“I don't think anyone really wakes up one day, gasping for breath and thinking everyone else is a lizard.”
Like Molly, you probably know someone who has tried to convince you that vaccines are full of mind-controlling nanobots, or that 5G towers are really being used to brainwash us.
Maybe you’ve even heard some that actually make you stop and think: like, maybe something supernatural is going on in the Bermuda Triangle?
A lot of people have lost faith in traditional institutions of power and are searching for answers that make sense of an often out-of-control world, even if those answers don’t make much sense either.
The conversation around conspiracy theories – and the people who believe in them – quickly becomes an ‘us and them’ joke, full of eye rolls and unhelpful arguments.
We’re trying to cut a path to a time before the conspiracy memes and comment threads to understand why this is happening, and what you can do to keep the conversation open.
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Doomscroll Remedy is a University of Queensland podcast, produced by Deadset Studios.
Hosted by Stephen Stockwell. Produced by Grace Pashley, Krissy Miltiadou and Rachel Fountain at Deadset Studios, in partnership with consulting producer Zoe McDonald and commissioning editor Greta Usasz at The University of Queensland.
“I don't think anyone really wakes up one day, gasping for breath and thinking everyone else is a lizard.”
Like Molly, you probably know someone who has tried to convince you that vaccines are full of mind-controlling nanobots, or that 5G towers are really being used to brainwash us.
Maybe you’ve even heard some that actually make you stop and think: like, maybe something supernatural is going on in the Bermuda Triangle?
A lot of people have lost faith in traditional institutions of power and are searching for answers that make sense of an often out-of-control world, even if those answers don’t make much sense either.
The conversation around conspiracy theories – and the people who believe in them – quickly becomes an ‘us and them’ joke, full of eye rolls and unhelpful arguments.
We’re trying to cut a path to a time before the conspiracy memes and comment threads to understand why this is happening, and what you can do to keep the conversation open.
+++
Doomscroll Remedy is a University of Queensland podcast, produced by Deadset Studios.
Hosted by Stephen Stockwell. Produced by Grace Pashley, Krissy Miltiadou and Rachel Fountain at Deadset Studios, in partnership with consulting producer Zoe McDonald and commissioning editor Greta Usasz at The University of Queensland.
The first one that I was really like, that's not reality with a conspiracy theory about something to do with an island owned by the American government that's not on the map that they control the weather from. And it's something to do with getting back in Japan for Pearl Harbor. And there's a reason that Japan doesn't have an agricultural industry like it used to. And it's because all of the weather is being controlled by the US government from somewhere. And in reality, it's like, well, that's called Climate Change. There's like the reason that Japan keeps having so many bad weather events. That's climate change. And that is a real problem. Like we can talk about that. But it's not, I can't talk about that if the basis of that is grounded in like this staunch belief that there's a hidden island like, yeah, it becomes very, very difficult to talk to someone when so many of these things that you do want to talk about are actually these massive, these really big problems, like their social problems and their environmental problems. But the angle that they're being kind of approach from is unbelievable.
Stephen Stockwell:Unbelievable, and kind of confusing, but not a lot makes sense. When you start diving into the world of conspiracy theories. That secret whether Ireland is a new one to me, maybe you too, but by now, you've probably had someone an aunt or an old friend from high school posting on Facebook about things like chemtrails, and 5g towers. Maybe you even heard some that actually make you stop and think like, Is my phone really eavesdropping on my conversations? Fake News, misinformation, disinformation, from genuine conspiracies to the purely theoretical ones. There's a lot of people who've lost faith in traditional institutions of power and a searching for answers that make sense to them. Even if they don't make sense, full stop. Molly, who's telling this story has some ideas about how we got here, which, if I'm honest, aren't as exciting as I'd hoped.
Molly:I don't think anyone really wakes up one day, like gasping for breath and thinking everyone else's elicit.
