Is what I call it when some website, twitter feed, blog, etc., starts with puppy pictures and once it gathers enough followers, the bullshit creeps in, bit by bit.

Here's a Mother Jones article observing this in real time:

One central question, however, is if the ascendant parents’ rights groups will broadly embrace disinformation about Ukraine. It’s probably too soon to say—but the possibility is certainly not out of the question. Last week, Mother Jones’ Ali Breland wrote about the extremist groups who are trying to convince mainstream Republicans that Putin’s invasion is justified. “To date, the American right has not firmly settled on a unified position on the invasion,” Breland wrote. “Speaking out against Ukraine seems unthinkable in the current moment, but large swaths of the contemporary right do not care about boundaries of acceptability established by the center-left and even conservative moderates.”

Broniatowski echoed those sentiments and noted that if this trend continues, the American right’s drift into conspiracy thinking could become a national security liability. “When you start having such a clear indicator of a susceptible population, that population can then get seeded with other conspiracy theories,” says Broniatowski. “And they become a population that can be relatively easily mobilized for other uses.” As disinformation about Ukraine proliferates in seemingly unrelated parts of the internet, one thing is for certain: Russia is watching.

https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2022/03/how-wellness-influencers-became-cheerleaders-for-putins-war/

I often wonder if these influencers are who they say they are? Or is that a CS on my part? Damn the information age can be a challenge.