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Corona ruled life in 2020 and unleashed a new dimension of misinformation. When the virus was not yet sweeping Europe, claims were circulating that the danger was being downplayed. Then the “big scam” story became popular.
By Patrick Gensing, Editorial Office of ARD-faktenfinder
Almost exactly a year ago, the first reports of a puzzling lung disease appeared in China. It wasn’t long before religious fanatics came up with the first doom scenarios and stark explanations: Clerics in Tunisia and Egypt, for example, claimed that the epidemic was punishing China for dealing with Uighurs.
In Iraq, a political commentator spread the theory that the epidemic was an American Jewish plot. The goal is to decimate the world’s population.
But this was only the prelude to a global triumph for the conspiracy legends, all of which follow an identical internal logic: a small minority controls politics, media and science, according to myth, to carry out a sinister plan. All conspiracy legends work according to this principle, and they relate perfectly to anti-Semitic myths like the falsified “Protocols of the Elders of Zion.” Therefore, experts speak of an anti-Semitic structure, even if the legend is not explicitly directed against Jews.
Right-wing extremists called for tougher measures
In Germany, the momentum of the spring was completely different: it was claimed that risk was being minimized, that politics and the media would deliberately minimize real risk. The racist portal “PI-News” wrote in early April: “Merkelland: More victims of the crown than China!” The charge is that the “1,100 deaths per crown are Merkel’s deaths” so far. The press also speaks highly of the situation.
The right-wing extremist “Compact-Magazin” praised in mid-March that 60 million citizens were being quarantined in Italy. On the contrary, he criticized “Compact”, which advocates “the measure and the means”. In other words: the Chancellor should obviously take more drastic measures. In April, the magazine suddenly spoke of a “dictatorship of the Crown” in Germany. Voices were widely quoted that the virus “was not particularly dangerous.” And “PI-News” repeatedly reports how “people are fighting against the dictatorship of Corona.”
The notorious fake news site “Anonymousnews Russia” put the fictitious quote on the Chancellor’s lips that open borders are more important than human lives. But the response is still manageable compared to previous similar contributions, as one evaluation shows. Refugee policy was no longer a suitable scapegoat in a global health crisis.
AfD called for drastic measures
The AfD also initially accused the federal government of failing to protect Germany. In late February, Alice Weidel urged Federal Health Minister Jens Spahn to minimize the danger. The death rate with Corona is ten times higher than with the flu. AfD politicians also claimed that climate activists show no consideration for older people and thus contribute to the spread of Corona. To do this, they shared images that were taken out of context and therefore deliberately misleading.
But the strategy was unsuccessful: a radical change of course followed, the emerging “Crown Skeptics” movement provided the keywords, which was followed by the political right. More and more was read that Corona is, at best, as dangerous as the flu or even a total fraud dating back to Bill Gates. Experts watched as right-wing extremists increasingly participated in the protests.
Several “Crown Skeptics” became leaders and keywords of a new movement and radicalized with impressive speed. Anti-Semitic agitation and insults documented their fanaticism. Calls for violence and even armed struggle soon circulated. Several elements of well-known conspiracy legends reappeared in the context of Corona, for example the myth of kidnapped children being tortured in underground prisons.
Trump as a driver of disinformation
One of the drivers of the misinformation was US President Donald Trump, who repeatedly spread false reports about the pandemic. The QAnon movement also played an important role in this context; their symbols also appeared in demonstrations in Germany.
The spread of false reports and rumors can hardly be measured, as many circulated on courier services. But some figures show just how huge the phenomenon is: Facebook alone removed seven million posts in three months. However, much of the misleading content remained online, despite being disproved.
Climbing in Berlin and Leipzig
Then tens of thousands of people took to the streets during the mass protests in Berlin and Leipzig. Selectively, false information about the number of participants was disseminated to increase the relevance of the protests. In addition, protesters stormed the entrance to the Bundestag, spurred on by false news that US President Trump was in Berlin to take power or that police officers had “defected.” Obviously, many protesters actually believed there was an overthrow.
The AfD increasingly acts as the parliamentary arm of this movement. It received strong criticism after guests from the parliamentary group in the Bundestag had molested and harassed politicians.
At a “lateral thinking” demonstration in Leipzig in early November, violence escalated and right-wing extremists attacked journalists and police officers. The movement is increasingly targeted by security authorities.
More afraid of a cloth mask than the virus
Germany is now locked up again, thousands of people have died from the corona virus, hospitals are on edge. But the “skeptics of the Crown” downplay or deny the danger posed by the virus to this day. Everyday masks, on the other hand, become a supposedly potentially fatal risk. For example, false reports were spread selectively, according to which the children had died with simple mouth and nose protection.
Vaccines against Covid-19 are also represented by adventurous claims as a great danger to health: there is talk of genetic changes and infertility in women, and even cancer should be able to trigger a vaccine, it is said. But all these theses are neither proven nor valid.
And so it looks like the virus could potentially be defeated in the next year if vaccines work. But the long-term damage caused by conspiracy legends as a simple explanatory model of complex phenomena is likely to keep society busy.
