Covid Conspiracy Theories- A New Religion Born?

I was chatting to an old friend on WhatsApp recently when she suddenly said they were not getting vaccinated. Oh, I said. Are you an antivaxxer? 

I meant it as a light-hearted joke, and not really a serious question. But, as our conversation went further and deeper into the subject, I realized, with huge sadness, that yes, she was indeed, a conspiracy theorist and an antivaxxer. 

I am genuinely fascinated by the way Covid split the world into groups of people who don’t understand or respect each other based on their beliefs in one or another approach to vaccinations, masks and Covid itself. As if we didn’t already have enough to separate us. Religion. Politics. Parenting style. Vegetarianism. Transgender rights…Cancel culture and race issues…The list of taboo dinner party subjects was already too long! FFS, how and why did Covid have to turn into a yet another topic which so easily breaks friendships and even families?

 

It is difficult to remain respectful when each side is convinced the other side is stupid, brainwashed, and delusional. And, however nice of a person you are (I am not, but you might be) you simply cannot avoid the argument.

 

I was shocked to find out my friend had this whole other parallel universe she lives in, where all billionaires in the world, along with politicians I guess, and all the medical staff-all conspired to create a “live forever” drug, which they test, via the vaccinations, on the rest of the population. 

So, according to this specific conspiracy theory, Jeff Bezos and whoever else might be in his gang, due to his “God complex”, wants to create a protein of youth. I dutifully looked up (as I refuse to be an arrogant snob who dismisses anyone else’s beliefs without looking into them properly first, however crazy they might sound) the whole rejuvenation drug thing and yeah, I found something on Altos labs and the Russian billionaire Yuri Milner, together with Jeff Bezos, who set them up to study this anti-ageing drug to ultimately prolong human life. 

Now, my friend believes that by vaccinating all of us, Bezos tests the spike protein for this future drug, and vaccinating the world is part of their research.

 

What fascinates me the most, is not that someone might be setting up a huge plan to run secret tests on other people. That, and the whole live forever idea if not that difficult to understand. 

What I don’t get and tried to question, is how she thinks that idea could be so perfectly organized, coordinated, orchestrated,and then implemented throughout the world. 

Come on, I said to her. You worked in a big multicultural organization! You, just like any of us who ever worked in such environment, must appreciate how difficult it would be? 

Covid, she said, is just a flu. It isn’t as bad as they make it out to be. Fine, I said but then you basically are thinking that everyone, all those doctors, nurses, people whose relatives died from Covid…all lie?

Like some humongous multicultural, multinational lying machine. Perfectly functioning, able to cover up things that would be impossible to cover up in the modern world. 

 

The conversation didn’t go well. You see, she said, you are asking these questions and cannot stop. Why? Because you yourself don’t believe it but don’t want to admit. 

What is fantastic in this situation is that people explain the other side’s views exactly the same way. 

I suspect that people who want to believe in conspiracy theories do so due to some subconscious way of coping with the mess the world is in due to this pandemic shit. It is easier (maybe?) to explain this otherwise unexplainable cluster fuck if you imagine it is all set up by evil billionaires and politicians. It is also satisfying to think everyone else is just stupid, but you are a critical thinker, someone who can read between the lines, someone who is a survivor in this world of slowly killed off sheep. 

At the very same time, my friend thinks that I would also believe it if I wanted to, and I just cannot face the real picture because I am afraid to do so. See how this whole thing is hopeless? 

What I am also curious about is how do conspiracy theorists see each other? Do they respect other conspiracy theories a little more than people like me, who according to them are stupid and brainwashed and “don’t see the matrix”? Or, is it a bit like religion where people don’t just dislike non-believers or people from a different religion, but cannot tolerate each other even when they worship the same God, but belong to different branches of the same religion? Is this going to be the same thing now with conspiracy theorists? 

What I mean is if you for example, believe in Bill Gates and microchips, do you loathe those who believe in Bezos? I guess so. 

To summarize, here are a few main conspiracy theories I personally heard of which we can now classify into major streams so to speak:

1. Bill Gates and microchips. I still don’t know why he would want us chipped. I assume to know all about us. But he does already- with all the social media and the smart phones we are using.

2. A method to control us all by the governments. Like the above, but without microchipping, just via Covid passports which will be used to control where we go on holidays and where we work, etc. Not sure why anyone would want that, but anyway.

3. The big Pharma money-making theory. They created Covid just to sell vaccines, etc. 

4. Jeff Bezos wants to live forever and experimenting his drug on the whole world, via vaccinations. 

5. Some people back in Baku don’t want to get vaccinated, as they believe the vaccine changes their genofond. (Genetic pool) Don’t even ask. 

 

So… there we go. I asked this friend if she is alone in her strong beliefs in the Bezos theory, or do her friends and husband support her. Because really, it must be incredibly lonely to think that only you understand the whole global evil plot, while everyone around you is brainwashed and delusional. 

She didn’t answer.