What if all of the conspiracy theories are true? I bet you know more than one:
"chemtrails" as a population-reduction scheme.
Vaccines being made from mercury, aborted fetuses, and unicorn blood, used only to keep you sick and a ready source of income for the healthcare industry. And to cause autism in children, can't forget that one.
GM crops are unstudied and dangerous.
Fluoride in our water is unnecessary and makes us more susceptible to mind control.
Climate change is liberal trickery.
On and on and on, all manner of zany nonsense. But...
What if every last one of them is true and factual, and all the tinfoil-hatted gizmoids screaming the loudest about chemtrails and about vaccines and about GMOs and about fluoride and about climate change and about everything under the sun... What if those people are Gub'mint Shills?
Oh, sure. There are plenty of people who swallow a premise hook, line, and sinker. I'm not talking about the rank-and-file; people demonstrate their eager willingness to serve as rousable rabble every single day. I'm talking about the charismatic leaders of the movements, the anti-vaccination camp. The anti-GMO people. The climate-change denialists.
What if they're in league with the airlines and the FAA, in league with Big pHARMa, in league with MonSatan, in league with the Illuminati and the Reptilians and the NWO? What if their mission is to trumpet their nonsense so loudly and so abrasively and so absurdly, to make such outrageous and ridiculous claims that even legitimate concerns - voiced quietly and reasonably - prompt nothing but eye-rolling and a dismissive wave?
For that scenario to work, all you'd really need is a group of people willing to sell themselves. If The Government and The Companies are willing to pay to set up "resistance" to themselves, and if the "resistance" can generate additional income on its own, well! Is it so difficult to imagine that there are enough ethics-challenged folk around to carry it out? While we're circling the drain, what if the other side - the scientists and experts, the people who know about these things - is in league with the first? Experts of all stripes, in every field of research, working in tandem with the tinfoil-hatted gizmoids.
There are some necessary ingredients: a population with a significant number of people who are unwilling and/or unable to think for themselves, with the bulk of the remainder more interested in their own personal day-to-day routines than they are in activism.
Check.
And a group who sneeringly loathes anyone who's earned a degree. The group who'd gnaw their arm off at the elbow before they'd learn something that falls outside their interests. The single-mindedly intelligence-averse.
Check.
You also need the contingent who's authority-phobic, from the boss at work all the way up to the Authorityest people in charge of everything, these people fear and hate and mistrust The Man so completely that they could be convinced of anything, as long as it disparages authority.
Check.
Additionally, you need the nonconformists. The ones who take pride in being "different" or "weird" or who are "going their own way". These are the folk who, when they've bought in to an... "unconventional" notion, will shout from the rooftops that they're "awake". Maybe they call people who don't share their beliefs "sheep" or "sheeple".
Check.
Also critical: a generous helping of know-it-alls. They're the ones who are not only smarter than everyone else - combined! - they also have an opinion about everything. One of their main opinions has to do with how dumb you are for having opinions of your own.
Check.
There's a lot of overlap between the groups, and they're all of them a dime a dozen. They're everywhere.
The final, crucial ingredient is the growing, arrogant belief that the majority of people - across all groups, reasonable and not-so-reasonable alike - seem to have: that they're entitled to their own set of facts. Within the confines of this belief, a personal opinion about anything from "my sportsball team is the best sportsball team!" to "Tang is the best drink there ever was!" becomes a rule set in stone. Deviation from whatever personal "fact" is at hand will not be tolerated. Ever. Any move not in perfect lock-step with the "fact" holder will be considered a personal attack. The "personal attack" will be met with surly resentment at the very least. In most cases, the person who loves tang will respond quickly and aggressively. And loudly.
Very loudly.
Before you know what's happening, you'll be backing away hastily, wanting nothing more than to be away from this suddenly-rabid oik who somehow managed to get
"I TORMENT YOUR GRANDMOTHER BY POOPING IN HER SHOES EVERY DAY WHILE KICKING HER DOG AND PLAYING THE BAGPIPES!!!!!"
from
"I never really liked Tang all that much."
If you're really unlucky, you'll meet one from the other end of the "Hold-Your-Ground-No-Matter-What" spectrum, one who's willing to punch, kick, and stomp a worshipful adoration of Tang into your stubborn head.
So, all the pieces are in place.
The majority of people are busy keeping their lawns immaculate or posting selfies on Facebook or making dinner or generally living their lives. For people who like to argue on the internet, though, the game is set and the players are ready to square off. Scientists and researchers, authorities in various fields, people who are well-educated, assuring the mainstream that "chemtrails" aren't what they think. That vaccines are safer than the diseases they prevent. That GM agriculture and agricultural practices aren't tools of the devil. That fluoride isn't part of a mind-control scheme. That climate change is an actual thing they should worry about. That this thing and that thing and the other thing are harmless or beneficial or needn't concern anyone.
