I love examinations of online communities. ( )

Journalist Kelly Weill has spent much of the last decade covering the rebirth of the flat-earth movement, which has skyrocketed in the age of social media, where anyone can be a producer of films claiming anything imaginable. How on earth has such an easily disproven assertion attracted so many new adherents? Are flat-earthers automatically more prone to adopt other equally ludicrous beliefs? Weill provides here some history, background and insight into an alarming development.

Equal parts fascinating, depressing and infuriating, this book feels important in that it attempts to help us understand how people fall down the rabbit hole (a phrase used frequently by flat-earth interviewees) of conspiracy theories. That said, I'm not sure I'm much closer to understanding, from a psychological standpoint, how an otherwise intelligent person could deny not only what countless scientists who dedicate their entire lives to studying and researching conclude, with evidence, but also observations they can make (and personally have made) using their very own senses. It's heartening to learn that YouTube and other social media have modified their algorithms from directing maximum traffic to conspiracy channels, but it is clearly too late for a lot of folks out there. The cynic in me also can't help but wonder how many of the guys cashing in (merch, conferences, fundraising, etc.) on someone else's susceptibility to conspiracy theories actually believe themselves in what they are peddling. Wilbur Voliva sounds creepily and unsettlingly like Trump in speech, mannerisms and actions. ( )

4.25 ( )

surprisingly moving in places

I've read a lot of books on conspiracy theory, and a lot of conspiratorial books. This is one of the few I've read recently where I learned something new. Several things in fact, from the Indiana roots of the flat earth movement historically to a reasonable and cogent explanation of how conspiracies metastasize and recombine, sometimes into bizarre forms (one chapter is titled "Flat and Fascist").. I could quibble over a couple of minor points and over her rather tepid attempt at a solution to what I'm coming to believe is an unsolvable problem, but I won't. This tome deserves all five stars. Read it and laugh, then weep. ( )