#Conspiracytheorists

Covid has been the perfect subject for conspiracy theorists to latch on to.

I have been prompted to write this short blog about conspiracy theorists by three news items/blogs/podcasts that have come to me around the same time (and by coincidence).

The first was Twitter's announcement that they have permanently banned arch conspiracy theorist David Icke. Icke lives on the Isle of Wight so it is local news. 

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/nov/04/twitter-permanently-bans-conspiracy-theorist-david-ickes-account (about David Icke)

The second was an interview of Sebastian Shemirani who talks about his mother conspiracy theorist Kate Shemirani.( Marianna Spring Specialist disinformation reporter, BBC News) 

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/blogs-trending-54738471

The final one was was a BBC Live Wire podcast about the rising phenomenen of conspiracy theorists.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/p08wxtb3

My dilemma is I fully support the principal of free speech and I am very reluctant to ban anyone from saying anything. It is clearly much better to engage with their opinions and counter them with science based evidence. (if you can be bothered).

The trouble is conspiracy theories - certainly the covid ones for instance can be dangerous - can actually cause harm both to indivduals and the wider community. It certainly can be very destructive regarding personal relationships. (Marianna Spring talks about individuals disappearing down a rabbit hole and to be lost). 

My own experience of people who puport conspiracy theories coincides with research. Most often individuals are not successful in life - they need something to blame for their failure. They are a victim of a grand plan to do them down! It is often about attention seeking. It is a way of bolstering poor self esteem - giving a warped sense of self importance - they are clever - they have a brilliant insight that most other people have missed or have been duped. 

The saddest thing is once someone has adopted a conspiracy theorist mentality they start seeing everything in those terms. (nothing is what it seems - and every cock up is some machivellian plan being played out by the all powerful to keep us ordinary people in our place!) You cannot counter their theories with science based and objective research. Their stock response is either you have been duped or you are part of the conspiracy ! The development of social media platforms gives them an outlet and the inadequate and the needy are sucked in and feed off the misinformation to create more misinformation however crackpot.

If it wasn't so sad it would be funny but actually a pointless / irrational paranoia is ruining lives, breaking up families and causing harm to our wider society. What can be done about it I am not sure. Sadly removing their social media platforms such as Twitter might be the only practical response.