But the thing is that these people are the ones whose main prerogative is to score points. They are largely uneducated and disinterested, the world around them is complex and they feel inadequate. So they read something that tells them all the scientists and educated people in the world are either evil or sheeple and with the blink of an eye they have found superiority to you, when in reality, deep down, they know they don't have a position with regards to the big conversations of the world.

Rather than putting work in to maybe get to a point where they still have to be corrected by those they feel jealous of, those they resent for their cultural capital, they instantaneously put themselves above and beyond all of them.

Reasoning with and understanding them is impossible for two reasons. Everything I've said above and also how infuriating they are. There is only so much going around in circles listening to complete and utter tripe that the most patient of us can deal with. And that is what you'll spend your time doing, because reasoning and explanation is precisely what these people resent about you and it is precisely the driver of their beliefs.

The problem, I believe, is that the ridicule just isn't enough. They have each other as a force field. If they all of a sudden came up with a new piece of half-baked tripe which was ridiculed in their own circles, they would backtrack faster than they've ever adopted any of their views. The ridicule needs to be drilled in.