It is a difficult thing to do, which is why looking at the source of everything is always a good idea as is digging under the surface, but you have hit the nail on the head in terms of one thing and that is facts. Fact check everything, as you would be surprised how much basic stuff gets missed by conspiracy theorists.
Didn't you know, conspiracy theorists are in the Olympic games. We compete in the long jump.
I'm guilty of this. I did this with chemtrails. I heard about them and immediately jumped on the band wagon. It's neither sane or logical. But that's how the mind of theorists work. The Guv'ment and Illuminati are always up to no good. But I have the mind to find out if my jumping to conclusions is justified or not.
As far as news sites go, well the do range from the better (BBC at a push) to the very dubious (Huffington Post and Russia Today), and the trick is to check as many as you can as a starting point. The other thing to keep in mind is that all of them are after ratings and will only focus on a news piece for as long as they get that or it will draw in a target audience. The often held argument that topic A is not covered because the government got to the press is often in reality simply a case that it wasn't a draw for the target audience, these are after all businesses.
The news goes vary. It can be fantastically interesting to Nancy Grace. That's exactly why I do employ the method of watching several news agencies when I can. During the Boston Bombings, I watched each channel in intervals. You can pick up on what ideas every channel has in common. Then you can piece together your own idea based on those standings. It's the true first step to researching any current event/conspiracy theory. This doesn't work on topics like chemtrails however. If, and that is a
huge if, the news covers chemtrails, it's usually a joke piece. Akin to a squirrel riding on a RC boat. It gets two minutes and usually ends with anchors laughing like they were forced to. It's just not big news. Also, who wants to do a news story where your target audience are a bunch of "weirdos". Do I believe that this is the government or powers that be are to blame for this. Are they keeping the secrets off the air on purpose? Part of me wants to believe that. That part that jumps to conclusions. But you are ultimately correct. It's just bad business. There isn't enough of us "weirdos" to fill a demographic. Plain and simple
One site I find that can help is rational.wiki, its generally helpful in terms of common flaws in arguments, but often even a basic bit of digging will need more work; my links to papers on Contrails is an example. You soon get the idea of what to look for and where.
I hadn't heard of rational.wiki before you mentioned it. But isn't saying much. I may be a theorist, but it doesn't overtake my life. I research topics only when I learn about them. And again, that's following the usual avenues. I try to dig, but I give up after the garbage of the internet buries me. With that being said, I found rational.wiki to be a rather ok place to start from now on. I like because it gives you information on the theory and to some degree the reasons it may be bogus.However, I find their conclusions in disproving a theory not to be all that conclusive.
Example: Their opening statement on the debunking of the chemtrail theory.
The very existence of the Grand Conspiracy required to administer chemtrails may be challenged on the basis of the difficulty of maintaining such a conspiracy for so long. Aerial spraying from high-altitude would be an extremely inefficient and inexact mode of delivering chemicals to ground-based targets. Pesticides, for example, are often sprayed on crops from airplanes flying at thirty feet. Wide-area mosquito spraying may be done from an altitude of 150 feet. Chemtrails are supposedly deposited at 30,000 feet or higher, where winds would likely disperse them unpredictably. If there were a campaign to introduce foreign chemicals to the population, it would be simpler and more effective to put them in the water supply (
seewater fluoridation), or the food supply; or if inhalation were necessary, to release them from ground-based vehicles — have you
seen the smoke coming suspiciously out of some cars?
Does that make you feel confident in a decision that chemtrails do not exist? I sure don't. I mean, think about this as a counter point: If there is a huge conspiracy to disperse chemicals to a large population, would you really care if they were dispersed over a unpredictable area? I wouldn't assume that if America wanted to disperse a chemical, they would just want to affect Denver for example. Who cares if Wyoming gets hit? Their argument isn't blowing holes in anything I would want to believe. The site itself, in my opinion, seems to have a overtone of mocking to it. Why would I want to figure out a theory completely based on a site that pretty much calls me stupid for believing in the theory. An example of this;
Discussion tropes
- People who disbelieve in chemtrails "with so much overwhelming evidence" are sheeple.
- The "overwhelming evidence" will be skimpy indeed.
- "In the 1970s contrails lasted only a few minutes" (this is incorrect).
- Links to YouTube videos where the uploader removes rebuttals against the cranks, followed by Photoshopped videos of "chemtrail vents" on commercial airplanes.
- Naturalnews claims that chemtrails, unlike contrails, "linger for hours or whole days." Furthermore, while contrails "are very white and somewhat thinly textured," chemtrails "tend to be thicker and wider than contrails, and their white plumes can be tainted with slight discolorations."[22] Both claims are incorrect.
In my opinion, that just sounds condescending. I agree theorists
can be nutty. But to shove us and our thoughts under a carpet is just plain wrong. Our ideas do have some basis in reality. Heck, maybe were right about somethings. I am willing to debate just about anything I believe in. But I can't do that if people just assume I am an uneducated good for nothing. If you assume that I and my theories are nutty just because, you are only showing your own ignorance and bigotry. Again, I like the idea behind rational.wiki and I do feel it's a good place to start. However, do I feel this site is unconditionally right. Not a chance. Further digging, as you said Scaff, is necessary. Which leads me back to the internet and what limited resources I can scrounge together at the library. Which is essentially side A blowing the side B out of the water with facts. Then side B diluting those facts of side A with thought provoking counters.
If it wasn't for some of the information provided on this thread, I would still be a believer in chemtrails in one fashion or another. Cloud-seeding still seems possible, might I add.
EDIT: I don't think I had this much to say in the first two years of my membership combined. LOL
