No need to be mean Nigel! Most people have simply been brainwashed by a very bad propaganda agenda for decades (though it has seriously ramped up lately).
Towards the end of my PhD work I took stage hypnosis as an elective and, for my final, I had another PhD candidate running around the stage on his hands and knees using his shoe to pound imaginary nails that kept popping up back into the floor. He was dead certain he hadn't done any such thing afterwards... until we showed him the video.
The takeaway was that it takes at least six or seven times the effort to get someone to realize that they've been programmed.
Needless to say, the vast majority of people have neither the time nor the background to research what's going on so they take what they're told at face value. A lot of this goes back to the 20's when a guy named Edward Bernays (the so-called Father of Propaganda) began using suggestion techniques he learned from his uncle (Sigmund Freud) to convince people of a lot of bad things like breakfast being the most important meal of the day (which sold a LOT of sugary crap!) and that smoking for women was both sexy and healthy. Pay off a couple of doctors or actors posing as doctors and *boom!* the masses went along with it hook, line and sinker!
I started researching things back in 2009 after I had just about everything illegally stolen from me because I wanted to know how that happened. I've since spent HUNDREDS of hours researching and reading dozens of really boring studies. I definitely don't expect others to put in even a fraction of the time I've spent (and many of the places to find the information have now been censored!). You certainly won't find all of what's REALLY going on using the primary sources like Google, Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, etc. They are heavily censored to only follow the given narrative. Using the Brave browser and places like Epoch TV is a good start.
Actually, if you want to have an idea of what's going on, just watch any of the mainstream media platforms like CNN, MSNBC, ABC, NBC, CBS, BBS, even Fox then take the opposite! I've seen videos that show about 30 different stations where the same story is told using the same words and even with the same cadence and inflections. Pretty obvious that they were all told to use the same script. Journalism is dead. There's a reason why what you see on TV is called "Programming."
One way to tell just how much a person has been brainwashed is to see how fast they counter with a pre-supplied reply to any "hot topic" (like calling anyone with a counter-opinion a "Conspiracy Theorist" or spreading misinformation). Big Brother is wired in far more than Orwell could have ever imagined!
The thing that really makes me shake my head is that those who are attempting to run the world don't even hide what they're doing (I've got a LOT of proof that's WAY beyond the scope of this overly moderated forum).
Most importantly, I'm seeing what's going on as the last gasp, all out attempts before things will turn much better. Unfortunately, this also means that things will probably get worse before that happens.
