# Half of Trump's voters believe in pizzagate **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [December 28, 2016, 3:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/half-of-trumps-voters-believe-in-pizzagate/775777 "2016-12-28T15:23:23Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Wesley\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wesley_clark/32/20581_2.png) [@Wesley\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wesley_Clark)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2016, 3:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/half-of-trumps-voters-believe-in-pizzagate/775777/1 "2016-12-28T15:23:23Z")
Neat. Pizzagate is the theory that Hillary Clinton is involved in a satanic pedophile ring operating out of a pizza parlor. A Right wing extremist went there with an assault rifle to ‘investigate’ recently. > **[Nearly 50% of Donald Trump voters believe Hillary Clinton is involved in...](https://www.nydailynews.com/2016/12/28/nearly-50-of-donald-trump-voters-believe-hillary-clinton-is-involved-in-pedophilia-ring-poll/)** > > Nearly half of all Donald Trump voters believe a widely debunked conspiracy theory claiming that Hillary Clinton is involved in a child sex ring run out of a popular Washington, D.C. pizzeria, a re… > [@](#): > > The Economist/YouGov poll released Tuesday shows that a staggering 46% of Trump voters believe the so-called “Pizzagate” conspiracy, which began circulating on obscure sites like 4chan and Reddit ahead of Election Day before spurring controversy on Twitter and Facebook. > > The poll, which was conducted between Dec. 17 and 20, also showed that Trump voters were far less likely than Clinton voters to believe a joint report from the CIA and the FBI concluding that Russia meddled in the election through cyberattacks in order to help get Trump elected. A whopping 80% of Trump voters claimed that the intelligence community’s conclusion was simply “not true.” > > Further, the poll showed that 60% of Trump voters believe the President-elect’s false claim that “millions" of people "voted illegally” in this election, while half think it’s “at least probably true” that President Obama was born in Kenya — a claim originated by the notorious “birther” conspiracy, which attempted to delegitimize the first African-American President. I was reading up a bit on Identity-Protective Cognition and cultural cognition. People do not use cognition and reasoning to find objective truth, we use them to obtain the results we need to obtain to justify our existing beliefs, and to maintain status within our social group. It seems this is a major problem. Is there a solution? I mean, if you take a scientific issue that causes people’s values and sense of identity to come up (creationism, climate change) people will use their critical thinking skills to come to the conclusion they need so they can maintain their identity. But if you bring up a scientific concept that is not tied to their identity or values (seat belts, nuclear fusion) this isn’t an issue. I guess I don’t know what I’m posting. My point is that is there an answer or is this just who we are as Americans, and who we always were? I know there have always been conspiracy theories about the jews controlling everything, about how JFK was going to take orders from the pope, etc. Maybe this is just who we are. ---
**Author:** ![Snarky\_Kong](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a183cd/32.png) [@Snarky\_Kong](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Snarky_Kong)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2016, 5:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/half-of-trumps-voters-believe-in-pizzagate/775777/2 "2016-12-28T17:00:08Z")
No matter how many times i read something like this, or about young earth creationists, or flat earthers, I assume they must not really believe. The opposite is too scary. ---
**Author:** ![dasmoocher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/dbc845/32.png) [@dasmoocher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dasmoocher)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2016, 5:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/half-of-trumps-voters-believe-in-pizzagate/775777/3 "2016-12-28T17:01:51Z")
Pizzagate? It must be true if the son of the selected national security adviser is tweeting it: [Michael Flynn’s tweet wasn’t actually about #PizzaGate, but his son is now defending the baseless conspiracy theory](https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2016/12/05/did-michael-flynn-really-tweet-something-about-pizzagate-not-exactly/?utm_term=.d69216cea8d8) ---
**Author:** ![bobot](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bobot/32/21622_2.png) [@bobot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bobot)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2016, 5:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/half-of-trumps-voters-believe-in-pizzagate/775777/4 "2016-12-28T17:03:58Z")
I’d bet that there are lots of really scary/baffling things that could be prefaced with “half of Trump’s voters believe…”. ---
