How to talk to conspiracy theorists

David Pakman [00:00:00]:
I received a ton of emails about this. One of the most common requests for segments I've gotten over the last couple of weeks is from people who write in and say some version of I have a Trumpist conspiracy theorist, family member or friend or coworker. I don't know how to talk to them. I don't want to make anybody angry. But in some way, I feel the need to try to knock some sense into them, proverbially, not physically. And I don't even know where to start. And in the past, depending on the relationship with the person, I say, well, you have to decide your approach will depend on how aggressive you're willing to get. Are you willing to ruin this relationship? If these are presumably people you have to continue to be around cordially because their coworkers or family members or friends that you love and want to continue being around.

David Pakman [00:00:54]:
I believe the best approach is a sort of gentle probing Socratic method of questioning, asking people to think about how they came to the conclusions they came to. And hopefully some fraction of them will say, oh, the basis on which I've come to hold these beliefs isn't that strong. Let me let me sort of reexamine it. That's the the best I've suggested we can really hope for if you want to go with the gentle probing idea. Charlie Wartsall wrote a really great opinion piece in The New York Times called How to Talk to Friends and Family Who Share Conspiracy Theories, which contains a lot of really important information. And I thought we would go over some of the basics. And I recognize that when when I've talked about a Socratic method of questioning, one of the questions that comes up regularly is what exactly are the types of questions that I should be asking? So let's start there. 1st of all, almost exclusively the best place to start when someone shares a conspiracy theory on Facebook or in person at Thanksgiving or whatever the case may be is where is the information coming from? Where did you where did you learn that? How did you come to believe that thing that you just told me? This is useful because it opens the door to later asking, and how do you know that you can trust that source? How do you know the information is trustworthy? So it's useful for that reason.

David Pakman [00:02:15]:
It's also useful because it helps you understand the sort of information environment. Where are some people getting this stuff? Some might be getting it from Facebook. Others may be hearing it at work. So that's very important. The next step, as I sort of alluded to, would be asking people how they've determined that the information is trustworthy. How have they determined that their source of information can be believed? What about it makes it believable? How would they know if it were not believable? These are generally relatively inoffensive questions that you can ask with a genuine curiosity to establish their system of belief. And they can get people to start. They can get the gears moving.

David Pakman [00:02:56]:
How do you identify something that would be less believable? And a lot of this is not necessarily for you to understand their level of media literacy, although that is useful. But again, inject the idea that they need a process for thinking about have I properly vetted and evaluated the conspiracy or the fake news that I'm sharing right now? And then maybe the hardest part is to really follow through on the assumption that if their conspiracy theory was real, then what other things would have to be real? And this one requires a little more knowledge and nuance. Imagine that you're right about this conspiracy theory. Imagine that what you're saying is true. What would happen next? What are you anticipating it would mean in terms of this or of that? And there's a really good example. I'll try to. This is on my Twitter. I'll try to reshare it if I can find it.

David Pakman [00:03:48]:
I retweeted a really good Twitter thread that I went over last week on a stream where there was like a Hollywood screenwriter talking to a conspiracy theorist woman back and forth on Twitter. And he actually did this. He engaged with her ideas, which started with there's a plan for Trump to remain president. She was posting this on January 21st. Obviously, Trump was gone, but she was saying there is a plan for Trump to remain president after the inauguration. And this guy started asking specific questions. Okay, how will it be carried out through? What mechanism will Trump be back in office and Biden be gone? Well, he's going to be arrested. Okay, what will he be arrested for? And eventually the woman came to the claim that Joe Biden had actually already died and been replaced with an imposter at some point in the past.

David Pakman [00:04:35]:
And it was fascinating to see the questions that followed, which included, oh, how did Biden die? Was it of natural causes, disease or did somebody kill him? If he was killed, who killed him? How was it covered up? How many people would have needed to be involved in that to replace Biden with an imposter, with nobody knowing? Why did they even need to kill him? Like, in other words, if Biden was going to steal the election either way, why do you need a fake Biden to steal the election from Donald Trump? Why not just have the real Biden steal the election from Donald Trump? And although this particular woman was clearly too far beyond reach, what was interesting was that it was a really good example of the types of questions that for some people can actually get them to say, maybe there's something about this that doesn't make sense. Really important. Last thought on this. Just because a belief isn't based on a solid foundation doesn't mean people will give it up easily. And remember that just because this idea, this system doesn't work on 1 person doesn't mean that it's the wrong method. We looked at that focus group with 12 Trumpists last week. Only 1 of the 12 was willing to reexamine his beliefs and see reason. So this a lot of people aren't even open to this.

David Pakman [00:05:47]:
But for those that are, I find that this method seems to be the best one. Let me know your thoughts. If you've had success with this method, let me know. If you failed with this method, also let me know. I'm on Twitter at David Pakman. One of our sponsors is Hydrant, which is a delicious fruit drink powder that you mix into water for rehydration, and they're giving you 25 percent off your first order. It's made with 4 key electrolytes. The body needs powerfully supporting your hydration.

