>Thing is, the only way they can succeed is if people take it seriously and keep the spiral going.

Why would that stop anything? I spent half an hour over Christmas explaining to an aunt why the circle game [0] wasn't a white supremacist thing. All because the media chose to fall for the most inept trap ever planned: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OK_gesture#White_power_symbol

https://www.dictionary.com/e/slang/circle-game/