What drives conspiracy theorists?

Conspiracy theory is much easier to grasp than fundamental science.

I can only answer based on one person I know who’s a conspiracy theorist. A real bona fide one. As far as I can tell from this person and their personality, they want to be right about everything without having to prove it. I guess some people like to give off the impression that they know something everyone else doesn’t.
I don’t dismiss all conspiracy theories, but if three quarters of them were true, the people who ’‘know all this shit’’ would have been kidnapped never to be seen again, long ago.

Oh my god, I can’t even imagine the scene at this

I see it as an attempt to make a more interesting narrative. Reality often makes for a pretty unsatisfying story. Random shit happens. People do stupid things for piss-poor reasons. It can be hard to make any sense of things.

If you’ve consumed a steady media diet of fictionalized intrigue, evil geniuses, and master-minded plots, then reality can seem pretty lackluster and messy by comparison; a bad story, in other words. It’s more satisfying to think that the “real” story behind the scenes is more exciting and has a better plot.

It also makes people feel smarter and more special to think that they alone know the real story.

I am not a shrink. But in my opinion, conspiracy theorists are deeply insecure, to the point of paranoia. Their view of the world is irrational because think that the world is designed with a mission of destroying THEM;

THat’s why so many conspiracy theorists are deeply religious. It addition to their irrational paranoia, they seek for simplistic answers through religion (to compensate).

Well, I do know someone who is a conspiracy theorist. She’s one of those “pan-conspiracy” believers who believes in all of them and thinks all conspiracies are connected, and she probably thinks the Illuminati are behind all of them, from Obama being a Muslim to Bush perpetrating 9/11 to contrails to FEMA camps to the Sandy Hook massacre being a hoax. She is mentally ill, she is very paranoid, and recently her relationship with her son (one of my closest friends) was severed. I’m not sure why she does it; I’m not a psychologist. I just know that she does get something out of stockpiling food and telling her kids that they’re in danger and all that. She’s been alone for a long time and has little relationship with her kids, so I’m sure that has something to do with it.

@syz I bet the costumes are awesome! Well, unless everyone is dressed in a trenchcoat and dark glasses…

With the one friend that I have that is a major conspiracy theorist (her favorite one is chemtrails) is because she is sick, both physically sick with a debilitating illness, and mentally ill, I think partly because she smokes a lot of pot (multiple times daily over many years) and I think that over the years it has made her paranoid and she is clearly depressed and anxious.

Because she is sick, she desperately wants to find a reason for why she is sick, although the real reason is just a bad luck of the draw as far as her genetics go.

She is also a huge drama queen that needs to be right. If you go against her, she will throw a hissy fit. She’s lost jobs, relationships, friends and places to live, because she picks fights with people who don’t agree with her conspiracy theories.

For every credible (and I guess credible is in the eye of the beholder) piece of information that anyone shows her about how her thinking is muddled/mistaken or just plain wrong, she can find 5 other websites that show how her ideas are “facts” She bombards FB with them every day. I’m considering un-friending her due to the multitude of conspiracy theories she posts. I don’t feel free to comment, respectfully, on her posts, because she throws a hissy fit if anyone goes against her.

I feel very sorry for her, but I don’t know what I can do.

It helps that what the media tells us is completely unfathomable.

Who told you to ask this question??? Who sent you???

I think a lot of people know that they really know nothing about what happens behind doors containing powerful people. We are lied to every day.

Conspiracy theories offer answers to the unknowable. Pointless, of course.

An as an aside, we now know that what we learned in that past about American events isn’t always true. There is room for questions.

It’s a way of simplifying the world, and explaining it in a way that releases you from any responsibility. “It’s not my fault, it’s because….”.

And it is easier for someone who feels they have no control over their own lives.

Do you think a politician believes something because he says he does?

GQ, and some really wise and well articulated comments on this thread.

I believe conspiracy theories are concocted for much the same reason celestial constellations were created eons ago: to fill the eternal vacuum in which some questions are unanswerable without sufficient knowledge of the facts.

This is not to say a conspiracy theory is automatically false… just that it shouldn’t automatically taken as fact no matter how often or by whom it’s repeated.

