In a complex,changing world both peddle a simple us-and-them narrative. The results are calamitousType in “conspiracy theories” and it is wonderful what magma bubbles up. There are entire websites devoted to laying out the wildest scenarios supposedly hidden behind events from the assassinations of JFK and John Lennon to the deaths of Marilyn Monroe and Princess Diana, to 9/11; even the recent Paris attacks are the subject of online ramblings. Shocks occur, or crazy theories start swirling.
Psychologists have tried to explain the phenomenon. Some things can be so painful or traumatic that factual,documented truths are discarded and minds are sucked into half-baked conspiratorial versions. This is the things-aren’t-what-they-seem school of thought. Nothing original perhaps. But what has become most striking is the degree to which conspiracy theories now abound in the political arena.
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Source: theguardian.com