For a certain group of people, science and life have gotten too complicated, and they want to feel special with special knowledge (often coupled with a distorted god belief), so they fall in the conspiracy theory rabbit hole.
And flat earth is actually one of the more dangerous conspiracy theories too, according to this chart, as it is usually not the only conspiracy these people believe in.
dangerous
It killed that guy with the home built rocket
It’s in the top category on that site, which is also all antisemitic — I haven’t noticed a religious side to flat earth believers (aside from their belief in their idea of the shape of the planet)
I’ve heard quite a few flat earthers who claim that “they” are hiding god by hiding the true shape of the earth (according to the flat earthers obviously)
According to them the Bible tells them the world is flat and there’s a dome separating the waters above from the waters below.
As with many things, the underlying problem creating conspiracy theorists is the mediocre high school dropouts need to feel superior to others in a world that values you for your skills and education. American Psychological Association: “The researchers found that overall, people were motivated to believe in conspiracy theories by a need to understand and feel safe in their environment and a need to feel like the community they identify with is superior to others.”
If you can’t develop a sense of pride by working hard to create actual merit, why not just fake it by grouping together with a bunch of other flunkies to be like “actually, we’re all better than you, because you’re all just sheep who believe what the government tells you!”
Bonus points if you combine this line of thinking with some other forms of discrimination, but even traditionally marginalized groups can fall prey to this trap. I’m not sure how to solve it, perhaps a stronger social safety net would prevent people from losing their grip on reality just to feel safe from perceived threats. Then again to quite a few people “black people” and “women” and “people from other countries” and “trans people” are threats so perhaps nothing we do can make them feel safe enough to stop being annoying online
