WARNING: The following article contains spoilers for Venom-Carnage: Infinity Comic #3, available now.
Carnage's latest battle with Venom has once again caused mass symbiote infections. During the fight he merged with a dust storm, transforming into a massive giant that nearly destroyed all of Las Vegas. It was only thanks to Venom's quick thinking that the storm giant was dispersed with a well-placed lightning bolt. But Carnage didn't simply evaporate, the physical matter of his symbiote fell to the earth and blanketed everyone on the streets with it in Venom-Carnage: Infinity Comic #3, by Karla Pacheco, Scott Hepburn, Ian Herring and VC's Joe Sabino.
This infected anyone unfortunate enough to be outside at that moment. It not only reused Knull's King in Black idea to smother the Earth with symbiotes; this attack also justifies recent public resentment towards the symbiotes and aliens in general.
Carnage's initial plan was to just wreak havoc as a giant empowered by a dust storm. But now he has a literal army at his disposal, one he is already using to hunt Venom down. It's actually a fitting twist of fate. With Knull gone, the main symbiote threat is now represented by Carnage and his unquenchable desire for death and chaos. So it seems appropriate that he would pick up some of Knull's tricks.
When the symbiote god first invaded the Earth, he encased it in a symbiote shell, cutting the Earth off from the sun before he proceeded to infect everyone he could with a symbiote. It quickly turned the Earth's population into his own private army with many heroes falling under his influence. It's fortunate then that Carnage was only able to replicate this feat on a significantly smaller scale. If the world had been transformed into an army of Carnages, it would be dead inside of a day. But regardless of the scale, Carnage is now aware he can infect people on such a scale.
He's been mostly acting on his own since Knull was deposed. But the killer in Cletus Kasady was never going to stay idle for long. And now, he has a twisted new way to spread his murderous tendencies. Kasady has always strived to find new ways to take lives, and his symbiote is just a means of improving his range. He has killed, physically destroyed people's minds to turn them into killers, but it's rare for him to actually be able to affect so many normal people and turn them into carbon copies of himself.
And his actions are only worsening the public perception of aliens. As of late, the world has been through two separate alien invasions. One from the Cotati and another from Knull. The outcry against alien life on Earth is growing, resulting in the traditionally mutant-hating humans-first movement hate group known as the Friends of Humanity using the growing rage and hatred from the public to achieve political power and seize public offices within the United States.
Carnage's continued attacks only add fuel to the flames, justifying this crusade against aliens. The Friends of Humanity are not simply against symbiotes, they are vilifying all aliens. The reality is, so long as humanity believes they have something to fear from aliens, someone will exploit that fear and turn it into anger for their own benefit.
But when has Carnage ever cared what other people think or how they react? To him, everyone is beneath his notice because they don't share the same broken view of the world that he does. In fact, if he actually took the time to consider the consequences of his actions, Carnage might be amused and perhaps even a little vindicated. He believes the world is full of monsters who don't deserve to live because they deny that they're evil. So to see them turn against whole species because of his actions would probably make him feel like he's right.