Ever notice that fringe conspiracy theories surround liberal philanthropists but not brazenly selfish libertarians?
Bill Gates, who wants to end malaria, not for himself -- he lives in Washington State for god's sake -- but to help the helpless in the tropics (and yes, selfishly to cleanse his conscience and legacy and yes, he invests in the cures, but he could invest those funds elsewhere and earn even more). Gates is the regular target of some of the most nefarious conspiracy theories, among them some of the most absurd ones like promoting vaccines with the intent of inserting a chip in every body to surveil or control us all.
Meanwhile Elon Musk, who shows no interest in protecting the impoverished or helping the helpless, whose philanthropic trust gives money to his own enterprises -- iow, it's just a selfish money-laundering scheme -- Elon Musk who believes in libertarian selfishness and promotes selfishness, even taking gov't subsidies to float his business and fatten his wallet, who plainly and publicly buys political influence, who really does seem to be intent on actually controlling the world, and who owns the public square itself under the pretense of ridding it of censorship (although his first act was to restrict criticism of himself), this Elon Musk who actually, physically and literally inserts chips in human brains at Neurolink -- that Elon Musk has not a single fringe tinfoil hat conspiracy theory attached to him. Ever notice that? Isn't that odd?
I want to call this the Gates-Musk paradox.
I want to be clear at the outset, that I'm not complaining that the conspiracy theorist is treating Gates unfairly and I'm not defending Gates' philanthropy. Gates could be a misguided, arrogant, meddling fool and Musk a brilliant hero of our time (though I doubt that, given other of his proposals I've written about here). I'm interested only in understanding the paradox to see it if tells us anything about theorizing and theorists, that is, about human thinking.
This paradox, btw, is not just true of Gates and Musk. It is a general character of conspiracy theory, maybe even a law.
Consider Soros, another classic philanthropist spending his money on helping the helpless whether they be despised immigrants or victims of racism or of autocracy. Whatever you think of his goals or his means, they are not selfish. Yes, he wants to influence governments, but to encourage liberal democracy so that all its nation's people have equal access to rule. You can't call that enslaving the world -- forcing people to choose for themselves what they want of their government -- but world enslavement is what he's accused of attempting. Meanwhile, Peter Thiel promotes monopoly as the best business strategy -- not to benefit society or the little guy, but to make most money fastest for the monopolist alone. There are no elaborate fictionalized conspiracy theories or wacky conspiracy theorist calls to alarm surrounding Thiel. But Soros? He's second after the Federal Reserve among conspiracy theory targets.
Again, I'm not suggesting that Soros' domestic or foreign interventions are good ideas. Personally, I think he's an antiquated relic of the Cold War, the successes of China and Singapore demonstrating that his political proposals are not necessary conditions for social prosperity, and the many market failures of the US sadly demonstrating that his proposals are not sufficient conditions either. Having no crystal ball, I have no idea what will or would be the consequences of his interventions, just as I have no idea what will come of Donald Trump's strategic and antagonistic tariffs on China or his transactional tariffs on virtually everyplace else. It's just remarkable that there are no conspiracy theories targeting Mr. Trump while there are many targeting Soros.
Or take the Federal Reserve compared with any other bank, say, J.P Morgan-Chase and Goldman Sachs. The Fed pursues a well-defined albeit incompatible mission veering between the Scylla of inflation and the Charybdis of unemployment, and it does this surprisingly well, responsibly and efficiently, given its narrow means, quite unlike the typical dysfunction of government. The giant banks, on the other hand, have no such public-interest mission. Which are the targets of conspiracy theories? You got it: The Fed.
So what's going on with this Gates-Musk paradox? It seems as if the conspiracy theory crowd have purposely chosen the wrong targets, welcoming the dangerous Musks and Thiels and Kochs and big banks, while shining light on shadows that they themselves have cast for the purpose of shining a light on the unsuspecting. Crazy, no?
It takes more effort to invent a danger than to acknowledge a public one in plain sight. So why all the attention to the do-goody philanthropists, embracing all the while the self-professed self-oriented and even lying self-promoters?
The obvious response is that a conspiracy theory has to have an element of secrecy and deception so they can't attach to Musk and Thiel or Charles Koch or the late Sheldon Adelson. And of course that's true about a conspiracy. But consider what that means about conspiracy theories and the theorists' concerns. Are the theorists concerned about nefarious actions and their dangers or are they concerned about secrecy and deception? Is conspiracy theory about danger or about distrust? The Musks and Thiels also do not inspire trust. The conspiracy theorist is not distrustful of the targets, they're distrustful of reality, of information. The essence of a fringe conspiracy is not just distrust, it's the fictionalization of distrust, the irreality that confirms their distrust.
There's a lot more to be said about this paradox, but I want to stop here with this consequence of it: the paradox means that distrust of reality and information (not of danger nor of conspirators) is the focus of conspiracy theory. It may have been obvious that distrust was the driving emotion or cognitive principle among conspiracy theories. My goal in this post is to provide the evidence that this is so. The paradox is that evidence.
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