5 ms·

> Mainstream press never really looks at the deeper causes of why these conspiracies exist in the first place. This is because reporting on psychology is borin

> Mainstream press never really looks at the deeper causes of why these conspiracies exist in the first place. This is because reporting on psychology is boring: * https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/people-drawn-to-conspiracy-theories-share-a-cluster-of-psychological-features/ https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/people-drawn-to-c... * https://www.apa.org/news/podcasts/speaking-of-psychology/conspiracy-theories https://www.apa.org/news/podcasts/speaking-of-psychology/con... * https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/0963721417718261 https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/096372141771826... * https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/28/health/psychology-conspiracy-theories.html https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/28/health/psychology-conspir...

somenameforme 3y ago
I think there's another more simple explanation: * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henny_Penny https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henny_Penny Henny Penny is Chicken Little. And this really does seem to explain these issues to the point of being a tautology. As an institution loses trust then people stop believing what they say. 'My opinion is no worse than your falsehoods.' There have been a million and one trust-destroying events in the past couple of decades. So seeing ever more people come out with their own explanations, some being somewhat less than well thought out, is hardly some inscrutable phenomena. The Google ngram for 'conspiracy theory' [2] is also quite telling. It seems to have risen somewhat during the Red Scare years, but then just went to the Moon shortly after November 22, 1963. [3]. And it's difficult to imagine why anybody might not think everything wasn't on the up and up there. I mean it's only been 60 years, and only 3% of the records remain classified. --- [1] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Emperor's_New_Clothes https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Emperor's_New_Clothes [2] - https://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=conspiracy%20theory&year_start=1800&year_end=2000&corpus=15&smoothing=3&direct_url=t1%3B,conspiracy%20theory%3B,c0t1 https://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=conspiracy%20t... [3] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assassination_of_John_F._Kennedy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assassination_of_John_F._Kenne...
- eesmith 3y ago
  > The Google ngram for 'conspiracy theory' [2] is also quite telling. I disagree that it's telling. It could have replaced a previous term. What did people call helicopter parents before there were helicopters? We know there were conspiracy theorists well before even the First Red Scare - Henry Ford believed in the international Jewish conspiracy theory, as described by the fabricated antisemitic Protocols of the Elders of Zion, written ca. 1900. Or, from "Conspiracy Theories Abounded in 19th-Century American Politics" at https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/conspiracy-theories-abounded-19th-century-american-politics-180971940/ https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/conspiracy-theories-a... : "conspiracies flourished in the 1820s and 1830s, when modern-day American political parties developed, and the expansion of white male suffrage increased the nation’s voting base. These new parties, which included the Democrats, the National Republicans, the Anti-Masons, and the Whigs, frequently used conspiracy accusations as a political tool to capture new voters—ultimately bringing about a recession and a collapse of public trust in the democratic process." Since you mentioned Kennedy, President Garfield's assassination also resulted in conspiracies, including using the term "conspiracy theory". From https://academic.oup.com/book/25369/chapter-abstract/192453115?redirectedFrom=fulltext&login=false https://academic.oup.com/book/25369/chapter-abstract/1924531... : > Conspiracy theories have been around for a long time, though how long is a matter of debate. As for the concept of conspiracy theory, it might seem reasonable to expect a more exact answer about the moment of its emergence. When do we first find people talking and writing about conspiracy theories? While much of the literature points to the twentieth-century philosopher Karl Popper and his famous work The Open Society and Its Enemies (1st edition: 1945), newspaper databases allow us to locate earlier occurrences of “conspiracy theory.” They reveal that the term proliferates in newspapers from the 1870s onward, particularly after the assassination of President Garfield in July 1881. What can this discovery then tell us about the modern-day phenomenon of conspiracy theories? The full text, available at https://archive.org/details/uscinski-conspiracy-theories-and-the-people-who-believe-them/page/n89/mode/2up?q=garfield https://archive.org/details/uscinski-conspiracy-theories-and... , says "First occurrence of CTs related to assassination of Garfield: "One of the conspiracy theories has been exploded," Boston Journal, July 12, 1881." The article goes into depth on the context behind the word "theory" for this sort of description, at https://archive.org/details/uscinski-conspiracy-theories-and-the-people-who-believe-them/page/n95/mode/2up?q=%22theory+in+the+newspapers%22 https://archive.org/details/uscinski-conspiracy-theories-and... with examples of "murder theory", "abduction theory", and "fraud theory" before going into details about publications of a conspiracy theory "linking Guiteau to a circle of undiscovered and unidentified associates ... that foreshadows the later shooting of Lee Harvey Oswald by Jack Ruby—Guiteau himself became the target of an attempt on his life a few days after his trial began in November 1881, speculation once more arose about a conspiracy." Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose.