**Author:** ![dasmoocher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/dbc845/32.png) [@dasmoocher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dasmoocher)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2016, 5:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/half-of-trumps-voters-believe-in-pizzagate/775777/5 "2016-12-28T17:05:46Z")
> [@Snarky\_Kong](#): > > No matter how many times i read something like this, or about young earth creationists, or flat earthers, I assume they must not really believe. The opposite is too scary. Actually, for the oil company climate change deniers, I think they’re privately counting on it to be real. So they can drill in the Arctic in the near future. (Prove me wrong! I think JFK is orchestrating the whole thing from the moon we didn’t land on!) Kind of like how the tobacco CEOs testified before congress that they thought cigarettes were safe and non-addictive. ---
**Author:** ![JRDelirious](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jrdelirious/32/9531_2.png) [@JRDelirious](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JRDelirious)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2016, 5:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/half-of-trumps-voters-believe-in-pizzagate/775777/6 "2016-12-28T17:09:03Z")
That a large segment of the population will believe the damnednest fucked shit is old news. I think recent events just made them feel they have social permission to admit they do. ---
**Author:** ![Procrustus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/procrustus/32/2994_2.png) [@Procrustus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Procrustus)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2016, 5:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/half-of-trumps-voters-believe-in-pizzagate/775777/7 "2016-12-28T17:11:31Z")
> [@bobot](#): > > I’d bet that there are lots of really scary/baffling things that could be prefaced with “half of Trump’s voters believe…”. I have a hard time buying that half of Trump voters believe Hillary was actually engaged in child sex ring based in a pizza shop basement. I do believe they’d be willing to endorse any negative option in a poll about her, however. If a pollster asked me if I believed Trump had tiny fingers, I would agree in an instant. ---
**Author:** ![Drunky\_Smurf](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/drunky_smurf/32/449_2.png) [@Drunky\_Smurf](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Drunky_Smurf)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2016, 5:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/half-of-trumps-voters-believe-in-pizzagate/775777/8 "2016-12-28T17:39:14Z")
> [@bobot](#): > > I’d bet that there are lots of really scary/baffling things that could be prefaced with “half of Trump’s voters believe…”. Half of Trumps voters like puppies. ---
**Author:** ![Spice\_Weasel](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spice_weasel/32/5435_2.png) [@Spice\_Weasel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spice_Weasel)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2016, 5:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/half-of-trumps-voters-believe-in-pizzagate/775777/9 "2016-12-28T17:46:14Z")
I think you bring up a lot of really good points about protective cognition, but my first reaction reading this OP was, “Well, this shows how unreliable polls are.” Seriously, almost nobody believes that for real. Sent from my Nexus 5X using Tapatalk ---
**Author:** ![dasmoocher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/dbc845/32.png) [@dasmoocher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dasmoocher)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2016, 5:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/half-of-trumps-voters-believe-in-pizzagate/775777/10 "2016-12-28T17:54:11Z")
> [@Drunky\_Smurf](#): > > Half of Trumps voters like puppies. And the other half wants to make fur coats out of them. I read it on the internet, so it must be true! ---
**Author:** ![k9bfriender](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/k9bfriender/32/3283_2.png) [@k9bfriender](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/k9bfriender)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2016, 6:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/half-of-trumps-voters-believe-in-pizzagate/775777/11 "2016-12-28T18:11:04Z")
> [@Drunky\_Smurf](#): > > Half of Trumps voters like puppies. Yeah, but they like 'em with mayonnaise. Ewww. Who likes mayonnaise? ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2016, 6:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/half-of-trumps-voters-believe-in-pizzagate/775777/12 "2016-12-28T18:12:54Z")
