Will children disappear from the face of the Earth in the next fifty years? This is what many publications have been saying for several days on social networks.
This mass extinction would be cleverly orchestrated by the World Economic Forum (WEF) – known for its annual meeting in Davos, Switzerland – and by its founder, the German economist Klaus Schwab, who would like to replace our dear little blond – and brown heads , and redheads….- by virtual children, raised in the metaverse. A bit like Tamagotchis, these little virtual animals of the 1990s. It would even be an integral part of “The Great Reset”, a WEF program intended to enslave populations by connecting their minds to a cloud. .
A diabolical and inescapable plan. Yet none of this is true. 20 Minutes explains why.
FAKE OFF
At the start of this rumor, there is therefore the idea of an advent of virtual children. It is mentioned by a British expert in artificial intelligence, Catriona Campbell, in an article in the Daily Mail in its edition of May 31, 2022. In its book AI by Design : A Plan For Living With Artificial Intelligence, published the same month, the Briton predicts that virtual children will become a common thing within the next fifty years, aided by the development of technology.
Artificial intelligence will then be powerful enough to allow these beings to develop their own personality in the metaverse, and helmets, gloves and suits will be able to simulate the tactile sensations necessary to reproduce physical interactions with them. Exchanges, laughter, moments of happiness, everything will be there, according to her. She adds that this development would be guided by future global issues: overpopulation, global warming, lack of resources… No mention is made of the WEF.
An unrelated link
His predictions are repeated a month later on The Defender, a website that claims to provide information for the defense of children. Antivax propaganda, infox on the Covid-19, interviews with American conspiracy personalities… The media takes up all the elements of the conspiracy. And on June 27, it was a certain Joseph Mercola, an American doctor-osteopath, who mixed up, in the same article, the words of the British expert, “The Great Reset” and the World Economic Forum.
For Joseph Mercola, the causes of this digitalization of human life are an integral part of “The Great Reset”, a WEF program “which will not be complete until humanity is enslaved to the unelected few who will rule the world through algorithms and AI”.
A catch-all global conspiracy
There are many conspiratorial versions of this “secret” agenda: a global elite ambition led by Klaus Schwab to control our minds. The creation of Covid-19 to rid the earth of the weakest populations. A global plan to adopt draconian measures…
In reality, as the Conspiracy Watch site explains, “The Great Reset” program is no secret. Offered to all comers on the WEF site, it is even the opposite of the theories that conspiracy theorists attach to it. This is a program developed in their book COVID-19 : The Great Reset (2020) by Klaus Schwab and Thierry Malleret, also former director of the WEF. Starting from the premise that major crises are at the origin of profound changes in society, the current pandemic “represents a rare but narrow window of opportunity to reflect, reimagine and reset our world”.
The two authors campaign for a “less divisive, less polluting, less destructive, more inclusive, more equitable and more just world than the one in which we lived in the pre-pandemic era”. It is not about control, loss of freedom or authoritarianism. Even fewer virtual babies, a subject never mentioned by the program.
A disinformation professional at the helm
This does not prevent the followers of the conspiracy to take up Mercola’s thesis by citing the work of Catriona Campbell. And they are many. According to the latest report from the Center for countering of Digital Hate (CCDH), an Anglo-American non-profit organization fighting misinformation, the osteopathic doctor has 3.6 million followers across all social networks.
In this report published in May 2022, Joseph Mercola deserves the honors, since he tops a list of 12 people responsible for sharing 65% of all anti-vax messages on Facebook and Twitter. He is described there as a “successful anti-vaccine entrepreneur, promoting dietary supplements and fake remedies as alternatives to vaccines”. Employing a dozen people to maintain his social networks, he is qualified, in a survey by the New York Times, as a “pioneer of the anti-vaccine movement”. […] past master in the art of capitalizing on periods of uncertainty, such as the pandemic, to develop his movement” by a researcher specializing in conspiracy theories.