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RFK Jr.'s MAHA wants to make chemtrail conspiracy theories great again

https://arstechnica.com/health/2025/10/rfk-jr-s-maha-wants-to-make-chemtrail-conspiracy-theories-great-again/
20•ndsipa_pomu•2h ago

Comments

ndsipa_pomu•2h ago
What bugs me about the chemtrail conspiracies that I've heard about is that distributing toxins from planes is probably about the worst practical way to distribute them. If you really want to put stuff into the water supplies then it's surely far more efficient and cheaper to hire a load of people to dump the chemicals straight into the reservoirs. It's also indiscriminate which isn't likely to be useful - why poison everyone within potentially wide areas subject to wind conditions?
DemocracyFTW2•1h ago
chemtrails work surprisingly well on a flat globe
krapp•1h ago
The smart way to do it is either in medication or the food supply. Far easier to target specific demographics.

But yeah, chemtrail people also think they're used for weather modification. These people don't think rationally.

ndsipa_pomu•1h ago
Weather modification makes more sense to me as that would need to be done by plane (I wonder if balloons would work, but I suppose they're harder to position exactly). I'm not sure why they'd be modifying weather, but things like increasing rainfall over areas might be useful which raises the question of why does it need to be a conspiracy? If they've got a system that increases farm yields then why not make it public knowledge and even sell weather services to various states.
quantified•1h ago
Contrails do modify weather a bit.

Of course, funny how they don't modify it enough to put rain or snow where it's needed.

dekhn•1h ago
Are you referring to this? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Contrail#Impacts_on_climate I think that's considered an actual legitimate scientific phenomenon.
quantified•1h ago
Hence fluoridation. You're onto them.
D-Coder•20m ago
That's what the boattrails are for.

https://images.unsplash.com/photo-1668403778611-4f20c4afc816...

metalman•1h ago
unfortunatly absurdism has languished until very recently with the youngest generation comming up, though they are faced with a dificult task in differentiating there humor from actual official press releases
techblueberry•1h ago
Why do people focus on stuff like this? Why not more direct and obvious harms to society like wealth consolidation or AI or whatever? Even if I thought vaccines were dangerous, there are so many things ahead of vaccines that keep me up at night.
fennec-posix•1h ago
It's all a distraction. Since a lot of these guys peddling this benefit from the actual harms to society.
techblueberry•1h ago
I don't mean RFK Jr, I think this stuff comes up because there are like everyday people who care? Why do those people care!
quantified•1h ago
He's one of them. They all go together.

That doesn't answer why. But remember that 4% of people reliably believe that lizard people are waiting below the earth, that the earth is flat, and so on. About 4% will believe anything, though it's a different 4% for each thing to be believed. Rises quite a lot for unprovable religions.

yongjik•1h ago
What, do you think people who cheer for RFK and friends would give a damn about "harms to society"? Talk about "harms to society" to these people and the majority of them would be like "What's that crap? Sounds like liberal nonsense!"
janice1999•1h ago
While the modern "chemtrails" conspiracy makes no sense, it's interesting how like many conspiracies there is a grain of truth, however twisted, at the center. During the Cold War the US (and Canada and the UK and others) carried out experiments on large population centers by, among other things, dispersing chemicals from planes to simulate nuclear fallout and biological weapon attacks.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_LAC

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Sea-Spray

xnx•55m ago
Same people who believe in chemtrails also believe in their god-given right to "roll coal".
RickJWagner•36m ago
You know what?

RFK is a mixed bag. Some of his ideas are kooky. But he’s also getting harmful gook taken out of food, and he’s setting a good example of how aging adults can keep themselves healthy. ( Check out RFK and Pete Hegseth doing pull ups and push ups. They’re both obviously good about exercise. )

I’m giving RFK good marks for some, but not all, of his program. Some of what he’s pushing is good stuff.

tylerflick•34m ago
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