The reason I'm bringing this up is cause a new video came out from John Oliver about the conspiracy theories, but at the same time you're probably aware that Hive has been riddled with these as well. Why some whales decide to autovote these so high is beyond me, maybe they just value the censorship resistance and free speech but I'm glad they're also facing downvotes cause this is not something that should constantly be trending on Hive nor any other social media platform. In the recent episode John even mentioned how many other platforms are flagging these posts and warning readers that the information they're taking in may not be true. While I personally haven't been downvoting all of them I've tried to focus more on the engagement aspect of it as most of these content creators getting these autovotes seem to barely have any readers and at the same time believers on the platform.
Anyway here's the video if you wanna watch it, I'd recommend it:
I can't help but agree with some of his examples, like the one of the assassionation attempt on Reagan which seemed like barely anyone cared about because the even wasn't successful thus no one cared enough to create conspiracy theories as to why they were trying to kill him but in the case of Kennedy there were so many theories that came to life.
Although I realize our userbase is quite small and that not too many may be affected by these theories I still can't help but think about the effects it may cause to readers and those not doing their due diligence and believing what they're seeing - which often is on trending. I'm sure the effects it has had on other centralized platforms has been way bigger and the results must be devastating. There's one example in the video above but I've heard and read about many non-believers and conspiracy theorists who they themselves got infected and some that even died from the virus.
There's of course many different theories and not all just denying that covid actually exists or how harmful it can be. I just can't help but feel ashamed of these people that push these theories and at the same time profit off of it. To many it seems that conspiracy theories are their bread and butter and I often wonder what must be going through their heads, do some of these actually believe in the shit they spew or are they really not that dumb but still desperate enough to continue along that path because it is providing them financial support.
Imagine some time later when a vaccine is finally created that gets rid of this virus once and forever, what will be their next target? Will people remember what it was they were saying before that? Will it have been worth it for them to potentially kill a lot of people just to be able to earn some income off of it? Most importantly, why would anyone, whether there is a pandemic or not, not decide to better be safe than sorry. It really is not the end of the world to wear a mask when you're close to other human beings, even when it's the hottest day of summer? I don't think it is.
Most importantly, though, how will you be able to sleep at night knowing that your content may have infected and killed other people?
