Conspiracy Theories, Fake News & Information Warfare
IN FOCUS, 2 Mar 2020
Uriel Araujo | OneWorld – TRANSCEND Media Service
The problem is that, in everyday usage, “conspiracy theorist” (just like “populist” or “terrorist”) may refer to anyone. Such labels are often employed as an accusatory category. Just like witchcraft and witches in many societies, a “conspiracy theorist” is always the Other, always someone else.
18 Feb 2020 – Nowadays, “conspiracy theories” (CT) and “fake news” are hot topics: the former seem to have become largely mainstream; both are denounced as threats to the “open society”.
Many experts have looked at CT as narratives that help people make sense of complex realities. Such narratives may not be factually true but, like folk rumours, they say something about a society and its anxieties. Even so, their spread and increased popularity contributes to disrupting trust in authorities and thus supposedly poses a threat to democracies.
The problem is that, in everyday usage, “conspiracy theorist” (just like “populist” or “terrorist”) may refer to anyone. Such labels are often employed as an accusatory category. Just like witchcraft and witches in many societies, a “conspiracy theorist” is always the Other, always someone else.
The anthropological literature about witchcraft stresses that it has its own “circular logic” and once one gets entangled in such discourse, there is no way out. In a similar fashion, when describing and denouncing conspiracy theories and the motivations of the professional conspiracy theorists behind them, we often end up engaging in another type of CT ourselves – one about sinister consulting firms, ill-intentioned “conspiracy theorists” and their evil plans to spread disinformation via armies of bots, thus meddling with elections to plant foreign agents in power, for instance (sounds familiar?). Such consulting firms and social media bots do exist, of course – what is not clear is the real extent of their influence.
Most experts will admit that sometimes conspiracy theories are proven to be at least partly correct. Paradoxically, a “true” or ideal CT is always false – in the sense that its narrative does not accurately describe reality. However, what happens when new data changes the “official” story?
For instance, we now know the Tuskegee Syphilis Experiment (1932-1972) in the US infected about 400 African American men with syphilis without their consent or knowledge. Project MK-ULTRA also was a secret program of unethical experiments on human subjects. Both were carried out by the US government. Files have been unclassified and formal apologies have been issued.
Indeed, it is still not clear how a “correct conspiracy theory” (one which later happens to be proven correct) differs from a false one. Some authors define “conspiracy theories” in a more neutral manner as any hypotheses that seek to explain an event by invoking a “conspiracy” – that is, a secret plan being carried out by a group of individuals.
Here one should also be cautious as to avoid confusing a mere CT (about anything) and a conspiratorial way of understanding society and history in general. Conspiratorial thinking, in extremis, implicitly holds that nothing ever happens by chance but rather everything (specially tragedies) happens by design. This manner of thinking to a certain degree is more widespread than it seems, and it occurs specially in times of crisis.
Therefore, it is only natural that right now conspiracy theories about the Coronavirus outbreak are spreading (some wrongly believe it must have been caused by biological weapons). Epidemics and outbreaks happen. Biological weapons do exist, of course, but one has no reason to suspect biological weapons were used unless one has concrete reasons to suspect it.
On the other hand, conspiracies do exist, as we’ve seen. Not everything is a conspiracy, though. What then is a “conspiracy theory” (in its derogatory sense)? Was it a conspiracy theory when critics argued that the US government had lied about the real motivations which led it to invade Iraq? Is it a conspiracy theory to point out that many Hong Hong protesters have been aided by the West, even though there is plenty of evidence of it? Why was it not a conspiracy theory when Western media accused China of having lied about the Corona virus death toll?
If one claims the Illuminati control everything, this would be an example of conspiracy thinking few will take seriously. As for other claims, “credibility” often depends on who is claiming what about whom.
In 2015, it was reported that a Pentagon’s new war manual stated that journalists could also be considered “unprivileged belligerents”. This reasoning might be older: in 2007, the US military did open fire against Iraq journalists holding cameras (supposedly a mistake).
Last year, Israel bombed a building used by Hamas cyber hackers – cyberwarfare is indeed now recognised as a new battlefield. Modern warfare extends way beyond the (traditional) battlefield.
Let us think then about conspiracy theories (and the very labelling of some narratives as “conspiracy theories”) as also a part of the psychological and information warfare in the pursuit of soft power – a process that involves multiples actors and many grey zones. And everyone is engaged in such warfare.
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Uriel Araujo – Anthropologist and researcher based in Brazil.
Go to Original – oneworld.press
Tags: Conflict, Conspiracy Theories, Journalism, Media, Politics
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