Something needs to be done about the conspiracy theories forum

osarusan

Tbf there are forums, like the Religious ones, or the Hunting one, or the Vegan and vegetarian one, which have different 'starting points' for discussion than other forums.

In the hunting form, for example, it's not allowed to question the morality of hunting:

Hunting is legal, ethical and morally sound. This is an accepted axiom of this forum and discussions about whether or not hunting itself is an ethical or legal activity are not permissible

because allowing this to be questioned would make the forum impossible to operate.

Maybe there could be something similar here, along the lines of 'Conspiracy theries by definition not supported by any evidence, so requests for evidence of a conspiracy theory are not permissible.'

But what are you left with then in terms of discussion?

I think the thread has been going round in circles for a long time now, and at this stage (and indeed, well before now) it's obvious that posters just want a place to post nonsense free from any troublesome requests for anything that might support the theory. But they know how silly this sounds so they won't admit that. Instead, they try to characterise these requests as sealioning and harassment.

King Mob

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117927819#Comment_117927819

I don't think that such a rule banning evidence would be very honest for conspiracy theorists to request. When it suits them, they have no issue providing evidence for their claims. We see them making claims of fact all the time. The defense that "it's just a theory" only seems to come out when people start to scruntinise that evidence or the lack of such either.

A better idea might be something more like: "Conspiracy theories by they nature might not have evidence supporting them. As such, it is accepted here that not everyone will accept a conspiracy theory is true without that evidence."

This might stop all the posts about how people are sheeple and how the conspiracy theory is obviously factual. And it would free theorists more to just admit when they don't have evidence for specific claims.

Dohnjoe

If it were a supernatural forum, for fantasy, the paranormal and so on, I can see people trying to cut back normal discussion

But the conspiracy theory forum is full of disinformation related to history, current affairs, science, some of it very ugly. Anyone can see it's been chock full of medical disinformation about vaccines and the pandemic for a year and a half now. These are often presented as fact, and I see many of the posters in normal forums trying to push them. Why anyone wants to shield that is beyond reason, but there is a blatant, cynical attempt to do so.

That's why the template is a good idea, it cuts out all the innuendo and denial and gets straight to the conspiracies theories themselves. As mentioned in a previous post, templates already exist on other forums, it's definitely workable.

sydthebeat

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117927819#Comment_117927819

there is a HUGE difference between questioning the morality of hunting (which is the expression of an opinion) and questioning the evidence base for forming a Conspiracy Theory.

Conspiracy theries by definition not supported by any evidence

then thats not a CT, thats a musing or though inside a persons head.

are people on here allowed to say whatever thought comes into their head without consequence? because thats what you are stating here

can i say "covid 19 vaccines contain 5g nanomites which are there to track you everywhere you go" and i would be free from ANY questioning?

i dont believe that should be allowed because if you allow that kind of thought to be posted on a public forum without question, you are de facto validating that thought.

thats very very dangerous.

astrofool

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117927316#Comment_117927316

It has been a problem on the COVID and Current Affairs forums, we have the pandemic deniers and the US election results were false posters on both of them but posts often don't get moved over (even after being reported), which means we have CT discussions there instead, with the typical behavior of posters running away for a few weeks, then coming back and posting the same nonsense again. I don't believe the moderation tools allow moving of individual posts to another forum which means that entire swathes of discussion just get deleted when the mod catches up (depending on how deep down the rabbit hole it went). Most often this just results in threadbans leaving the original poster free to drag other threads off topic.

breezy1985

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117927311#Comment_117927311

Created an echo chamber

Beasty

To be clear, the likes of Christianity, Vegetarian/Vegan (and indeed other areas such as Hunting) forums cater for people with certain beliefs. Allowing posters to openly attack those beliefs within the dedicated forums is inappropriate, and I find it perfectly reasonable that such forums have strictly applied charters.

I'm not seeing a similar situation with Conspiracy Theories. It surely should not be considered a "safe space" for people to go unchallenged when posting what may appear to many to be bizarre or highly unlikely scenarios. It seems to me that posters should be allowed to post their "theories", but must be prepared to accept challenge. The argument that the "deniers" are typically a small cohort of posters is not, in my view, a reason to try and restrict challenges.

