Can't stop thinking about this infographic this morning, honestly.

I'm not sure whether the basic structure of it is good or bad, at minimum a number of things are badly placed because of the author's political brainworms or other worldview issues. Consider two things that aren't on the chart: "Russiagate" and "Havana Syndrome".

I believe the author would put both of these in the green "known to be fact" zone, even though they're both substantially conspiracy theories. I could easily place both of them in two different categories, though. I could place them in "we have questions", because they both involve speculation about real things that happened. Russiagate: Russia did buy Facebook ads during the 2016 election season, and someone leaked DNC emails to Wikileaks, though the evidence connecting it to Russia is questionable. Havana Syndrome: a bunch of US and Canadian diplomats serving in Cuba (and some others in Vietnam) did get sick around the same time, though it's most likely because of exposure to pesticides used in mosquito fogging, and not the directed energy weapon that the State Department is pushing as an explanation.

But despite the fact that they're speculation related to real events, I would honestly put both of them in the "harmful to yourself and others" category, because the mainstream/establishment narrative about them embraces some of the most extreme speculations about them, poisons domestic political discourse, and promotes hostility towards other countries based on lies.

Then there's the "Deep State", which the author puts in the most extreme category, past the "antisemitic point of no return". But the Deep State is simply a real thing that has been misrepresented by right-wing conspiracy theorists and then reflexively denied by liberals; it is nothing more or less than the continuity of US foreign policy between presidential administrations, as implemented by the continuity of State Department and "intelligence community" staff. I'd file it under "we have questions" at most; there are definitely unhinged conspiracy theories about the Deep State, and the public understanding of it has been severely deranged by the Trump administration's misuse of the term, but an actual understanding of the Deep State is actually useful for understanding US politics. I guess now we need to refer to it as "the national security establishment" to avoid getting lumped in with right-wing conspiracy theorists, which is annoying.

Also, cryptids belong in "we have questions". I will not elaborate.