They are paranoid and lazy; verifying facts is too much bother.

@syz they forgot to invite David Icke…
Well the thing is some facts may be the truth but more often the facts are bend to serve another agenda. These guys are like politicians they think they are the next savior.

I think it has something to do with intelligence. I mean, is it just a coincidence that people who buy into the conspiracy stories have horrible writing skills? I don’t know anyone personally who is a conspiracy nut. All I know is what I see written on facebook and places like that.
Maybe it’s an attempt to show their intellect by linking unrelated events together. They think they’re outwitting somebody or something.

They use it as a vehicle to pursue fantasy, fuelled by their intense desire for all things nerdy.
Or, whichever car @ragingloli owns.

Like this gun nut’s comment ” All 2nd believers should stop doing business with any business not allowing them to carry inside the business period”

Extreme distrust of government.

Well, some conspiracy theories have been proven to be true (ie: the Gulf of Tonkien Incident that never actually happened, but was used as an excuse to increase the US participation in the Viet Nam War).

I’m actually not sure what you’re really asking here. Do I believe there are many ridiculous conspiracy theories out there: yes. On the other hand I’m not sure someone believing that aliens have (at least) visited earth is entirely wacky when many highly credible and intelligent high ranking officials have even testified to seeing UFO’s/aliens.

I think there is a big difference between believing that something is possible vs the need to believe that a conspiracy must have happened. Conspiracy theorists usually fall into the latter category, and open-minded people usually would fall into the former category. I’m not sure how believing that something considered unorthodox may be true makes one a conspiracy theorist. Personally I feel that many irrational rationalists are just as bonkers as the conspiracy theorists they like to ridicule.

@Linda_Owl You’re wasting your time on here for they’ll simply just say something like “well if the conspiracy is true then it wouldn’t be considered a conspiracy theory anymore but a verified fact.”

What ” highly credible and intelligent high ranking officials” are you referring to, @Paradox25?

People who are distrustful of authority to the point of paranoia adopt or develop alternate explanations that fit their belief system.

@Dutchess_III I’m not going to answer that on this thread for I’m not interested in posting something that will be counterposted, in turn to be countered by me and then so on when evidence or testimony is not the point of the question. I have to ask you something though, so here’s a list and you decide whether any of these statements make one a conspiracy theorist, and I’m talking about the actual definition of the term conspiracy theorist.

1. I think it is highly likely that intelligent life exists elsewhere in our galaxy/universe.
2. I think it is likely that intelligent alien life has visited earth.
3. I’m open to the possibility that the JFK assassination was carried out by someone other than a lone assassin.
4. I’m open to the possibility that bigfoot is real.
5. I believe in God.
6. I believe that ghosts exist.

Does believing in the possibility that any one, two or more of the above may be true really make one a conspiracy theorist?

@Paradox25 I think you hit the nail on the, well said….

The thing about Bigfoot, though…I mean, we would have found some sort of physical evidence by now. A skull, a bone, something. All of those people searching for them and we don’t have a single scrap of evidence? Does not compute. I’d like for Bigfoot to be real, too, but it is probably not true.

@Dutchess_III I was more interested in dealing with the fact that the premise of this question is based upon a strawman rather than trying to explain my position on each of these subjects, which of course would be nothing short of typing my own version of an encyclopedia. I’d rather reserve debating the validity of my position of a single topic on a thread devoted to that topic, not here.

You’ve misrepresnted my position as well as the reasons for coming to my opinions, but many other skeptics have done this too so you’re not alone in that department. First off I’d never said that I wanted to believe that bigfoot was real, nor did I even give my personal opinion about it. Other skeptics (not all but many) have misrespresented my position on other topics as well such as making assumptions about my personal feelings about a topic based upon my stance.

In fact I hear this all of the time when I attempt to debate the validity of afterlife evidence, that I have come to my stance of this topic due to wishful thinking, religious upbringing, culture, lack of critical thinking ability and so on. I’ve come to my position because I’ve actually spent the last 10+ years researching, and posting the very evidence which I repeatedly hear skeptics claim doesn’t exist, not because of wishful thinking. In fact I’m not sure I’m very fond of the concept of an afterlife and I even debated a Spiritualist philosopher about the possible negative consequences of the mind surviving physical brain death. I’m obviously no religionist either so that type of bias is ruled out too, and I actually consider myself to be a secular individual (as odd as that may sound).