Equally my personal view is people should not be badgered to provide answers or evidence. Clearly providing evidence is part of the justification of such theories, but a failure to do so should perhaps generally be considered evidence of lack of conviction behind said theory. The best way to deal with such theories, in my view, is to challenge to see if evidence is provided, but if it's not just leave it at that as readers can draw their own conclusions. Indeed perpetuating discussions by repeating questions could, in my view, provide unnecessary credence to theories. If someone reads a thread with a dozen posts across a week it may suggest the particular theory in question has little to support it. A thread of 100 posts over a similar period might be viewed as having more credence

breezy1985

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117930463#Comment_117930463

On the first paragraph there Beasty does that then give us the right to stop all the "why don't cyclist use helmet/path/road/lane/hi-vis/tax/insurance angry wind up muppets that we get every week

ohnonotgmail

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117930508#Comment_117930508

assuming you are referring to the cycling forum is that not what already happens? I dont spend much time in there but users who post stuff like that tend to get short shrift.

breezy1985

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117930581#Comment_117930581

God it's nothing like the Christianity forum. If you come on the cycling forum with "pay tax" trolling nonsense you will get it back hard but the mods will engage a lot before any bans.

Christianity is an echo chamber

Beasty

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117930508#Comment_117930508

The Cycling forum has rules against that sort of thing. If it happens in somewhere like AH there's likely to be a different approach to moderation. Clearly though repeated threads on the same or very similar points in quick succession is likely to attract some mod activity

Beasty

The point I would make is that if a forum is dedicated to promoting and discussing a particular activity then posters should feel they can post without others piling in being dismissive of such activity (or being relentlessly negative of the topic)

Here is a quote from the Cycling Forum Charter that explains part of the approach adopted there

"There are lots of places on the internet where you can have a rant about cyclists. This isn't one of them. This is a place for people with an interest in cycling to discuss cycling. If you treat it as a venue for holding all cyclists to account for perceived or actual misbehaviour by some, you can expect to find your access swiftly removed. In short, we are not your punching bag. If you really do want do want an answer to your gripe, do a search. The usual topics, such as cycle lanes, cycling two abreast etc. have been discussed, ad nauseam, many, many times before"

So some discussion is permitted on those controversial topic, but typically in dedicated megathreads where the relevant underlying topics have been done to death, and the regulars can avoid such threads if they are sick of the sight of such points being raised. Discussion is permitted, but not in a way that seeks to attack the community that underpins the forum

Now this is not a thread to discuss the merits or otherwise of the Cycling Forum Charter, but it does illustrate how discussion that may to some extent go "against the grain" can be permitted without causing problems with the posters who do support the forum

I'm not sure that Conspiracy Theories is an area which could necessarily adopt such a template, but there is scope within the topic to accommodate both "believers" and "non-believers" which would not be the case with a forum such as Christianity where belief underpins the topic.

PeadarCo

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117930667#Comment_117930667

From memory the reason the mods inserted the paragraph Beasty quoted into the cycling charter was to make it easier for mods to deal with people who came into the forum just to wind regulars up. It was voted in by boards members at the time.

The problem with the "pay tax" etc on the cycling forum its literally been done to death. Its not that those topics don't get discussed, its the very opposite they have been discussed too many times. For regular reader of the forum its nuisance and doesn't add anything. Its not new, not original and generally posted with the intention of winding up people up. If you post something that you know is going to wind posters up for the sake of it you are going to end up in trouble . The intention is just as important at times as the content.

After debating with some posters on the Covid forum on a topic that at times was border line if not outright conspiracy theory and reading this thread. My thoughts are there are different types of conspiracy theories like big foot, the lock ness monster that are harmless fun. Then there are others that are actively dangerous a good example being Covid denial. If you can't supply evidence for big foot big deal, if you are spreading misinformation about Covid its very different and you have a range in between the extremes. Theres also the intention of the post which is incredibly difficult though to judge on an internet forum which for goes for the conspiracy theory as well. In an ideal world you'd have more relaxed rules for more harmless theories and harder rules for more dangerous theories. Even though I appreciate this suggestion may be completely impractical to implement.

Dohnjoe

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117930816#Comment_117930816

Interesting post, but I do feel it's important to highlight some key points

The mods on the conspiracy forums do a relatively decent job considering (despite the boards change) when dealing with insults and ad hominem to posters that cross those lines. Indeed, being made welcome and civility is important, on any forum, but it has to cut both ways, I have been accused of being a "shill", a "troll", a "sheep" etc so many times I've lost count, it's become the norm. I get that a certain amount of it goes with the territory, and yes there's going to be friction, but I don't think one side or group can claim any monopoly on being made unwelcome.

