,
does anybody die at Disney? Has anyone ever died at Disney?
We'll find out more after the break and we have returned.
I hope you all enjoyed that. I hope you all
enjoyed that ad break. Oh yeah, I want you to
(19:27):
enjoy everything. I mean, it's not really up to me.
You can do whatever you want. I don't have any
real effect on it. But okay, spoiler alert, Yes, people
have died in Disney. People have probably died everywhere on
this planet that people can reach, So that has occurred,
and people have in fact legally been pronounced dead on
Disney property. Just for one example, in nineteen eighty four,
(19:48):
there was unfortunately a small airplane crash in an Epcot
parking lot where one person was pronounced dead at the scene,
and that is not the only one. Yeah, there's actually
a really interesting list. I don't want to say interesting,
because this is people, you know, being killed or dying
or getting injured, and so I don't want to use
the word interesting because that's a little insensitive to these
(20:10):
people's memories. But interesting in the sense that it completely
sort of just debunked this entire myth or conspiracy that
people are walking around is spousing because there have actually
been several people that have been pronounced dead on Disney property.
You're like at Disney World. Yeah, yeah. So for example,
(20:31):
February eighth, nineteen ninety a worker was killed at Disney
Hollywood Studios when he fell thirty three feet to his
death from a scaffold while working on an air conditioning duck.
So thirty three feet not a good not a good
way to go. And then on June thirteenth, two thousand
and five, a four year old boy died of a
heart attack after riding the Mission Space ride at Epcot,
(20:53):
which is super sad a four year old boy. And
then some more. In two thousand and seven, a forty
four year old man offered a heart attack while on
a ride at Animal Kingdom, and the heart defibrillators were
available in the area. Two thousand and nine, a monorail
driver was killed on his train crash into another mona
rail and so he was pronounced dead. And then also
(21:15):
there have been some incidents of like stuntman being injured
and dying. A stuntman at Hollywood Studios died after suffering
a head injury while practicing a tumbling role. During a
rehearsal for the Indiana Jones Epic Stunt Spectacular show. Yeah,
I remember that one. Yeah. And then also there was
a boy, like a little boy that got eaten by
(21:35):
an alligator or drowned by an alligator, and that was
at a resort. And so I don't know how this
whole like, with this idea of no one dies at
Disney World. I don't know how technical we want to
be about what constitutes Disney World versus you know, the
larger part of the same. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I think
I think it's more like like in the theme park itself.
(21:58):
I think I think you're allowed to die wherever you
wherever else you want on the property. But they're like not,
You're like not within the purview of Cinderella's castle, Like
please move that along, Oh my god, but no, seriously.
So that's that's hilarious because um, that's sort of one
of the building blocks for this entire conspiracy, the idea
that nobody is physically allowed to die at Disney or
(22:20):
be pronounced dead at Disney because they'll be spirited away
through these seas or they'll do like unnecessary resuscitation on
you or something like that. Yeah. But but but there
are all of these examples of right, where people have
in fact died and been pronounced dead on Disney grounds,
on the Walt Disney grounds. So I feel like that
that's that's a clearer this is a clearer statement than
(22:43):
we usually get for any kind of fringe theory. It's
just like, oh no, that's untrue. Cool uh period. And
they're even like Snopes looked at it at some point,
and on the Snopes website they say, the claim here
is not that no one has ever actually died on
Disney theme park property, but whether Disney can legitimately make
the claim that no one has ever died at a
Disney park because they ensure that any declaration of death
(23:06):
takes place outside of park property. Uh. Tricky, tricky, Disney.
We see what you're up to. Um, you're trying to
make people have a good time. I guess, I guess right.
