Something needs to be done about the conspiracy theories forum

Standard fair for all conspiracy theorists

1. Make a claim

2. Ignore/Refuse to answer a single question about said claim.

3. Claim persecution/harassment because people ask questions.

4. Close account.

5. Re-reg under a new username

6. See step one and continue the cycle.

They also point out that the people asking questions have been posting in the CT forum for years, They themselves have been doing this but under many different usernames, at least the people asking questions have the conviction to do it on the same account.

Reregging after a ban is a breach of the charter.

Evading a ban is a breach of the charter and it's indicative of bad faith and an inherent lack of honesty.

Dude, you've had ample opportunity to:

1. Lay out your accusations and back them up.
2. Suggest ways to fix the problem you claim to see and address the points people bring up against that suggestion.
3. Bring up points about the suggestions other people make.

You've done none of that.

Why would you expect people to be convinced of your point when you don't do anything to actually support it and just avoid the points and questions people bring up that show your point isn't very good?

That's what you want. Yet you have not lain out any cogent case why that should be, or why CT should be afforded the privilege of protected speech.

You have repeatedly asked that the forum be closed and even in acknowledging the template suggestion?

You haven't actually clarified whether or not you support it?

People want to discuss the CT forum but not the actual CT's that they post.

The discussion by them is that they want a safe space to post whatever fantasy/CT comes to mind without that fantasy/CT being scrutinised.

We have even had CT posters go as far as to ask for other posters to be banned from posting in the CT forum because they scrutinise thier CT too much.

As I said, they don't want a CT forum they want a safe space/echo chamber where they can post any auld shìte they want without being pulled up on it.

Case in point

"I think a rough template might be no harm, but if it's brought in King of the mob shouldn't be allowed ask any questions.."

Ah. So it has nothing to do with promoting discussion or fixing the forum. You just don't like certain posters and don't want them to post.

Sounds like he wants opposing opinions shut down. We could call the CT Forum "The Ministry of Truth"

Why stop at stopping people opposing your opinion on the internet? Why not hunt them down and lock them up for having opposing thoughts?

And other 1984 references I guess, I don't know.

I can't help but think this is one massive troll. How can someone who posts about this stuff all the time propose the very thing thy post against with a straight face?

So is the charter going to be restored or not? This endless back and forth is getting nowhere.

nobody has presented a good reason for doing so.

What reason was presented then?

It's pretty objective.

"We want a safe space where we can spout any aul nonsense, claim it to be real without demonstrating it, and not have to answer any questions on the subject."

or

"Asking questions is harassment"

....are not reasonable arguments.

I'd support the template idea. It provides a positive start and details to discuss. If a poster is unable to say what the conspiracy is or provide basic details/evidence for it, then it's unlikely a normal discussion will follow

If a poster doesn't have a conspiracy but wants to engage in contrarianism or denial only, e.g. anti-vaxx views, then those posters could be directed to the medical/science forum. Unless of course they do have a conspiracy, in which case they could fill out the template

For the "people ask too many questions" complaint, the core issue is typically posters who refuse to address the most basic questions. Since the template would cover most of those, it should allow discussion to move forward into the meat of the conspiracy itself

There's a template on one of the PC forums which most users fill out on a regular basis, if I remember correctly, it's the building and upgrading forum, I've seen other examples of it on other forums, so it's not unprecedented or untested. It took me about 2 minutes to fill with my own conspiracy theory in the draft template as a test earlier in this thread, so it's not too time-consuming.

Some users may try to "troll" the template or put in minimum effort, but the mods could make decisions on that, if someone doesn't make the effort to fill the template then its unlikely they'll make an effort at normal discussion in the thread. Also, the forum usually only receives a couple of theories per week, so it's doable.

maybe rename the forum 'Conspiracy Ideas' ...