The lunatics on Earth 2
I remember when I debunked my first conspiracy theory. It was Christmas time, and I was four years old riding in the back of my mother’s car through the streets of downtown Tacoma, Washington. In the front seat my eight year old sister said, “There’s Santa!” Standing on a corner was Santa Claus, in the flesh. Less than a minute later she said it once more. “There’s Santa again!” Standing on another corner was another Santa!
Wait a minute, wait a minute, I thought. That’s a completely different Santa! What’s going on here?
What was going on was I had just used my inborn faculty of critical thinking for the first time. I used it to question a rampant conspiracy theory about a guy who delivered presents to all the children of the world in a single night. It’s something we all do sooner or later. It’s natural and easy and obvious, and most of us have this inborn talent without trying.
It was an example of intellect triumphing over wishful thinking. Of course I wanted the myth of Santa Claus to be true. But I couldn’t sustain my belief in the face of real evidence to the contrary.
On the other hand, I could have used my wishful thinking to instead suggest that those were not real Santas but representatives of the real Santa. As empirical evidence mounted against the proposition of his existence, I could have elaborated a set of explanations, each more bizarre than the last. I could have, in short, refused to accept the evidence of my eyes, or refused to follow the inevitable inference of all evidence altogether.
But there’s an interesting subtlety in all this. Which was the real conspiracy theory? The one that a Christmas present-delivering elf is real or the one that says that he is not real? That’s obvious, you might say, In the cold light of examination, the truth lay with the evidence. It’s a conclusion most children reach without help. And year upon year the final proof in favour of the existence of Santa Claus never materialises.
And yet it’s a faculty we often lose as adults. By the time we become adults, our ability to see the truth becomes complicated by habit and a desire to cling to the exciting notion of what we want to be true. Sometimes that belief is political and held by like minded people who also want to believe it.
The notion that the 2020 election was stolen is a case in point. There exists no evidence to support it. More than 60 court cases have been decided against the misplaced notion that Donald Trump was robbed of the presidency. Trump lost, and he lost by more than seven and a half million votes.
And yet people who want to believe that the election was rigged continue to cling to any innuendo or rationale or narrative in support of their belief, no matter how specious or absurd. A whole documentary called “2000 Mules” was created for that purpose.
The documentary was easily debunked, but the people who believe in it don’t know that because they refuse to listen to the debunking evidence. Instead they go in search of YouTube vlogs and websites that support their belief. They prefer, in short, to continue to live on Earth 2 while the rest of us live on Earth 1. Before you go looking, in too great haste, down your nose at them, consider that many of us have our own set of fallacious beliefs that are likewise easy to debunk.
Consider this as an example. There is a meme that circulates on many left-leaning websites and social media groups that says, “The melting point for steel is 2750 degrees Fahrenheit. Jet fuel burns at 1890 degrees Fahrenheit.” The conclusion? “Jet fuel cannot melt steel beams.” In other words, since burning jet fuel can’t turn steel into liquid, jet planes crashing into the World Trade Center couldn’t bring the twin towers down.
What people circulating this rubbish hope you don’t notice (or don’t know themselves) is that you don’t have to turn steel beams into liquid in order for them to collapse. Six hundred degrees Fahrenheit will weaken them sufficiently. Jet fuel-burning temperatures would weaken steel beams to the consistency of Silly Putty. Yet as soon as you point this out to a 9/11 “Truther” they’ll change the subject to some other absurdity about Building 7. The fact is they all want to believe it, and nothing you say will get them to look at the evidence against what they believe, despite the fact that every single “Truther” point has been thoroughly and completely debunked.
So in order for us to get Republicans out of Earth 2, we have to stay the hell out of Earth 2 ourselves. We have to stop believing rubbish before we can educate other people away from believing rubbish.
One important fact about conspiracy theories is they are never, ever solved. Year upon year conspiracy theorists expect to be exonerated, and year upon year they are disappointed.
There is still no evidence that alien beings are buzzing the planet, that we didn’t walk on the moon, that vaccines are full of autism-creating properties, that the earth is flat, that 9/11 was caused by the Bush administration, that global warming and the coronavirus pandemic are hoaxes. Instead the theories proliferate and books become wilder and wilder. How many JFK assassination plots are there now? Five hundred? A thousand?
We all need to start thinking with our brains and stop thinking with our wishes. For our own good we all need to stay the hell out of Earth 2. As soon as we do that we can educate future generations to do that as well.
The world is dying by conspiracy theory. America is dying by conspiracy theory. It’s time we stop participating in the madness. It’s time to get the hell out of Earth 2. And, as ever, ladies and gentlemen, brothers and sisters, comrades and friends, stay safe.
Robert Harrington is an American expat living in Britain. He is a portrait painter.