It's a sad and sickening reality of conspiracy culture that there's a segment who believe that any mass casualty incident is some kind of "false flag" - a planned event with "crisis actors" and the involvement of the media. Boston Bombing and Sandy Hook being two prime examples. It seems very likely they will continue to do so with the Umpqua shootings.
What can be done? With the "true believer", there's not a lot. They believe in the face of evidence, as their belief is based on irrational faith, and contrary evidence is seen as deliberate disinformation, a test of their faith, and so debunking only makes their faith stronger.
The best we can do is try to stop people falling down the rabbit hole. Fact check claims if they seem to be getting popular. Provide links to actual evidence. Watch those who promote conspiracy theories for profit, and call them out when they distort the facts.
The Wikipedia page generally is a good first place to look in an incident such as this. It's quite bare at the moment, but will fill up quickly. The most useful thing about a Wikipedia article is that it is based on multiple reliable sources, so you can check the evidence. It's also frequently edited to keep up to date with new information, so is generally more useful than a single news report, which reflects only what is known at the one time of writing.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umpqua_Community_College_shooting
What can be done? With the "true believer", there's not a lot. They believe in the face of evidence, as their belief is based on irrational faith, and contrary evidence is seen as deliberate disinformation, a test of their faith, and so debunking only makes their faith stronger.
The best we can do is try to stop people falling down the rabbit hole. Fact check claims if they seem to be getting popular. Provide links to actual evidence. Watch those who promote conspiracy theories for profit, and call them out when they distort the facts.
The Wikipedia page generally is a good first place to look in an incident such as this. It's quite bare at the moment, but will fill up quickly. The most useful thing about a Wikipedia article is that it is based on multiple reliable sources, so you can check the evidence. It's also frequently edited to keep up to date with new information, so is generally more useful than a single news report, which reflects only what is known at the one time of writing.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umpqua_Community_College_shooting
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