I have no brilliant answers to offer (wish I did).
But, through no specific deliberate choice of mine, I ended up watching Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles this evening, and what's truly scary, is the plot of the movie, is essentially the same as the covid conspiracy. Which is weirdly alarming.
Yes, there ARE a lot of very unnerving coincidences out there.
I'm not saying I support any of them as fact.
I don't support a lot of things.
I mean, if 10 out of 10 people are wrong about something, it's still important to remember, they are still wrong.
And you only need 1 person out of 10 to be right about something, to have a winner. Or 1 out of a 1000. Or 1 out of a million.
The thing is, facts are not decided by consensus. Facts are facts. Voting on them is not required.
The earth was actually known to be round BEFORE what we call the 'dark ages'. But sadly, we got told different information for a time.
The internet, I'm sure it was hoped the 'information age' would usher in an era of knowledge and understanding. But, it doesn't seem to have done so entirely. Unfortunately, information is 'just' information. It can be factually correct, or it can be just a lot of garbage information.
I don't rely on Google or Wiki for my 'knowledge'. I still rely on old school hard science in peer-reviewed materials and published works that had to make it past an editor and publisher. Not perfect of course. But it tends to require a lot of formal education to make it pass muster.
Here at Matrix Games, we're a significant density of historical knowledge. Most learned the old school way.
How many here have an MD qualification? How many here have an engineering degree? Anyone here actually a rocket scientist? Any molecular biologists in the house? Anyone have all 4 levels of qualification? Myself, I'm a talented painter and writer, and I've done architectural modeling. I'm great with wood working tools. I know nothing about virology. And I suck at electrician work too.
But I can smell bull a mile away

Wargame, 05% of the time.
Play with Barbies 05% of the time.
Play with Legos 10% of the time.
Build models 20% of the time
Shopping 60% of the time.
Exlains why I buy em more than I play em.