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The deadly reason Republicans are suckers for fake news
Over on Fox “News,” a recent segment with Tucker Carlson suggested that vaccines are more dangerous than getting Covid. Why do conservatives fall for this kind of BS?Multiple recent studies show that Republicans are as much as 8.5 times more likely to both believe and share fake or false “news”...
www.rawstory.com
First, conservatives are more vulnerable to listening to and believing people who present themselves as authority figures. This tracks back to George Lakoff’s finding that conservatives are most comfortable in a world that’s run along “strict father” lines, while progressives prefer a “nurturing family” model of society and politics.
While a strict father limits freedom, he also provides a sense of safety: “Father will protect and take care of you.” Putting your trust in authoritarian figures diminishes the complexity of life: there’s less to have to know or worry about if you believe that “father” has it all under control.
But it also makes conservatives more vulnerable to believing any old thing that “father” tells them.
Second, there’s more conservative misinformation out there than there is liberal misinformation. Thus, conservatives are more likely to be exposed to it and to share it.
To a large extent, this flows from the conservative worldview being more adolescent, narcissistic and “me-centered,” with the myth of the “rugged individual” at its center. Ayn Rand’s writing epitomizes this.
The conservative worldview putting, as it does, the “freedom of the individual” above the “welfare of society,” is much more vulnerable to corporate-funded pitches that work to increase profits. The core message of most advertising is, after all, “You are the most important person in the world and you want this product.”
And make no mistake about it: a lot of what passes as news and commentary is actually advertising for the idea that corporations and billionaires should be able to do whatever they want.
“Low taxes, reduced regulations, smaller government”: it’s a sales pitch.
Our tax law is organized in such a way that anything that increases profits is tax-deductible to a corporation, so, for example, we’ve seen in the past few decades:
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