Some just want to promote conflict, cause chaos, or even just get attention.

Some just want to promote conflict, cause chaos, or even just get attention.

There has been a lot of research on the types of people who believe conspiracy theories, and their reasons for doing so. But there’s a wrinkle: My colleagues and I have found that there are a number of people sharing conspiracies online who don’t believe their own content.

They are opportunists. These people share conspiracy theories to promote conflict, cause chaos, recruit and radicalize potential followers, make money, harass, or even just to get attention.

There are several types of this sort of conspiracy-spreader trying to influence you.

  • Ogmios
    740·
    3 months ago

    Frankly, some of it is push back against busy-bodies who seem to be totally incapable of parsing the concept that the Internet isn’t some sort of bastion of absolute truth. It’s sarcasm that idiots take far too seriously. More than a little is because certain autocratic wanna-bees seem to desire to use the Internet to intrude upon people’s most private thoughts and moments.

    But yes, explain it all away as some sort of nefarious plot to justify even further intrusions into people’s lives.

    Edit: Since the page was bugging out, in reply too: “You are who you pretend to be.”

    I’m not talking about “pretending” to be anything. I’m talking about screwing with overly serious idiots who can’t comprehend that ordinary human conversations aren’t logic problems to be solved, to the point where they call everything that isn’t a dispassionate recitation of official statistics to be a conspiracy theory. If you think sarcasm is ‘pretending’ to be something else, then you fail to grasp the very basics of human communication, and frankly it feels like you’re being deliberately obtuse about it.