Conspiracy Has Broken News and Politics

There have always been bad faith media actors and conspiracy theorists, because human nature is undefeated and there is nothing new under the sun. But technology means that bad faith actors and conspiracy theorists are finding comfortable homes in social media and news media where a constant search for optimized niche content is the name of the game. “Everything is a conspiracy if you don’t understand how things work” is a filter we are just going to have to apply to talking heads, pundits, social media accounts, news outlets, and even our elected officials. From the plane & helicopter crash at Reagan National to RFK, Jr.’s senate confirmation hearing, properly discerning our times means cutting through the conspiratorial noise and getting to good information by pruning our information intake in times like these.