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That's right. You have to dismiss them as stupid and deranged. For real though, the article makes the point that it's more than stupidity, it's a fear of what people can't control that turns them to conspiracies.
But why do they feel so out of control? Why do they not understand how anything works?
They feel out of control because they ARE being exploited by systems that are designed to obscure the fact. They don't understand how anything works, because those systems have replaced their education with propaganda.
Big time. Try opening a publicly funded law school, teaching the rulebook to the plebs, see the power structures try to jam it up, see if local corporate media doesn't publish constant articles about how much money it will cost and constant op-eds like "does [name of local area] really need more lawyers?," while their parent corporations and advertisers are represented in all things by lawyers at firms with 1,000 attorneys that each make in an hour what most working people make in a week. I'm telling y'all, it's sabotage.
"why do so many people believe in conspiracies"
"Well, to understand that, you have let me tell you about how The System is designed to replace education with propaganda."
Problem is that lots of seemingly regular Americans believe in some conspiracy theories to a greater or lesser extent. Having spent significant time living on both the US and Europe, I'm pretty shocked how many Americans always seem to think that someone is "out to get them." If it's not some random person, it's a criminal, it's the government, it's the school board, it's the gays. Anyone, really. It's tiresome.
Edit (case in point): https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/suspect-fathers-decapitation-went-rails-college-knew-say-rcna136647
well, the vietnam war was started from a conspiracy: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gulf_of_Tonkin_incident
and the iraq war:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraq_and_weapons_of_mass_destruction
there was a plan to stage a false flag attack by cuba, and start a war: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Northwoods
(JFK said no... but his assassin was a lone wolf)
the Tuskegee experiment killed about 100 people, denying them access to syphilis treatment: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tuskegee_Syphilis_Study
see also unethical human experimentation
the NSA was illegally spying on all Americans and the entire world illegally... probably still are...
the Animal Enterprise Terrorism Act of 2006, made it legally "terrorism" to basically do any kind of animal rights activism...
....
ill give you that "a secret cabal of satanic pedophile cannibal ultra-wealthy people" is a pretty sill idea...
but yeah, im sure there's never been any other conspiracies.
....
here's a programmer, who worked for a voting machine company, testifying about when he was asked to write a program to rig elections: https://youtu.be/5y48iHK3RP4?si=tGIVNV4WXgmaaFgh
(i know trump lost fair and square... but there's a lot of other elections)
when covid first started spreading, there was a conspiracy in China to cover it up... i first learned about it from a conspiracy forum because a doctor leaked that info (he later died from covid)
there are a shit load of conspiracies all the time... it's basic human nature, really...
but you can't figure it out from clues in taylor swift's dance routine or whatever the fuck the q-tips are going in about...
if anything, Qanon was a real conspiracy, but just to control conspiracy theorists while making them look dumb.
also, the term "conspiracy theorist" was invented by the CIA to, once again, make them look dumb... but it doesn't even make sense, (almost) nobody has a job making up conspiracies... and it's not a theory without evidence, it's a hypothesis at best (and even then it's probably a very very uneducated guess)
🇺🇸🏈💸☕️
tl;dr there's a lot of real conspiracies...
p.s. the ultra-rich conspiracies are actually just about stealing and hiding more money: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panama_Papers
oh, groups like Scientology actually do gang stalking... although it's usually just schizophrenic people thinking it's happening, sometimes people are out to get you...
relevant Dead Kennedy's song: https://youtu.be/kpoRMKXVkmE?si=vsUGbi9VkfghZd6U
i'd say it's more about the want of feeling special and/or in control, not exactly about fear
there's an excellent Dan Olson video on this topic https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JTfhYyTuT44
Got a nice long ride tomorrow for the rest of this video. Very enjoyable listening.
In my experience it seems more effective to counter conspiracies with laughter and mockery than dismantle it. Which may sound strange since it sounds intuitive to counter a falsehood with truth or reason.... But disproving takes far more effort than the original conspiracy theory, and that's how these things get out of control. But laughing it off, mockery, and general comedy takes less time and still gets the message across to bystanders.
On the flip-side I do agree doing it wrong can send them deeper into the hole because at its core it's about a sense of community, and everyone has issues with ego and self-esteem clouding better judgment. It's just the circumstances these people are in, well, it makes them far more vulnerable to grifters preying on their ignorance, lack of time, lack of education, etc.
Definitely! There are some things in society that are harmful to the public, antisocial, breaches of the social contract--such as being unvaccinated, not washing your hands after taking a huge dump, or spreading conspiracies--but which are not illegal or redeemable in tort, things for which public shaming is a just and maybe only remedy.