By: Laura Meyers
What happens when you blend Caitlyn Jenner and Rachel Dolezal together with a pinch of brain cancer, fraud and a gluten-free, holistic nutcase?
Belle Gibson.
Gibson is a newly-disgraced wellness blogger who deceived millions of online followers that she had been diagnosed with terminal brain cancer, and was treating a malignant tumor with holistic medicine because “at the time, that was [her] reality.”
She has collected over $1 million in sales from a book, celebrity appearances, and a wellness app called The Whole Pantry, that describes her “battle” with cancer and promotes holistic health to cure sickness. Despite promises to donate over $300,00o of her earnings to various charities, Gibson has failed to do so, and pocketed all the profits.
In 2009, Gibson lied about having three heart operations, two cardiac arrests, a stroke, and claimed to have died twice on operating tables before being diagnosed with an inoperable brain tumor.
She blames her incessant lying on abuse she had suffered as a late teen when “someone close to her during childhood” was stalking her.
Her web of lies is never-ending, having lied about her age, made up doctors, tales about a “box” one man allegedly used to diagnose her with cancer, having manipulated one family out of information about their son’s real cancer so she could use the evidence in her own stories…all while dissuading real victims from effective, conventional medicine and making a living doing it.
On an episode of 60 minutes, Tara Brown drills Gibson about how her story began.
Since the public’s discovery of her fraudulent behavior, Gibson has appeared in a the 60 minutes interview and in a feature story in Woman’s Weekly in which she said “I don’t want forgiveness. I just think [speaking out] was the responsible thing to do. Above anything, I would like people to say, ‘Okay, she’s human.'”
The feature starts by explaining that Gibson “says she is passionate about avoiding gluten, dairy and coffee, but doesn’t really understand how cancer works.”
Yeah, we got that.
It’s reassuring to know that Australia has their own Rachel Dolezal now too.
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