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“Are Conspiracy Theories Your Religion?”
Categories: M. W. Bassford, Meditations
The other day, I read a fascinating article (https://medium.com/curiouserinstitute/a-game-designers-analysis-of-qanon-580972548be5) posted by my brother and friend Tim Thompson. In it, the author argues that QAnon functions much like the live-action games he designs for a living. In particular, he points to a quirk of human psychology that is significant to both. It’s called apophenia, and it’s the tendency to see a pattern and form connections where none exist.
This is why, for instance, most people will look at the overflow faceplate in the picture and see a face. It is not a face. It is not even designed to look like a face. Nonetheless, we glance at the plumbing fixture and see eyes, nose, and face.
We also enjoy figuring things out for ourselves. We get a dopamine hit out of putting a puzzle together, and our memory does a better job of retaining the answers we arrive at than the ones that are handed to us. We tend to be more emotionally invested in those answers too.
Other human blind spots play into this as well. We are communal creatures and are prone to accepting what our community accepts, whether in person or online. Conversely, we mistrust those we consider to be “other” and regard what they say with skepticism.
QAnon, and other online conspiracy theories much in vogue, exploit all of these things. They feed their audiences “breadcrumbs”—isolated, random facts—and encourage them to assemble the breadcrumbs into a pattern. They suggest that most media outlets are fundamentally deceptive, but that the discerning mind (note the appeal of “I figured this out! I’m smarter than everyone else!”) can ferret out the truth. They provide a community of true believers to help enlighten new initiates. Once someone has bought in, they are nearly immune to counterclaims.
The author argues, and I agree, that this infatuation with conspiracy has religious overtones. Faith, after all, is the evidence of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen. I don’t think that a bunch of random celebrities flashing hand signs is the evidentiary equal of eyewitnesses who died for their faith. Nonetheless, in both cases, once we put it all together, our new conviction transforms our worldview.
This is a problem because the Christian worldview and the conspiracy-theorist worldview are incompatible. The Christian believes that God controls everything. Nations rise and fall according to His will. However, the QAnon initiate believes that a vast, shadowy conspiracy controls everything, and They are the ones who shape reality according to Their desires (world power, sex trafficking, etc.).
This is blasphemy. It is attributing one of the attributes of God to human beings. In my life, I have read a whole, whole lot of history. From beginning to end, the annals of humankind are filled with blundering, incompetence, false starts, and foolishness. The greatest and most powerful people ever to live (with the sole exception of Jesus) made wagonloads of clumsy mistakes.
By contrast, QAnon posits a cabal that has enrolled hundreds of thousands of people, operated for decades if not centuries, succeeded in its objects, and avoided exposure (“until now!!!”). That doesn’t sound like the human race. It sounds like Ephesians 3:8-11. It sounds like God.
To brethren who are worried about these things, then, I say, “Relax.” Even if there are people out there who want to control or harm you, they aren’t that capable. If they do come to power, it will be clumsy, bloody, and obvious, like the French Revolution, the Russian Revolution, etc. Even the Chinese, as competent as they are, can’t take away democracy in little ole Hong Kong without a lot of noise and stink. Subtle schemes to steal away our freedom are beyond our enemies, as they are beyond all of us.
Instead, worry about God. Trust in Him, and trust that He will keep His promises to you. Here, I can do no better than repeat the words of Isaiah 8:12-13. “Do not call everything a conspiracy these people say is a conspiracy. Do not fear what they fear; do not be terrified. You are to regard only the LORD of Armies as holy. Only He should be feared; only He should be held in awe.”