Stephen Stockwell:We all want to know why people believe in conspiracy theories. And we'll dig into that later. But also want to know what it's like for people like Molly standing on the sidelines. Is there anything that she can do? I'm Steven Stockwell. And this is Doom scroll remedy, a podcast from the University of Queensland, where we spend time with the people living through the existential threats that keep us up at night, and the people trying to solve them. We're unpacking the big questions about how the planet humans ended up like this. Not with the goal of fixing them, we're not wizards, but in the hope that we can slow down enough to understand these big problems swirling throughout feeds. The sort of story that Molly is telling about a person that she loves becoming more and more entangled in conspiracy theories is not uncommon. Molly's family would often talk politics, and for the most part, they've always been on the same page. But gradually, conversations with their brother started to change.
Molly:I think it always starts with like a general disenfranchisement and the general mistrust of hierarchy and of the government and, you know, power structures, then at some point you having you find yourself having an argument about 5g, or you find yourself having an argument about something, and it's like it stops making sense,
Stephen Stockwell:this story gets pretty personal. So we asked Molly, if she wanted to change her name. She didn't. But she did want to change her brother's name. So Molly, blank slate, any name in the world,
Molly:I always wished he was called Sam told me that Sam, he would be 31. He doesn't live in the country. But in the years since he's moved overseas, he's become very interested in conspiracy theories. From what I would consider conspiracy theories, what he considers a very emotional reality.
Stephen Stockwell:Do you worry about Sam? Oh, constantly?
Molly:Yeah, all of the time. What about, I worry that he's maybe making his own life harder. I worried that he's isolating himself, I worried that he is losing community and gaining a lot of say, the wrong type of community that the community that he is gaining is non physical. And it's not it's online. And it's, in some ways that makes it purely theoretical. And that's not a support system. And I think that that's like, as we're seeing more and more something that we need, like a physical and presence support system. And I think that that's what I worry the most about is that he's isolating,
Stephen Stockwell:how does that kind of influence the way that you you talk to him when I have the
Molly:emotional strength to talk about these things as well? Lots of it sometimes does come down to me just trying to protect my own well being and my mental well being because it's can be incredibly stressful. And I'm not always up for it, which I think is fair enough. And that's a long process. I think to give yourself the space to just not engage with it for a while, but when I do talk to him about it, I think I try to keep in mind that he is just someone who is looking for a conversation, like he's looking to be validated. And it comes from a place of disenfranchisement. And I think that the things that I try to keep in mind, like I do choose my relationship over being right or over winning an argument or over changing someone's mind, because at the end of the day, like, he doesn't want his mind change, and he doesn't want what I consider help. So I think that when I talk to him, I just, I don't know, I just try, try to keep every one of my mind. You know, don't argue too much. Just say things like, what's interesting when you hear that, or, and just kind of let him run his writings, wheels until he's sick of talking about it. And I can ask him, How long had this been?
Stephen Stockwell:What do you think he's looking for with these?
Molly:That's an incredibly good question. I would love to know, I think he's looking for a reality that makes sense to him. Maybe I think he's looking for something that he can understand. Like, I think that he's maybe looking for something that makes him feel like he has a place or has like people around him who have the same beliefs as him. I think he's just looking for connection. I think people are just looking for connection and for community in to be people who feel misunderstood. Just want to feel understood at the end of the day, isn't that it? Like? I think that that's all I can see out of it. Like, I don't think that he's looking to start a fight with me. And I think don't think he's looking for people to call him crazy. Certainly not, you know,
Stephen Stockwell:trying to find out what sends people towards these theories, or what makes the theories attractive in the first place, is one of the million dollar questions here. So we asked Glenda getting a professor of social psychology at the University of Queensland, to help us understand why some people get caught up in these theories.
Glenda:For a long time, when we tried to answer that question, we're very much focusing on what kind of people what is the personality that they actually believe in these conspiracy theories. But we actually sort of start to move away from that. And it's much more that we're trying to look at it, what are the type of context when people start to be start to gravitate towards conspiracy theories, because then you can start to understand what they're looking for, right. And in our own work, we start to focus very much on, you know, things happen in our world that require an explanation. And sometimes they're these massive things happening that seem really illogical, right? How can this ever happen? And so then we start to be quite prone to conspiracy theories, right? It cannot just be an accident, it needs to be that there is someone behind this some people who actually plot together and preferably, you know, very powerful people, people that we don't trust. That's a when, when that is actually happening. That's when I guess we're we're all quite sort of, you know, open to accept the validity of conspiracy explanations.
