April 15, 2022

Hal Brown, Conspiracy theories

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I received this in an email from Tom Dwyer Auto Repair in Selwood, Oregon (Website). This repair service is an excellent car repair service which promotes progressive books by having a collection of just about every anti-Trump book ever published in their waiting room for customers to read.

Conspiracy Theories...

When Reality just isn't twisted enough.

We live in a world that is, unfortunately, dominated by conspiracy theories. There are the funny ones like the Jewish Space Lasers or the Flat Earthers, and less entertaining ones like the Satanist pedophile ring in the pizza restaurant or the 'false flags' of school shootings. It may be tempting to laugh, but one need look no farther than the January 6 Insurrection, fueled by the paranoid ravings of election fraud, to see how deadly serious these self-reinforcing lies can be. As we were strolling along the InterTubes recently, one link led to another and they all prompted us to share this short article on Conspiracy Theories with you. There's an amazing chart with current conspiracies, reasons people believe, and ways to fight back, but keep reading for your own way to participate in spreading the lies that someone, somewhere will believe...

Conspiracies in the world today

***MUST LOOK***

The Conspiracy Chart 2021

- A chart of conspiracies arranged from those that actually, provably happened to those that are even too insane for Alex Jones. And it’s interactive, so if you see a conspiracy you haven’t heard of before (like “Biden is a robot”) all you have to do is click for more ‘information’.

The Craziest Conspiracy Theories That People Actually Believe-

30 Real Doozies, Charlotte Chilton in Popular Mechanics, Oct 2021

The 13 biggest conspiracy theories,

Benjamin Radford and Stephanie Pappas in LiveScience, Dec 2021

Why do people believe this horsepuckey?

Belief in conspiracy theories is the product of normal human psychology, but can be extremely dangerous, Graham Lawton in New Scientist

Conspiracy Theories: Why Do We Believe Them? Calvin J. Emerson on Engage.youth.gov, Aug 2021

Speaking of Psychology: Why people believe in conspiracy theories, Karen Douglas PhD in American Psychological Association ‘Speaking of Psychology’, Jan 2021

Maybe a free thinker but not a critical one: High conspiracy belief is associated with low critical thinking ability, Lantian, Bagneux, Delouvee, and Gauvrit in Applied Cognitive Psychology, Jan 2021

The Roots Of Conspiracy Theory, Helen Lee Bouygues in Forbes, Mar 2021

Fighting back IS possible… sometimes

Conspiracy Theories: What Can I Do to Stop Them? Calvin J. Emerson on Engage.youth.gov, Aug 2021

Expert: The best way to fight a conspiracy theory isn’t with facts, Keith Brannon in Tulane News, Oct 2020

It's only fake-believe: how to deal with a conspiracy theorist, David Robson in The Guardian, Nov 2020

Zen and the Art of Talking to Conspiracy Theorists, Jonathan Jarry in McGill Office for Science and Society, Feb 2021

My contribution to the articles above is this from AlterNet:

Thomas Zimmer, a visiting professor at Georgetown, wrote:

"There is a calculating quality to Greene’s polemics," Zimmer wrote. "Last fall, for instance, she recorded a campaign video in which she used a military-grade sniper rifle to blow up a car that had the word 'socialism' written on it, promising to do the same to the 'Democrats’ socialist agenda.'"

However, he also highlighted what he believes to be the reason behind her antics. "It was over-exaggerated campaign nonsense," Zimmer noted. "But Greene knew the unsubtle insinuation of using violence against a political opponent would demand attention."

My view: There is no doubt that she expresses extreme views and probably does so in a calculated way In order to get media attention and incite her base. However she also promotes ludicrous conspiracy theories. It is not possible to ascertain whether she she believes them. If she does the expert analyses of why people are unable or unwilling to evaluate these theories using logical thinking applies to her.

It appears that some people who understand how gullible believers in conspiracy theories are use this knowledge to exploit them in order to make money. Consider: