US officials struggle to quash Hurricane Helene conspiracy theories
US officials struggle to quash Hurricane Helene conspiracy theories
One of the more far-fetched rumors is that Helene was an engineered storm to allow corporations to mine regional lithium deposits. Others accuse the administration of President Joe Biden of using federal disaster funds to help migrants in the country illegally, or suggest officials are deliberately abandoning bodies in the cleanup.
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Okay, like, let’s take a step back here and talk about how exhausting it is to see conspiracy theories every time we have a climate disaster. Seriously, why are we so obsessed with blaming anything but ourselves? Like, HELLO, hurricanes like Helene are literally getting worse because of climate change (thank you, fossil fuel industry 😒), but no one wants to talk about THAT. Instead, we’re out here debating if the government is controlling the weather??! Are we in a bad sci-fi movie??
My take on the conspiracy theory issue:
There are certain mental illnesses which make people more susceptible and prone to conspiracy theories. For most of history these people were largely isolated and spread randomly throughout various communities. This had a moderating effect, as contact with non conspiracy people didn’t fuel their theories as much.
Fast forward to the internet as a tool for finding and building communities, and conspiracy theorists take advantage of the new technology to find each other and form larger communities of conspiracy theories.
Finally, recognizing a new political constituency, the Republicans decide to start messaging directly to these conspiracy theorists. Their goal is to undermine and dismantle the government, and so they see government-suspicious conspiracy theorists as a natural constituency.
They will not stop as long as the conspiracy theorists continue to eat it up.