Stephen Stockwell:So it's like an explanation thing. This is why this happened.
Glenda:Exactly. Yes. I mean, you know, whenever we go through the social world, we always look for explanations. And sometimes we often also look at other people to help us, you know, why is this happening? And we look for validation information of our beliefs. And sometimes there's also authorities who tell us well, you know, official accounts, why things are happening. And so I'm quite interested in when it is actually that we're no longer accepting these official accounts for why 911 happens, or COVID What's What's the background? But when we actually start to reject those and say, no, no, actually, I know really, what's happening, something quite different is happening, much more sinister. And they want us to believe this thing. But you know, I'm clever enough to see through dad's
Stephen Stockwell:basically, the whole world is complicated, and messy, and sometimes easy answers, even if they're wrong, just make things simpler to understand or even help you make sense of it all. I've never really followed this path. I kind of like a complicated, but I do love a good story. So when we started thinking of whether there are any conspiracy theories that I believe in, or maybe more accurately, just sort of entertain, I did manage to land on one. The last cosmonauts This is the theory that during the space race in the 50s, and 60s, the former Soviet Union covered up the deaths of cosmonauts, Russian astronauts that were lost in space. I was reminded about this in a Reddit thread a few weeks ago. It was also debunked in the same thread. But it did make me think about why I was drawn to it and I realized that it was so easy to believe, because it reflected the secrecy that I expected of the Soviet Union. And the stereotype that their space program wasn't as advanced or they weren't as skilled as the West. It just reinforced an established worldview and stereotypes that I already held.
Glenda:It's very much driven by stereotypes that we have and where we expect it to happen. But it gets also what, what is often the case here, I mean, especially the example you're given is, it is a mystery, right? What happened to these guys, and you have a government that is covering it up, right, or is not really giving you all the information that they have. So there is something that remains to be explained. And it makes me think very much of while you were talking, I was thinking of the Malaysian Airlines that disappeared. And the days after, I mean, just looking on Twitter was full with conspiracy theories. So the more people that seem to believe it, well, maybe there is some truth to it. It's an interesting thing that starts to have its own life.
Stephen Stockwell:One thing that people who follow these theories have in common is usually a starting point where they distrust governments, powerful people, institutions, etc. which can be quite useful. I mean, the entire profession of journalism is based on questioning authority. Now that I think about it, actually, often journalists are trying to on Earth conspiracies, you see conspiracies are real. It's the theoretical part, that makes it blurry.
Glenda:Conspiracies happen, right? Where powerful people, small groups of them will come together, and they're hiding their actions from the public, right? You know, think even of the cigarette lobby lobby. For years, they were actually very successful in withholding information from the public, that smoking is bad for you, right? So this happens, a conspiracy theory is basically a hypothesis that people may have that this is happening. But it's an untested hypothesis. And so this is where the debate is coming from, where conspiracy theories, it's, some people will say, Yep, okay, I believe it, I think we have enough evidence to say that this is confirmed, this is a valid theory, whereas others will reject them. So it's all about the debate. Is this true? Or is it not true
Stephen Stockwell:when you're talking about people who don't have that trust and facing the government? Like, was there? Is there a kind of suspension of belief a part of that where they got a Well, obviously, they're not acting in our best interest. But they're also smart enough to be to try and hide this from us. Like, what what happened? What's happening there?
