State propagandists, bots, and amateur conspiracy theorists form reinforcing alliances.
Evidence
Starbird’s research also found that Twitter users who shared information from NoDisinfo and Veterans Today were more prone to sharing information from RT and Sputnik. In other words, there are unholy and chaotic alliances among state-sponsored actors, bots, trolls, and garden-variety conspiracy theorists to help advance untrue stories, funneling them from the farthest fringes into the mainstream. — Anna Merlan, Republic of Lies, 396
Categorization
- XREF: connects to: COINTELPRO’s tactics seeded paranoia across later conspiracy communities. — Anna Merlan, Republic of Lies, 856; Conspiracy theories themselves are old but their peddlers’ political power is new — Anna Merlan, Republic of Lies, 30; Revolutionary rhetoric can mask active counterrevolutionary alliances (+7 more)
Broader Connections
- Organized funding sustains professional anti-Muslim propaganda networks in the US
#exemplifies(0.80) — Carl W. Ernst, Islamophobia in America_ The Anatomy of…, 29 - Institutions deliberately engineer distrust to block group mobilization against them
#contradicts(0.75) — Russell Hardin, Trust and Trustworthiness, 487 - Revolutionary rhetoric can mask active counterrevolutionary alliances
#qualifies(0.72) - Conspiracy beliefs erode democratic participation and breed extremism
#expands(0.72) — Holm Gero Hümmler, Ulrike Schiesser, Fact and Prejudice, 287 - Conspiracy theories can be generated about conspiracy theorists themselves.
#expands(0.72) — Anna Merlan, Republic of Lies, 958 - Conspiracy surges track rigid class structure and felt disenfranchisement
#corroborates(0.70) — Anna Merlan, Republic of Lies, 33 - External distrust or threat drives people to build stronger local trust enclaves
#qualifies(0.70) — Russell Hardin, Trust and Trustworthiness, 695