As fun and “harmless” as those old conspiracy theories are, there’s a line of thought that it was exactly those that primed many to fall down the numerous politically-charged conspiracy rabbitholes that exist today, which sounds believable. Those who jumped straight to political conspiracy theories were likely always vulnerable to this sort of thinking, but a significant portion were likely people who weren’t predisposed but had their mental safeguards and sanity checks eroded by Area 51 and Bigfoot sorts of stuff.