So When, Exactly, Did Conspiracy Culture Stop Being Fun?

“I’m an X-Files Kid… you know what I mean? I’m a late-90s conspiracy guy. Man, conspiracy culture used to be fun. It used to not be so malicious and cruel. Area 51, Fish-Human hybrids… Roswell. I mean, it was kind of fluffy in it’s own way. It didn’t really hit, it didn’t really matter at the end of the day what’s at Area 51. It was a mystery box we could all have fun with. And there was a time when Alex Jones was hilarious, we just all kind of watched him in his early days. But the day he started commanding… I’ll tell ya, it goes hand in hand with those damn supplements…” — Mark Bankston, trial attorney in Heslin v. Jones.

A few weeks ago, I was trying to see if I could fix my YouTube suggestion algorithm to see if it could start recommending videos I might actually like instead of constantly trying to force-feed me right wing garbage. As it had been frequently observed to do. I deleted fifteen years of viewing history, deleted nearly all the accumulated interest keywords I just hadn’t been paying attention to, and finally consciously curated my at that moment kind of massive follow list. A lot of experimental, noise and witch house musicians that had pivoted to right-wing culture war content while I wasn’t looking. A lot of hack-a-day, circuit-bending and retro-gaming channels that had pivoted to right-wing culture war content while I wasn’t…