The US is awash with conspiracy theories. That itself is not surprising since conspiracy theories have long had an appeal for those who think that big events must have big causes and seek to find them by creating elaborate narratives that purportedly tie together many seemingly unrelated facts into a single narrative structure.
What is surprising and disturbing is that so many people seem to be willing to believe them and hucksters are willing to exploit that gullibility to enrich themselves. The PBS investigative news program Frontline has just released the above gripping 55-minute documentary that looks at this question, focusing mainly on one of the biggest creators and propagators of conspiracy theories, Alex Jones. He is so cruel that he unleashed his mobs on the parents of the children who were murdered at Sandy Hook Elementary School by claiming that it was all a hoax, staged by the government. He and his followers made life hell for them. Jones not only feeds the dark fantasies of many people, he also has the ear of Donald Trump who often says in public the things that Jones said a few days earlier.
Since Trump has long believed the crackpot ideas of someone like Jones, it hardly surprising that he would promote the crackpot ideas of others as well.
These are the people now in control of the Republican party and the US government.
What surprises me is that people seem to think this is a new thing.
The GOP told us not to trust the government in the 80s under Reagan.
Then they told us not to trust scientists in the 90s due to global warming.
Then they told us not to trust any academics in the 00s, because college teaches people how to obtain reliable information.
And they told us not to trust the press in the 10s under Trump, because the press occasionally prints things that aren’t propaganda.
Now we have a country that doesn’t trust anybody, and as a result they are dying in droves from the coronavirus because they don’t believe any legit source of information. These four secular institutions are the pillars of any successful nation, and the GOP has sought to demolish them for four decades now. Forget the Chinese virus — we ought to call it the Republican virus.
Brucegee1962 @1
I would only argue with you that the people who make up the GOP have been working (maybe not as concertedly) for well over 40 years. The anti intellectual people were here right from the start.
Rich