Like Like along those lines, I mean, they do have
plans for you for for should you encounter a medical emergency,
(23:29):
Like there's there's first aid centers with the with registered
nurses and over the counter meds that you can go to. Uh,
there's there's local urgent care and emergency facilities that they
will transport you too if you need it. Um, But yeah,
I mean more serious issues do happen. Like just from
the fourth quarter of twenty twenty one October through December,
(23:52):
Disney World registered nine emergencies requiring a hospital stay of
twenty four hours or more, including like stroke like symptoms,
cardiac symptoms, seizures. And I mean, like there's a there's
a nugget of truth to this idea of being whisked
away by you know, Cinderella's my sert snow whites, little
(24:14):
friendly forest friends, because like emergency services can access different
areas of the park through that utilidore system. Although, like
I'm thinking about it, and all of the reports that
I've read are that, like the emergency services that are
on call for this kind of thing, aside from any
in park staff were they previously went through the Reedy
(24:37):
Creek dispatch system, and since that no longer exists as
of about a week ago as of this recording, I'm
like wondering whether any changes will be implemented to emergency
systems with this new government governance happening. Yeah, that'll be
that'll be interesting to see, especially with ROUNDA Santis being
the new sheriff there, like, how that's going to handle
(24:58):
from here on out? Correct? But yeah, I mean it
makes sense. Obviously Disney's not gonna like advertise deaths or
emergencies being there, sort of the same with any large
corporation or organization of its size and nature that they're
going to seem to minimize liability or minimize bad news,
you know, So it makes sense that they're not widely reported,
(25:19):
but they're definitely Unfortunately for the people who believed or
like put stock in the idea that no one was
allowed to die on Disney property, like that is not
actually true. There's a little grain of truth there as
it relates to when somebody is quote like sort of
this nebulous idea of when somebody is pronounced dead or
like versus dying. But yeah, there have actually been people
(25:42):
declared dead on the property. And I guess at that
point you can also get into like, like what is
dying mean anyway? I mean, you know, we have different
no legit, I don't know the answer to either of
these questions. Um, and of course this isn't I mean,
(26:03):
if you want to look at other theme park or
theme park type environments. Again, people die everywhere. Um Like,
if you want to look at Vegas, about one thousand,
one hundred tourists die while visiting Vegas every year. And
I don't have I don't have really good sources of
(26:24):
this one for for this next fact, but I but
I read that, Like, if you die in a Vegas
hotel room, if the staff reported you dead there, they
would have to quarantine the room for two weeks. So therefore,
if anyone has such a serious emergency that they pass,
they will whisk you away, like like Cinderella's mouse friends,
(26:48):
to a different area of the hotel so that they
can keep that room open. Wow, that's disconcerting. I mean,
I completely believe it because capitalism and like money, But
I don't know, Like, if I died in a Vegas
hotel room, I would one hundred percent haunted for at
least the next two weeks. You know, once we get
the thirteen daymark, maybe I'll leave. So I guess I
(27:10):
understand the reasoning for quarantining it for fourteen days. But
I mean, yeah, it's wild because of course, if somebody
knew you know what I mean, if somebody was checking
into a hotel and knew that somebody died there the
previous day, they would probably be a little bit uncomfortable
about staying there. So I one hundred percent believe like
I said, you know, I know you said that you
don't have specific exact sources because this is also probably
(27:30):
not something that people would admit, but right, and see
that believe it? Yeah, right totally. And like the reason
that I don't have really good sources is that everywhere
that I saw that was kind of reporting this was
saying like, you can't get official confirmation of it because
the resorts won't talk about it and journalists will be
blacklisted if they talk about it. So again, I one
(27:54):
hundred percent believe that, just knowing what I know about
the world, I'm one hundred percent leave that. Yeah, yeah,
no doubt. But yeah, so just for comparison, right, Las
Vegas has about thirty eight point eight million visitors per
year as a twenty twenty, and then the Vegas metro
area has a standing population of just under three million
non tourists. Is what we're going to say, what we're
(28:16):
going to call the people that aren't visiting, which reminds
me is funny because I saw I think it was
on the Grammys where like bad Money or somebody was
singing it. It It was like speaking in non English, and
I just think it's really funny, or like singing in
non English. That apparently the two languages are English and
non English. So the two categories of people in Las
Vegas are like tourists and non tourists. That's what we're
gonna go with. But by way of contrast, Disneyland has
(28:39):
about like eight point five million visitors per year and
a Disney World has over fifty eight million per years,
So that's sixty million per year, not counting international parks.
And by the way, just for comparison, the population of
Reedy Creek is twenty four not twenty four thousand, not
twenty four million, like twenty four people as of the
most recent US census. Wow, I had no idea that
(29:04):
that Disney World was comparable to Vegas in terms of
visitor visitor numbers. That's that's fine, that's okay. No, I
mean they're they're very similar. Like it's it's all, it's
all a show, right, what happens in Disney stays in Disney.
And then yeah, I don't know, like this this grain
of truth about this Disney theory is really compelling, and like,
(29:27):
comparatively speaking, given the numbers that we just gave about
the amount of people that die in Las Vegas, right,
like a hundred excuse me, eleven hundred tourists die while
visiting Vegas each year, is what we said, right, And
so if you look at that being reported versus just
the handful or so of deaths that we've been able
to list coming from the Orlando Sentinel and the Florida
(29:49):
Injury Law website, then it does seem like the Mouse
is sort of succeeding in continuing this whole idea of
no one dies at Disney. Comparatively speaking, if we look
at those two tourist destinations, sure, sure, And I mean,
of course, Vegas is a very different gig. I mean
there's a lot more drinking and debauchery, and says who,
(30:09):
I sure don't. I can't personally speak to the amount
of debauchery that's happening at Disney World. And I also,
I'm not going to say anything else because I don't
want the mouse to come after me. So no way
more drinking and debauchery Inas Vegas. Huh, you still can
only drink and I believe two locations in Disney's Magic
(30:29):
Kingdom because Walt wanted to wanted that to be a
place where kids were not subjected to that kind of behavior.
You can drink in the other Disney parks. They do
have like beer for sale at Chaos at the other
three in Orlando, but you cannot thee that the two
places are like wine or beer with dinner at Cinderella's
(30:52):
Castle and Bell's Castle. Wow. I actually did not know that,
so I just learned that today. Thank you. That's super interesting.
