I have been pondering this idea recently. Every time I dwell on youtube or the internet in general and delve into philosophy and the like, it is very easy to be exposed to the overwhelming tidal wave of paranoia, fear and concern in the USA over perceived conspiracies from the JFK assassination to the illuminati to the Bohemian Grove coverup to Area 51 to UFOs to lizardmen and, most recently, 9/11. These kind of conspiracy theories go back a long way over the last 200-300 years. Interestingly, even though you can find conspiracy theorists elsewhere in the world that make claims about the illuminati and so on, the sources of these theories can be found in the USA. The USA is, in my mind, the centre of the world for conspiracy theories and abstract thoughts in this vein.
It occurred to me that, whether or not these theories are true, there may be a semi-national predisposition to looking for conspiracies and malicious government coverups. The reason for this could be in the fact that the USA is largely a nation of immigrants - a large number of which fled to the USA, escaping oppression from the likes of Eastern Europe. If your family were Jews who fled fear and persecution in, say, the Russian Empire or later the USSR, of course the trauma of having such a totalitarian government that was prone to lying and making dark plans in half-lit chambers would leave its mark on you. That's just one example.
As time has gone on, perhaps the fact that the USA has been so isolated from the likes of mainland Europe and the middle east and so on means that without as many wars and without as much emphasis on international politics, the American people had very few international enemies. It's only in the last century or so that this has really stepped up. Because the Americans have had so few international enemies, they ended up picking fights with each-other (simplistic, but just hear me out), the greatest manifestation of this being the American Civil War. Perhaps they also began to question the judgement of their government far more at this time, which, when coupled with sentiments being brought over from Europe about Jewish bankers and such, has led to a vast array of conspiracy theories developing and evolving.
There is also the ugly phenomenon of witch hunting and moral panic which grew out of McCarthyism and has manifested itself on a number of occasions, one of which being the 1980s Satanist Ritual Abuse panic. Perhaps America was fertile ground for that kind of thing before McCarthyism because of the mutual suspicion among immigrants from different countries and different periods. In any case, the fear that your nextdoor neighbours could be Reds plotting to overthrow your government and other such stuff surely contributed to the number of conspiracy theorists.
What do you gentlemen think? Am I rambling on about something I don't understand, or does this theory hold any water?