I’ll throw in quick opinion since you’ve brought the topic of bigfoot up though. I have not done enough research on bigfoot, yeti, etc to post any viable opinion here. I’m very skeptical about such a creature existing as I was with Nessie, but still open to the possibility. I’m probably much more skeptical about the existence of Nessie than I am bigfoot, but I’ve done much more research about this alleged Loch Ness Monster than I’ve done with bigfoot. However even this discussion doesn’t fall under the category of conspiracy theories, so maybe you can see why this question struck me as more of a why do people believe in wierd things like aliens, god, ghosts, etc rather than a question truly directed at conspiracy theorists.

@antimatter These types of questions along with the typical fluther responses are a prime reason why (even when I was a skeptic myself) I never identified with the skeptical movement or mindset. In fact there are several reasons why I find many in the modern skeptical movement who are flawed with their way of thinking, including the widely held belief that the scientific method is the only tool we can use to have true knowledge of anything, and that they speak in the name of science, and that the ‘real’ science they claim they stand for itself doesn’t comprise of politics, profits incentives, reputations at stake and other special interests.

I’ll go with skeptics Truzzi’s and Bond’s take on this and simply refer to myself as a skeptical seeker rather than a ‘skeptic’ with the modern day skeptical mindset. Today the term skeptic usually means psuedoskeptic or obstructionist, and the term skeptical seeker means what the term skeptic used to mean in the nineteenth century, at least to me anyways.

Goodness @Paradox25. I’m sorry! I was looking at your list of things that you believe to be true, and I agreed with some, and stand neutral on others. I just mentioned Bigfoot because those reality series about Bigfoot are all the rage right now, and my husband and I discuss the possibilities occasionally. The reasons for my skepticism are listed in my post, and it had nothing to do with you personally. I wasn’t attacking you or misrepresenting you. I did not say “You just want to believe they exist.” I said, I want to believe they exist, and I do. Wait…I did say “I want to believe they exist too” which makes that implication. I’m sorry for any misunderstanding.
Now, I shall go find a Bigfoot question. I believe they exist around here some where. :) Cheers.

@Paradox25 I don’t think most of the things you are describing fall under the definition of “conspiracy”. A conspiracy involves some kind of government or other organization cover-up or secret master-plan. The possibility of alien life or God or ghosts or Bigfoot really has nothing to do with that. So I don’t think anyone was attacking anything you had to say.

When I think of “conspiracy” (and what I was referring to in my post) was this need to take any disaster that occurs (9/11, Sandy Hook, etc.) and say that it did not happen the way it is said to, but was rather the result of a government conspiracy to gain support for the Iraq War or gun control, etc. Then they make connections between this and hand signs made by rappers in music videos and say it’s all part of the Illuminati, etc. Or say that a scene in a Batman movie predicted the massacre. Stuff like that isn’t evidence; it’s just arbitrary connection. And it doesn’t come off to me as “skeptical” when all these people do is ignore any evidence that disproves their theory and say that it’s just “part of the conspiracy”.

@Paradox25… I found one!!

This morning I found one of my school mates posted a picture claiming that the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting was faked, and that it is a government ruse to take our guns.
I came unglued. How can people be so unempathetic?

I know, @filmfann. Not only unsympathetic but down right cruel. Horrible. And those are the kind of people who think they are trying to keep “horrible” away from all of us. Just sick.

The people who invent conspiracy theories are driven by the same lust as computer trolls. They love observing how people are reacting. The stronger the emotions, the better.

@Dutchess_III I wasn’t mad, I just tend to overstate what I mean sometimes.

S OK. It’s all good

It could be a combination of suspicious and ingenuity.

This came out today, but it still doesn’t explain it as far as I’m concerned.

They view themselves as having superior intelligence. They “know” things that other people are too stupid to recognize. Did someone else say that up there?