Sunday 18 September 2022

Believe it or not

It never ceases to amaze me how people will believe not only the unlikely but the clearly impossible. Even if other people pick a hundred holes in whatever they're champion-ing, they take no notice. I guess it's true that people often believe what they want to believe.

The Queen's death has been the signal for a tsunami of nonsense about the royal family, most of it totally absurd but eagerly propagated day after day.

One of the most bizarre is a video that criticises Meghan Markle for wearing an old outfit of Diana's at the Queen's funeral. This is despite the fact that the funeral won't even take place until tomorrow. But hey, that's just a minor detail.

Then there are the claims that some public figure has actually died and been replaced by a look-alike, the best-known example being Paul McCartney. Supposedly he died in a car crash on 9 November 1966.

The claim that the US's last Presidential election was rigged and that actually it was won by Donald Trump also widely persists despite numerous declarations that the election was completely fair and legitimate with no evidence of fraud.

Many people still believe it's possible to change sex even though it isn't. If you challenge them with the biological facts, they simply reiterate their opinion.

And then there are those who deny that major events ever happened - like the moon landing, 9/11, the covid virus and the Holocaust.

How do people manage to have such baseless beliefs despite all the opposing evidence? How do they convince themselves that they're right? It intrigues me.

The only blatantly false belief I've ever held is the existence of Santa Claus. I was ten before the truth dawned on me. No idea why it took me so long.

24 comments:

  1. My current favorite is that the US government believes it has a right to legislate use of a woman's body when it comes to procreation.

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  2. Linda or Hannah? Or genuinely anonymous? Anyway I agree that what a woman does with her body should have nothing to do with the US government.

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    1. Linda. Sorry. Forgot to sign it.

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  3. People will believe anything if they see it in print. My personal irritant is that vaccines cause autism. The ‘doctor’ that promoted that lie was proven to be a fraud, but people continue to state his study as fact.

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    1. Bijoux: You can prove a dozen times over that something is nonsense, but people continue to believe it and simply block out the reality.

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  4. People make decisions with their emotions and justify them with the thinking part of their brains. So if you want to understand them you have to go deep.

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  5. Jean: A lot of people don't even consciously make decisions. They just believe whatever they've heard or read somewhere. Quite often thought isn't involved at all.

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    1. Why would it be otherwise? Rational thinking clearly hasn’t been an important survival trait. I can think of many cases where it‘s a lot more apt to get you killed.

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    2. Jean: I would have said rational thinking was a very important survival trait, but as you say it can also lead you into trouble.

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  6. Human frailty

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    1. Ramana: Indeed. In the shape of irrationality, gullibility and lack of an open mind.

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  7. This spot is spot on. It makes me crazy. People Alex Jones who talked about Sandy Hook not being real, but paid actors comes to mind and could be added to your list. It's dangerous ignoring facts and science. Our country is dealing with so much poo left by the orange one who is still spreading fear and lies hand over fits. Very very sad.

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    1. Sandy: Indeed, Trump is still pumping out so much bullshit and millions of Americans are actually lapping it up.

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  8. I actually think many people have very little going on in their real lives, and look to these stories to add interest!

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    1. Jenny: I think there's a lot of truth in that. People find these absurd ideas exciting and dramatic.

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  9. I never wanted to let go of Santa Claus either. I was way late, fighting in school for his existence. :D
    Crazy headline today: "George and Charlotte are immaculate at funeral." Make of it what you will. With staff and nannies and clothes budget and good soap, they would attend the funeral in rags and dirty faces?
    XO
    WWW

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    1. www: So many idiotic headlines on utterly vacuous themes. Yes, it would be extraordinary if the royals were not immaculate, given all the personal staff they employ.

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  10. I started to write, "Poorly educated," but then realized, to my dismay, that some very smart people that I know are Trumpers, anti-vaxxers, anti-maskers, and very bigoted.

    Sadly, many of them used to operate a nuclear power plant.

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    1. Mike: It's baffling how many highly intelligent people can believe total moonshine. The sex-change baloney is taken seriously by all sorts of eminent public figures.

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  11. So far as the sex change "issue," I knew a person for a long time who underwent hormone treatment and reassignment surgery in their 40s to go from being male to female. Ricky was was an ugly guy with the worst fashion sense I've ever seen, favoring plaids all of the time. Now Katy Angel, she is an ugly woman with bright and colorful attire.

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  12. Mike: And presumably happy with how the transition has turned out. Unfortunately quite a lot of people are not happy with what they've done and have "detransitioned".

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  13. Some people just aren't smart enough to know that these things aren't true. And they will believe any conspiracy theory that makes its way to them.

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    1. Mary: And schools don't teach people to be critical thinkers, only to absorb and regurgitate facts.

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