- Contradictory- When the theorists believe in conspiracies based off of events that are mutually contradictory.
- Overriding Suspicion- Extreme suspicion that births there own theories that can be a belief in anything.
- Nefarious intent- The theory is intended to describe the function of an event as a criminal act.
- Something must be wrong- When the theorists get proven wrong about an idea they come up with something else to cover that idea but let their end conclusion stand without change.
- Immune to evidence- They tend to turn facts around to make it seem that the facts are the reason why their theory is true in order to turn peoples heads.
- Re-interpreting randomness- Diagnosing every detail to their side by delivering the message that everything happens for a reason.
- Persecuted Victim- Theorists tend to play the role as a direct victim of their theories in order to make the claim seem personal. So, the technique is used to make the viewer proceve them to be the victim and ultimately believeing their claims.
- According to Lewandowsky and Cook they describe the reason for delivering conspiracies to the world is because the person feels less powerful and threatened. For instance, when people feel like they don’t have a say in things or have 0 power over events in their life. The government is what causes people like this to develop their own theories based off of their own lack of power they wished to possess.
- In the corona virus conspiracy sent out by Jordan Sather, he questions if the coronavirus has been planned. He ultimately adds to his claim by saying,”with QAnon and anti-vaccine Facebook groups posting links to the patent suggesting that the government had introduced coronavirus, presumably to make money off a potential vaccine.” QAnon is a youtuber who posts theories for most of his content. People believe this theory because there hasn’t been a vaccine yet and if you think about it, if someone were to make a vaccine they would make a whole lot of money.
- The next theory to talk about is from a Facebook blog post that went viral. It stated that the government has a cure for the virus but will not release it to the public. It was believed that the virus was introduced by the government in order for the pharmaceutical companies to make profit. This theory could have been believed by many when the virus first started to take place but now that all of what has happened. I think it is safe to say that there is no vaccine as of right now and it wasn’t developed by the U.S government.
One thought on “Activity 2 Due April 19”
Good work on Q1 and 2. Do see any of the traits of conspiracy thinking you defined in Q1 or any of the motivations you explained in Q2 in play in any of the Corona theories you explored?
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