If you want proof we’re living in a golden age of conspiracy theories, the latest offering of fake news doing the rounds among hard-right Trump supporters is really pushing the envelope.
On social media networks such as Twitter, a significant number of posts are being hashtagged with the term #followthewhiterabbit – some garnering thousands of shares.
It’s a line from the Lewis Carroll novel ‘Alice in Wonderland’ and references a belief that there are hidden truths being concealed by a global elite heavily involved in a paedophile network – which Donald Trump is trying to bring to justice.
Most recently, it was invoked when the US President struggled to drink Fiji water recently. He was, according to the white rabbit theory at least, sending a secret signal to his faithful followers.
It originated on sites such as 4Chan, and is loosely based on ‘revelations’ from a supposed ‘Q-level’ insider in Donald Trump’s team.
The very fact that people are sharing this stuff is evidence that we are living in very, very strange times indeed.
But the more serious point is that, according to research conducted in August this year, 67 per cent of Americans say they get some of their news on social media – with two out of 10 reporting that they do so very often.
In 2015, Italian researchers analysed just how gullible social media users were by planting fake news and seeing just how far it travelled.
They found that conspiracy articles were far more likely to attract comments, likes and shares that fact-based content.
And these theories have real life consequences, too. In December 2016, a man opened fire on a pizza restaurant in Washington DC because he falsely thought it was the epicentre of a child sex ring linked to Hillary Clinton.
Those bogus claims had been widely spread on social media under the hashtag #PizzaGate – a conspiracy theory which has now been incorporated into the #followthewhiterabbit conspiracy.
So if #followthewhiterabbit is the latest conspiracy theory to go viral, here are some of the strange things its fans seem to genuinely believe.
Trump was sending a secret signal to his followers when he struggled to drink Fiji water
Followers of the theory believe that Trump was sending a secret signal to his followers when he struggled to drink a bottle of Fiji water.
Fiji, you see, is a source for the child-sex industry, according to believers, and Trump took power specifically to take on an elite conspiracy of paedophiles involving Clinton, the Rothschilds and other classic conspiracy targets.
There is no evidence for any of this, obviously.
Hillary Clinton, John McCain and Chelsea Clinton are already wearing ankle tags
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