The rise of conspiracy theories in America

In the recent years since Donald Trump was in office, the rise of the conspiracy theory has been one of the most intriguing aspects of politics ever. Promoted by Trump himself, these theories are by far one of the most bizarre and absurd our nation has ever seen. Conspiracy theories have been around American politics for years now, however, the difference is these theories are usually proposed by members of the far right or left political spectrum. Trump and his allies have succeeded in convincing the controversial Rerpublican base that these claims are explained by substantial evidence. These allies include Fox News and other far right news channels, pushing the amusing claims that Republicans have adopted as a core part of their campaign and agenda. The first, and in my opinion the strangest theory, was proposed by Fox News talk show host Tucker Carlson in the past couple days. His theory was that the FBI had a connection to the January 6th capital insurrection. His blasphemous claim supported by no factual evidence was that a majority of the violence caused on that day was by FBI agents embedded in the crowd. This is all, of course, based on assumptions. Debunked immediately, Carlson still continued to push this lie to energize the far right Republbican base. These types of conspiracies are not recent though. Donald Trump himself proposed the theory that Barack Obama wasn’t born in America, but rather Kenya. This racist theory was supported by no evidence, but Trump’s assumption was based on the fact that Obama didn’t release his birth certificate immediately. This was embarrassing for Conservatives, and has only been worsening for them as mainstream media such as One America News and Fox keep endorsing them. The largest, and most dangerous lie, was that the 2020 election was stolen from Trump. These claims have been refuted time and again. These theories are weaponized in a way not seen ever before in American history. Trump’s own officials have come out saying that the 2020 election was the most secure election in the history of the country, which it was. These claims that ballots were stolen, and videos popping online of ballots being thrown away, have all been proven to be the wrong interpretation. Many of these videos were just depicting the transfer of ballots to another table, not ballots being switched. Videos and images have also surfaced where election officials were preventing people from watching the counts. While the reason for this is unknown, this is not direct evidence connecting to the assumption that Trump ballots were being manipulated, let alone widespread voter fraud. Despite this overwhelming evidence that the election wasn’t stolen, and the dismantling of every single voter fraud accusation, conservative media have constantly and consistently pushed this lie to their highly gullible viewers. These conservative commentators and news anchors know their prominence and influence on the party is measured and dependent on the loyalty to the president, even if it means standing for some of the most queer claims ever pushed in politics. Fox news, for example, has lost a significant number of viewers after calling the election for Biden. Some anchors even insisted that the election was stolen, before they were sued by election mandate companies, of course. One America News is still obsessing over this lie, resulting in their viewership reaching record highs as Trump supporters look to find a new mainstream media outlet. Charlie Kirk, the founder of Turning Point USA, a conservative student youth organization which promotes and spreads Republcian ideology to college campuses, has recently published videos demonstrating “alleged voter fraud” as well as “Trump victory rallies’’ even after the election was declared as a Biden victory. In a recent interview by Andrew Neil on “The Spectator,” commentator Candace Owens refused to acknowledge that Joe Biden won the presidency, and gave a very ambiguous answer to whether or not the election was stolen. The general idea she was tryna capture was that she will not agree to the election results until Trump and his legal team finish their attempts at overturning the election. The disheartening aspect of all of these theories that have completely destroyed the GOP is that conspiracies such as these laid out will only continue to rise in the coming years, and unless the party of Lincoln sees drastic changes in leadership, the party will push towards the extreme right of the political spectrum. If this continues, the Republican party will no longer be the party of free market and limited government, but rather the party of betrayal due to the leadership’s constant attack on American democracy. It’s an insult to our founding fathers who worked so tirelessly to build a system of government that has had a proven record to eliminate the cheats and manipulators in the process. The people who support the “big lie” as well as other conspiracy theories are assaulting a democracy in which they claim to love. If they really do love it, spreading baseless theories such as the election was stolen, or that the FBI played a part in the capital insurrection isn’t the way to go. These theories weaken us as a country, but make our enemies stronger. The situation we are currently facing on the American right can best be reflected in the famous quote by Lincoln that said, “America will never be destroyed from the outside. If we lose our freedoms it will be because we have destroyed ourselves from within.”