Conspiracy Theories

Community Or Conspiracy

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Conspiracy Theorists fascinate me, as regular readers know and as any new reader is about to unfortunately find out. One thing that really intrigues me is how Conspiracy Theorists somehow turn out to be power-hungry, bigoted, and all too ready to serve existing power structures. No matter what “Conspiracy” they’re fighting to save the world, the end result is just creating an oppressive system, or serving a new one, and going after whatever minorities are convenient to hate.

If you’ve ever followed any serious Conspiracy Theorists, they often seem to veer into a kind of monarchism and outright racism. “We need a leader for the Ultimate Awakening, we’re genetically descended from the Super Aliens. Also buy my supplements/book.”

Now this is not to say, as often noted, I do believe in conspiracies. It’s just that people don’t want to deal with real conspiracies, because ultimately they may not be aware of them, want to be aware, and benefit from them. It’s easy to ignore mass financial fraud when, say, you work in finance or are in an overhyped industry driven by stock price . . .

I’ve wondered how we deal with and prevent Conspiracy Theorists from arising and inflicting their damage to sell books and boner pills. Something that keeps coming back to me is one word – community.

Having connections to people, having roles, having relations gives one a sense of the world. You have to understand and work with people. You have to be something and someone. You’re maintaining the community and understand a bit of how the world works as you have to.

I’m not talking just one community, I’m talking networks. Clans of interrelated and interacting people. Being in a professional association and working in your city library. Real community isn’t just one community, but it’s having community including a community of communities.

It’s community all the way down – and up.

This also means that Conspiracy Theorists have a harder time causing destruction. When people are connected to others they’re less likely to turn on them. They care about people. They know they’re not evil, even if they’re a-holes. They also have people giving them feedback that they might be under the spell of a Conspiracy Theorist.

When I think of my own past, I was not always the most social person. Working with zine groups, fan groups, RPG games, etc. gave me a surprising amount of social connection. I’m used to a matrix of connections, so much so I’ve missed that I have it. I’m used to it – and it’s also helped me keep a perspective on How Stuff Works and a sense of connection.

(And perhaps, explains more on why I’m a Project Manager).

Conspiracy Theorists are driven by The Theory and whatever opportunities it provides. They may have a community or communities, but that’s not the point of the communities to them. The goal is to fight The Thing or sell things about The Thing, or whatever. Real community would mean you fight for real things for real people because they are right there in part of your life.

I think this is one reason that Conspiracy Theorists so often attack communities – especially minorities and outgroups. They’re not just easy targets, but such people are often networked and have community because they have to. The Conspiracy Theorists may instinctively know Community is the enemy – and they view everything Not Them as Conspiracy anyway.

Hell, maybe the Conspiracy Theorists are jealous. Seeing people happy? Seeing people fulfilled? Without a giant complex flowchart explaining why you’re right? Imagine the seething jealousy they feel at people who can be happy without selling seminars on alien conspiracies?

This is where I can say we need more community – that works for us. The Conspiracy Theorists are a continuing danger to humanity, every technical innovation is one they may turn to their twisted fantasies and psychological needs. The Conspiracy Theorists can’t fight that because they don’t really get how community works.

No wonder they’re afraid of it. How do you turn people to your cultish behavior when they don’t need you and they have something real and someone will warn you?

It also means we need to remember our roles in our community – that protects others from being co-opted.

–Xenofact

Confucians and Conspiracy Theorists

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When I first encountered Taoism, I became aware of their conflicts with Confucians. Later when I took a deeper interest, this “awareness” turned into “wow for a while they really mocked the crap out of them.” Later still, I realized this mockery of Confucians really helped me better understand Conspiracy Theorists.

Strap in for this one.

The history of Confucianism, and the period it was in conflict with Taoists, is complicated, but a few trends stood out in my studies. Political philosophy Taoism (embodied in the Tao Te Ching) were more about psychology, frugality, not seeking complexity, and leaving people the heck alone. Confucianism was seen as ritualistic, rote, and about memorization of trivial bits and bobs of culture. The conflict was simple – “real life” and pointless trivialities.

