Masha Gessen Quotes

Conspiracy theories are an irresistible labor-saving device in the face of complexity.

We have a tendency to think everyone's idiotic and everyone's only doing something idiotic, and the world is controlled by a not-so-secret group of morons. There's great truth in that, I suppose, but then it's also not true.

One problem with the focus on speculation is that it tends to promote the growth of the great intellectual cancer of our times: conspiracy theories.

I am not in any way a conspiracy theorist and have no time for such nonsense.

Birtherism is a fringe issue that's way out of the mainstream, and it's disturbing when you see people you... have some level of respect for, whether it's members of Congress or even Donald Trump, falling into that category.

There's so many lies being told throughout the media and people just run with the lies. They're numb to it. Too many followers, not enough leaders.

No one is served or benefitted by believing in false or faulty ideas.

You have these catch-phrases that you associate with 'The X-Files': 'Trust No One,' 'Deny Everything.' 'Believe the Lie' was one of them.

Anecdotal thinking comes naturally; science requires training.

I love conspiracy theories. I used to just live on it. You know it's all hype and garbage, but you're still really paranoid afterwards. It's fun entertainment.

Contradictions do not exist. Whenever you think you are facing a contradiction, check your premises. You will find that one of them is wrong.

It does no good to believe in what does not exist to the point one cannot focus on what is real. That would be the greatest tragedy of any 'conspiracy.'

When the intensity of emotional conviction subsides, a man who is in the habit of reasoning will search for logical grounds in favour of the belief which he finds in himself.

I have no doubt that what we started has become a plague. Because - and that's a million years ago but we got caught up in the drama more than we caught up in going after the facts.

For all of its well-deserved reputation for pragmatism, American popular culture frequently nurtures or at least tolerates preposterous views and theories. Witness the 9/11 'truthers' who, lacking any evidence whatsoever, claim that 9/11 was a Bush administration plot.

We tend to believe our own propaganda a little too completely.

Conspiracy theories are beliefs unencumbered by facts.

I may not be smart enough to debate you point-for-point on this, but I have the feeling about 60% of what you say is crap.

A democracy becomes ungovernable if a substantial portion of the population lives in an alternative reality…. How do you have a rational conversation about President Obama’s policies of he believes that Obama is a spy for Iran.

I'm not a conspiracy theorist, I'm a conspiracy analyst.

Facts are incidental if not accidental, and the problem that we have as a society is that there is a significant number of people who have grown up in a different information environment ... surrounded by much more information, but whose provenance is not clear.... The rumors will be believed; the fiction will be thought of as fact; and the political agendas, among other agendas, will be influenced by interest groups who are coming from some quite strange trajectory to issues based on collective understanding that is founded on falsity.

I do not believe in conspiracy theories.

I have come to the conclusion that Ben Carson is a bit nuts. I say that not because I disagree with him politically, but because he doesn't seem to know what the truth is.

You might not believe me, but I really don't like conspiracy theories.

I think that at the end of the day correcting misinformation and questioning what we think we know as a habit of mind is incredibly important.