Shareholders could find out if there's such a massive naked short position in PTOI if they were ever allowed to vote on anything. If most of the shareholders on margin have had their shares loaned out or otherwise don't own voting shares because they somehow purchased imaginary shares, they would only get to vote a fraction of their shares and it would be immediately obvious that there's such a large short position. Unfortunately, shareholders haven't been allowed to vote on anything for years.

Other than that, it's psychology. There's a ton of blame which needs to be assigned for PTOI's drop over the past decade. Shareholders can't blame Mr. Heddle because they fear he will get angry and do even less for them (if that's even possible). They can't blame themselves for not bidding up the share price. They can assign some of the blame to critics who think PTOI is a sham but there's still plenty of blame left to assign. Enter imaginary naked shorters.

Think of it another way, if alleged naked shorters didn't get any blame, PTOI's critics would have to absorb all of the blame. And really, if many people believe that a massive naked short exists in PTOI then for most intents and purposes, that short position does exist.