Conspiracy

On August 2, financier and accused sex molester Jeffery Epstein was found dead in his prison cell, apparently from suicide.  That same day President Trump retweeted an unsubstantiated conspiracy theory that Epstein had been murdered and that Bill and Hillary Clinton were behind it.  Trump later defended his retweeting with the comment that the original tweeter had half a million followers.

This is not the first time that President Trump has passed along conspiracy theories without a shred of evidence.  The following are from Business Insider’s “21 Outlandish Conspiracy Theories Donald Trump Has Floated Over the Years.”

• He is perhaps most famous for championing the theory that Barack Obama was not born in the United States and, therefore, not eligible to be president. 
• In April of this year, he said, “they say that the noise from [wind generators] causes cancer.”
• In November 2017, the president retweeted three videos from the British ultra-nationalist, anti-Muslim organization Britain First that purportedly showed Muslims in Europe committing crimes.  There is no evidence that these events actually happened. 
• The President retweeted that a frequent critic, Joe Scarborough, had killed his intern several years previously.  There is no evidence for this.
• Other unsubstantiated claims were that he had seen New Jersey Muslims celebrating after 9/11; that vaccines are a cause of autism,; that presidential opponent Ted Cruz’s father had been involved in the John Kennedy assassination; and still others.

According to Harvard politics professor Nancy L. Rosenblum, author of A Lot of People Are Saying, conspiracy charges have taken on a new form: bare assertion.  It

spreads through innuendo. You’ll hear people say, “I just want to know more, I’m just asking questions.” Or, as President Trump likes to say, “A lot of people are saying...” This is conspiracy without any theory. It’s about validating preexisting beliefs by constantly repeating false claims that reinforce what you already believe. …
It’s a way to delegitimize what it means to know something at all. So you often find today that people don’t really care if something is totally true. They’re just looking for something they can hang their hat on, to create enough doubt to justify their core beliefs and sow cynicism at the same time. … There is no ground for argument or persuasion or even disagreement. … [It] is more profound and unbridgeable even than partisan polarization.

Is the impact of Trump’s retweeted conspiracy theories any different from his other lies?  And do they have an effect on democracy?

Conspiracy theories twist information to create suspicion and outrage.  When the president of the United States uses his authority to pass on those conspiracies and powerful politicians refuse to refute them, his supporters feel justified in their outrage.  His retweet may cause even those who distrust the President to wonder about the truth.

The FBI has issued a bulletin:

Anti-Government, Identity-Based, and Fringe Political Conspiracy Theories Very Likely Motivate Some Domestic Extremists to Commit Criminal, Sometimes Violent Activity

Conspiracy theories are dangerous: There is no way to refute them.  There is no way even to discuss them.  They are not about the truth. 

Democracy depends upon fact-based discussion and debate about the issues and candidates.   Democracy depends upon truth and transparency.  Conspiracy theories strike at the heart of democracy.