About Conspiracy Theories : "grime building up on the window until you can see only the outlines of shadowy figures"

I'm seeing posts recently about conspiracy theories, and related events -- mainly, how crazy they are and how they're going to get people killed! 

Then today I found a couple of great charts that show all of the recent conspiracy theories and particularly how they all sort of fit together. 

So under the category of "know your enemy" I'm printing them here: 

Got all that?  

Don't you feel better now that at least SOMEBODY knows what's going on....

I found both of these charts posted in the BlueSky thread below, from social scientist Matthew Facciani:

I consume a lot of conspiracy-theory content for work, and two major themes always stand out. First, conspiracy theories offer comforting certainty around confusing and complex issues.

— Matthew Facciani (@matthewfacciani.bsky.social) December 4, 2025 at 10:07 AM

Second, there’s the powerful community element, large groups of people validating the belief and supporting one another as they try to make sense of chaos.

— Matthew Facciani (@matthewfacciani.bsky.social) December 4, 2025 at 10:07 AM

The world is often scary, uncertain, and chaotic. When something unfortunate happens, conspiracy content and the communities around it offer clean, simple explanations that give people a sense of closure and understanding.

— Matthew Facciani (@matthewfacciani.bsky.social) December 4, 2025 at 10:07 AM

Here's an interesting way to describe belief in a conspiracy theory, from a book called Conspiracy Nation, which is about conspiracy theories in Australia: 

"It's like grime building up on a window until the only thing you can see on the other side is the outlines of shadowy figures."

Really loved Conspiracy Nation by @arielbogle.bsky.social and @cameronwilson.bsky.social , especially this summary of the way conspiratorial thinking escalates

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— Tansy Gardam (@tansyg.bsky.social) December 4, 2025 at 3:57 PM

however I can’t recommend reading it during downtime at a new-ish workplace unless you can say “I’m interested in conspiracy theories as a cultural phenomenon, I’m not a conspiracy theorist” really fast when people see the cover.

— Tansy Gardam (@tansyg.bsky.social) December 4, 2025 at 3:59 PM

I found a podcast of the Conspiracy Nation booklaunch in August:

And on the other hand:

I think conspiracy theories make things more complicated. If nothing is what it appears to be, then you have to invent more complex series of events involving dozens, hundreds, or thousands of people involved in fabricating and/or covering up the “truth,” with no apparent motive to do so.

— jl25and3.bsky.social (@jl25and3.bsky.social) December 4, 2025 at 12:21 PM

People can be pretty amusing about conspiracy theories too:

"brainwashed by tiktok conspiracy theories" doesn't mean "believes something i disagree with", it means "believes something no human being could normally sincerely believe outside of an exotic form of walking neurological collapse"

— POUND THE FUCKING LOTTIE ⚧️🏴‍☠️ (@vaporlight.bsky.social) December 2, 2025 at 11:18 PM

Sometimes, of course, there is something to be said for them:

most conspiracy theories are fake except when they involve the CIA, then it's the opposite

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— zaratustra (@zaratustra.bsky.social) December 1, 2025 at 5:45 AM

this is why being a leftist means that you sound like a conspiracy theorist sometimes too, which is also really frustrating and makes me feel unmoored from reality sometimes. there ARE powerful actors working to keep us down. and far too many of them DID hop on epstein's private plane

— Maddy Myers 🏳️‍🌈 (@midimyers.com) December 3, 2025 at 11:09 AM

The only meaningful difference between leftie and right-wing conspiracy theories is that the leftie ones are often true

— Keza MacDonald (@mackeza.bsky.social) December 3, 2025 at 11:51 AM

Its not all gloomy, though -- Facciani also notes this:

New research shows that the farther people feel from politics, the more likely they are to believe conspiracy theories. But the study also found that when people imagine a better politics—one that is transparent, relatable, and connected to daily life—their conspiratorial thinking goes down.

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— Matthew Facciani (@matthewfacciani.bsky.social) December 3, 2025 at 12:56 PM

We're seeing the conspiracy theory miasma in real time this week:

This frantic, 160-post truth binge is unhinged. Raging at 2 a.m. with AI clips and conspiracy theories shows a president utterly detached from reality while his administration crumbles. It's terrifying.

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— tomwellborn3rd (@patriotprogressive.bsky.social) December 2, 2025 at 7:30 AM

