Conspiracy theories another virus we need to beware

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BREAKING NEWS: The coronavirus was masterminded and spread by Budweiser to get people to stop drinking Corona beer.

Well, OK, not really. That’s not true, but it’s as good a conspiracy theory as anything else floating around these days.

I don’t mean to make light of the virus. It’s a serious matter, but so are conspiracy theories.

At a time when we need facts to deal with a public health crisis, the last thing we need is viral misinformation.

Conspiracy theories are dangerous.

If you don’t believe me, just ask “Mad” Mike Hughes.

Well, you can’t ask “Mad” Mike Hughes, because he’s dead now.

The reason he’s dead is because the man who billed himself as the world’s greatest daredevil was killed last month in the explosion of a homemade rocket in which he launched himself in a bid to prove that the Earth is really flat.

Yes, the Flat Earth Society still exists. There are still people who believe the world we live on is not really round and doesn’t orbit in space around the sun.

Of course they have plenty of “evidence” for this, like the fact that Kansas is flat and penguins don’t fall off of the South Pole,

There are a lot of silly things that people still believe in spite of all rational evidence to the contrary: That the Earth is flat; that the moon landing was a hoax; that the JFK assassination was a government plot; that aliens are being housed at Area 51; that a cabal of reptilian shape-shifters controls the world’s economy; that Woody Allen movies are actually any good.

Those conspiracy theories are all pretty harmless. The conspiracy theories being floated around the coronavirus, however, are not. They put people’s health and maybe even their lives at risk.

People like Rush Limbaugh and others in the far right-wing echo chamber are spreading a conspiracy theory that the coronavirus is a plot to bring down Donald Trump. They say the intent of the virus is to cause panic so the stock market will go down and tank the economy and undercut Trump’s chances of getting reelected.

Even Trump has gotten in on the game, calling it a hoax at one of his rallies.

Of course, Trump has never been a fan of facts or of science, and I would love to hear him weigh in on whether he believes this liberal, left-wing conspiracy theory that the Earth is round.

These days, the spread of misinformation is almost as dangerous as the spread of the coronavirus. We should be protecting ourselves from it. Maybe we should be wearing face-masks when we go on the internet. Maybe we should wash our hands after watching Fox News or, if you’re like me, you’ll just want to take a shower.

The internet has become a breeding ground for preposterous conspiracy theories, helped in large part by Mark Zuckerberg’s “not my problem” attitude and Twitter, which is the preferred outlet of our conspiracy theorist-in-chief.

Many conspiracy theories go viral, spread by friends and relatives through social media, and catch on with some segments of the public.

However, there are also some conspiracy theories that never really gained any traction.

I’ve managed to compile a few as a public service. Here are a few conspiracy theories that never caught on:

• Socks that go missing from the dryer are being collected by invisible dwarfs so the government can analyze your DNA.

• Dinosaurs died out because of the Affordable Care Act.

• Polka was created by aliens. (Well, think about it. Could human beings really have come up with the accordion?)

• Mickey Mouse ratted Donald Duck out to the House UnAmerican Activities Committee.

• The conspiracy theory that the government is secretly hiding aliens at Area 51 is really just a cover story to hide a much more sinister government conspiracy to bring back disco.

• The year 1997 never really happened.

• Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders were separated at birth.

• Abraham Lincoln faked his own assassination.

• Toilet paper causes colon cancer.

• Apples and oranges are really the same fruit in disguise.

• Hollywood has really only made one movie in the last 30 years and keeps releasing it with a different title. (Actually, that one could really be true.)

• All government debt is really being paid off to a guy in Brooklyn named Carmine.

• Beavers are actually really quite lazy.

• Parsley is just a weed that hired a good press agent.

• Preheating the oven is a hoax perpetrated by the gas company.

None of those things are remotely true or even plausible, but any one of them would be believed by somebody if you put it on the internet, on Twitter or into a Trump rally speech.

If you want to test it out, send that list to Limbaugh. He’s bound to buy at least one of those theories.


Tim Ryan is a Leader reporter and intermittent columnist. Readers can contact him at tryan@newmedia-wi.com