Take it easy. All I said was that there was (arguably) a conspiracy, and @Noper simply agreed with me in that much, at least.
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I didn’t have a problem with your remark. I was objecting to Noper’s bizarre attempt to seize upon it as a solution to his dilemma. How is it “completely fucking obvious” that what I wrote back there is a “conspiracy theory”?
He said it was completely fucking obvious there was a conspiracy suggested, not a theory. Also it looked to me see if he said your quoted comments did not arguably suggest a conspiracy, but definitely. I understand your point that such things are simply what government does, in one sense, but it seems there would have to be some unstated aim to such an ambitious program that could make the label “conspiracy” appropriate.
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They want us to eat bugs, apparently
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Yes. That was my interpretation.
I suppose you might call it a conspiracy. It is not a conspiracy theory. There was nothing theoretical about it. It was what happened. It was public policy.
Well yes. But nowhere did I speculate upon that - at least, not in this thread or the related one. I laid out the facts, as they appear in the public record.
No. Their stated aims were to keep people in their homes, and isolated from others. You can read into that whatever secondary aims you like. There are very predictable consequences that flow from the stated aims, but I didn’t mention any of those.
I see, but if you missed my edit:
Well OK. But this thread here is about the use and abuse of the epithet “conspiracy theory”, which carries with it the connotation of some far-out, unsupported speculation that isn’t worth discussing.
It often does, that’s true. Noper does seem to see it that way based on his comment in the other thread.
I never understood the logic behind this theory everyone is trying to get us to eat bugs. For one, it would be huge beneficial if we embraced “bugs”. Secondly we already eat snails, shrimp, clams and etc. So we are already ok with he concept.
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Speak for yourself 
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But I’d probably guess that trying to call out people for breaking the rules as you see it while you yourself are breaking a rule is pretty uhhh… not Kosher.
We’re already eating bugs. Peanut butter contains bugs.
Not me!
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You’re missing out.
As @Explant points out, shellfish and insects share a common ancestor. I think edible snails used to be called wall oysters, but I might have dreamt that.
I know for sure that fried tarantula tastes like crab. Albeit not technically an insect
Oh, go on then. What rule have I broken now? In any case I’m not “calling people out”. I’d already let the matter drop in the original thread. I was objecting to people using ‘conspiracy theory’ as a dismissive insult - along the lines of ‘well, you obviously voted for Donald Trump, so there’s not much point discussing this further’. I’m not sure why @yyy started the thread, but he was presumably expecting me to respond.
It seems to me that @yyy has a particular affinity to squabble about semantics, in this case “conspiracy theory” which he declares with much pomposity in the OP to be the official definition and proceeds his proclamation with official sounding phrases like
He then proceeds to share his definition of “conspiracy theory” which personally I think is bollocks but hate arguing semantics.
However should you in the future use the term outside of his personal definition he will fill the responding posts with lots of emojis of head banging against the wall and declare this issue has been “resolved” many times over and you must simply be obstinate or slow not to get it.
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There isn’t actually a rule about it, funnily enough. And in any case I’ve explained this about six times now. If the mods want to back my assertion that ‘conspiracy theory’ is being used far too often as an insult to shut down legitimate discussions (not just here but out in the real world too), then they can do that. Or not. It’s all the same to me, but from the responses I’ve got here so far I doubt there’s much point in flagging it when it happens.
@Mick : yes, pontificating over the semantics can end up getting a bit silly. From my POV, “theory” implies a position that is at least congruent with empirical observations but is still subject to disproof. It doesn’t just mean “an unverifiable claim that might or might not be true”.
Just out of interest, what was the ‘conspiracy theory’?
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I’m starting to get the impression this disagreement started on another thread, in which case you have a case for flamebait
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