Well, not quite. The actual question wasn’t whether “Hillary Clinton is involved in a satanic pedophile ring operating out of a pizza parlor”. The question was (if you go to the source article): _52. Conspiracy Theories – Leaked email from some of Hillary Clinton’s campaign staffers contained code words for pedophilia, human trafficking and satanic ritual abuse - what some people refer to as ’Pizzagate’._ Still an pretty “out there” CT to believe in, but not quite the same as claimed in the OP. The gist of the article is quite interesting, though, and there has been a lot of research lately on how political beliefs shape reaction to news stories (whether fake or real). Our brains seem to release dopamine (or something like it) when we encounter news stories that reinforce our biases. Could be the basis of a new type of bar-- no need for cocaine, just read some position papers from ThinkProgress or The Cato Group!! 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![wolfpup](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wolfpup/32/10618_2.png) [@wolfpup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wolfpup)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2016, 6:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/half-of-trumps-voters-believe-in-pizzagate/775777/13 "2016-12-28T18:23:25Z")
> [@Snarky\_Kong](#): > > No matter how many times i read something like this, or about young earth creationists, or flat earthers, I assume they must not really believe. The opposite is too scary. No, it really is true, it’s just that the precise number of ignoramuses is hard to quantify. But there are lots of interviews with Trump supporters and, earlier, with Tea Party types that demonstrate an appalling lack of knowledge about just about anything, and lots of random man-in-the-street interviews that demonstrate much the same thing. Out in the hinterlands of the Interwebs lots of feeble but determined efforts are being made to justify, say, the flat-earth idea or the (only slightly more subtle) young-earth idea. [Here is a thread](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=814686) in which the poster asks how he can refute his friend’s stupid ideas about heart function and heart disease (which apparently is caused by negative ions from the earth, being touched, and something about being hit by sunlight without being grounded, or something). I think the best answer is that the poster needs new friends, because that one is beyond the reach of reason. It’s in the same realm as anti-vaxers and believers in mystical healing. Ignorance is everywhere in abundance. > [@bobot](#): > > I’d bet that there are lots of really scary/baffling things that could be prefaced with “half of Trump’s voters believe…”. Yep, exactly this. ---
**Author:** ![drad\_dog](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/aeb1de/32.png) [@drad\_dog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/drad_dog)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2016, 6:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/half-of-trumps-voters-believe-in-pizzagate/775777/14 "2016-12-28T18:35:56Z")
> [@Drunky\_Smurf](#): > > Half of Trumps voters like puppies. But half of them torture puppies. ---
**Author:** ![dasmoocher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/dbc845/32.png) [@dasmoocher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dasmoocher)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2016, 6:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/half-of-trumps-voters-believe-in-pizzagate/775777/15 "2016-12-28T18:48:29Z")
> [@wolfpup](#): > > No, it really is true, it’s just that the precise number of ignoramuses is hard to quantify. But there are lots of interviews with Trump supporters and, earlier, with Tea Party types that demonstrate an appalling lack of knowledge about just about anything, and lots of random man-in-the-street interviews that demonstrate much the same thing. Out in the hinterlands of the Interwebs lots of feeble but determined efforts are being made to justify, say, the flat-earth idea or the (only slightly more subtle) young-earth idea. [Here you go](http://crooksandliars.com/2016/09/wow-mind-blown-daily-shows-jordan-klepper): > [@](#): > > Wednesday’s episode of The Daily Show didn’t have to create crazy fiction or conspiracy theories to malign Hillary Clinton. That’s because Correspondent Jordan Klepper found plenty of Trump supporters to do it all by themselves. It was a spectacular display of the rampant ignorance and misinformation that has run amok among the supporters of Donald Drumpf. > > … > > ``` > KLEPPER: Why do you think she has AIDS? > > MTV [Male Trump Voter]: Because, uh, because of the way her husband used to be. > > KLEPPER: So you think Bill has AIDS? > > MTV: Yes > > KLEPPER: So how did Bill Clinton get AIDS? > > MTV: Probably messing around with Magic Johnson. > > KLEPPER: That's the natural conclusion? > > MTV: Yes > > KLEPPER: Interesting. > > ``` > > … > > The last popular conspiracy that Klepper addressed highlighted the irrelevancy of time to the typical Trump supporter. More specifically, they blame anything that happened during the Bush 43 Administration on the Clintons and the Obama Administration. We hear some more ‘thoughts’ from the original MTV, who was asked why President Obama didn’t lift a finger to stop the 9-11-2001 attacks. Klepper suggests to the same man who created the aforementioned Magic Johnson/Clinton theory that Barack Obama was remiss in the tragic events of fifteen years ago. That Kenyan guy just couldn’t be bothered to do his job. The cause? > > ``` > MTV: Not being around, always being on vacation. Never in the office. > > KLEPPER: Why do you think that Barack Obama wasn't in the Oval Office on 9-11-(2001)? > > MTV: That I don't know. I'd like to get to the bottom of that. > > ``` ---
