Hieman huolestuttavasti Yhdysvalloissa liberaalien keskuudessa leviää nyt "BlueAnon"-salaliittoteorioita, joita mukailevia juttuja on saanut lukea tästäkin ketjusta:
Minutes after Saturday’s shooting at a Trump rally in Butler, Pa., liberals began flooding social media platforms with conspiracy theories.
They claimed the blood on former president Donald Trump’s ear was from a theatrical gel pack; that the shooting was a “false flag,” perhaps coordinated by the Secret Service in collaboration with the Trump campaign; that the scene of a bloodied Trump raising his fist under an American flag was “#staged.”
“When did the Secret Service start allowing the President under duress to tell them ‘to wait’, then stand up to be seen by the crowd fist-pumping?” one user posted on X. “Can you blame me for thinking this is fake?”
As more Americans lose trust in mainstream institutions and turn to partisan commentators and influencers for information, experts say they are seeing a big uptick in the manufacture and spread of BlueAnon conspiracy theories, a sign that the communal warping of reality is spreading well beyond the right.
“The good-versus-evil paradigm of QAnon has really taken hold of the anti-Trump movement and you’re seeing two sides that feel like they are fighting a battle between good and evil,” said Mike Rothschild, author of “The Storm Is Upon Us: How QAnon Became a Movement, Cult and Conspiracy Theory of Everything.” “It’s coming from major leftist and liberal ‘resistance’ influencers who believe that Trump is so devious that he’d fake his own assassination attempt in order to help his campaign.”
That theory was boosted by at least one influential Democrat: Dmitri Mehlhorn, a political adviser to Democratic donor Reid Hoffman, encouraged supporters in an email late Saturday to consider the “possibility — which feels horrific and alien and absurd in America, but is quite common globally — … that this ‘shooting’ was encouraged and maybe even staged so Trump could get the photos and benefit from the backlash.”
He added: “NOT ONE NEWSPAPER OR OPINION LEADER IN AMERICA IS WILLING TO OPENLY CONSIDER THE POSSIBILITY THAT TRUMP AND PUTIN STAGED THIS ON PURPOSE. Ask the question, people.”
Olennaista tässä on mitä käy kun luottamus instituutioihin rapautuu ja retoriikka ja kahtiajako kärjistyy. Trump ja republikaanit ovat ehdottomasti se toksisempi osapuoli, mutta on erittäin huolestuttavaa jos se "järjen äänikin" alkaa enenevässä määrin kehitellä kaikenlaisia hörhöteorioita oman kärjistyneen narratiivin säilyttämiseksi. Esimerkkejähän saatiin myös tässä kestjussa.
In BlueAnon world, shadowy forces, including the mainstream media, are working to destroy President Biden’s candidacy and usher Trump back into power on Nov. 5. Karl Folk, a researcher studying authoritarianism and radicalization at Augsburg University in Minneapolis, said this “more conspiratorial mind-set has become more pronounced in liberal circles over the last eight months.”
Tästäkin on näkynyt kaikuja Suomessa asti. Ei niin, että meillä olisi esitetty asiaa varsinaisesti salaliittona, mutta näkemyksiä joiden mukaan media tuhoaa Bidenin mahdollisuudet epätasapuolisuudellaan, on esitetty. Kenties nämä ammentavat jokusen mutkan kautta samasta lähteestä, vaikka vastaavaan lopputulemaan voinee joku riippumattomastikin toki päätyä.
Tätä ei pidä myöskään lukea tasapuolisuusharhana niin, että molemmilla puolilla tilanne olisi yhtä paha tms. Suunnasta on kuitenkin syytä kantaa huolta ja muistaa lähdekriittisyys myös liberaalien somespekuleeraajien villejä teoretisointeja lukiessa.