Glenda:My colleague, Matthew Hornsey, makes this point to where he says there is something there, that's not quite logical, right? On the one hand, you don't believe the government to be able to govern us and they're not competence. At the same time. This is belief that so competent, to plot all of these very complex events. And not only dad that they execute them well, and I also get away with it, because no one really finds out except me who really sort of sort of unraveled sets, right, and finds little pieces of evidence that this happened to often people who are really into it, they combined different conspiracy theories that are logically in coherence. So just to give an example, we find that people who believe that Princess Diana was murdered by Mo five, they're also more likely to believe in a conspiracy to Diana actually escaped and she's living on an uninhabited island somewhere far away from the press. So she cannot be dead and alive at the same moments. But still, in the mind of someone who's really into conspiracy theories, that sort of apparent contradiction doesn't pop up or even with bin Laden, exactly the same thing that the conspiracy theories said Bin Laden died 10 years before he actually did. But people who believe that are also more likely to believe that he was assassinated by the American forces when he was so it's, it's an interesting one. You know, there's no logic to any of this.
Stephen Stockwell:I think that's why it feels so easy to just pile on conspiracy theorists and not take them seriously at all. Like, where's the edge of the world? If the world isn't round?
Molly:Birds aren't real. That's a good one. Which Have you ever seen a bird up class?
Stephen Stockwell:One of my favorites is that Australia's not real. It's actually an island of Florida. So if you're flying to Australia, from America, you actually fly around in circles for a bit. And then you land at a place like an island or Florida or something like that. And everyone's a paid actor.
Molly:I've got some questions about this. Ultimately, the chip that put in my vaccine,
Stephen Stockwell:we started turning the whole thing into a job, which Molly actually ended up calling us on.
Molly:Isn't this conversation that you and I are having now? Interesting, because this is the cultural understanding that we have of conspiracy theories and, like you and I are obviously interested in it and concerned about it, but we're not blame free, because we're still joking about it. And we still think it's kind of funny. And this is like, this is part of the attitude towards it. And like, obviously, I'm not saying that we shouldn't laugh about it. It's very funny sometimes. But I do think it's interesting that like, even when we're like, trying to look very critically at it, and trying to look closely and deeply at it, it's still like a little bit of a joke to us when this is like, it's still a bit of a joke to me. And this is someone who I love endlessly. And this is his reality. And I'm still like, so I think it would be very interesting for me to know like, what, what can be done on like a larger level for us to make people feel more included and not feel like the butt of the joke?
Stephen Stockwell:What's the risk of dismissing people who believe in conspiracy theories? Is there like an inherently kind of other ring way of labeling people or isolating people who we who we kind of in inverted commas considered conspiracy theorists?
Glenda:Yeah, certainly. I mean, many people will experience that, if you have a close friends family member who becomes really goes down rabbit hole, that, yeah, their relationships is severely damaged. What can you do? I mean, what I guess I instinct is to start to argue and to say, look, you know, have you try and reason with them provide explanations why they cannot be right. i The the initial evidence suggests that that is actually counterproductive, because most conspiracy theories, they have thought about the topic much more than many of us have, who don't have a conspiracy theory. So there's no information that you can give them that they haven't always already come across. And the other thing is, of course, that if you strongly take the side of the official version, then you become identified with the official version, and potentially a threat, right? You're the photo conspiracy theorist in their minds, you become the danger itself, which can lead, you know, they alienate you, and they don't want to share all the information with you. So they close themselves off. And so it becomes very much that they start to drift into this world of finding other like minded individuals hanging out with them. And they only provide them with validation and affirmation. But it also means that you get polarization right further away from those who try and pull them back. And the call of those who actually say, Yeah, you know, we believe in these things, just like you do, that that call becomes stronger. So that's, that's a very dangerous path. And at the moment, actually, we know very little about how to break that.
Stephen Stockwell:Yeah, right. So at the moment, we're probably not dealing with this in the right way.
Glenda:I agree. I don't think we're dealing with it in the right way, we're, we're still on the path of just provide them with information. Even with the vaccination campaigns, it is very much about just provide people with information about why it's so important to get vaccinated. And not enough trying to stand in the shoes of those who believe in these conspiracy theories and ask the question, why would they believe this? Why is this so compelling for them. And once you actually understand that, then you might also work a bit more with that, to counter it.
