One of the reason the flat earth society still exists, is the earth has been portrayed as flat; 2-D, by maps, from ancients times until today. From a young age people see 2-D maps of the earth, in part or whole, more than they will see 3-D globes. The powers to be essentially say; do as I say and not as I do?
Map are still 2-D due to the convenience. This is also based on how our direct sensory systems see the earth. If you only had your five sense to rely on and could not use your faith in the knowledge of others; publications, the earth would appear 2-D to you. I have never been in space to see a 3-D earth for myself. I need to rely on faith in others, who were there to tell me this. Without some faith, I can not derive it directly by my own senses.
If you go to amazon to buy a globe, the picture is a representation of something that is supposed to be 3-D, but it too is shown on flat screen in 2-D. As an experiment, touch the image below to see if the 3-D globe below feels 3-D or 2-D? One needs faith among the mixed sensory signals to get to 3-D. I would have to wait for the box to arrive, to know for myself, without needing some faith.
I can accept the 3-D nature of the earth, but some faith is involved, since my limited world view and five sense, does not allow me to easily derive this, independently. Although if I go the ocean and look at the horizon you can see the curvature of the horizon on a clear day. Nautical miles take this into account.
Getting back to the topic of why so many people like to believe what is not true, this can be explained with one word; fiction. People like to read and watch fiction even though it is not real or true. The reason is, fiction can be used to stimulate the imagination and can allow one to feel things; emotional thinking. Something does not have to be real, to give you a nice emotional buzz. If emotional buzzing is important to you, even the written and verbal drugs of misinformation, will be seen as means to this end; prescribed drug.
Many women like love stories. These love stories allow them to safely feel the deep ups and downs of love, while having a way to leave it, without becoming disorientated, as in real love. It is all make believe, but it still allows you to cry and feel good ads then live your life. Our emotions are like muscles of the soul and it is good to exercise them, with some emotions better exercised with fiction, instead of realty; fear.
There is also the horror movies that some men and women like. These are designed to scare you or make you react to uneasy and mortified, which some people find very satisfying. There is a buzz for all.
A good textbook example of misinformation fiction, was the Russian Collusion Delusion Coup fiction. It was a fictional dram based on a fear theme similar to a horror movie. As the plot thickened, the villain; Adolf Hitler 2, was about to rise and nuke the world. The villain was deprived and did weird thing with hookers. People will go to such movies so they can get various emotional buzzes. Once the villain was defined within this fiction, the audience could feel self righteous indignation, and with all your hate justified; people love to hate the villain. There is emotional release in these dynamics, which is a type of buzz that can become additive.
When the fictional reality was disrupted by the Mueller report, it was like the last episode of the season for your favorite TV series, but with a very weird ending. Some of the audience felt empty since this was a good show and based on the twist in the ending, it was no clear if there would be another season. Others moved on to a new fictional narratives; Climate Change disaster movie. Still others looked forward to the next season, which is now in the news. There is a push by Direction Biden to put their favorite fictional antagonist; Orange Man, back on center stage. He is a tricky character that people love to hate.
It is easy to do this show again since the Left was taught to be emotional thinkers more than rational thinkers. To them it is all about how things feel and less about cause and affect. This allows fro the creative freedom with the facts; fictional based emotional buzzes, no matter how Hollywood presents them. The reason censorship is key is because, the hard facts are like the member of the audience, who points out the inaccuracies, that can dampen the buzz for others.
There is a neurological basis for this but this is getting too long to explain, here.