Daniel Dale / CNN

Fact check: The five wildest conspiracy theories from Trump’s late-night posting spree
...Trump shared a social media post from notorious conspiracy peddler Alex Jones that said, “WILD: Michelle Obama May Have Used Biden’s Autopen in the Final Days of His Disastrous Administration to Pardon Key Individuals, Patrick Byrne Reveals.” ...
Trump shared a social media post in which pro-Trump social media commentator Mila Joy wrote, “Jeffrey Zients, Bidens Chief of Staff, says that even though the paper he is reading SAYS he approved the use of the autopen, that he actually DIDNT APPROVE it. Someone else FORGED HIS APPROVAL!” ...
A key tenet of the QAnon conspiracy movement is that various Democratic and “deep state” perpetrators of crimes against children and the country will be arrested under Trump and face justice before military tribunals. On Monday, Trump shared a post from a QAnon-promoting account that said, “When the Director of National Intelligence tells the public, Obama committed TREASON and President Trump is your President, you can 100% know we will see his MILITARY TRIBUNAL.”...
Trump has long used false claims to try to blame Democratic former House speaker Nancy Pelosi for the attack on the US Capitol by pro-Trump rioters on January 6, 2021. On Monday, he shared a Mila Joy post that said, “Nancy Pelosi’s former top staffer said Nancy planned January 6th for two years. Lock her up.”...
No Trump conspiracy-pushing blitz would be complete without some nonsense about the 2020 election he legitimately lost to Biden. The president shared a post from a pro-Trump commentator who called the election “stolen” and who then rattled off a variety of nonsense about supposed election-rigging by machines – including a claim that 51%-to-49% margins of victory are “no coincidence” but occur “because that’s the way the programs to steal elections were designed.”...

Anyone can post a quote of Trump saying something stupid and we can’t tell if it’s real or made up. This is where we are. 🤦‍♀️

— Sandy (@sandysue1958.bsky.social) December 2, 2025 at 7:52 PM

And there's more:

Canada is certainly not immune -- a political push is starting to elevate the Convoy into a great Canadian patriotic event. And I wonder if that might actually happen if the federal Conservatives ever get elected to government again:

This is not satire. This MLA from BC wants a provincial statutory holiday in honour of the Freedom Convoy. www.castanet.net/news/Kelowna...

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— Sean Devine (@seandevine9.bsky.social) December 2, 2025 at 10:23 PM

She needs to really give her head a shake. Their warped minds spin everything nasty to make it sound good. There was nothing peaceful about that convoy. It was full of lies, spies 😉 and boy's that tried desperately to be men. #Shameful #StandUpToHate

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— 🇨🇦 KimberlyC 🫐 (@annkimberly.bsky.social) December 4, 2025 at 4:39 AM

Another example:

Here's Senator Ron Johnson, vice chair of the Senate oversight committee and chair of the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, spreading long debunked conspiracy theories about 9/11

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— Timothy Burke (@bubbaprog.xyz) December 4, 2025 at 6:34 PM

This guy will kill people:

RFK Jr.’s pick to reshape the childhood vaccine schedule embraces Covid conspiracy theories Dr. Kirk Milhoan is a pediatric cardiologist and church pastor who has falsely stated that Covid vaccines cause cancer, miscarriage and widespread heart disease. By @brandyzadrozny.bsky.social

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— Charles Ornstein (@charlesornstein.bsky.social) December 3, 2025 at 9:08 AM

And the FBI finally made an arrest in the Jan 6 Pipebomb case - and speaking of conspiracy theories, I myself had always suspected the pipebombs were intended to provoke a declaration of martial law so Trump could suspend the Congressional confirmation that Biden won.

But I guess not, so never mind:

Patel is celebrating the pipe bomber arrest by doing a media tour of right-wing wackos

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— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar.com) December 4, 2025 at 5:04 PM

Kash Patel knows nothing about law enforcement - he just wants to blab details of each case like Gossip Girl

— so-what-who-cares.bsky.social (@so-what-who-cares.bsky.social) December 4, 2025 at 5:24 PM

Perhaps we could also ask, what does it really matter if people believe something that isn't true? A thousand years ago, just about everyone believed the sun circled around the earth -- in their day-to-day lives, one could argue who cares, because this belief didn't really affect anybody one way or the other. 

 Except, of course, that there couldn't be any advancement in physics or math or cosmology or figuring out how to forecast the weather that would affect the crops until scientists could understand the truth, and could study the universe the way it really is.
So finally, here is an interesting observation by Rachel Vindman:

When Reality is Hard
Why believe face the truth when you can just make up your own version?
...If we’ve learned anything from the MAGA movement and Donald Trump, it’s that people really enjoy simple explanations. I don’t know if it has always been like this or if it’s a byproduct of our ever-shrinking attention spans, but anything that can be explained with a pithy five-words-or-less catchphrase really seems to resonate with the MAGA crowd. The rest of us are over here understanding that the world is complex and reality is often gray, but apparently that requires more energy than they are willing or able to give. When things don’t add up, it’s easy to grab onto a version that’s tidy and aligns with what we want to be true. Whether it makes sense or not is immaterial. Sometimes the crazier the story, the more convincing it feels, because believing it proves you’ve spotted something the rest of the world is too blind to see....
Distrust is the real engine of conspiracy theories. They offer simpler and easier realities when the truth is hard, but more than that they often give people a tidier way to explain why our lives aren’t what we want or hoped they would, could, or should be. They germinate when trust breaks down; they flourish when people feel disappointed with their lot in life. When governments lie or corporations cover up, people don’t ignore it and move on, rather, they fill the silence with stories and those stories feel real enough to live inside.