But something began to tickle at the back of the mind in my recent readings and re-readings. The Taoist documents that mocked Confucians mocked them for pretention, ritualism, trivialities, and over-complicated ideas. Even later Taoist/Taoist inspired documents that felt they had commonalities with other philosophies warned against such things. Be it mocking the Confucians or warning against pointless ritualism, something seemed familiar.

Then it struck me. The Confucians that Taoists mocked – and the people that later Taoists critiqued – reminded me of conspiracy theorists.

Conspiracy theorists have huge, complex beliefs they spin into webs, ensaring them – and if possible, others. Conspiracy theorists are often repetitive – in ritual ways – reinforcing their conspiracies (which often need it). Finally Conspiracy theorists are often deep in trivialities, to the point it’s hard to understand what the hell they’re talking about – the cultic conspiracy elements that wall people off others.

Plus, Conspiracy theorists often seem very brittle and ready to use force to control you, something Taoists also mocked in general and specific.

Suddenly I got the earlier Taoist mockery. I’ve watched puffed-up Conspiracy theorists, confidently spewing nonsense, spinning elaborate incoherence, and arguing they get to decide right and wrong, life and death. Be it some earlier Confucian wonk or the latest maniac analyzed by the near-endless podcasts on Conspiracy theorists, they’re the same.

Thus, I get why some people 3000 years ago said “look at those pretentious motherfuckers.”

Now that I have this unusual insight, maybe there’s really some kind of human archetype at work here. The obsessive, trivia-infused, control freak who builds elaborate plans to make the world work – or explain how it works. A warning sign throughout the ages.

And of course, a useful insight on how some things never change, and maybe we need to be ready to warn against the same problem again and again – or just take a page from the Taoists and mock the hell out of it.

-Xenofact

Your Paranoia Is Your God

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Many a Conspiracy Theorist claims to be religious, but I think they’re not honest about who their real God is.

As my regular readers know I have a fascination with Conspiracy Theories. This is both because I’m interested in how people work, and because as we’ve seen they’re incredibly goddamn dangerous. Honestly the way we treat Conspiracy Theorists as a point of humor misses how some of them turn very deadly individually or in groups.

As I watch these potentially dangerous people, I’ve seen how their ideas can become all-consuming. I’ve noted elsewhere that Conspiracy Theory is a kind of creative skill, an unhealthy form of writing and imagination. I suppose it has to be that way so it can encompass everything you need to an eternal yes-anding to reality.

After all, your Theory has to explain everything. Plus you can’t let someone one-up on you, especially if you want to get internet clicks and sell supplements. A Conspiracy Theory is a comittment.

These Conspiracy Theories almost inevitably include religion because you have to. You have to cover it all, so deities, Satan, angels, etc. all have to become part of it. Most Conspiracy theorists remind me of the ever one-upping that dooms movies and TV shows to raise the stakes ridiculously to keep going before their inevitable collapse. The theory must be fed.

Watching this constant adaption, this sacrifice to the Theory, reminds me of what I said early about Monotheism being so unstable it has to evangelize and spread to avoid questions. Thus I can safely say that Conspiracy Theories are just a form of monotheism.

Think about it. Conspiracists are beholden to the Great Conspiracy. The Conspiracy defines them. The Conspiracy must be supported. For many The Conspiracy is a form of profit or career, the very essence of what they do. The Conspiracy Theory is the most important thing in their life – in short, their god.

And it has to be monotheism. The Conspiracy Theorist by definition worships an all-encompassing idea. Any different idea is incorporated or is declared falsehood and the enemy. To not do so is to risk breaking your god – you may dress it up in cosplay as some other god, but it’s yours and it’s just as broken as you are.

Even if the Conspiracy Theorist is a pure grifter, they still have to keep putting time in on the Theory as it’s always under challenge. It’s still their god even if they don’t believe it. Plus there’s always the risk they start believing or have to start believing.

Whatever deity they say they worship, The Conspiracy Theorist’s real god is The Theory.

This “monotheism model” is a tool I find useful to understand Conspiracy Theorists. They’re on a religious crusade no matter what. They have to be. They have to maintain this god, the god is all they have. No wonder they seem so anxious to kill people for their god.

It doesn’t make me feel any safer. If anything I feel kind of worse. But I feel I have a better grasp of what to worry about.

-Xenofact