somenameforme 3y ago

I think there's another more simple explanation: * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henny_Penny https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henny_Penny Henny Penny is Chicken Little. And this really does seem to explain these issues to the point of being a tautology. As an institution loses trust then people stop believing what they say. 'My opinion is no worse than your falsehoods.' There have been a million and one trust-destroying events in the past couple of decades. So seeing ever more people come out with their own explanations, some being somewhat less than well thought out, is hardly some inscrutable phenomena. The Google ngram for 'conspiracy theory' [2] is also quite telling. It seems to have risen somewhat during the Red Scare years, but then just went to the Moon shortly after November 22, 1963. [3]. And it's difficult to imagine why anybody might not think everything wasn't on the up and up there. I mean it's only been 60 years, and only 3% of the records remain classified. --- [1] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Emperor's_New_Clothes https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Emperor's_New_Clothes [2] - https://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=conspiracy%20theory&year_start=1800&year_end=2000&corpus=15&smoothing=3&direct_url=t1%3B,conspiracy%20theory%3B,c0t1 https://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=conspiracy%20t... [3] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assassination_of_John_F._Kennedy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assassination_of_John_F._Kenne...

eesmith 3y ago
> The Google ngram for 'conspiracy theory' [2] is also quite telling. I disagree that it's telling. It could have replaced a previous term. What did people call helicopter parents before there were helicopters? We know there were conspiracy theorists well before even the First Red Scare - Henry Ford believed in the international Jewish conspiracy theory, as described by the fabricated antisemitic Protocols of the Elders of Zion, written ca. 1900. Or, from "Conspiracy Theories Abounded in 19th-Century American Politics" at https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/conspiracy-theories-abounded-19th-century-american-politics-180971940/ https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/conspiracy-theories-a... : "conspiracies flourished in the 1820s and 1830s, when modern-day American political parties developed, and the expansion of white male suffrage increased the nation’s voting base. These new parties, which included the Democrats, the National Republicans, the Anti-Masons, and the Whigs, frequently used conspiracy accusations as a political tool to capture new voters—ultimately bringing about a recession and a collapse of public trust in the democratic process." Since you mentioned Kennedy, President Garfield's assassination also resulted in conspiracies, including using the term "conspiracy theory". From https://academic.oup.com/book/25369/chapter-abstract/192453115?redirectedFrom=fulltext&login=false https://academic.oup.com/book/25369/chapter-abstract/1924531... : > Conspiracy theories have been around for a long time, though how long is a matter of debate. As for the concept of conspiracy theory, it might seem reasonable to expect a more exact answer about the moment of its emergence. When do we first find people talking and writing about conspiracy theories? While much of the literature points to the twentieth-century philosopher Karl Popper and his famous work The Open Society and Its Enemies (1st edition: 1945), newspaper databases allow us to locate earlier occurrences of “conspiracy theory.” They reveal that the term proliferates in newspapers from the 1870s onward, particularly after the assassination of President Garfield in July 1881. What can this discovery then tell us about the modern-day phenomenon of conspiracy theories? The full text, available at https://archive.org/details/uscinski-conspiracy-theories-and-the-people-who-believe-them/page/n89/mode/2up?q=garfield https://archive.org/details/uscinski-conspiracy-theories-and... , says "First occurrence of CTs related to assassination of Garfield: "One of the conspiracy theories has been exploded," Boston Journal, July 12, 1881." The article goes into depth on the context behind the word "theory" for this sort of description, at https://archive.org/details/uscinski-conspiracy-theories-and-the-people-who-believe-them/page/n95/mode/2up?q=%22theory+in+the+newspapers%22 https://archive.org/details/uscinski-conspiracy-theories-and... with examples of "murder theory", "abduction theory", and "fraud theory" before going into details about publications of a conspiracy theory "linking Guiteau to a circle of undiscovered and unidentified associates ... that foreshadows the later shooting of Lee Harvey Oswald by Jack Ruby—Guiteau himself became the target of an attempt on his life a few days after his trial began in November 1881, speculation once more arose about a conspiracy." Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose.