Are conspiracy theories more popular now than ever?

[bostjan]

I love my dad. He was probably the kindest person I ever knew. But... well, when his health started going down hill, he'd talk, sometimes nonstop, about all of these crazy conspiracy theories he would see on the history channel, or some that he heard from people with whom he used to work.

Everyone in my family started to acknowledge that he was starting to behave differently - sometimes paranoid, starting to ramble, and on rare occasions, he'd go incoherent.

I know this is not the case for all people, but, it seems to me, often times, buying into really wild conspiracy theories is a sign of mental illness.

In my dad's case, I mean, he was the one who taught me about math and science as a little kid, and he knew his stuff. But, starting around the time he started having health problems, he would occasionally slip into weird conversations. The one that sticks out the most to me, was when he declared at a family dinner one evening that he didn't believe in gravity. At the time, I thought he was just testing me and being goofy, but, in retrospect, I think it might have been his mind starting to slip, because, ten years later, the Titanic never sunk, Hitler was living in Argentina, and we had never been to the moon.

 

[Cyanide_Anima]

There's a lot of people who are into these websites/YouTube channels NTD News, The Epoch Times, America Uncensored, China Uncensored and some others that are even more extreme. These are very strange sources as they are all funded and supported by Falun Gong, which is a religious death cult. They're very anti-Chinese government (for some good reasons and some not so good). More and more people are sharing 'news' from these sources that have a pretty clear agenda when you dig into their history, their leader, and the reasons why they support Trump.

They're trying to instigate an economic and physical war with China in order to destroy the government of China and 'restore' it back to its ancient purity. By purity I mean they seek racial purity, separation from modern technology, and to have a fascist right wing religious theocracy.

They've pumped up Trump by a huge margin, spending a few million on Facebook ads to promote him. They also may be behind the Q anon movement or at least one of the main reasons it has spread on mainstream social media and news outlets. The similarities between the use of cult ideals and manipulation through their Falun Gong religion and through Q anon are very similar.

There's a lot of irony from the people who share videos and news from this source who claim that the Biden administration is a Chinese puppet government yet have no issue using a fascist religious movement's propaganda machine as a source. It's kind of scary how cognitively lazy the right has become, and how much of the conservative movement has been coopted by a foreign cult leader's media.

 

[Justaguitarist]

There's a lot of people who are into these websites/YouTube channels NTD News, The Epoch Times, America Uncensored, China Uncensored and some others that are even more extreme. These are very strange sources as they are all funded and supported by Falun Gong, which is a religious death cult. They're very anti-Chinese government (for some good reasons and some not so good). More and more people are sharing 'news' from these sources that have a pretty clear agenda when you dig into their history, their leader, and the reasons why they support Trump.

They're trying to instigate an economic and physical war with China in order to destroy the government of China and 'restore' it back to its ancient purity. By purity I mean they seek racial purity, separation from modern technology, and to have a fascist right wing religious theocracy.

They've pumped up Trump by a huge margin, spending a few million on Facebook ads to promote him. They also may be behind the Q anon movement or at least one of the main reasons it has spread on mainstream social media and news outlets. The similarities between the use of cult ideals and manipulation through their Falun Gong religion and through Q anon are very similar.

There's a lot of irony from the people who share videos and news from this source who claim that the Biden administration is a Chinese puppet government yet have no issue using a fascist religious movement's propaganda machine as a source. It's kind of scary how cognitively lazy the right has become, and how much of the conservative movement has been coopted by a foreign cult leader's media.

I read about Falun Gong and they do seem to be very cult-like. However, some of the things the Chinese government does to them are certainly human-rights violations. As a leftist (democratic socialist), I still think that the Chinese government kinda is a terrible dictatorship (mostly because it´s just a more ruthless force of state capitalism anyways).

