"Conspiracy Theory" Theory
The most important fact about the term “conspiracy theorist” (or “conspiracy theory”) is not, as is typically assumed, that it describes an alarming paranoid tendency, which certainly exists, to interpret political events in a distorted, unfalsifiable way that undermines democracy. It’s that it’s an epithet which, at least since the JFK assassination, has been used dishonestly to discredit those theorizing about possible conspiracies regardless of whether the theories were plausible, even though powerful people do conspire, and even though “conspiracy” has long been a stand-alone criminal offense in every jurisdiction - based on a simple moral idea which is readily grasped - and which, in any individual case, may be proven true or false, or more or less likely, based on the evidence.1
The term is also used, deliberately and thoughtlessly, to blur the distinction between conspiracies as defined by the criminal law or ordinary morality and the conscious pursuit by powerful minorities predominately within the government of their objectives and interests against the objectives and interests of the democratic polity (for lack of a better term). In the second capacity, the term obscures the most basic perception of the obvious: that people, especially people in power, are political beings who intentionally pursue particular interests. This obscurantism disables the public from practicing democracy, which rightly assumes that this reality exists and is being, and should be, negotiated through democracy’s deliberative procedures.
In other words, "conspiracy theory" is, first and foremost, a political insult, not a scientific or psychological term, which intentionally, though not necessarily with any presence of mind, conflates preposterous, over-explanatory suppositions, e.g., “Pizzagate”, of the kind about which ceaseless, hand-wringing psychological studies are done, and media articles written, with other suppositions about possibly real facts and the workings of political power, frequently in connection with transformative events, e.g., the JFK assassination, the 9/11 attacks - around which the government is not entitled to erect impenetrable walls of secrecy - which are not preposterous and would, if they proved to be facts, obviously have far-reaching ramifications. This conflation is invalid, and it is entirely morally and intellectually correct to reject it and to relentlessly expose how dishonest it is.
Excessive conspiracy theorizing occurs for all the reasons that all the studies show they occur. However, conspiracy theories in general exist, and have increased in intensity, because the government is excessively secretive and real conspiracies among those in power, which have extensive though not necessarily total political influence or explanatory significance, unfortunately do happen.2 The way to stop deranged conspiracy theorizing (it is not desirable to stop valid conspiracy theorizing) is for the government, corporations, etc., to stop being so secretive and to stop engaging in real conspiracies - and then covering up the evidence when those conspiracies are exposed. That this remedy will be the only enduring antidote for this problem, not information control or any of the other “liberal-Democratic” assaults on the First Amendment that we've had to endure since Trump was elected, is too obvious to require further comment.
Merriam-Webster defines the term as “a theory that explains an event or set of circumstances as the result of a secret plot by usually powerful conspirators . . . also : a theory asserting that a secret of great importance is being kept from the public.”
Even the Encyclopedia Britannica acknowledges that “governments do at least occasionally conspire against their own citizens.”