The catastrophic fires that have ravaged the island of Maui have had other harmful consequences.
If we are to believe a conspiracy theory that has gained a lot of attention in recent days, these fires that have ravaged part of Hawaii and killed more than 100 people have nothing to do with climate change. They would have been caused by a ” high energy weapon “. In other words, a laser beam.
A small presentation of this smoky theory
It is in particular thanks to the quasi-absence of moderation on X.com that this beautiful story was able to spread so easily. According to this theory, different governments secretly develop “ high energy weapons “. These would then be used to light fires almost everywhere on the planet and make people believe in the reality of climate change. In some cases, as for the island of Maui, this destruction would even have been organized to clear the way and install ” ecological villages “.
Creating fires to install greens may seem incoherent, but it is important to remember that many of their authors are earth-earth enthusiasts, which does not prevent them from thinking that laser beams are fired by satellites.
At this point, it is perhaps important to remember that the origin of these fires has not yet been clearly identified, but the extremely hot summer this year, the strong winds of an offshore hurricane, or even the particularly dry vegetation created ideal conditions for the conflagration.
Doubting climatic events to discredit science, a well-established strategy
If he is probably not at the origin, the American far-right host Stew Peters (who recovered his X.com account thanks to Elon Musk) was a good sounding board for his most of 300,000 subscribers. Indeed, between two theories on Joe Biden, his editorial line consists mainly of denying the reality of climate change and the need to change lifestyle. Of the little hands that gave weight to his claims, few actually used footage from Hawaii, usually preferring SpaceX liftoff photos, a refinery fire in Ohio , or an explosion in Chile.
Arunima Krishna, a professor at Boston University and an expert on climate disinformation, explains that “ whenever there are events like this and calls for stronger action on global warming, there is usually parallel action to discredit science, deny any link to climate change and blame something else “.
What is also unfortunate is that every time such a theory reaches a certain audience, real scientists have to take their time to explain in simple terms that no, NASA does not want to create ecological villages in Hawaii.
Sources: South West, AFP
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