Views however are different. If someone feels victimised because their views are being challenged, then that is not the same. If I post a theory or view, especially an extreme one, to a public discussion forum, then I would expect it to be challenged, it's only natural. If was claiming that e.g. the "Titanic didn't sink due to an iceberg", I'd expect a flurry of questions asking me how I believed it sank and why I thought that and what evidence I had. Perhaps I wouldn't like it, but discussion of a theory is not a personal attack, and it's only reasonable to expect it on any forum. However, if I were to ignore the questions, plow on with my theory regardless, not discuss normally, and then claim to be a victim of it all, then that's pretty transparent behaviour. If I were to take it a step further, and start using that to push for the creation of an echo chamber, then that's dangerous territory. Yes, posters can ask too many questions, or some challenges can be irrelevant, but again it goes both ways, posters can deliberately ignore questions and discussion, can believe their views belong in ivory towers and are not up for normal debate.

Do I think the current situation is bad? Not really, certainly no worse than most forums (look at After Hours or Current Affairs). Could the civility improve on both sides somewhat? Sure. Keywords: both sides. Everyone should be welcome to that forum, but it shouldn't develop into any sort of echo chamber for any side or by change of rules be allowed to develop that way.

Protecting posters is fine, but not at the cost of protecting their views.

JRant

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117927311#Comment_117927311

That would be an equimenical matter.

King Mob

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117930816#Comment_117930816

In your example, doesn't it mean that the person who isn't answering questions has killed the discussion?

What happens if that person then tries to continue on the discussion as if the question has been answered or was never asked on the first place?

An example on this is the "don't be a boiling frog" thread. It started with the claim that all measures are going to be permanent.

However in the intervening months not one person posting in favor of the conspiracy has answered the question that has been asked at the start: which measures and why?

Yet some posters there keep posting and changing the claim back and forth whenever they dump a new article and all in spite of the central premise of the thread being proved wrong by time.

What you seem to be suggesting is that people ask them once to back up their claims or explain their theory. Then if that is ignored they are able to continue posting nonsense unchallenged.

Here I think that if ignoring fair questions was treated as a breach of the charter then either the nonsense would just be stopped or possibly a discussion with actual progress would be able to be had.

I'm sure some people would then protest that this would entitle certain posters to "bombard" people with questions. But this could easily be also moderated. If a mod feels like someone is demanding too many questions or the questions are too off topic, they can step in.

(I don't think this actually happens though as we've seen on this thread 2 questions asking for clarification being described as "bombarding".)

One thing I think I and others can do to help this would be to clarify why we are asking those particular questions and why they are important to the points we're making. I will admit that currently I have a habit of just asking the question without this kind of clarification and this can come of badly.

The template idea would also go a ways to solving this issue and could be used in combination with the above as it would give conspiracy theories structure and a framework for discussion rather than leaving the basics unknown.

King Mob

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117931373#Comment_117931373

 I have been accused of being a "shill", a "troll", a "sheep" etc so many times I've lost count, it's become the norm. 

Don't forget how often we're told we are the same person. That's the worst insult of all!

storker

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117931506#Comment_117931506

The same fat person. 😁

ohnonotgmail

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117931506#Comment_117931506

for who?

Fighting Tao

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117931958#Comment_117931958

The big bad wolf (basically anyone they don’t agree with).

ohnonotgmail

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117932003#Comment_117932003

I was referring to this in jest

Don't forget how often we're told we are the same person. That's the worst insult of all!

patnor1011

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117931373#Comment_117931373

I do not know. CT forum actually feel like echo chamber now. Asking questions is normal but demanding answers and generally dismissing everything which was said with repeating "you did not answer my question" tripe is the problem. Some people act like it is their life mission to shoot down everything what is discussed there.

I also do not fully agree with notion of trying to categorize which conspiracy is harmless or dangerous. Like one poster mention covid conspiracies as dangerous while quite a few of them turned out to be not theories and far from conspiracy. Despite popular debate killing "science is settled on this one" we are quite fortunate to see in a real time that science is far from being settled and a lot of stuff pretty much change in front of our eyes.

While a lot of conspiracy theories turned out to be just crazy nonsense there are few which turned out to be true and that is a fact. It happened before and will happen again. With some things like that it is just a matter of time till we learn new facts or some whistleblower decide to talk... Some conspiracies turned true pretty much instantly and some required quite a lot of time to pass.

Posting questions and answering them is perfectly normal when it is done in a civil way and do not turn in interrogation peppered with sneering and indirect insults. We came so far that any question about current topic number one will result in number of posts where you will be called covid denialist antivaxxer and such. Some people then go on offensive and call opposed party different derogatory names.

Timberrrrrrrr

Here's why Covid vaccine disinformation needs to be stopped, this is why questions get asked when people post in CT about vaccines.