David Pakman [00:06:19]:
Hydrant tastes great. It's made with real fruit juice. It's been a great part of my daily routine for a while now. Keeping myself hydrated puts me in a better mood. The body needs hydration for basic energy and focus. And hydrant is the perfect way to rehydrate, especially because it's cost effective and lower in sugar compared to all of those popular sports drinks that are out there. You really have to try it for yourself to see what I mean. It tastes great.

David Pakman [00:06:47]:
They also have a variety called hydrant immunity packed with vitamins a, b, c and D, which is also very much worth trying. Hydrant has a full refund guarantee if you're not satisfied and you'll get 25% off your first order when you go to drink hydrant.com/pacman or just enter the code Pacman at checkout. I've put the link right underneath this video.

Antonio [00:00:00]:
Hi. It's Antonio with escaping the rabbit hole dot com. This is gonna be a fairly short episode. I just wanna talk about a video came across called how to talk to conspiracy theorist by David Pakman, a political commentator. In the video, he talks about I'm gonna have it linked I'm gonna have it linked in this, this podcast. If you're not listening to this on to my website, go to escaping the rabbit hole escaping the rabbit hole dot com. Go to the button. I think it says, podcast episodes, and you'll see a podcast labeled how to talk to conspiracy theorists.

Antonio [00:00:35]:
When you go on there, I'll have a link to his actual video. In the video, he talks about Socratic questioning to help a to help a conspiracy theorist kinda shift their beliefs. And with Socratic questioning, what you're doing is you're you're not so much challenging the person's belief. You're helping them to understand how they came to believe what they believe. It's a lot of, like, you know, like, trying to think about the questions. It's like, how, what, when, why, who. How did you come to believe what you believe? When did you start believing this? When you ask somebody, when did you start believing x? It almost makes them it almost implies that they didn't always believe that. It's kind of like a hidden implication where it kinda helps them to understand that.

Antonio [00:01:23]:
Another really good resource I always, mention is how to have impossible conversations by Peter Boghossian. In that book, Peter Bergasseon talks about his, his Socratic style questioning. He's got a full methodology that he coined street epistemology. What I know epistemology is it's basically the theory of knowledge. In street epistemology is, I guess, like is it's a way to help people to understand that their knowledge, how they got to believe what they believe. One of my one of my favorite questions he has in his book is a scaling question. On a scale of 1 to 10, how confident are you in the belief of x? On a scale of 1 to 10, how confident are you in the belief that the 2020 election was stolen? Depending where somebody is on that, it'll give you kind of their baseline where they're operating from. Let's say if they say, like, a a 7, for example.

Antonio [00:02:27]:
I think a lot of people think, like, oh, he's gonna he's gonna ask me why didn't I go choose a higher number. Instead, you're going to kinda throw a curve ball. You're gonna ask them, why didn't you choose a lower number like a 6 or a 5? And then they have to kinda dig in and give you an answer of why not. That could be one way to help, slowly start moving the needle. With this being said, he mentions in this book that as long as somebody's willing to have a conversation with you, that's great. If they're not willing to have a conversation, it's pointless to even try. And in the video, David Pakman talks about they had, I think, a focus group of, 12, Trumpers, and I think only out of that group of 12, only one person was willing to rethink their positions. So even though this is, like, a really strong methodology, it's not 100% guaranteed.

Antonio [00:03:25]:
I think one of the biggest things to do is to if you if you want to talk to a conspiracy theorist, well, a couple things to know is conspiracy theorists aren't stupid. I'm a former conspiracy theorist. I'm highly intelligent. A lot of conspiracy theorists, there's people fall into conspiracy theories because of an emotional need. They people are radicalized into conspiracy theories not through logic, but rather through emotions. And then I think logic comes after. Now if you think about, if you know anything about sales with a salesperson, a good salesperson, they sell on emotion and they follow-up with logic. When you you sell the motion, you want to be able to follow-up with a little bit of logic so later you don't get buyer's remorse.

Antonio [00:04:15]:
In the same case with conspiracy theories, you want to get somebody riled up with emotions. Get them all riled up, maybe go all riled up about the, about immigration, for example. Just talking about all these people come over, taking their jobs, they're bringing diseases, etcetera, get them all riled up. Then you wanna follow-up with a little bit of logic. I'm trying to see if I can come up with some logic on the fly. I guess some of the logic on the fly after you get them all riled up, and then you can just tell them, you know what? This is to to keep your kids safe in the future. So that's a little bit of logic. Oh, yeah.

Antonio [00:04:50]:
It's natural. I I wanna keep my kids safe in the future, for example. And it doesn't have to be in my opinion, it doesn't have to be a a really strong piece of logic or evidence. It just it doesn't have to be that strong. With belief, we are looking once once we kinda get that belief formed and we have that emotion behind that belief, any logic that comes up, we're gonna we're gonna jump onto it. Think of, think of think of it this way. Let's say you have a plant that's dying, and maybe this isn't the best metaphor, but if you have a plant that's dying, any bit of liquid you give it, it's gonna soak it up. Think of it like that with with conspiracy theories.

