Friends Don't Let Friends Spread Conspiracies

Paul Pelosi, husband of Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, was attacked in their San Francisco home early Friday morning. Because Nancy Pelosi is kinda important, this is getting a lot of coverage followed by a million¹ tweets of speculation and conspiracy-peddling, because people gobble up those tasty nutrient-free conspiracy theories like Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups on Halloween.

Humans are story-telling, pattern-finding machines.² Our brains are experts at seeing connections between things and that’s a good thing because it’s helped us outlast a bunch of other species for a few hundred thousand years (sorry Neanderthals). See grass moving nearby? It could be an errant breeze or it could be a lion about to pounce. Back away and stay alert! The downside of being so clever is that we often see patterns that aren’t there. For our primeval ancestors, no big: If they were wrong, they just got a little harmless adrenaline rush, but if they ignored the pattern they might become lion chow. For us modern humans, however, it leads to rabid-weasel levels of conspiracy-mongering.

Of course, try and tell people that the things that they see with their own two eyes aren’t really there. They get testy and refuse to believe you. Don’t you see the grass moving?!?

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True unexciting illustration: A while back I was walking alone late at night and realized I wanted to pick up a bottle of Diet Dr. Pepper,³ so I crossed the street in the middle of the block to be on the same side as a nearby bodega. A quarter block later, I realized I already had soda at home! Tcha, idiot me. So I crossed back over, no problem.

Thinking about it later I realized I must have looked kinda weird. Crossing over, walking for a bit, crossing back, what was my deal? Then, being a guilt-ridden liberal, I wondered, “What if a young black man was walking along towards me?” He would have seen me cross ahead of him, and then cross back behind him, and the obvious conclusion would be that I’d crossed to avoid him. Racist white liberal! Even if I rushed back to explain the truth (“I swear I’m not racist! I would have voted for Obama a third time!”) he wouldn’t have bought it. He saw me crisscrossing with his own two eyes!⁴

We see a pattern, we tell a story, and then we believe that story because that’s how our brains work.

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Some conspiracies

Back to Nancy Pelosi’s husband getting attacked in their San Francisco home... Immediately the conspiracy machines geared up for mass production. Why was Paul attacked? Why was there no security?⁵ What did the man want? WHO’S BEHIND IT ALL?!?

Little factoids, or alleged factoids, were dropping all over the place and people started building conspiracies around them. Can’t you see the grass moving? It’s clearly invisible lawnmowers!

Please don’t join Conspiracy Club™. We don’t have all the facts. This is a breaking story. New information is popping up constantly. Someone tells someone something unbelievable and it gets reported by an unscrupulous site eager for clicks. Even reputable news sites will get things wrong because they’ll be given garbled information by the authorities. A breaking news story is a chaotic game of telephone⁶ played out under the distorting glare of a public spotlight.

This guy with 32k Twitter followers puts up a video claiming, with no evidence, that Paul Pelosi was having an affair and was attacked by his lover. His only “proof” is initial reports claimed the attacker was in his underwear. See, in his underwear, the grass is moving! He must be Mr. Pelosi’s lover. We found a pattern that seems to fit AND makes Pelosi, age 82, look sleazy.⁷

JD Sharp @imjdsharp

The media is attempting to both cover up Paul Pelosi’s affair and blame republicans 🔽

For starters, the underwear thing is not confirmed. A few early headlines mentioned it, like this from a Fox News affiliate:

But when you click the link the headline has changed…

The article now states:
CORRECTION: An earlier version of this story misstated what clothing the suspect was wearing when officers found him. 

Perhaps the story will change again and it will later be confirmed he was in his underwear—it wouldn’t be surprising given that the alleged attacker was allegedly a nudist activist—but it might also end up being just more garbled misinformation.

This anti-woke account, 175k followers, claims that both men were holding hammers. A weird image indeed, except the reports actually said both men were struggling to hold one hammer, which the assailant pulled away and then used to hit Mr. Pelosi.

End Wokeness @EndWokeness

SF Police say Paul Pelosi and the attacker were both holding hammers The man waited until police arrived to attack, and he did it using Paul Pelosi’s hammer This is strange AF

This 15k account wants to know why there was no panic room as if every house should have its own Jodie Foster’esque safe room.

Janey Mack @JaneyMackWriter

@EndWokeness @SoCalTrumpMAGA Feels like a ‘domestic’ call to me. 3rd in line and there’s no gov. security at residence? $7 million dollar house and no ‘internal’ security system? No panic room with refrigerated safe of Jeni’s gourmet ice cream?

And plenty of folks were just playing amateur crime scene investigators.

emmie59f🇺🇸 @emmie59f1

@EndWokeness Saw aerial footage of property. Glass on the ground outside of French doors. Shouldn’t the glass have been on the inside if hit from the exterior? Maybe I’ve watched too many crime scene shows.

Or asking how it was so easy to get into the house.

NoVAXIDEver @NoVaxIDEver

@EndWokeness How did the attacker even get in, surely they have first class security.

A quick search of news reports would have shown a corner house that seems very easy to access (including glass doors around back).

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Just don’t

You don’t know what happened. You don’t have inside information. Your uninformed speculation is pure balderdash. That short video clip doesn’t tell the whole story. The scorching hot news article you’re planning to retweet was written by an intern in five minutes to get clicks. Coming up with your own clever theory may make you feel smart (and get you those sweet sweet Twitter ‘likes’) but it makes you look dumber than a bag of hammers. If you’re truly interested, read a few stories from reputable sources and then get on with your day. Realize that the early stories, even from good sources, will often have big gaps and inaccuracies. Whatever you do, don’t start spreading BigReggie69’s theories about how “it smells like a false flag!” Otherwise, you’ll be contributing to making the world an even stupider place than it already is. Have I made it clear enough how much I loathe conspiracy theories?

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And what really happened? We don’t know! For what little it’s worth, I think the attacker was probably a mentally unwell person who got obsessed with Nancy Pelosi and tried to attack her in her home. Was the attack a product of current heightened partisan tensions? Perhaps, but that’s more speculation. Sometimes crazy people are just going to do crazy things.

1. I didn’t actually count. Sorry.

2. Also chocolate eating.

3. Don’t judge.

4. I don’t remember there being anybody on the street in front of me but lost in my dreams of soda I might not have noticed.

5. Nancy and her security detail were back in Washington.

6. Really? You haven’t played telephone? Twenty of you sit in a circle and the first person whispers in the ear of the second, “My mother’s house is filled with piles of old crooner records and elegant paper maché statues,” and by the time it gets around to the twentieth person it’s turned into “My mother built a raccoon house and shows them videos of machine elephants.”

7. Or impressive.