How should journalists deal with conspiracy theories?

If the mainstream media fails to report conspiracy theories, we are part of the plot, suppressing ‘the truth’, writes John Rentoul

The unfounded theory that coronavirus is caused by 5G radio waves has spread through social media (Reuters)

A crisis such as a pandemic is bound to produce conspiracy theories. In many ways we should be reassured that there are so few. But in recent days the unfounded theory that the coronavirus is caused by 5G radio waves has spread through social media, which presents journalists with a problem.

If we ignore such theories, we cannot communicate basic information from reliable scientists explaining why they are untrue; but if we do report them, however much we try to report the science, we make more people aware of them – and just by appearing in credible media, claims which are described as untrue acquire some credibility.

That is how conspiracy theories work. If journalists fail to report them, we are part of the conspiracy, suppressing “the truth”; if we say that they are bunk, it is because we are scared of “the truth”, which is important enough to justify our “propaganda” against it.

I think we got it right last week. It was something a lot of people were talking about online after the fire affecting a 5G mast in Birmingham, so we needed to cover it, and our report began: “An unfounded conspiracy theory that radiation from 5G towers causes coronavirus and cancer is spreading across social media and messaging apps.” We also quoted credible authorities such as the World Health Organisation explaining why the theory was nonsense.

It is important that such theories are rebutted in a calm and factual way by trusted news organisations such as The Independent. It may not seem that we are doing much good, because the paranoid mentality turns every attempt to disprove a conspiracy theory into a confirmation of it.

But for every determined irrationalist there are many people who think “there may be something in it” who are reading and watching and, we hope, deciding that the conspiracy theory doesn’t make sense. So good for my colleague Ahmed Aboudouh, who tried – and, he says, failed – to persuade a group of Middle East contacts that coronavirus is not a US conspiracy.

He may not have changed minds there and then, but he may have sowed the seeds of doubt and scepticism. That is our urgent duty as journalists, because conspiracy theories about coronavirus are dangerous.

Yours,

John Rentoul

Chief political commentator