Naturally, the nonthinkers, sneering loathers, authority-phobes, nonconformists, and know-it-alls will receive these assurances poorly, dismiss the experts as liars and shills.
Because the experts are experts.
Because they're educated and they're intelligent, and they have the gall to show it.
For an alternative to the hoity-toity experts, how about a Vani Hari, a Jenny McCarthy, a "Dr." Sherri Tenpenny, a Mehmet Oz or two, a few John Edward types, some televangelists, hordes of ignorant lawmakers to "legitimize" them, and any number of media outlets to spread the word? Charismatic and attractive people without any credentials at all, or credentialed people without any regard for ethics at all, leading the charge against progress. Rousers for the rabble, a grassroots opposition movement. How about that?! A clever super-conspiratorial maneuver to deflect attention from The Truth!
If I were fashioning for myself the most spectacular of Shiny Tinfoil Hats, I'd pamphlet up a manifesto, take a marker to a sandwich board, and hit the streets tomorrow. I don't hold much truck with aluminum headwear, though. "Balderdash" is a word that comes to mind. Another is "poppycock".
This isn't to say that I trust our government or the companies.
Our government doesn't care about us, other than to keep us docile and content enough that we're not causing them too many problems. Oh, they'll throw us a bone once in a while - legislation about "rights" or "protections", the occasional tax break - but on the whole they're interested in us only as single taxpayers among millions.
Individually, we matter almost not at all. Elected officials' jobs include keeping us content-ish and focused on pop-culture fluff, sports, and any number of individual concerns - probably the ideal situation. If we get concerned with social or policy issues, the best-case scenario for them is for us to be facing off against each other, deeply divided on everything from liberal-vs-conservative "core" issues, spiraling all the way down to all the nonsensical "tastes-great/less-filling" disputes. They manage this through doing the rest of their job, which is legislating as the banks tell them to.
I don't trust any company any further than I could throw one - they're interested only in their bottom lines. From the manufacturers and sellers of the most frivolous impulse items all the way across the board to those of the most basic necessities, they're interested in quality and product safety and customer satisfaction only to the extent that you'll continue to buy what they sell. Our purpose is to work and consume. We are here to serve the economy.
With that in mind, I have a choice to make. I can side with the organic-only, stop-going-to-the-doctor, climate-change-denial crowds, or I can side with scientists and experts. Someone's lying to me.
Maybe everyone is.
On the one hand, if I throw my lot in with the science deniers I need to reject a lot of seemingly common-sense things, and the only way I could know for sure is to earn myself all the credentials necessary to work in each and every "controversial" field. And then spend enough time working in each and every "controversial" field to become competent.
That plan is hardly practicable, though. At my age I might be able to earn one doctoral degree and put it to use for a few years, but I'd be hard-pressed for time - if I'm going to live my life that way, if I'm going to fully embrace the paranoia, most of my time is going to be spent farming my sub-suburban lot. You know, because I don't trust food I didn't grow myself.
But I don't really know much of anything about agriculture, so I'll probably have to learn some farming techniques. And I can't see myself giving up bacon. Or tasty burgers, so I'm going to have to learn some animal husbandry. I guess that'll push back my starting-college date.
I'll have to make my own pesticides and herbicides as well, since I can't trust any Evil Chemical Companies. So I'll have to learn to do that.
Oh, and I'll have to become a mechanic. On account of how I can't trust some corporate flunky to botch equipment repairs so I have to keep going back.
And a blacksmith. I can't stomach the thought of propping up Big Hardware, so I'll need to make my own tools.
And an electrician. And a welder. And a plumber. And a veterinarian. And a carpenter. And an electronics repair technician. I'll probably have to become a computer and software engineer as well.
Thank goodness for Google University! I'll be an expert in all those things in a few weeks, and then I can start applying to colleges.
Or I could just do a little bit of simple math and pick the group that isn't lying to me in order to hide the lies they told me to get me scared enough to buy their book. Or their organic running shoes. Or their dietary supplements. The organic movement operates in the here-and-now, without thought for the future. The anti-vaccination types lie for profit in the short-term, without regard for public safety. The same goes for all for-profit, anti-progress miracle-item sellers.
I'm going to have to go with the experts and the scientists, the FDA and other regulatory agencies, and the medical establishment. For me, it comes together because the banks - who own and control everything - allow and/or encourage their lawmaking and public policy subsidiaries to endorse the safety of GMO foods, vaccines, medications, and hundreds of other "contentious" things. The banks - who own and control everything - have nothing to gain monetarily from poisoning us en masse, short- or long-term. Population isn't so much of a drain on resources that artificial reduction or control is a thing. Yet.
I have to be on the side that cares - at least peripherally - about my welfare.
