Crisis Actors and "Viral" Lies

I was listening to a podcast about Russian disinformation during the Ukraine invasion, and the story was about a fashion blogger who had "supposedly" been in a maternity hospital when the Russians attacked it. There was the usual discussion of how the photos were staged, the Ukrainians did it to themselves, all those people were "crisis actors" (more later), and that particular blogger had been paid to look like she had been injured, and even that she was paid to dress up as some random second woman. This is not about the RUssian invasion - this is about how so many people just refused to believe that the event happend at all, and in some weird way it was like the blogger herself was one of the strongest piece of evidence that this didn't happen. My suspicion is that the cognitive dissonance comes from a feeling like "this sort of thing doesn't happen to rich people, and she is rich, so obviously it didn't happen". And frankly, if this could happen to a wealthy, internet-famous woman in Ukraine, it could happen to anyone. Which brings me to my next thought: Sandy Hook, et. al. (Terrifying that there have been so many fucking school shootings that I can't even list them). But the whole idea that the thing was staged is fucking ludicrous. Alex Jones must have just been randomly throwing shit around the room when he came up with that. How many other things did he say that day that no one even remembers? Much like Trump, any actual coherent connection of one thought to another doesn't matter, just keep saying shit until people respond (more later). In this case, though, I think the Sandy Hook "crisis actors" lie took hold because so many people JUST DIDN'T WANT TO ADMIT that maybe, if it happened in a rich suburb, in could happen in their town, too. I mean, that sort of thing just DOESN'T HAPPEN, right? But it did... but what if it didn't? The appeal is powerful. So my final thought through this: what is it that made these lies really get picked up? Sure, it is an appealing thought, but much like a game of telephone, it should eventually putter out, and do what "crazy uncle" talk would always do - disappear and be replaced by the next crazy thing said at Thanksgiving dinner about how car companies shifted to Front Wheel Drive becasue that meant cars were less safe, so more people would die in car crashes, and the liability payout for a dead person is less than a permanently diabled one (true story - this was actually told to me by my aunt's boyfriend). And Alex Jones, as mentioned before (or Trump, or Limbaugh, or whoever) just keeps throwing the lies out there. These are not carefully crafted disinformation campaigns (at least not in the beginning) they are just a Great Pacific Garbage Patch of mistruths, conpsiracy theories, and "what if?" BS. The difference now is that the lies don't just putter out. Much like smallpox or Ebola would surge in a local spot, then eventually burn through everyone anbd die out again, these lies would eventually reach a wall of sanity and stop moving through the population. But with social media and nationally broadcast local media (I can find out in moments what is happening in Jemez Springs, New Mexico), there is no buffer wall of sanity anymore. That one particularly powerful lie (they were actors hired to pretend to be injured kids!) can move faster than normal, can go from your crazy uncle to mine without either of us being able to stop his bullshit. I have no answer to this, just sadness.