Covid Deniers and Anti Vaxxers

[Roger Mexico]

5 minutes ago, TheTeapot said:

He's mostly copied out of this, tied it in with some other stuff, and sold his 'method' to gullible people 

https://www.forgottenbooks.com/en/books/ScienceofBreath_10002203

And free from Gutenberg:

https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/13402

(Amazon also being good at repackaging free stuff to sell to the gullible)

[TheTeapot]

3 minutes ago, Roger Mexico said:

And free from Gutenberg:

https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/13402

(Amazon also being good at repackaging free stuff to sell to the gullible)

Cool, its well worth a read, and indeed worth practising some of the techniques involved. I have a photocopied version kicking about somewhere, cos the book itself was old and falling apart.

[Ramseyboi]

The Mannin line right now is definitely about to become an anti vaxxers wet dream.

 

 

[Phillip Dearden]

9 minutes ago, Roger Mexico said:

Well presumably he'd have had to call it something else if it was more restrictive.

Thinking about it, despite one's initial reaction, the rise of the internet has probably reduced this sort of nonsense.  It's true that everyone is more aware of the loonies, but in part this is because people are now able to say: "Look at these loonies! ".

This sort of nonsense has certainly been around for a long time - cults aren't a new thing and any Victorian paper will be full of ads for all sort of pseudo-scientific nonsense.  The internet may help spread such things, but it also gives people the tools to debunk them.

https://www.politico.eu/article/tim-berners-lee-i-dont-regret-creating-the-web-tim-berners-lee-web-summit-contract-for-the-web-lisbon/

Tim doesn't regret creating the WWW but he has spotted that it has the potential to cause polarised views.

Isn't this the main point re the conspiracy promoters? There were always a minority with unusual and extreme views but they were isolated and easily dismissed. Now they can communicate with other like-minded people and the groups thus formed, reinforce each other's views.

At the same time, their views are exposed to comment and opprobrium from the rest of the world.

I am amazed at how many people can adopt views that are contrary to evidence that is easily available.

 

 

[pongo]

23 minutes ago, Roger Mexico said:

Thinking about it, despite one's initial reaction, the rise of the internet has probably reduced this sort of nonsense.  It's true that everyone is more aware of the loonies, but in part this is because people are now able to say: "Look at these loonies! ".

This sort of nonsense has certainly been around for a long time - cults aren't a new thing and any Victorian paper will be full of ads for all sort of pseudo-scientific nonsense.  The internet may help spread such things, but it also gives people the tools to debunk them.

 

The fact that these kind of ideas can spread and morph so easily online (like a virus) is the thing. Social media algorithms deliver these ideas to people so effectively. People don't start off believing some crazy thing - it's a gradual process. They start by taking on board an idea which probably seems quite reasonable. And then an algorithm shows them something else they might also be interested in. And so on until soon enough they've been red-pilled. It's the same as people being radicalised. 

The whole hive-mind thing absolutely depends upon the existence of the internet. QAnon, for example, began as probably a sort of in-joke on the nihilistic Chans - more or less a conscious amalgamation of existing conspiracy theories. The idea of impersonating (typically as a joke) a secret whistleblower in a position of authority was very much a Chan thing. And the corny style of language, the same. On the Chans everyone knew that everything was basically just a sick joke - that nothing should really believed. Like a game. Long before normies picked it up on Reddit and Twitter - or even via the Facebook algorithm. And took it seriously.

Sure these kind of crazy ideas existed in small pockets. But they had no traction and no way of spreading.

Edited August 9, 2021 by pongo

[Chef Raekwon]

It's all very well laughing at these bellends, but they genuinely want to have doctors and nurses executed. They're not just deluded, they're evil.

[TheTeapot]

3 minutes ago, pongo said:

 

The whole hive-mind thing absolutely depends upon the existence of the internet. QAnon, for example, began as probably a sort of in-joke on the nihilistic Chans - more or less a conscious amalgamation of existing conspiracy theories. The idea of impersonating (typically as a joke) a secret whistleblower in a position of authority was very much a Chan thing. And the corny style of language, the same. On the Chans everyone knew that everything was basically just a sick joke - that nothing should really believed. Like a game. Long before normies picked it up on Reddit and Twitter - or even via the Facebook algorithm. And took it seriously.

 

The conspiracy 'scene' has changed over the last few years, a little longer maybe. It used to be dominated by anarchists/anti-capitalists, but has steadily been taken over by, well I dunno, Trumpers I guess. I'm pretty convinced this is by design. Take Alex Jones as an example. Contrast the stuff he was putting out 15 years ago with now, there's a huge difference, gone from being terrified of black helicopters and FEMA camps to outright sucking trumps balls. It's bizarre.

