I really still don't know if any of them legitimately believe it or if it's just a fun ruse to screw with people. Maybe that's just my inner desire to maintain what faith in humankind I have left.
I think there's a decent chunk of them that do, but in the abstract sense, by that I mean they don't really have much understanding of this stuff (full on, I think its outside their ability to comprehend, and they recognize that, but can't admit it), and I think they honestly don't even actually care that much (I think there's a healthy bit of fear - basically this is their excuse for not wanting to explore space and the cosmos, although some of that might be due to their often belief in various extraterrestrial stuff), but they have to believe this, because its the only way their broken brains can rationalize everything else.
They genuinely believe they've stumbled on this great complex conspiracy, and this is just the next level in what they need to believe in order to believe all the other conspiracy garbage they believe that is their actual overriding focus. And that's how they got there, because they had to keep expanding the ridiculous bullshit as at every turn there's things where if they actually accepted rational logic, it would unravel everything, so they were forced to apply their broken logic to an ever expanding assortment of topics.
Just wait, its going to get more insane too. Keep in mind, they had to start believing in flat earth to support shit like interdimensional bigfoot. Which, oh by the way, bigfoot isn't really bigfoot, its more of like an entity that just takes the form of bigfoot, for...reasons. But something something, he's an interdimensional traveler that may or may not be good/evil/just a trickster (so basically you know, any explanation could work if you want it to).
Ugh, listening the Last Podcast on the Left, while often being reasonably entertaining, I've gotten to really dread so much of the conspiracy and other shit that they delve into because to even just think about it in abstract way you have to unhinge your brain, and not in a fun way, in a "you've got to be a fucking dumbass" way. Anything remotely related to "High Strangness" which is just asshole speak for trying to legitimize fucking crack pots and their crazy bull shit makes me The saddest part is seeing people that desperately want to believe in stuff like that, but the logic parts of their brains are locked in like a life and death struggle to keep them from just turning legit insane (and they're cognizant of that), is kinda scary. And then finding out just how many people are in that state or already went over the edge is especially scary. It really makes it difficult to remind myself that stuff like that used to be even more rampant.