A thought on conspiracies
Do you know anyone who is nice, smart, caring, and overall just very normal? But then one day after a glass or two of wine they start talking about how Bill Gates is part of the new world order and plans to make us all infertile to stop overpopulation? You chuckle because you think they are joking, but they stare into your eyes unwaveringly. They are serious.
How does that happen?
I have a theory:
Certain temperaments are more prone to believe in conspiracy theories, and those temperaments can often be of similar political leaning. That may be why it seems like many conspiracies seem to originate from the political right.
It’s been proven that those ranking high in Big Five trait openness are likely to lean left politically. And those ranking high in conscientiousness are likely to to lean right. Openness is a trait that is open to new ideas, doesn’t like to put boundaries on things, and is creative. Conscientiousness people value hard work and structure. They are organized, goal directed and have strong impulse control.
The world is full of chaos with the likes of Covid, inflation, shortages, natural disasters and more. It makes sense to me that those high in conscientiousness (generally those who like prefer things to be in organized and structured), are prone to force the chaos into a structure. Even if that structure is an evil overlord billionaire lizard man.
I am not trying to insult those high in conscientiousness, in fact I rank high in conscientiousness, so make of that what you’d like. Obviously most people don’t subscribe to over the top conspiracies, the wild ones just spread the fastest. I also don’t think there is anything wrong with trying to rationalize what is happening around us. My overall point is, I find it interesting to consider that the general temperaments of right leaning people may tend them towards conspiracies more so then it may for left leaning people. Perhaps to those who prefer structure, forcing chaos into a structure is a natural temptation. And perhaps to those leaning left it is less of a temptation given the likelihood that they are more comfortable in unstructured, chaotic environments.