Being intelligent really has no bearing on the level of emotionalism a person has, so what we see is that smart people who are ruled more by emotion than intellect are susceptible to the attacks and they respond accordingly.
People who are able to discern false accusations can deflect these attacks because they know they are untrue.
My belief as to why so many people are ruled by emotion goes back to our education system, and the reluctance to demand objective truth. When we are taught that there are no wrong answers, we lose our ability to objectively scrutinize many situations.
And so, we are repeatedly told that when the police are involved in violence against a person of color, it is racist (even when all the people involved are black- i.e. Memphis case of Tyre Nichols); yet, when blacks are perpetrators against white victims, there is not racism involved. Rather than risk being considered to be racist, the intelligent and emotional person will conform to the prevailing narrative. They will look at the full circumstances. Over time, these things just build up; racism, climate change, LGBT issues, and on and on. If they go against the narrative, they are told they are bad people, and they cannot consider any other alternative.
Well said!