Stephen Stockwell:I always think about how hard trust is to build and how easy it is to lose. So turning that around is really slow going, and I think will probably take us longer than we've got. But is there actually a cure for conspiracy theories? Whenever I hear people argue back, it's like they knock off one head into MMA seem to pop up in the same place. So how do they die?
Glenda:I think that a lot of conspiracy theories have certain predictions for the future. And right, so think of all of those doomsday cults, and we know historically, that it's very interesting to study them. Because when the day comes, that the world is going to, you know, explode, but you know, our little cult is going to be picked up by a spaceship. And when that time comes, and it doesn't happen, how do you then what do you do with that, right? You've, you've had your whole sort of these people truly believe that the world is coming to an ends and that they're the few ones who are going to be saved. When that doesn't happen. What do you do? Do you revise your theory? Or do you just come up with more theories and it is the ladder that actually typically happens because there's too much at stake. Right? If you have to accept that all of this thing that I'm so fully in this this group and my world view that I have that that's complete rubbish. Well, that's a very threatening proposition. So it's often more that people are more keen to try and save the world view, then really to challenge it, if you have to admit, say, after years and years of going down the rabbit holes, that, well, maybe I was wrong, that's such a threatening thing, to your self esteem to who you are, because that people don't resist it. And if they do, they often get very isolated, because you no longer have that social support from that group of other people who believe in this conspiracy theories. And because for many of them, also, if they've been in it for years, there, they have cut ties with families friends before that period. So it's, it can be a very isolating experience. And you're left with all of these events that that's, that happens, and you still don't know why they happened.
Stephen Stockwell:I'd never really put myself in their shoes before I thought about what might attract people how they thought about and justified these theories, but never how much a part of them was, which kind of changes how I'd approach someone, especially someone close. Let's say there's someone who believes George Bush is behind 911, maybe an arm of yours, what else is going on in their life? How close were you before you were just laugh reacting to all their Facebook posts? I wanted to know how you could get back to a time before the conspiracy memes and the obnoxious the unhelpful comment threads.
Glenda:Tonight about challenging, it's not about starting to win the argument or proving them wrong. It is about maintaining the relationship. And one thing that also comes to mind is that there are some researchers now that you could call it an inoculation approach, right? Where you get small doses of information that might challenge conspiracy theory, but only very small doses, you actually just plant the seed in their minds as something that doesn't quite stack up. So I liked that approach. Because it is the soft approach that allows you to maintain the relationship that helps people to work out for themselves. But the truth this
Stephen Stockwell:do you think your brother will ever change?
Molly:No. And I don't think he wants to, like I think to change, you want to change? Changing is incredibly difficult, and it takes a lifetime. And I don't think that he wants to change. And I think that that's actually okay. Like, I think that he thinks, thinks believes feels that he knows the truth. And he feels righteous, He feels good. He feels good. When he's telling you about it. He feels like he's helping you feel like he's saving you. Even in some small way. I think he feels like he understands something and that he belongs to something bigger than just himself and that the world that absolutely makes no sense whatsoever to him maybe isn't as it seems. And that's a good thing. So I actually don't think that pressuring someone to change, like, what's it going to do for us? What's it gonna do for them other than, you know, I think we're maybe the ones who need to change.
Stephen Stockwell:Maybe, just maybe those small drops will add up over time. I kind of like Sam at this point. So I hope they do. But look, maybe they won't. At the very least though, by prioritizing the relationship, Molly can still pick up the phone to her brother and ask him how the weather is. Make sure you follow Doom scroll remedy and your favorite podcast app so you can join us as we dive into other existential threats like just how bad plastics are forests, or bushfires and climate change, we may well see some more extreme fires, it's it's probably fair to deduce that we're likely to see more frequent thunderstorms associated with those fires that present the associated risks that we've spoken about. But a lot of that will depend on on how our climate changes how these natural climate cycles interact with each other, but also how they respond to global warming. Doom squirrel remedy is a podcast from the University of Queensland. It's produced by deadset studios, hosted by me Steven Stockwell, produced by Grace Pashley executive producer is Rachel fountain sound designed by Chrissy multi rd consulting producer Zoe McDonald, commissioning editor Greta use S