In the paranoid style, as I conceive it, the feeling of persecution is central, and it is indeed systematized in grandiose theories of conspiracy. But there is a vital difference between the paranoid spokesman in politics and the clinical paranoiac: although they both tend to be overheated, oversuspicious, overaggressive, grandiose, and apocalyptic in expression, the clinical paranoid sees the hostile and conspiratorial world in which he feels himself to be living as directed specifically against him; whereas the spokesman of the paranoid style finds it directed against a nation, a culture, a way of life whose fate affects not himself alone: but millions of others. Insofar as he does not usually see himself singled out as the individual victim of a personal conspiracy,' he is somewhat more rational and much more disinterested. His sense that his political passions are un-selfish and patriotic, in fact, goes far to intensify his feeling of righteousness and his moral indignation.
Sound familiar? There’s an entire media/political empire built around maintaining and intensifying all manner of persecutions, conspiracies, and assorted other forms of insanity to keep viewers and followers glued to the sources for the next revelation of the so-secret schemes by those on the Left to destroy American that even we don’t know about it! The Ultimate Conspiracy!
As I write this well in advance of its posting date, news is out that Chelsea Clinton is pregnant. Right on the heels of that announcement were suggestions by some of the more foaming-at-the-mouth extremist news sources that this was planned to boost Hillary Clinton’s White House ambitions. It must be exhausting to conjure up so much fear and paranoia on a daily basis. As laughably ignorant as most of that nonsense is, it’s also quite sad.
This is the contribution to our collective well-being that some have decided is their best offering? That they continue to “succeed” in keeping supporters duly riled-up says a lot—none of it good.
What is it about conspiracy theories that make them so appealing to so many, especially when they make no realistic sense and, as [Sander] van der Linden writes, theorists need contradictory evidence to even make it plausible? He devised three common facts about such suspicious minds:
People who believe in one conspiracy theory are likely to espouse others, even when they are contradictory.
Conspiracy ideation is also linked with mistrust of science, including well-established findings, such as the fact that smoking can cause lung cancer.
Mere exposure to information supporting various fringe explanations can erode engagement in societal discourse.
That’s actually not such a good thing, if our future well-being is of any interest to the public. The rabbit hole of one insane theory leading to another moves its perpetrators and sympathizers farther away from reality and facts the more often they engage in their fear-inducing disaster concoctions. The point?
No one disputes that caution is a good thing, and certainly there have been more than a few instances when the public is told one thing by the government [Left or Right] which is an exercise conducted with great generosity in the definition of truth. But to awaken each morning fearing the day and then working double-time to pervert facts into a narrative that satisfies those weird urges doesn’t help them or others in addressing actual problems which require cooperation and expertise.
Perhaps a consideration of the facts on the ground and then focused efforts on addressing them collectively and cooperatively might be a pleasant diversion?
Just a thought, if our future well-being (here in reality that is), still means something. Perhaps our children have some thoughts on that….
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