Conspiratorial Narratives on Facebook and Their Historical Contextual Associations: A Case Study from Cyprus

Abstract

Conspiracy theories and their effects have greatly proliferated during the COVID-19 pandemic crisis. As in various countries, so in Cyprus, a mobilization of anti-vaxxers organized mainly through Facebook, violently attacked the largest media group of the island, “Sigma”. Taking into consideration local peculiarities and historical contexts, a qualitative research was conducted on comments posted on Sigma Live's Facebook page, spanning between August 2020 and June 2021.The article illustrates how cultural, political, and historical peculiarities are instrumental in the formation of anti-vax movements, and how conspiracy theorizing in general is inextricably bound to such peculiarities. We demonstrate how new publics in social media platforms may dispute media outlets’ representations through using the official channels of these outlets, highlighting an understudied facet of participatory media. The paper advocates for more context-bound theoretical analyses of conspiracy theorizing, which delve deeper into the meaning-making, interpretative, and discursive practices of conspiracists against media outlets.