(Image: Gorkie/Private Media)

I’ve been a public intellectual and political activist for decades. In that time, I’ve watched with horrified fascination at the haphazard way the media alights on words and visuals to describe and illustrate important social and political phenomenon. Like the ubiquitous photo of an enormous baby bump to accompany every story on abortion, despite around 92% of terminations in Australia taking place within 14 weeks, when visible signs of pregnancy are scant.

In the traditional media age, academics and activists could shape coverage by distributing training manuals to mainstream media outlets or encouraging the Australian Press Council to develop specific reporting standards, as happened in regard to media coverage of suicide.

But today such interventions aren’t enough. Why? Because in the age of social media, we’re all broadcasters and distributors of news. Which means that we all have the power — and must accept the responsibility — to choose accurate and illuminating terms to describe the things that matter most.

Like the crumbling of liberal democracy in Western nations like the United States and Australia.

I’m not being a pedant. As Einstein reminds us, time spent making sure we’ve got our arms around a problem is never wasted. “If I had an hour to solve a problem, I’d spend 55 minutes thinking about the problem and five minutes thinking about solutions,” he once said.

Naming a problem accurately and in a way that flags the most important features ensures that the solutions we propose work.

Right now, we’re not doing this well when it comes to the feckless, fact-free, unilluminating, paranoid and anti-democratic drivel we find in our news feeds and on truth-relative TV and radio stations. The content the media has dubbed “conspiracy theories”.

This is a terrible name. Firstly, it’s too broad, capturing perfectly legitimate news in its ambit. Secondly, the word “theory” dignifies this rubbish beyond what its substance justifies. Finally (and most importantly), it’s a missed opportunity to point to what’s most incendiary and dangerous about this speech, which is not that it’s paranoid but that it’s a) unmoored from reality and b) designed to undermine our faith that truth and reality even exist.

I’ll take these in turn.

Too broad

A conspiracy theory is “an attempt to explain a significant political or social event as a secret plot by a secret alliance of powerful individuals or organisations”. As this definition makes clear, what became the Watergate scandal began life as a conspiracy theory, though it’s now just accepted historical fact. The theory about the murder of Jovenel Moise is another — still unfolding — conspiracy by powerful players that resulted in the assassination of the Haitian president.

My point is that powerful people sometimes do secretly conspire to do things that are wrong and dangerous for individuals and society. Theories about such conspiracies, where grounded in evidence, are not a problem for individuals and society, but a good and necessary thing to describe the real and complex forces that drive the changes we see in our lives.

Too dignifying

Much of the unproven or disproven assertions we call “conspiracy theories” are unworthy of the description “theories”. Academics Russell Muirhead and Nancy L Rosenblum call them “conspiracy without the theory”:

“…conspiracy without the theory dispenses with the burden of explanation. We see no insistent demand for proof, no exhaustive amassing of evidence, no dots revealed to form a pattern, no close examination of the operators plotting in the shadows. Instead, we get innuendo: some government agency “has an agenda.” Or it takes the form I’m just asking questions…”

Missed opportunity

The most regrettable aspect of the moniker “conspiracy theory” is that it misses the opportunity to point to the most egregious aspect of such speech. Which is not that it’s paranoid or intellectually lazy, but that it is untethered from reality and seeks to undermine faith that “reality” and “truth” are concepts that even exist, a state of affairs that, should it persist, will prove fatal for democracies. As my father, a regular listener of Fox News, informed me confidently the other day: “You have your facts, and I have mine.”

But while it’s easy to see what’s wrong with the phrase “conspiracy theory”, choosing a better description is less straightforward.

We need a description that is accurate, and points to the most problematic aspect of the speech, but that’s also punchy and pithy, so a hashtag and hopefully widespread adoption will follow. I’ve tried to fashion a few phrases to conclude this article, but none in my view are a clear winner. “Democracy destroying delusions”? “Anti-democratic lies”? “Paranoid nonsense”?

Which is why I’m reaching out to you, dear readers, for help. What word or phrase do you think best describes the speech we currently call “conspiracy theories”?

Below, to get you started, are a collection of words I’ve assembled that describe the nature or problematic aspects of the speech along three dimensions: the accuracy of the speech, the sincerity and intention of the speaker, and the impact of the speech.

Accuracy of the speech: Disinformation, propaganda, falsehoods, misinformation, unsubstantiated, unproven, disproven, lies, nonsense, garbage, drivel.

Sincerity and intention of the speaker: Bad-faith, delusional, self-serving, disingenuous, trust-undermining, anti-democratic, duping.

Impact of the speech: Trust-undermining, democracy-destroying, suspicion-sowing, confusion-sowing.

Feel free to add suggestions to any category or suggest a category I’ve left out, as well as sending me the word or word combination you think nails it. We’ll announce finalists and a winner in a subsequent column.

Can you help Dr Cannold come up with a better term than “conspiracy theory”? Let us know your thoughts by writing to letters@crikey.com.au. Please include your full name if you would like to be considered for publication. We reserve the right to edit for length and clarity.