Mick West might just be the consummate gentleman debunker.
After devoting the past fifteen years to online conspiracy-fighting projects such as MorgellonsWatch.com, ContrailScience.com, and Metabunk.org, he has released a new book. It’s easy to see conspiracy theorists as unreachable, unreasonable, and unredeemable. But West is here to help, and he offers this help on multiple levels. It can be self-help if the friend caught up in a rabbit hole is you; it can be help for loved ones, even if they act like enemies when certain topics come up; and it can be help for society at large. The harm these false beliefs cause is not limited to particular relationships or households—it spills into public discourse and legislation.
West sees the term debunking as noncontroversial in this instance, because when he shows people the error of chemtrails or flat-earth theory, he is not remaining impartial to investigate an unknown but rather introducing people to facts that have already been proven. The bunk has already been established as bunk; it’s now an issue of debunking the mindset. A former game programmer, West admits it’s a process comparable to debugging.