How Conspiracy Theories Became More Personal, More Cruel And More Mainstream After The Sandy Hook Shootings

 <p class="is-style-sans-serif"><em>This article is part of&nbsp;<a href="https://talkingpointsmemo.com/cafe">TPM Cafe</a>, TPM’s home for opinion and news analysis. It first appeared at&nbsp;<a href="https://theconversation.com/how-conspiracy-theories-in-the-us-became-more-personal-more-cruel-and-more-mainstream-after-the-sandy-hook-shootings-172015">The Conversation</a>.</em></p>    <p>Conspiracy theories are powerful forces in the U.S. They have damaged public health amid a global pandemic, shaken faith in the democratic process and <a href="https://abcnews.go.com/US/qanon-emerges-recurring-theme-criminal-cases-tied-us/story?id=75347445">helped spark</a> a violent assault on the U.S. Capitol in January 2021.</p>    <p>These conspiracy theories are part of a dangerous misinformation crisis that has been building for years in the U.S.</p>    <p>American politics has long had a <a href="https://harpers.org/archive/1964/11/the-paranoid-style-in-american-politics/">paranoid streak</a>, and belief in conspiracy theories is <a href="https://www.rollingstone.com/culture/culture-features/qanon-expert-joesph-uscinski-1242636/">nothing new</a>. But as the news cycle reminds us daily, outlandish conspiracy theories born on social media now regularly achieve mainstream acceptance and are echoed by people in power.</p>    <p>As a <a href="https://journalism.uconn.edu/amanda-j-crawford/">journalism professor</a> at the University of Connecticut, I have <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PHxDoAykbQ8">studied the misinformation</a> around the mass shooting that took place at Sandy Hook Elementary School on Dec. 14, 2012. I consider it the first major conspiracy theory of the modern social media age, and I believe we can trace our current predicament to the tragedy’s aftermath.</p>    <p>Nine years ago, the Sandy Hook shooting demonstrated how fringe ideas could quickly become <a href="https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/bensmith/sandy-hook-conspiracy-theories-edge-toward-the-mai">mainstream</a> on social media and win support from various establishment figures – even when the conspiracy theory targeted grieving families of young students and school staff killed during the massacre.</p>    <p>Those who claimed the tragedy was a hoax showed up in Newtown, Connecticut, and harassed people connected to the shooting. This provided an early example of how misinformation spread on social media could cause real-world harm.</p>    <figure class="wp-block-image"><a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/436389/original/file-20211208-133881-1mm90e1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/436389/original/file-20211208-133881-1mm90e1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" alt="A woman in a red shirt sits among a group of people and holds a photo of a young boy."/></a><figcaption>Francine Wheeler displays a photograph of her son, Sandy Hook Elementary shooting victim Ben Wheeler, at a 2018 gun control rally. <a href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/francine-wheeler-displays-a-photograph-of-her-son-sandy-news-photo/1015738992">Kena Betancur/AFP via Getty Images</a></figcaption></figure>    <h2>New age of social media and distrust</h2>    <p>Social media’s <a href="https://theconversation.com/misinformation-on-social-media-can-technology-save-us-69264">role in spreading misinformation</a> has been well documented in recent years. The year of the Sandy Hook shooting, 2012, marked the first year that more than half of all American adults <a href="https://www.pewresearch.org/internet/2015/10/08/social-networking-usage-2005-2015/">used social media</a>.</p>    <p>It also marked a <a href="https://news.gallup.com/poll/157589/distrust-media-hits-new-high.aspx">modern low</a> in public trust of the media. Gallup’s <a href="https://news.gallup.com/poll/355526/americans-trust-media-dips-second-lowest-record.aspx">annual survey</a> has since showed even lower levels of trust in the media in 2016 and 2021.