A conspiracy theory requires some specific conditions to thrive, and you'll find all of them in the current climate. A sense of powerlessness? Check. Generalized anxiety? Absolutely. Deep partisan divide, along with platforms that easily amplify misleading messages? Yes and yes.
This makes Megyn Kelly's forthcoming interview with Alex Jones, the InfoWars host renowned for spewing right-wing conspiracy theories, troubling. Kelly insists that she will challenge his views during Sunday night's interview, and reports suggest that after criticism she has overhauled the interview to be more hard-hitting, but it doesn't matter. Psychologically speaking, elevating chicanery and those who propagate it—even to debunk the lie—only spreads their nonsense.
“Megyn Kelly interviewing Alex Jones is like taking a leaf of poison ivy that you know is making you itch and rubbing it all over someone’s face,” says Stephanie Kelley-Romano, who teaches rhetoric at Bates College and studies how and why conspiracy beliefs take root. "You don't spread it around."
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The briefest glance at the political landscape proves her point. During his presidential campaign, Donald Trump used the rhetoric of conspiracy—often cribbing from Jones himself—to appeal to his base. Thousands of Muslim-Americans celebrated the fall of the Twin Towers. Climate change is a Chinese hoax to hobble US manufacturing. The election system is rigged. He masterfully played to voters' fears of disempowerment and disenfranchisement, feelings that historically leave people susceptible to paranoia. In doing so, Trump pushed paranoia into the mainstream, and now the country finds itself in the improbable position of having a conspiracy-theorist-in-chief. That gives misleading ideas unprecedented reach and influence.
“These conspiracy theories are corrosive to trust in journalism and government, and they exacerbate hostile feelings toward the opposition,” says Brendan Nyhan, a Dartmouth University political scientist who studies the role conspiracy paranoia plays in society. "And they undermine the factual basis for democratic debate."
Conspiracy theories are not limited to conservatives, of course. Those on the left propagate them, too, especially now that Republicans rule Washington. Republican lawmakers celebrated the passage of Trumpcare over beers. Bernie Sanders is a Russian agent sent to destroy the Democratic Party. The FCC targeted Stephen Colbert. None of this should come as a surprise, because if there's one thing that's true about any of this nonsense, it's this: Conspiracy theories beget conspiracy theories, and once a crazy idea takes root it is all but impossible to quash. You can only slow its spread.
The Feeling of Truth
People love conspiracy theories because they feel good. “If false conspiracy theories are being believed as true, it's because they are doing some sort of work for the people who believe them,” says Kelley-Romano.
People always try to make sense of the senseless. Faced with uncertainty, the brain seeks understanding. Conspiracy theories provide refuge in a complicated, confusing world. Coal miners aren’t losing their jobs because of economic and climatic shifts but because Barack Obama hates them. “It's a simplification device," Kelley-Romano says. "Rather than struggle with the complexities of economic theory, we say, 'No, it's because of this great cabal that's plotting against us.'"
Some researchers suspect that embracing a conspiracy theory stems from the human inclination to detect patterns and avoid exploitation. Tumultuous times can lead even the most rational person to believe paranoid fantasies. “The most consistent predictor of who is most likely to believe in conspiracies is some form of uncertainty,” says Anna Newheiser, a psychologist at SUNY Albany.
It gets worse when you add extreme partisanship to the mix, because those beliefs get enmeshed in the person's sense of identity. When your erroneous belief is wrapped up in your value system, it buttresses your sense of self. That makes accepting that a conspiracy theory is bogus feel like admitting there is something wrong with you. Experts say this is a key reason people can fervently believe something despite evidence disproving it. That, in turn, deepens the cultural divide.
Mainstreaming the Fringe
Which brings me back to Kelly's interview with Jones. He has spent a fair amount of time arguing that the Sandy Hook massacre is a hoax, propagated by Democrats to pass gun control laws. This is, of course, an egregious lie, and if he mentions it during Sunday night's interview, Kelly will challenge him on it.
It won't matter. Merely mentioning the lie will give it credence in the eyes of those who believe it—and anyone susceptible to believing it, if they haven't already heard it.
“From the preview we’ve seen, it looks like Kelly is treating him like a subject worthy of respect," says Nyhan. "We know that giving more stature to people can increase their audience. Exposing people to conspiracy theories make them seem true.”
This works because of something called the illusory truth effect, which states that the more familiar something is, the more likely it is to seem true.
What makes this particularly troubling that is the mainstreaming of false narratives risks muddling people's ability to understand genuine conspiracies. After all, sometimes a conspiracy theory is true. Take the ongoing investigation into Russian meddling in the 2016 election. At first glance, it sounds like the plot of a Hollywood blockbuster or a Le Carré novel. Yet investigators at all levels of government are taking it seriously enough to launch hearings and inquiries. But then people on the left, like conspiracy theorist Louise Mensch, and on the right, like Newt Gingrich, take it further down the rabbit hole with all manner of outrageous claims. "Our ability to have a conversation about those real facts is undermined when they are being distorted and the investigation is being attributed to a deep state conspiracy against the president," says Nyhan.
How to Stop a Conspiracy Theory
With conspiracies rampant on all sides, knowing how to spot them and react to them grows more complicated each day. You can't stop them, but you can prevent them from spreading. Journalists, psychologists say, must cover such things responsibly—always leading with the truth and avoiding repeating the misinformation. And people like Kelly shouldn't give their proponents a platform.
“The record suggests that when Alex Jones talks, he says things that are mostly false,” Nyhan says. “Unless Kelly’s interrupting him all the time, things will go by that aren’t refuted."
Social media plays a role, too. Nyhan says shame is among the few things that prevents people from spreading conspiracy theories. They might not change their personal beliefs, but fear of ridicule can stop them from repeating untruths.
“We need more shaming of people who elevate and promote false claims in mainstream life. It should harm your reputation when you bring misinformation to the public sphere,” Nyhan says. Twitter outrage, after all, helped prompt advertisers to drop Bill O’Reilly’s show. It likely accounts for why some advertisers have pulled out of Kelly's show over this interview, too. But as with everything nowadays, it’s complicated. Twitter, Facebook and other platforms provide an excellent outlet for debunking lies. But they also do a remarkable job spreading them.
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