But yeah the Falun Gong leader has said some very bigoted shit about interracial marriage and homosexuality. Also China, as a lot of other places, never wasn´t diverse. A lot of fascists have this very wrong understanding of history where they think that in ancient times there was no racial and cultural diversity. A lot of Arab countries, other Asian countries, and even the Roman empire ( in small ways) interacted with China in ancient times. The far-right has this mistified history that is unhistorical. For example, the Vikings did actually have peaceful contact with other cultures. They traded with the Slavs, with the Byzantines, with Medieval Europe... Some Vikings even traveled to the middle east where they fought as mercenaries and converted to Islam. The whole "pure race" "history" thing that fascists believe in is utterly unscientific and unhistoric.

 

[bostjan]

Chinese socialism is scary. It's still socialism, because everything is owned by the government (society), but when the government is forcing people to labour on things that don't work (like smelting metal in their backyard wood stoves - yes, that really happened in early socialist China and no, it obviously didn't work), or to toil much harder for the betterment of society at their own personal cost (much like what is happening in modern socialist China to the lower class), or to obey strict social rules that the government justifies as negatively affecting productivity (z.B. with whom people associate or what they eat or whatever), or executing people for non-violent crimes (China executes more people than all other nations combined, many of whom are executed for financial crimes or drug offenses), all signs point also to authoritarianism. So you end up with a socialist dictatorship, just like Stalinist USSR or whatever.

I used to love travelling, before covid. I told everyone I'd go pretty much anywhere except certain parts of the Middle East, certain war zones, or China. The thought of finding myself, a libertarian-minded (in terms of social liberty, don't go all Ayn Rand on me, please) European-descended American, waking up in China, is just as terrifying to me as waking up in Mogadishu under the chaos of a raging war. Sure, I might not be captured for random in China, but the government there would have no qualms with throwing my into a mobile death van and not even bothering to report my killing as a statistic.

 

[Cyanide_Anima]

My issue is not with fighting the Chinese government. I'm all for that. They're fascist as well. It's the end goal of the Falun Gong and they way in which they are going about making it happen. They lie about a lot of shit, including some of the human rights violations perpetrated against them. There isn't really any credible evidence to the "Falun Gong members being harvested for their organs on a massive scale" thing. They spread every western conspiracy theory under the sun and pander to all the far right ding dongs who have nothing better to do than propagandize themselves. I know several people who only trust these YouTube channels they have created for their information consumption. These channels are still saying Trump won, and they want people to rise up and commit acts of violence and continue the treasonous insurrection. If the Falun Gong leader gets his wish we have war with China and we have the USA in shambles which would only increase the chances of China winning such a war. Then whole world loses.

 

[Justaguitarist]

My issue is not with fighting the Chinese government. I'm all for that. They're fascist as well. It's the end goal of the Falun Gong and they way in which they are going about making it happen. They lie about a lot of shit, including some of the human rights violations perpetrated against them. There isn't really any credible evidence to the "Falun Gong members being harvested for their organs on a massive scale" thing. They spread every western conspiracy theory under the sun and pander to all the far right ding dongs who have nothing better to do than propagandize themselves. I know several people who only trust these YouTube channels they have created for their information consumption. These channels are still saying Trump won, and they want people to rise up and commit acts of violence and continue the treasonous insurrection. If the Falun Gong leader gets his wish we have war with China and we have the USA in shambles which would only increase the chances of China winning such a war. Then whole world loses.

There´s something wrong with your comment. China´s government isn´t "fascist". Fascism is a far-right authoritarian ultranationalist ideology based on the privatization of companies, the killing, and deportation of people who are considered "inferior", an ultra-militaristic state, a nostalgia for a mythologized past. Also, Fascists hate almost all leftist ideologies like marxism and anarchism. The first concentration camp was for leftist dissenters. To call Nazism "far-left" or to call all authoritarian regimes "Far left" is to fall for Nazi and Italian Fascist propaganda long after the fact. The nazi party did call themselves "National Socialists" but that was because socialism was seen in a good light and they wanted to take advantage of that (like when authoritarian countries call themselves The Democratic Republic of -insert country name here-).

