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All my adult life I’ve operated within subcultures which are inherently sceptical of authority. For the most part, that scepticism shows a healthy disregard for the sort of thinking which created the unfair world in which we live. We always need to be prepared to speak truth to power and to challenge “received wisdom” in a clearly dysfunctional world.
But there are times when that scepticism can lose all grounding in rationality, and in these days of internet propaganda and confirmation-bias algorithms it’s clear that this is what’s happening. The Q Anon theories are so outlandish that it’s astonishing that anybody can take them seriously. But when vociferous internet charlatans can set up online mini-empires in which their views go unchallenged, then those looking for answers to why the world seems fucked can too easily get dragged into these vortices of misinformation.
Of course, within any outlandish conspiracy theories there are always grains of truth, and those truths shouldn’t be dismissed simply because they become tainted by association to craziness. When we do that, it simply sends more people down the rabbit hole and into subcultures with alternate views of reality – many of which are harmless, but some of which certainly aren’t.
When the internet-age dawned, there was a lot of talk about how the news would now become “democratised” – no longer just the property of governments and the establishment, but now open to everyone to be able to tell their stories about how they see the world. And there are undoubted benefits to that – particularly in countries which are less tolerant of freedom of speech or expression. But it also creates a space in which those who are good at marketing themselves can become established voices of opinion without any real scrutiny of their credentials, their sources of information, or their motives.
When someone walks into a pizza shop with a gun because he thinks there are abused children trapped in the cellar, or when the grieving parents of school shooting victims are subjected to online hatred and threats by those who think they’ve been paid by the state to make the whole thing up, then the danger of shit-spreaders like Alex Jones becomes plain for all to see.
lyrics
In the fast expanding world of internet propaganda
It seems that he who shouts the loudest gets to set the agenda.
I’m no friend of the establishment, but Jesus fucking wept…
How can so many fall for “theories” that are so totally inept?
I don’t think that I’m naïve about the workings of the State,
But there’s something totally unhinged about those who believe in Pizzagate.
Like the members of a cult, they are deluding one another –
With those who are so gullible there’s no need for a Big Brother.
Chat rooms full of hate add fuel to every little neurosis
Until the end result resembles a form of mass-induced psychosis,
And rabid mobs take to the streets demanding recompense
For mass crimes that they’ve imagined and which don’t make any sense.
This is not part of some honourable tradition of defiance –
Those who proclaim their scepticism towards the voices of science
Will blindly follow the mad rantings of a nut like Alex Jones,
And accept, without question, the word of crazy keyboard clones.
When a little knowledge goes far further than it should,
Then a grasp on reality can become as clear as mud
And result in crackpot thinking that becomes the latest craze.
Lunatics are viewed by some as prophets nowadays.
With social media exploited by psychopaths and liars,
What would once have been irrelevant can now spread like wild fires
Until they reach a point where they demand the whole world’s attention.
Could it be that the road to hell is paved with good inventions?
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