This guy not only wants to stop covid vaccines, he also wants other non covid vaccines review

https://twitter.com/bubbaprog/status/1441071490489856002?s=19

robinph

> While a lot of conspiracy theories turned out to be just crazy nonsense there are few which turned out to be true and that is a fact. 

No it isn't fact.

There are conspiracies, but none which have been discovered after posting on Internet messages boards. Any confirmed conspiracies are generally discovered by leaks from those involved or professional journalists.

banie01

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117932570#Comment_117932570

Was just coming to post this, but with an added question for @patnor1011

Which ones are fact? Also the "science is settled" is never a reason to dismiss something. As long as their evidence that can counter the current scientific consensus. Science isn't drawing a line through something and deciding we know enough to be certain. It is knowing that given current knowledge we have a working theory and approximation of how something works. New knowledge always invites reconsideration of that. Even with Covid alone, things such as masks, airborne transmission and asymptomatic transmission all point to reassessment of new evidence changing the consensus.

So I'd like to see your examples of proven Covid consparicies, please?

King Mob

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117932469#Comment_117932469

Sorry man, but this is completely off base in every respect.

Asking questions like "What do you believe" and "Why do you believe it" cannot possibly shut down discussion. The only time questions like these could shut down discussion is if the other person does not want to answer them. At which point it was never a discussion in the first place and not because of the person asking a question.

And why would you expect anyone not to dismiss a theory when people aren't able to answer questions like this?

And no, no conspiracy theory has ever been shown to be true.

Conspiracies happen all the time. And I'm sure people are going to rush to point out a bunch. But in all of those examples, the conspiracies were always exposed either by mainstream journalists using real investigation and/or leaked information or by the governments themselves declassifying things well after the fact.

To my knowledge there has never been an example of a theory that:

• was started and spread on the internet
• by random people with no qualifications
• using clues found on the internet
• that make specific falsifiable claims
• that was later found to be true.

That's basically what conspiracy theories are. And even if there was one that just happened to be right, there's a whole mountain of examples that have been dead wrong. Stopped clocks etc etc.

There's certainly none that have been posted on the forum here.

Conspiracy theories and that type of thinking does not lead people to the truth. It just makes people believe in bullshit.

Now again we're running into the idea of valid and invalid conspiracies, but we still have not seen how to tell the difference.

What is an example of an invalid conspiracy theory (or as you put it a "crazy nonsense" one) being proposed on the forum? How do you know it's invalid without finding out anything about it, or even asking why believers believe it?

Why are the conspiracy theories you accept valid?

Should only valid theories theories be allowed on the forum?

sydthebeat

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117932469#Comment_117932469

do you realise it is possible to answer a question with "i dont know" ?

however those 3 little words seem to be blasphemous to the CTers that frequent that thread.

there is a down right refusal to answer questions, hell, we've even had it on here within the first few days of this thread, that 3 different posters posted flat that they refused to answer questions !!

so i ask you, who creates the echo chamber? who stifles the discussion ? which side is the one that sticks its fingers in its ears going "na na na"

whats wrong with saying "i dont have an answer to your question"

could it actually be that CTers dont actually like their beliefs challenged? could it be they if admit thats theres no actual basis for this CT that the whole argument crumbles on the bed of sand they support it in?

i think the most significant problem in that forum is that the main CTers dont actually know how to form an argument.

too often they see some obscure youtube video which "exposes the truth behind X!" and then the go about sharing said video as some kind of eureka moment, not realising they are just making money / fame for the author through their sharing.

theres laziness and unoriginality involved

patnor1011

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117932646#Comment_117932646

See the first sentence in a post you reacted to.

I have actually seen a lot of people replying "I do not know" only to be ridiculed just for that. As I said problem is that question turns into questioning or outright interrogation coupled with derogatory labels and either direct or indirect attacks.

Anyone who wade in and go through just few threads will see the pattern. What is going on there is actually quite opposite to what debate is.

King Mob

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117932691#Comment_117932691

No, sorry, that's just not what happens.

I've seen maybe one conspiracy theorist in the last year admit that he didn't know the answer to a question. And this was after repeatedly dodging and avoiding the question.

And as another relevant example: 2 conspiracy theorists recently posted an image that turned out to be fake. One of them took 3 attempts to actually just say the image was fake and actually a fake ad from a game. He still dodges the question of why he posted it in the first place.

The other faked the image himself for some reason and was called on it almost immediately. He then denied it and lied about it 3 times before he declared the image was a victory. He is also still dodging questions about why he did it.

sydthebeat

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117932691#Comment_117932691

LOL

you havent said "i do not know" as an answer to a question, but as preamble to "CT forum actually feel like echo chamber now"

even now you cant get it right