</p>    <p>These two coinciding trends – which continue to drive misinformation – pushed fringe doubts about Sandy Hook quickly into the U.S. <a href="https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/bensmith/sandy-hook-conspiracy-theories-edge-toward-the-mai">mainstream</a>. Speculation that the shooting was a <a href="https://www.cjr.org/language_corner/false-flags.php">false flag</a> – an attack made to look as if it were committed by someone else – began to circulate on Twitter and other social media sites almost immediately. Far-right commentator and conspiracy theorist Alex Jones and other <a href="https://www.chronicle.com/article/the-professor-of-denial">fringe voices</a> amplified these false claims.</p>    <p>Jones was recently found <a href="https://theconversation.com/alex-jones-loses-sandy-hook-case-but-important-defamation-issues-remain-unresolved-171914">liable by default</a> in defamation cases filed by Sandy Hook families.</p>    <p><a href="https://www.npr.org/2012/12/18/167466320/coverage-rapid-and-often-wrong-in-tragedys-early-hours">Mistakes in breaking news reports</a> about the shooting, such as conflicting information on the gun used and the identity of the shooter, were spliced together in YouTube videos and compiled on blogs as proof of a conspiracy, as <a href="https://youtu.be/PHxDoAykbQ8">my research</a> shows. Amateur sleuths collaborated in Facebook groups that promoted the shooting as a hoax and lured new users down the rabbit hole.</p>    <p>Soon, a variety of <a href="https://www.salon.com/2013/01/14/is_it_okay_for_reporters_to_question_the_official_narrative_of_sandy_hook/">establishment figures</a>, including the 2010 Republican nominee for Connecticut attorney general, <a href="https://ballotpedia.org/Martha_Dean">Martha Dean</a>, <a href="https://www.nhregister.com/editorials/article/Editorial-Martha-Dean-who-gave-voice-to-Sandy-11371486.php">gave credence</a> to doubts about the tragedy.</p>    <p>Six months later, as gun control legislation <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/18/us/politics/senate-obama-gun-control.html">stalled in Congress</a>, a <a href="https://portal.fdu.edu/newspubs/publicmind/2013/guncontrol/final.pdf">university poll</a> found 1 in 4 people thought the truth about Sandy Hook was being hidden to advance a political agenda. Many others said they weren’t sure. The results were so unbelievable that some media outlets <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2013/05/rebellion-poll/315697/">questioned</a> the poll’s accuracy.</p>    <p>Today, other conspiracy theories have followed a similar trajectory on social media. The media is awash with stories about the popularity of the bizarre <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/article/what-is-qanon.html">QAnon conspiracy movement</a>, which falsely claims top Democrats are part of a Satan-worshipping pedophile ring. A member of Congress, U.S. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, has also publicly denied <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2021/01/22/marjorie-taylor-greene-parkland-sandyhook/">Sandy Hook</a> and other mass shootings.</p>    <p>But back in 2012, the spread of outlandish conspiracy theories from social media into the mainstream was a relatively new phenomenon, and an indication of what was to come.</p>    <figure class="wp-block-image"><a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/436462/original/file-20211208-149721-ebi7ij.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/436462/original/file-20211208-149721-ebi7ij.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" alt="A man dressed in black speaks into a loudspeaker."/></a><figcaption>Alex Jones, owner of the conspiracy theory site Infowars, is among the public figures who have denied the Sandy Hook shootings. <a href="https://media.gettyimages.com/photos/infowars-host-alex-jones-protests-against-2020-womens-march-on-18-picture-id1194525152?s=2048x2048">Zach Gibson/Getty Images</a></figcaption></figure>    <h2>New breed of conspiracies</h2>    <p>Sandy Hook also marked a turning point in the nature of conspiracy theories and their targets. Before Sandy Hook, popular American conspiracy theories generally villainized shadowy elites or forces within the government. Many 9/11 “truthers,” for example, <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-14665953">believed the government</a> was behind the terrorist attacks, but they generally left victims’ families alone.</p>    <p>Sandy Hook conspiracy theorists accused <a href="https://www.npr.org/2019/12/14/788117375/his-son-was-killed-at-sandy-hook-then-came-the-online-harassment">family members of those killed</a>, survivors of the shooting, religious leaders, <a href="https://www.salon.com/2013/01/15/this_man_helped_save_six_children_is_now_getting_harassed_for_it/">neighbors</a> and first responders of being part of a government plot.