I don’t think there has been a purposeful plan to flood the US with conspiracy theories so we ignore real problems. However, as most jellies know, I often am saying to people to stop being so afraid and that the media should stop giving many of these news stories a lot of air time. I probably would be more likely than most to dismiss something that really is something to worry about, because I think so much is manufactured, edited, spun, and biased.
Even with my tendency to downplay and want to make nice, when I started hearing about QAnon I took that conspiracy group seriously! I had a lot of friends dismissing them as a small group and not something to pay attention to, but I disagree. I think QAnon and similar groups have tremendous power right now. I am not completely oblivious I guess.