intellectual power
The power of knowing something others don’t. In the case of conspiracy theories, it’s the idea that you know some secret about the world that the sheep don’t, that you are smarter than all the know-it alls who keep thinking they are smarter than you.
“The reason conspiracy theorists aren’t bothered by… getting things constantly wrong… is because it gives them power over others who are bound by something as weak and flimsy as reality… They will happily carve out an exception because it makes them exceptional. They engage in wild hypocrisy as an act of domination, adhering to something demonstrably untrue out of spite, because they believe that power belongs to those with the will to take it, and what greater sign of will than the ability to override truth” - in search of a flat earth