</p>    <p>Newtown parents were accused of faking their children’s deaths, or their very existence. There were also allegations they were part of a child sex cult.</p>    <p>This change in conspiratorial targets from veiled government and elite figures to everyday people marked a shift in the trajectory of American conspiracy theories.</p>    <p>Since Sandy Hook, survivors of many other high-profile <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-do-mass-shootings-spawn-conspiracy-theories-155017">mass shootings</a> and attacks, such as the <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/us-news-blog/2013/apr/24/boston-marathon-conspiracy-theories">Boston Marathon bombing</a> and the <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/public-safety/witness-sues-infowars-for-claiming-he-caused-charlottesville-protesters-death/2018/03/13/4af0b4ee-26ca-11e8-b79d-f3d931db7f68_story.html">Charlottesville car attack</a>, have had their trauma compounded by denial about their tragedies.</p>    <p>And the perverse idea of a politically connected pedophile ring has become a key tenet in two subsequent conspiracy theories: <a href="https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2016/12/5/13842258/pizzagate-comet-ping-pong-fake-news">Pizzagate</a> and <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2020/06/qanon-nothing-can-stop-what-is-coming/610567/">QAnon</a>.</p>    <p>The kind of harassment and <a href="https://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/crime/fl-reg-sandy-hook-death-threat-guilty-20170606-story.html">death threats</a> targeting Sandy Hook families has also become a common fallout of conspiracy theories. In the Pizzagate conspiracy theory, the owners and employees of a Washington, <a href="https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2016/12/5/13842258/pizzagate-comet-ping-pong-fake-news">D.C., pizza parlor</a> alleged to be part of a pedophile ring that included politicians continue to be targeted by adherents of that conspiracy theory. In 2016, <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/local/wp/2016/12/04/d-c-police-respond-to-report-of-a-man-with-a-gun-at-comet-ping-pong-restaurant/">one man drove hundreds of miles to investigate and fired his assault rifle</a> in the restaurant.</p>    <p>Some people who remain skeptical of the COVID-19 pandemic have harassed front-line <a href="https://www.usnews.com/news/best-states/idaho/articles/2021-09-28/misinformation-leads-to-animosity-toward-health-care-workers">health workers </a>. Local election workers across the country <a href="https://www.npr.org/2021/02/05/963828783/you-better-run-after-trumps-false-attacks-election-workers-faced-threats">have been threatened</a> and accused of being part of a conspiracy to steal the 2020 presidential election.</p>    <p>The legacy of the mass shooting at Sandy Hook is a legacy of misinformation – the start of a crisis that will likely plague the U.S. for years to come.</p>    <div style="height:50px" aria-hidden="true" class="wp-block-spacer"></div>    <div class="wp-block-tpm-separator undefined TpmSeparator is-style-left"></div>    <p class="is-style-sans-serif"><a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/amanda-j-crawford-1243680"><strong>Amanda J. Crawford</strong></a> is an assistant professor of journalism at the <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/university-of-connecticut-1342">University of Connecticut</a>.</p>    <p class="is-style-sans-serif">This article is republished from <a href="https://theconversation.com">The Conversation</a> under a Creative Commons license. Read the <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-conspiracy-theories-in-the-us-became-more-personal-more-cruel-and-more-mainstream-after-the-sandy-hook-shootings-172015">original article</a>.</p>    <img loading="lazy" src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/172015/count.gif?distributor=republish-lightbox-advanced" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" style="border: none !important; box-shadow: none !important; margin: 0 !important; max-height: 1px !important; max-width: 1px !important; min-height: 1px !important; min-width: 1px !important; opacity: 0 !important; outline: none !important; padding: 0 !important; text-shadow: none !important"/> 

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