Viral thoughts: Why COVID-19 conspiracy theories persist

Funny how conspiracy theories all work out in the end. There are plenty of doctors around the world in the field of viruses and vaccines who are trying to bring the truth out on vaccines but they are blocked on main stream media.

There are two huge problems with your statement, the first is thinking that doctors and scientist depend in any way on the mainstream media to discuss professionally scientific information about vaccines. That is done in scientific publications.

The second is to blindly assume people must be correct just because they have a degree, specially when they don't have the evidence to back up their claims. That is the only important point, to have valid data that proves what they say.

Vaccines are safe for all the analysis that are available, that does not mean people will not get minor side effects that do not endanger the life. Up until now every important problem is presented in the same rates in vaccinated people as in unvaccinated, so obviously there is no relationship with the vaccine.

Remember what happened with the Guardisil vaccine and the damage it caused. 

Yes, you should remember what happened, because it proves you wrong.

The Gardasil vaccine was safe and effective, some people got worried about something but after checking it was found that there was no problem at all, girls had the same rates of problems no matter if they were vaccinated or not, nevertheless in countries like Japan the vaccine was vilified and as a result a lot of deaths by cancer failed to be prevented because parents stopped vaccinating their daughters.

Also, the spanish flu coming from vaccines is a completely false myth without basis in reality.

This are the kind of easily disproven myths and conspiracies that get "legitimized" being included in every article of the media that deals with vaccines. False information helps nothing in informing people, it does exactly the opposite.

Of course, this is just a natural event. It happens all the time just ask China

Or Vietnam, or Cambodia or half of the countries in Asia and Africa and even a couple of cases in South America, animal diseases is a completely natural phenomenon with dozens of books written about it.

The virus mutating on 5 separate continents is not unusual. 

Well, the virus is mutating on every single patient infected, so yes, it would not be unusual, that is what RNA viruses do and why they are still here infecting around.

The fact that multiple strains of the virus can infect the same host and that some hosts are left alive to infect others is the norm.

And before vaccines were discovered/developed the norm also included important deaths and disaster (you can ask Native Americans of the whole continent) it is fortunate science changed this norm.

 They persist because they are never openly and honestly discussed in public.

No, open and honest discussion is extremely common, conspiracy theories based on false information and misleading treatment of the data are quickly identified as such and discarded as it should be, that is what conspiracy fans detests, that their "arguments" can be instantaneously debunked as invalid so the discussion can continue with the real, valid, truthful information.

Conspiracy theories are generally misrepresented and criticized in very deceptive ways (as is obvious in the above article). Legit and qualified experts who try to raise certain concerns are generally censored.

No they are not, conspiracy theories are based on complete lack of evidence, and people irrationally clinging to them are not above using falsehoods to try and deceive others, anything sustained by actual evidence is not a conspiracy theory by definition. And the problem with the experts is that legit and qualified experts are careful to base all their conclusions on validated scientific data, while those that defend wrong conclusions have to cheat their way into the appearance of legitimacy that falls away easily when examined. Conspiracy theorist then have to choose between bought "experts" paid to find only one kind of conclusions, unethical researchers that manipulated and lie in their studies or fake experts that defend wrong conclusions without any evidence in the first place.

So the excuse is that their experts are "censored" for disagreeing (in reality it is because of their invalid "science") and the whole scientific and medical community becomes "big pharma". Just excuses.

I bet pro-vaxxers a more likely than the "anti-vaxxers" to believe the magic bullet theory.

Antiscientific conspiracy believers literally believe in a magical virus that can escape not only from a laboratory but from a huge highly populated city without causing any outbreak, travel to rural areas (exactly as if it came from animals) and then go back to the city to now cause outbreaks, I think it is clear who would be the ones needing magical explanations.

Remain calm and don't think about the horrific deaths or prolonged illnesses as anything but nature being natural...

Are you really saying you don't believe that viruses cause sickness and death in nature?

Funny how conspiracy theories all work out in the end.

You do know that sane people usually stop reading there?

Conspiracy theories are generally misrepresented and criticized in very deceptive ways (as is obvious in the above article). Legit and qualified experts who try to raise certain concerns are generally censored.

Legit and qualified experts are not censored if they give legit and qualified information. We see that on here everyday multiple times.

It’s people thinking they have legit information that clearly isn’t which is the problem. Ignoring those people isn’t censorship, it’s smart.

Wrestle with a pig, you both get muddy and the pig enjoys it.

Oh, what fools these morsels be.

I’m still finding the concept that people are getting their health advice off some random stranger on social media as opposed to their doctor totally bizarre . I had my first Covid vax and talked about the clotting hysteria - I have more chance of getting a clot by taking a four hour plane trip! But now because of the utter rubbish conspiracy and peoples reliance on social media no one will take it ! These people aren’t “woke” they’re just ill informed .