Antonio [00:05:37]:
Think of the the water as, like, the evidence or that logic. Doesn't have to be that much. Any any bit, a person's gonna, conspiracy theorist is gonna just completely soak it up. So the obvious things, or maybe not so obvious, is conspiracy theorists aren't stupid. And in my, first book, converting conspiracy theorists, you can it's you can get on Amazon. In converting conspiracy theorists, I actually talk about something called the FAME model, FAME. This stands for f is for feeling powerless. A lot of conspiracy theorists, they feel powerless.

Antonio [00:06:21]:
At the same time, they wanna be the hero that saves everybody. They wanna it really ties into, like, narcissistic tendencies. People with narcissist narcissistic tendencies, there's a lot of correlation between people that have narcissistic tendencies and a belief in conspiracy theories. A in the fame model is apophenia. Apophenia is the, you know, the connecting the dots. If you look at somebody like Alex Jones, when when people are in the process of trying to connect the dots, One thing Alex Jones is notorious for for years, he was telling people, oh, we gotta fight against the globalist, fight against fight against these people. And when people ask, like, when it like, okay. When is it? When are we gonna do this? He has this, this kind of this saying he'll tell people, I'll let you know when.

Antonio [00:07:11]:
I'll let you know when the time when it's time. And then he'll give you something else, some other bread, breadcrumb to kinda follow to chase down, so you're jumping all over the place. M is misinformation. Misinformation is everywhere. And then e is external locus of control. Locus of control, if you're not familiar with it, it's a psychological concept that states, like, where are you placing your control? Or better way of saying is, external locus of, power. Are you where you put placed in your power? Is that on the outside? Are you think the world is conspiring against you? Are you just do you feel like you're just an unlucky person, or is your control are you in your in the seat of your own power? An easy metaphor is who is driving the car. Are you driving? Are you a passenger in life? So for really quick recap, things to keep in mind that conspiracy theorists aren't stupid.

Antonio [00:08:09]:
They were radicalized by emotion. Every one of us operates on emotion. And if you're one of those people that think like, oh, no. I mean, it's extremely logical. Emotions don't come up into play. Bullshit. Every every behavior, in my opinion, there's a an emotional reason behind it. Even though if you're not aware of it, think of it like a like, we think of our behaviors.

Antonio [00:08:35]:
There's internal parts of us that control it. It's not a real part. It's a metaphorical part. These behaviors, these these parts are trying to do something for us. Maybe it's trying to keep us safe. Maybe it's trying to have us feel peaceful, feel validated in the world. It doesn't matter. There's emotion behind everything.

Antonio [00:08:56]:
So first and foremost, know that conspiracy theorists aren't stupid. We all operate off logic, some more so than others. And then, we've got the fame model that I just covered that really keeps people trapped in conspiracy theories. One of the things you can do if you do have a family member to to be able to talk to them is to realize that we all have what's known as our map of the world. My map of the world, my reality is not the same as yours. And even though somebody doesn't have the same map, it doesn't mean you have to respect their their beliefs or their opinions. Just rather respect that they that they have a choice to believe what they believe. One thing you can do is or something that would be really helpful is to talk to a therapist that could help you to become more emotionally flexible.

Antonio [00:10:00]:
When you're trying to talk to a family member that's a a conspiracy theorist, it believe me, I it's it's really easy for people to get really, really heated and angry. You're gonna want to find some kind of way to be able to relax those emotions. Couple things in my first book, converting conspiracy theorist, I think it's chapter 8. I give a couple of really good techniques to help you reduce, to become more emotionally flexible. In my second book, coping with coping with conspiracy theorists, it's more of a self care guide for family members of conspiracy theorists. There's quite a few techniques in there to help you manage, triggers. So let's say if there's a particular habit your loved one does and it just really triggers some kind of, frustration, anxiety, anger, whatever, there's a couple of really good techniques to help you reduce those triggers, techniques to set up boundaries and whatnot. Coping with conspiracy theorists should be out in the next month or so.

Antonio [00:11:05]:
If you want, another thing is we can jump on Zoom if you want to discover how I can help you to improve your mental your your mental health So you're not feeling so triggered by your loved one, we can drop on Zoom. You can go to escaping the rabbit hole dot com forward slash call. That's escaping the rabbit hole dot com forward slash call. We can do a 20 minute no cost consultation call. I can discuss how how we can help you. Now if you have any questions, please feel free to let me know. Make sure to subscribe to the newsletter. Put your your name and your email.

Antonio [00:11:43]:
You'll, you'll either see, like, a a link on this blog post where it, says little known conversation hack forces angry conspiracy theorists to calm down and listen to you almost instantly. It's a ebook that will give out, couple tips on how to kinda how to calm your loved one down so you can you can try to talk to you can at least start the conversation. I look forward to hearing from you. If you have any questions, feel free to reach out. Aloha.