'Conspiracy theories have become normalised in Britain', says BBC disinformation correspondent
'Conspiracy theories have become normalised in Britain', says BBC disinformation correspondent
Marianna Spring vows violent threats won't stop her exposing the forces behind false and dangerous claims
Well when a lot of things that were “conspiracy theories” ended up just being things the government refused to tell us during covid, of course the wilder and clearly wrong conspiracies will gain legitimacy.
If the government were honest and open about covid and the lab leak hypothesis and masking from the beginning, no one would lend credence to new outlandish conspiracies.
If the government were honest and open about covid and the lab leak hypothesis and masking from the beginning, no one would lend credence to new outlandish conspiracies.
can we uh... get some elaboration here on what exactly is meant by "honest and open about about covid and the lab leak hypothesis and masking"; as far as i'm aware governments were broadly, if anything, too conservative with their recommendations on how to handle COVID and masking and it's ambiguous what you mean here if you're alluding to that.
as far as i'm aware there's also nothing that privileges the lab leak hypothesis above any other explanation for COVID's origin, except low-confidence speculation by some branches of the US government (who don't all agree on it either).
I'm not sure what you mean by the governments being honest about the lab hypothesis and masking.
With that said, I'm of the believers that governments throw out fake conspiracy theories to hide the real ones. I have no evidence for this, but it makes sense to me.
Yep, such a tactic seems really obvious to me, especially considering that the term "conspiracy theorist" was used to discredit those that didn't trust the official narative on JFK's death.
I’m not 100% sure what you’re referring to when it comes to being honest about masking. If you’re referring to how some governments said “Don’t mask” and then were like “Nvm, y’all should put on masks” then I kinda disagree.
The reason it started off as “Don’t mask” is because we had very little information to go of off. One very real hypothesis was that masking was gonna make things worse, because we weren’t sure if it was airborne or not yet, and that masking might make people touch their faces more often.
Basically, if COVID wasn’t airborne, masking could very well have made things worse, because it wouldn’t protect against anything, it would only make people touch their faces more often. So I 100% understand the decision they made.
One very real hypothesis was that masking was gonna make things worse, because we weren’t sure if it was airborne or not yet, and that masking might make people touch their faces more often.
Was that actually real? I was under the impression that this was a red herring used to make sure lab and medical professionals got ahold of PPE before the general public could hoard it all.
One very real hypothesis was that masking was gonna make things worse, because we weren’t sure if it was airborne or not yet, and that masking might make people touch their faces more often
well I'm sure someone somewhere might have thought that but it was never a credible argument being made by anyone worth listening to.
if COVID wasn’t airborne,
COVID was obviously an airborne disease immediately. It is a quickly spreading resp disease. which has characteristics of being airborne. the only question was what the role of other mechanisms might have been. which is why we were all washing our hands and wiping down the cereal boxes. But the idea that it was not airborne at all I am sorry to say: totally ludicrous.
Anyway this comment bring to the front of my mind a major moderation problem; I am at a loss as to how to address it.
COVID, UFO/UAP's...the list goes on and on. Conspiracy theories are actually turning out to be the most reliable news sources. The MSM has proved over and over that they are just shills for whatever government they serve and we can't believe anything they put out as news.
No, MSM aren't all shills for governments, it's just that most of the time the corporations they're owned by and the government have a shared interest in keeping up the status quo because they both depend on it. That's the problem with 99% of conspiracy theories, they but the blame on a cabal of evil people acting behind the curtain, which in most cases blatantly false (there is no Jewish/Reptiloid/Illuminati NWO conspiracy) and where there's a grain of truth to them they completely ignore the structural reasons that lead to people and institutions doing bad shit, i.e. systems of power which the actors that benefit from them want to keep alive
It’s mental that we need such a specialised role in journalism.
Is it surprising? There are specialists pushing nonsense to dupe people constantly, fake experts, real news branded as fake news. No one reasonably has the time to research every bit of news they see. The world is a weird place rn.
Phew! It is such a breath of fresh air to see that this statement didnt end with "in the United States."
I think it's a good thing if people trust the government less and less, all this conspiracy stuff just means that people have access to other information. I'll end up dying alone in a run-down hostel at the rate things are going, I have no interest in defending the government here in New Zealand after everything they've done to spread poverty. I don't care what the official narrative is. I may be aware of it, but I don't actively follow it.
I think it’s a good thing if people trust the government less and less, all this conspiracy stuff just means that people have access to other information.
while i have no qualms whatsoever with people distrusting the government--governments are in my mind pretty much all amoral institutions--i would strongly push back against the idea that the "other information" most people would be accessing here is of a better or more reliable quality or something we should feel good about. actually i think a lot of it is quite dangerous, and a source of radicalization in a bad way for people. most conspiracy-heavy websites don't seem to make people more critical of their governments, it just makes them more crankish and willing to accept authoritarianism.
That's true and I'm aware of it. If we had an authoritarian leader who would build houses then I'd be all for it, but more likely we'll get some out-of-touch boomer who brings in a racial agenda and other crap, while not fixing the daily problems that people like me face.
Does that include Arden's government? I heard they were quite progressive
Ardern's government might have sounded progressive, but it was all talk. They never did anything good and I'm still poor and I struggle to save any money. My future has been destroyed by these people who pretend to be progressive.