 

[pongo]

1 minute ago, TheTeapot said:

The conspiracy 'scene' has changed over the last few years, a little longer maybe. It used to be dominated by anarchists/anti-capitalists, but has steadily been taken over by, well I dunno, Trumpers I guess. I'm pretty convinced this is by design.

I'd be more inclined to see it as mostly an inevitable evolution - the hive-mind in action. Millions of people creating and evolving stories and memes.

It almost seems a bit like a conspiracy theory to see it as deliberate or orchestrated.

Although I am not disagreeing that some very nasty ideas do quite deliberately get dragged into the mix.

[quilp]

30 minutes ago, TheTeapot said:

The conspiracy 'scene' has changed over the last few years, a little longer maybe. It used to be dominated by anarchists/anti-capitalists, but has steadily been taken over by, well...

I'm pretty convinced this is by design...

 

23 minutes ago, pongo said:

I'd be more inclined to see it as mostly an inevitable evolution - the hive-mind in action. Millions of people creating and evolving stories and memes.

It almost seems a bit like a conspiracy theory to see it as deliberate or orchestrated.

Although I am not disagreeing that some very nasty ideas do quite deliberately get dragged into the mix.

You're both right, of course. Conspiracy theorism has taken on almost theistic proportions and the medley of beliefs is a product of the 'modern' age and an era of information overload. People want to believe in something and with the advances in communication pathways their options are endless and increasingly bizarre.

A quick read here on the links between societal crisis and conspiracy theories...

https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/1750698017701615

The most bizarre aspect is that people, on every level of society and academia are (obviously) easily convinced, without reasoning. Even when presented with evidence contrary to their beliefs they wilfully refuse to accept the reality.

[The Chief]

99% of conspiracy theory is a grift, its to sell shitty ebooks, get traffic to shittly made websites or shitty news sites or buy shittly made chinese merchandise (see Trump supporters logic on that one).

As the pandemic seems to be receding (albeit slowly) these people are seeing their revenue streams start to dry up which is where the logic and bandwagon jumps start to come in.

Started with Covid was a hoax but people did actually die, then it was anti-lockdown but thats all stopping, so off they all jumped ship to the vaccine is a 5G/Big pharma conspiracy/hoax but prominent anti-vaxxers are dieing and now they need a new target so they don't have to get proper jobs. 

[NoTail]

9 minutes ago, The Chief said:

99% of conspiracy theory is a grift, its to sell shitty ebooks, get traffic to shittly made websites or shitty news sites or buy shittly made chinese merchandise (see Trump supporters logic on that one).

As the pandemic seems to be receding (albeit slowly) these people are seeing their revenue streams start to dry up which is where the logic and bandwagon jumps start to come in.

Started with Covid was a hoax but people did actually die, then it was anti-lockdown but thats all stopping, so off they all jumped ship to the vaccine is a 5G/Big pharma conspiracy/hoax but prominent anti-vaxxers are dieing and now they need a new target so they don't have to get proper jobs. 

What about the 1% though! There really are conspiracies out there. For instance I was talking to a mate who saw Elvis outside the twin towers on 9/11, a Rothchild was suspiciously lurking around with what looked like an explosive timer. 

[The Phantom]

1 hour ago, pongo said:

 

. QAnon, for example, began as probably a sort of in-joke on the nihilistic Chans - more or less a conscious amalgamation of existing conspiracy theories. The idea of impersonating (typically as a joke) a secret whistleblower in a position of authority was very much a Chan thing. And the corny style of language, the same. On the Chans everyone knew that everything was basically just a sick joke - that nothing should really believed. Like a game. Long before normies picked it up on Reddit and Twitter - or even via the Facebook algorithm. And took it seriously.

 

I never really dug that deeply into QAnon, but a quick general scan a few months ago of them and I came to sort of the same conclusion.  It appears to have been a conspiracy theory joke/piss take that all got a bit out of hand and the loonies all started actually believing it.  It's actually hilarious when you think about it. 

[quilp]

If it wasn't so tragic... 

[Ann]

Flashback. Dr. Deborah Birx, the White House's coronavirus task force response coordinator, blasted the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention during a discussion on COVID-19 data:

"There is nothing from the CDC that I can trust," she told CDC Director Robert Redfield, two people familiar with the meeting told the newspaper.

The Washington Post reported that Birx and others feared that the CDC's data-tracking system was inflating coronavirus statistics like mortality rates and case numbers by up to 25%.

CDC director Rochelle Walensky, Anthony Fauci and Surgeon General Vivek Murthy were all caught lying to the public when they said over 99% of covid patients dying in hospitals were unvaccinated.

Source: http://www.informationliberation.com/?id=62441

[Ann]

CDC Director Rochelle Walensky admitted during a press briefing last week that her claim that over 99% of covid patients dying in hospitals were unvaccinated was a load of cr*p.

Source: http://www.informationliberation.com/?id=62442