So you said that's that Magic Kingdom people can't drink,
but they can at the other ones. Okay, that's interesting. Yeah.
I have been to Disney World as an adult. They
have a drinking age, so that's not something that I
would have remembered, but that's sort of fascinating. But I
do definitely remember seeing, you know, for example, restaurants at
(31:13):
Epcot where I know as a child, I saw people
drinking there, like yeah, yeah, okay, yeah, it's it's as
going as an adult is a really trippy experience. Um,
I I enjoyed except for the people. I think if
I had a lot of money, I would like going
a lot better. If I could just like buy out
the park or something for a day, because just the
(31:35):
sheer number of humans, I'm like, oh, this is Mickey's great,
but why are there humans talking to me? I don't
like that. I mean, however, I will say, and like,
Disney isn't a sponsor that I'm that I'm personally aware of.
If they are, they're watching us. Um but uh but no, Um.
The magic is intact like they do such a wildly
good job of like pumping in sounds and and sense
(31:58):
throughout the park that you you don't really notice until
you start thinking about it, and then you're like, there's
no reason for like, like, no one is actually producing
candy on the street. It shouldn't taste, it shouldn't smell
like like candy is being made here. Why is that
bush playing music? I don't know? And so yeah, like
(32:19):
that sense of magic, it extends to not having corpses
littered the streets. I suppose. Oh my god, I'm sorry.
That was a really funny visual to me, and it
should not have been, because people dying is not funny.
I'm sorry everybody, really it's not. But people do die,
and according to sources that I've seen that's at a
rate at about approximately one hundred and six per minute
(32:42):
around the world. They're one hundred and six people dying
every minute. And so the fact of the matter is
is just given the stats, people are going to happen.
Some people are going to be taking their last breath
on Disney grounds. There's no hospital there, you know. So
again we talked about what this idea of the equal
definition of dying or you know, when somebody is dying
(33:03):
versus dead, But just with the numbers, somebody's taking their
last breath underneath Cinderella's Castle, and there have actually been
literally there have been people pronounced dead on Disney grounds. So,
like I said, unfortunately for those wishing to believe that
no one dies at Disney, that is not in fact true.
So now that we have established that, that is just
(33:26):
about going to do it for us. But we would
love to hear from you. What do you think about
all of this? Have you heard this conspiracy before or
any other conspiracies about Walt Disney? Have you personally died
at Disney World? Please tell us your story. And there
are a bunch of ways to reach us here at
stuff they don't want you to know, which I will
(33:47):
detail and just a moment. But first, Lauren, can you
please tell everybody where they can find you they want
to check you out after giving this a listen? Oh
heck sure, yeah if you want me to. If you
want to hear me talk about or dead people. Um,
I'm on a show called American Shadows. It's a historical
true crime kind of kind of show. Um. It's with
(34:08):
Aaron Menky's company Grim and Mild, so it's got that
same kind of vibe. And uh yeah, I'm also on
a on a short form science show called brain Stuff
and on a food show where we talk about dead
people more often than perhaps you would think. Um. Uh,
that's a one's called Savor and it's with I think
(34:28):
I think Annie Reese might have shown up on stuff
they don't even know before. Yeah. Yeah, a friend of
the show. I mean you're both friends of the show.
Oh thank you that I don't know I'm a friend
of me. Um. But yeah, so so that is that
is where you can find me, um or if you
want to look for me on Instagram. I am at
Vogel Bomb. That's Vogel Bomb because I was really feeling
(34:51):
myself the day that I made that user name Dope
and then as for me codenamed dot Holiday, I generally
don't want to be found. You know sort of what
we we're talking about this Disney and people. But you know,
if you're looking for me, you will be able to
find me in my super villain layer called the Utilador.
If you want to get in touch with the guys
or again reach out to us with any questions conspiracy
(35:12):
theories of your own, you can always reach us all
over the internet. We are Here's where it gets Crazy
on Facebook, that's the Facebook group and then conspiracy stuff
show on Instagram or TikTok conspiracy stuff on YouTube and Twitter.
You can also call the show directly at one eight
three three std WYTK. Make sure you keep in mind
(35:34):
that there is a three minute limit on those voicemails.
So if you have a lot to say, you may
want to just send us an email, which I will
tell you how to do in just one moment. But
as it relates to phone calls, you want to give
us a nickname that we can use. You might show
up on one of the listener mail episodes that I produce.
And then other than that, yeah, you can get in
touch with us the good old fashioned way, which before
(35:56):
I tell you, I want to thank you Lauren so
much for coming out and joining the show today. Thank
you us to have on board. They had a blast
bearing here and then for everybody else and those of
you that want to get in touch with the show
the old fashioned way can send us an email at
conspiracy iHeartRadio dot com. Stuff they Don't want you to
(36:36):
know is a production of iHeartRadio. For more podcasts from
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