**Author:** ![Okrahoma](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/90db22/32.png) [@Okrahoma](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Okrahoma)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2016, 7:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/half-of-trumps-voters-believe-in-pizzagate/775777/16 "2016-12-28T19:02:05Z")
People believe the darndest things. 50% of Hillary voters believe Russia tampered with vote tallies to help Donald Trump. > **[Belief in conspiracies largely depends on political identity | YouGov](https://today.yougov.com/topics/politics/articles-reports/2016/12/27/belief-conspiracies-largely-depends-political-iden)** > > Belief in conspiracy theories depends largely on which side of the spectrum you fall on ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2016, 7:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/half-of-trumps-voters-believe-in-pizzagate/775777/17 "2016-12-28T19:06:02Z")
> [@Okrahoma](#): > > People believe the darndest things. 50% of Hillary voters believe Russia tampered with vote tallies to help Donald Trump. > > [Belief in conspiracies largely depends on political identity | YouGov](https://today.yougov.com/news/2016/12/27/belief-conspiracies-largely-depends-political-iden/) On the spectrum of plausibility, Russian interference ranks well above child sex-trafficking in basement of a restaurant that doesn’t have a basement. I’ll have to read your cite more carefully later on, but the text suggests the poll questions allow gradations (i.e. something is “definitely true”, “possibly true”, “possibly not true”, “definitely not true”) but the results are divided starkly into “true” vs “not true”. If 50% of Clinton voters though Russian interference was “possibly true”, that’s far better than 50% of Trump voters saying pizzagate is “definitely true”, for example. ---
**Author:** ![Amateur\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/59ef9b/32.png) [@Amateur\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Amateur_Barbarian)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2016, 7:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/half-of-trumps-voters-believe-in-pizzagate/775777/18 "2016-12-28T19:11:32Z")
The willingness of USAians to believe patent horseshit, from Christianity to UFOs to conspiracy theories a toddler could debunk, is cultural. I believe it stems from the actual class stratification of our “classless” society; the lower classes know they are outranked and thus invent realities that make them superior in their own minds. ---
**Author:** ![Grumman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/43a26b/32.png) [@Grumman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Grumman)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2016, 7:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/half-of-trumps-voters-believe-in-pizzagate/775777/19 "2016-12-28T19:17:19Z")
> [@John\_Mace](#): > > Well, not quite. The actual question wasn’t whether “Hillary Clinton is involved in a satanic pedophile ring operating out of a pizza parlor”. The question was (if you go to the source article): > > _52. Conspiracy Theories – Leaked email from some of Hillary Clinton’s campaign staffers contained code words for pedophilia, human trafficking and satanic ritual abuse - what some people refer to as ’Pizzagate’._ > > Still an pretty “out there” CT to believe in, but not quite the same as claimed in the OP. Right. I have not read any leaked emails that support the theory, but as I understand it the conspiracy theory is that there were people talking about pizza in ways that normal people do not talk about pizza, and that the particulars of how they talked about pizza make it sound like the thing they were actually talking about was underage prostitutes. The guy going after an actual pizza parlor was a Zoolander-level idiot _even if_ the conspiracy theory was true. ---
**Author:** ![Okrahoma](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/90db22/32.png) [@Okrahoma](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Okrahoma)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2016, 7:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/half-of-trumps-voters-believe-in-pizzagate/775777/20 "2016-12-28T19:18:57Z")
> [@Bryan\_Ekers](#): > > If 50% of Clinton voters though Russian interference was “possibly true” The question was not about “Russian interference”. It was “Russia tampered with vote tallies”. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/half-of-trumps-voters-believe-in-pizzagate/775777.md?page=2)