To a conspiracy theorist weak debunking is fighting fire with gasoline. There is another layer to this about how conspiracy theories can be very useful. If you have a good enough theory to warrant a denial, you know it's important enough to command attention, which makes it a co-ordinate or waypoint to triangulate the truth.
Reporters and prosecutors traditionally do this by asking questions that make insane assertions so that they can get a denial co-ordinate, and use it as leverage to orient the narrative arc around the issue being denied. A conspiracy theory does something very similar. It's an accusation in the form of a question or unknown.
The theorists themselves index too heavily on whether or not the plot they imagine is true, I think because they have this imaginary conditional that if only this horrible thing were true, only then the discussion includes them, and they become stakeholders in the events. This is the error of conspiracy theorists: that their perspective and experience would suddenly matter more if they were proved right. It won't.
They don't have a plan for a world where the conspiracy theory is true, whereas I think the smart view is to look at conspiracy theories and consider how to survive and prevail in a world where not only are they true, but we can't imagine how deep they go. A big part of that is weighing the quality of denials they get. The efforts to debunk news are so partisan and crappy as to be evidence that the theories are "over the target" (in the lingo). Somewhere between the lie, the accusation, and the denial, the truth is located.
Reporters and prosecutors traditionally do this by asking questions that make insane assertions so that they can get a denial co-ordinate, and use it as leverage to orient the narrative arc around the issue being denied. A conspiracy theory does something very similar. It's an accusation in the form of a question or unknown.
The theorists themselves index too heavily on whether or not the plot they imagine is true, I think because they have this imaginary conditional that if only this horrible thing were true, only then the discussion includes them, and they become stakeholders in the events. This is the error of conspiracy theorists: that their perspective and experience would suddenly matter more if they were proved right. It won't.
They don't have a plan for a world where the conspiracy theory is true, whereas I think the smart view is to look at conspiracy theories and consider how to survive and prevail in a world where not only are they true, but we can't imagine how deep they go. A big part of that is weighing the quality of denials they get. The efforts to debunk news are so partisan and crappy as to be evidence that the theories are "over the target" (in the lingo). Somewhere between the lie, the accusation, and the denial, the truth is located.