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Why Do People Believe in Conspiracy Theories?

Sunday, November 23, 2014 8:03
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Scientific American gives Michael Shermer, founder of The Skeptics Society and its magazine Skeptic, a platform to ridicule conspiracy theories and those who believe in them:

President Barack Obama has been a busy man while in office: he concocted a fake birth certificate to hide his true identity as a foreigner, created “death panels” to determine who would live and who would die under his health care plan, conspired to destroy religious liberty by mandating contraceptives for religious institutions, blew up the Deepwater Horizon offshore drilling rig to garner support for his environmental agenda, masterminded Syrian gas attacks as a pretext to war, orchestrated the shooting of a tsa agent to strengthen that agency’s powers, ordered the Sandy Hook school massacre to push through gun-control legislation, and built concentration camps in which to place Americans who resist.

Do people really believe such conspiracy theories? They do, and in disturbingly high numbers, according to recent empirical research collected by University of Miami political scientists Joseph E. Uscinski and Joseph M. Parent and presented in their 2014 book American Conspiracy Theories (Oxford University Press). About a third of Americans, for example, believe the “birther” conspiracy theory that Obama is a foreigner. About as many believe that 9/11 was an “inside job” by the Bush administration.

The idea that such beliefs are held only by a bunch of nerdy white guys living in their parents’ basements is a myth. Surveys by Uscinski and Parent show that believers in conspiracies “cut across gender, age, race, income, political affiliation, educational level, and occupational status.” People on both the political left and right, for example, believe in conspiracies roughly equally, although each finds different cabals. Liberals are more likely to suspect that media sources and political parties are pawns of rich capitalists and corporations, whereas conservatives tend to believe that academics and liberal elites control these same institutions. GMO conspiracy theories are embraced primarily by those on the left (who accuse, for example, Monsanto of conspiring to destroy small farmers), whereas climate change conspiracy theories are endorsed primarily by those on the right (who inculpate, for example, academic climate scientists for manipulating data to destroy the American economy)…

[continues at Scientific American]

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Source: http://truthisscary.com/2014/11/why-do-people-believe-in-conspiracy-theories/

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  • Truth disguised as a conspiracy to hide it in plain site to baffle, confuse and intimidate folks by labeling them as wacko conspiracy theorists is an effective way to control what people think, say or do… and allow a gov’t to carry out it’s plans…unopposed. Folks have learned ALL GOV’TS are liars, cheats and hate the masses they are sworn to serve. So, now theories of evil or wrong doing are uncovered…it’s no shock… it’s most likely true and more folks start digging up well hidden evidence… to turn a theory into a truth again. That’s why gov’ts hate smart, creative and intelligent citizens…with a conscience and belied in God… evil loves to operate in shadows and darkness…and hates the raw exposure of light.

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