VERIFY EXTRAORDINARY CLAIMS

Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha

Antiscientific conspiracy believers literally believe in a magical virus that can escape not only from a laboratory but from a huge highly populated city without causing any outbreak, travel to rural areas (exactly as if it came from animals) and then go back to the city to now cause outbreaks, I think it is clear who would be the ones needing magical explanations.

Look at the USA, it has the worst number of cases. Half a million dead. Look at the unrest caused by the lying and denying irresponsible blasphemous Antichrist whose name is Donald Trump. He's had so many allies and ass-kissers spreading lies and misinformation and racist jokes which has led to Oriental-bashing lately.

Of course you can't see the virus and people haven't been using their heads, and the media has been partially at fault by not explaining the whole story. That gives the uninitiated excuses to blame somebody and then more get sick. Ignorance may be bliss but it gets people killed.

One factor that is not mentioned is the tacit support the mainstream media gives to these theories when they allow obvious falsehoods into their platforms. That gives the conspiracies an extra boost of apparent validity, after all a professional newspaper would not let people comment lies, right?

Unfortunately this is too common and can confuse readers without experience, even here you can find users for whom 100% of their comments are false or misleading information against vaccines. Maybe this is because of the mistake of offering an invalid balance (The experts offering validated information easy to corroborate in one side, and users pushing false information with no relationship with reality on the other).

People now are more informed and know that a comment in facebook is not always to be trusted, but if the comment is written in an official mainstream media that is supposedly controlled to avoid lies then more people may believe it. This should not be a problem so hard to correct.

Unfortunately, the real 'misinformation experts' populate our governments.

Conspiracy theories are enabled and given credence by the continued corruption, deceitfulness and lying of politicians.

If we had honest, transparent, fair and decent politicians, we might believe them when they tell us things.

More anecdotal evidence that the bell curve of intelligence has skewed right. unfortunately, very few people will understand what skewed right means or what the resulting curve looks like or represents, which means it is true...

virusrex

People now are more informed and know that a comment in facebook is not always to be trusted, but if the comment is written in an official mainstream media that is supposedly controlled to avoid lies then more people may believe it. This should not be a problem so hard to correct.

If people are so stupid that they can not be trusted to hear a variety of opinions, who gets to decide what they are allowed to hear? Somehow that question never gets addressed.

Antiscientific conspiracy believers literally believe in a magical virus that can escape not only from a laboratory but from a huge highly populated city without causing any outbreak, travel to rural areas (exactly as if it came from animals) and then go back to the city to now cause outbreaks, I think it is clear who would be the ones needing magical explanations.

Yes, a virus can definitely exscam from a laboratory with lax safety measures, and where do you get the idea from that what the CCP tells us when and where it was discovered has anything to do with reality? Where does this blind trust in the CCP come from?

Facebook, Twitter and other platforms have long faced criticism for allowing misinformation to flourish. They have acted more aggressively on COVID-19 misinformation, suggesting the platforms could do more to rein in misinformation about other topics, such as climate change, Cook said.

Where does the writer get this from? Fakebook, Twitter, etc. have been extremely draconian in silencing opions from critics of the official narrative, putting the opinion of their anonymous "fact checkers" above those of even highly qualified experts. They do not seem to recognize the value of free speech anymore.

Latest example is Youtube that has purged a video of a panel discussion hosted by Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis with health experts from Oxford, Harvard and Stanford whose advice informed his decision to ease COVID-19 restrictions last year. It is gone! The hoi polloi is not allowed to even see an panel discussion involving govnt officials and top virologists, if it contains verboten content.

Of course, this is just a natural event. It happens all the time just ask China. The virus mutating on 5 separate continents is not unusual. The fact that multiple strains of the virus can infect the same host and that some hosts are left alive to infect others is the norm. Remain calm and don't think about the horrific deaths or prolonged illnesses as anything but nature being natural...

Funny how conspiracy theories all work out in the end. There are plenty of doctors around the world in the field of viruses and vaccines who are trying to bring the truth out on vaccines but they are blocked on main stream media.

People trust getting a jab of an untested vaccine that shows many bad side effects and it is no conspiracy to say that news outlets who touted the vaccine is safe is now started to report the bad side effects. Guess you can't hide things forever. Remember what happened with the Guardisil vaccine and the damage it caused. Do people know that the Spanish flu started from vaccines given to the military soldiers. I won't be taking any vaccine, ever.

The above article helps demonstrate why conspiracy theories persist. They persist because they are never openly and honestly discussed in public. Conspiracy theories are generally misrepresented and criticized in very deceptive ways (as is obvious in the above article). Legit and qualified experts who try to raise certain concerns are generally censored.

Big pharma has a lot of power. They offer large financial incentives to get their way; to get favorable views of their products and to attack any critics.

or the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, when many found it difficult to accept that a lone, deranged gunman could kill the president.

I bet pro-vaxxers a more likely than the "anti-vaxxers" to believe the magic bullet theory.