Feigning Dissent: Do Conspiracy Theories Help or Hinder Anarchism?

The Iranian FARS News Agency recently claimed that NSA leaker Edward Snowden has released intelligence showing that space aliens have been in control of the United States since 1945, and that they previously controlled Nazi Germany. While this can be seen as an Iranian government attempt at stirring up anti-United States propaganda in whatever form it can, I can’t help but wonder how many United States readers saw this same news story and believed it as fact. For those that believe this story and other conspiracy theories like it, how much real Statist violence and aggression are they missing?

But I am getting ahead of myself.

There was a time in recent memory when I promoted and shared articles that I believed were strong support for anarchism, and otherwise credible critiques of the political class. After getting called out repeatedly for not vetting my sources, using critical thinking and so on, I started to change the way I approached information sharing and critical analysis.

There was also a time when I was a full on conspiracy theorist, and my road away from that began when I became an anarchist.

Now, I know many people might feel that conspiracy theory subculture is useful for anarchists in the sense that that it is always questioning the “official stories” of the political class, or that conspiracy is a major part of the political class’ actions. I think there is a difference, though, between questioning the political class’ explanations of events and conspiracy theory subculture. On the one hand it is important to assume that the criminal organization of the State is a den of vipers, and that they will go out of their way to lie, cheat, steal, and kill for what they want. On the other hand, it is entirely different to develop a conspiracy narrative which at the outset seems to do the above, but in fact is an unfalsifiable “theory” impervious to critical analysis. So, in order to make sure we have a level headed and critical point of view about the political class, it is important to work with credible, empirical evidence.

The problem is that conspiracy theories typically come without any empirical evidence (or come with incomplete evidence) to prove their claims, and are heavily burdened by conformational biases. The theorist then needs to spend an inordinate amount of time “proving” their case even if their claims are being debunked time and time again. Steve Horwitz has noted that conspiracy theories are “closed systems” in that they are impervious to outside critical analysis. This is especially problematic because anarchism is the opposite: it is an open system that welcomes a changing landscape of ideas.

In my opinion an anarchist is more likely to read up on a conspiracy theory than a conspiracy theorist is likely to read opposing evidence to their central claim; for me, the anarchist is unafraid of being wrong, whereas the conspiracy theorist is terrified.

Let’s be honest with ourselves here: anarchism can be a tough sell. This despite the fact that it is arguably the most credible and rational socio-political framework around. Conspiracy theories act as a weight to anarchism because they too often lack credibility, reason and empiricism. Furthermore, why spend so much time and energy building a complicated narrative without empirical evidence, when the political class daily does horrible things, in broad daylight, and of which we can find just watching CNN? Why invest so much time asking “Yeah, but what about building 7?” when we have so much empirical evidence of murder carried out by the criminals of the State? Or how about the daily violence of police out there beating, kidnapping and killing innocent people? Just skip Alex Jones and head to Copblock.

Ultimately, conspiracy theories take dissent against what we know the State does every day, and we know we can prove, and replace it with what we believe it might be doing, and of which we cannot prove. If the political class were really this good, there would be no need to fight because, well, they are essentially gods capable of overwhelming the hearts and minds of billions of people for thousands of years. Then again, the countless revolutions over the centuries show that, in fact, the political class is far more fragile than all of that.

Make no mistake, the political class has made a true mess of the world, and those in it have more blood on their hands than any of us could ever imagine. But we anarchists need all the credibility and rationality we can get, and thus in my estimation conspiracy theories are fundamentally incompatible with anarchism. Fortunately, the State gives us plenty to work with.

In other words, it is highly unlikely space aliens control Washington. Violent criminals, however, do.

Questioning Everything and Nothing: How Conspiracy Theories Harm Libertarianism

They are the people that arch a skeptical eyebrow during any and every mainstream news report. They set to blogging and posting memes within hours of massive social and political events and tragedies. They see foul play in every death of a politician or figurehead. They never accept any official story about anything. Ever. They are the conspiracy theorists. And many of them are radical libertarians, voluntaryists, or market anarchists, which poses a problem in the struggle to build a free society. Let’s look at why.

First, let’s start off with the good stuff. In my experience, conspiracy theorists are often highly intelligent folks. In some cases they are onto treachery before anyone else. They were among the first people to start asking questions about 9-11, and in the end some of the ideas that were written off as conspiracy theory ended up being true. They work hard to peel back the layers in big business practices and in many cases reveal some startling things happening in the world of crony capitalism. This sort of unwavering criticism and skepticism can be major assets to resisting statism.

At what point, though, do the above become a liability? Is there a point in which there is no more digging needed? In light of what the state does every day in broad daylight, are conspiracy theories even necessary?

Conspiracy theorists have a tendency to flash a massive flashlight on state treachery, but sometimes the light is so bright that it obscures everything. It becomes difficult to know what a credible claim is because the bright light of excitable skepticism makes everything questionable, even the conspiracy’s central claim itself. In fact, they can spend so much time constructing the narrative that they miss the forest for the trees. How many 9-11 Truthers have missed all the atrocities of the state in the years since 9-11 because of the obsession with their own narrative? Furthermore, if the narrative is so out on the fringe that it repels people from liberty and further entrenches them in statism, I don’t see how it can be a useful tactic.

If you have ever seen a link posted for a conspiracy theory and gone to the site you may have seen links embedded in the post, as well as links to “sources.” It is very common for the embedded links to lead to other pages on the same site, and for source links to lead to other conspiracy theory sites, which in turn loop around to each other. In affiliate marketing this is called a blog network within a specific niche. The blog network is owned by the same person, and acts as a support for their main money site. Google moves them up in the search engines because of links pointing to their money site (the idea is to click on their ad links). When these links are also shared by folks within the radical community, though, they are directing people to sites with no credibility, and are in effect helping to make the blog owner money. Nothing more.  No net liberty is gained, and the credibility of the radical community takes a hit.

Going beyond the conspiracy theory business, there also seems to be an effort to simplify complex situations. This may seem counterintuitive given the fact that conspiracy narratives can be so complex, but their complexity reveals a desire to clear away any ambiguity. I personally believe that many members of the political class, especially within the state itself, believe they occupy good and virtuous organizations that are trying to make the world a better place.  For example, I think President Obama is very aware that his drone strikes kill children, and I would even wager he is pained by that fact on a very real level. But this is what makes statism such a disease, and it is also what I think conspiracy theorists in the radical community are not prepared to deal with. In conspiracy theories we construct the devils we need in order to make sense of the madness of statism. Trying to wrap our minds around statist sociopaths that murder children for what they truly believe is the greater good is far more difficult. If it is really truth about the evils of the state the conspiracy theorist wants, then all they need do is go to CNN and look at all the atrocities carried out by the state in broad daylight. I would think ongoing war, economic oppression and police violence are enough to indicate that statism is a scourge on humanity and the planet.

In short, ditch the narratives. You don’t need them.