this post was submitted on 26 Oct 2023
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Showerthoughts
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My workplace got a "coronavirus" chat on the corporate chat server. And the known "conspiracy theorist" guy on my team posted a link to some article on some total misinformation mill masquerading as a news source.
I looked up the name of the source on Wikipedia, which said it was a total misinformation mill.
So I linked to the Wikipedia article in the chat.
I work at a fairly big and diverse company, so of course there was more than one conspiracy guy there. It was really surreal watching people who literally think all governments are run by a secret cabal of Democrat extraterrestrial pedophile child-adrenaline junkies attack the trustworthiness of Wikipedia.
Edit: I'd forgotten the name of the "misinformation mill" that originally started that shit storm in the work chat, but I went back and looked it up. It was Project Veritas. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Veritas
RIP in Piss P. Veritas I hope hell is hot for you on the way down
They still exist. They just do not have James O'Keefe who was shit canned.
Wait, James OKeefe was always a can of shit
Please let me live in the world where they were internationally disgraced and every pundit that used them as a resource equally disgraced
99% of people bashing Wikipedia do so because they read that they're delusional about something.
Source: have read >100 Wikipedia bashings that answered follow-up questions.
Silly question but why is a work chat used for conspiracy theories? It seems like a bad use of company resources
They've got the permissions set up on the work chat server to allow anyone to create chats at will. Those chats can be public (listed in the search and anyone can join with a click) or private (can't be joined without an invite from the owner of the channel).
And they don't discourage non-work-related chats for... team building reasons, probably? There's one for "Video Games" for instance.
I know the guy who made the "coronavirus" chat and he 100% did not intend it for conspiracy theories. The whole IT department was in the process of going remote when that chat was created and that chat was intended for everything from helpful tips for working remotely to news/rumors about when/if we might be going back to the office to news about death rate statistics and such.
And this conspiracy guy had (still has, actually) a deep-seated need to proselatize for the conspiracy of the week 24/7/365. So he just decided that was as good a pulpit as any.
Shortly after the shitstorm started, three levels of management above both me and Conspiracy McGee entered the chat. They didn't end up doing anything. (It fizzled before they had to take action.) But I'm sure they all had their fingers hovering about 2mm above the "shut that shit down" button.
Now, all that said, there is a chat on the work chat server dedicated to the conspiracy podcast "No Agenda." And I'm pretty certain it was created by Conspiracy McGee. And I'm pretty sure my/his direct boss is in the No Agenda chat.
So, I guess the short answer to your question is that they don't want to shut down non-work-related chats so as to pay some lip service to team building and not appear too draconian (while at the same tacitly encouraging a culture in which it's not really acceptable to spend too much time in those chats rather than furiously typing code). And the company's management is sufficiently right-wing as to not get that allowing conspiracy theorists to conspiracy theorist is eventually going to backfire on them, so they don't see it as dangerous. So they see it not much unlike having a chat about the latest Mario Kart game or the Marvel Cinematic Universe or whatever.
Hopefully that answers somewhat.
It sounds like the simple answer for you would be not to participate in chats that will upset you
Reality is a team sport, to some people. They're not actually arguing. Arguments have rules. What they're doing is a stupid word game where their goal is to demonstrate ingroup loyalty.
I cannot overstate how these people believe in nothing else. They think that's all you're doing. They think that's all there is.
Claims cannot be evaluated, in this worldview. In their minds that is not what claims are for. You simply accept or reject them based on interpersonal trust. People above you in The Hierarchy™ must be right and smart and handsome because they're so rich and powerful. It is your role to figure out what must be real, to square those arbitrary ideas, because it is impossible for your betters to simply be wrong. That would require evaluating claims. So disagreement means saying they're not trustworthy... and they don't belong in that position... and you deserve to be there. Why should you be better than them? Where's your sports car?
Please note - there is reasoning involved. They're not incapable. They can extrapolate big ideas that would have to be true in order for their thing to be real. They just refuse to accept that the absence of those premises means their conclusion is nonsense.
We keep asking why they never change their opinions when their reasons are wrong. They wonder why we change our opinions when there's so many reasons to choose from.