I´m sorry for being super nitpicky, but every time someone calls Nazis leftists or the contrary, a political scientist jumps off a bridge somewhere. Probably.

 

[Cyanide_Anima]

I'm not saying they are nazi's or right wingers. But China does have a lot in common with fascism. They have some fascist tendencies where they stamp out everything and silence everything that isn't what has been prescribed by the state. They're ultranationalist, ultraconservative, authoritarian, dictatorial, commit genocide, are imperialist, and there is an heir of racism (ie Han being the only true chinese). They do fit a lot of what fascism encapsulates. Even the Nazis called themselves Socialist which is contradictory to what fascism is. China has adopted a lot of fascist tendencies to into whatever system of government they have. They are not a purely communist state. They're almost state-controlled hyper-capitalists these days. But none of that has much to do with Falun Gong and their enormous influence over western conservatism.

 

[Justaguitarist]

I'm not saying they are nazi's or right wingers. But China does have a lot in common with fascism. They have some fascist tendencies where they stamp out everything and silence everything that isn't what has been prescribed by the state. They're ultranationalist, ultraconservative, authoritarian, dictatorial, commit genocide, are imperialist, and there is an heir of racism (ie Han being the only true chinese). They do fit a lot of what fascism encapsulates. Even the Nazis called themselves Socialist which is contradictory to what fascism is. China has adopted a lot of fascist tendencies to into whatever system of government they have. They are not a purely communist state. They're almost state-controlled hyper-capitalists these days. But none of that has much to do with Falun Gong and their enormous influence over western conservatism.

They were also never a communist state. A communist "state" would be a stateless, classless and moneyless society. So there isn´t a communist state. China and the USSR are/were called communist because the ruling party is a communist party.
Also, they´re the exact opposite of ultraconservative. They had a Cultural Revolution where they destroyed a lot of old artifacts, buildings, and books. Kinda the opposite of conservatism. BTW, do you like to read Chomsky? I´ve been planning to read some of his books sometime but I don´t know what´s the best book to start reading Chomsky. What do you recommend?

But sorry for being this annoyingly nitpicky. I understood what you meant.

 

[mmr007]

My 2 cents...which may be an exaggeration of its worth.....

Yes conspiracy theories are more popular than ever because-
A) We have spent decades railing against "coastal elites" and whatnot with their advanced education resulting in a generation (and more) that distrusts formal education as a sign of liberal indoctrination and thus ignorance (not stupity, ignorance) is worn like a badge of courage. Thus we have too many people (especially in the US) primed for disinformation
B) Obviously everything you read on the internet is true, or has a kernal of truth therefore to the unintiated must be looked into further. When you look into it you will find all the false affirmation you didn't know you were looking for.
C) News has to be entertainment because it has to make money. Although I am liberal I can only handle MSNBC for all of about 10 minutes because it is NOT NEWS. It is 5 talking heads arguing about their opinion about something they read in the New York Times the day before. If you want news, read the economist (too expensive so uneducated americans can't) or watch BBC or Al jezeera. Gone are the days of Peter Jennings and field reporters stating what was observed. Now it is celebrities on the right and celebrities on the left giving opinion pieces so conspiracy theorists can actually justifiable say there is a lot of disinformation in main stream media.
D) As others have stated, it feels good to "know something" no one else does. I was one of a small group of people in my company that knew one of my bosses was having an affair and doing something else that could get him fired. That "secret" gave me a feeling of power because others wern't "in the know". Imagine the power you must feel if you "know" about the child eating predators in government and that cheese pizza is code for child pornography at the highest level and that a revolution and mass arrest is coming and nobody but you and a few others who deciphered the Q clues know and understand.

Is it fixable? Yes. See subparagraph A and C. Those will fix the pernicious aspects of B.

One quick fix. Since we constantly take "non-astronauts" into space and Virgin and others have space tourism flights coming this year, it is wise to use tax payer dollars to take the two most prominent flat earthers into space and say "See that round thing motherfucker?! Go back home and tell your friends what you saw here today." Then work from there