One of the great joys of being a writer is that my books introduce me to people from all walks of life and all persuasions. One of my most passionate new readers is a young man, a veteran with a new family, a good job and fascinating conversational skills. He follows at least a half-dozen Facebook Influencers, podcasts and on-line narrations from “patriot conspiracy theorists.”
He asked me today what I thought of a couple of “current conspiracy theories.” We took a few minutes to discuss, not the theories themselves, but rather how he came to hear about them. What became clear was that, like someone who writes historical thrillers, the people who promote these conspiracies begin with a nugget of truth and then build a story around that nugget. Like promoting fiction, the more the story interacts with what the reader already believes or tears at something they hold dear, the more the readers engage with the story and the more they pass it on.
There are two fundamental differences between writing fiction and promoting conspiracies. Fiction writers admit that the story is made up and the good ones write it in a way that the reader not only doesn’t care but enjoys the story more because their primary reason for reading it is enjoyment. Conspiracy writers write in a way that the readers are so challenged that they cannot walk away from the story without deciding that it is or is not truth.
A good novel asks the reader to engage with the writer to fill in the character’s profiles, to visualize the settings as suggested by the writer, and to quickly determine whether the plot is credible. I encourage my readers, who come away from one of my stories wanting more information on the subject to do a little research of their own.
Most conspiracy writers approach their work very differently. They tell the followers what is right, what is real and provide a narrow set of facts to prove it. Readers who question the premise, are encouraged to go to other conspiracy writers. They reinforce each other’s ideas in much the same way that Facebook Influencers support each other. I am not saying that some conspiracy stories are not pointing to important issues that need to be explored. But many are nonsense.
How do you sort it all out? First, trust your own eyes. Most of us are highly experienced in recognizing what is real. Second, trust your head to guide your heart, not the other way around. Finally do a little digging of your own, do your own fact checking.
If you really love complex plots and conspiracy, and enjoy getting drawn into them, find a good fiction author you like and let them take you into the unknown. They won’t expect anything more from you than reading their next book.