On December 2nd, 2024, IPK Fellow Maya Vinokour penned an opinion piece for The Nation titled “RFK Jr. Is Scary. His Online Fans Might Be Scarier.” Read the excerpt below, then click for the full article.

In light of this realignment, it is time to stop thinking about the prospect of Kennedy in charge of American public health as a crisis of information or education, and start thinking about it as a crisis of culture. Since 2016, there have been calls to combat right-wing lies with fact-checking. But just telling the truth will not work on a base—and a political leadership—that has embraced the free intermixing of fact and fiction that defines life online. If we truly live in a post-truth era, we must accept that confronting people with facts does not change their minds. It’s also important to acknowledge that the convergence of conspiracy thinkers and wellness influencers is not some accident of the algorithm but a sign of widespread worries about the state of American public health. Healthful food has become extremely expensive since 2020, and potentially dangerous substances (including “forever chemicals”) pervade our food and water supplies. For the moment, Kennedy has assuaged these particular worries, convincing voters, as Trump did on the economy, that he will “fix it.”

Read the full article here.

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