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The German Wikipedia article "conspiracy theory" ("Verschwörungstheorie") says, roughly translated by me:

Since about the early 1960s, the US government does not support conspiracy theories any more. On the contrary, it uses the concept to discredit unwelcome heterodox knowledge. It used this instrument for the first time in 1967, when the CIA tried to depict as untrustworthy the spreading whispered criticism of the report of the Warren Commission, which had named Lee Harvey Oswald as the sole murderer of Kennedy.

The reference provided for this is the book Conspiracy Theory in America by Lance deHaven-Smith (2014).

The English Wikipedia article "conspiracy theory" does not make the same claim, but it does say:

Originally a neutral term, since the mid-1960s in the aftermath of the assassination of US President John F. Kennedy, it has acquired a derogatory meaning, implying a paranoid tendency to see the influence of some malign covert agency in events.

referencing the book 20th Century Words by John Ayto (1999).

I'm aware that the quoted text from the German Wikipedia is weasely and jargony, and as a whole the text is unsupportable. But it does contain one clear claim, namely that the derogatory meaning of the term "conspiracy theory" noted by the English Wikipedia did not just come about by chance, but was specifically promoted by the CIA.

I would like to know whether this claim, that the CIA facilitated (by means unknown to me) a semantic change of the term "conspiracy theory" for the worse, is supported by facts.

The supposed purpose of this would have been to discredit critics of the report of the Warren commission, but this is not the main thing I'm interested in.

A. Donda
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    I don't see how this can be meaningfully answered. What is "heterodox" is a personal opinion, what is effectively "legitimized" is another personal opinion, what constitutes "supporting conspiracy theories" is also a personal opinion. – Sklivvz Aug 07 '15 at 17:07
  • @Sklivvz, I agree the WP quote is pretty jargony. But the core question I asked in the title does not depend on the words "heterodox" and "support". And "delegitimize" is actually my translation of "unglaubwürdig machen", another translation would be "discredit". IMHO the question "Did the CIA promote the use of the concept “conspiracy theory” to discredit critics?", especially w.r.t. doubts about the JFK assasination, is relatively clear, isn't it? Would it help if I change the wording and formulate this question again explicitly in the text? – A. Donda Aug 07 '15 at 17:40
  • What I mean is: was 9/11 a conspiracy? depending on what you believe, then you can count it as an example of the CIA (or US gov) to discredit people, or not. – Sklivvz Aug 07 '15 at 18:04
  • I'm not convinced. The idea is roughly this: Someone has doubts about the findings of the Warren Commission. These doubts can be discredited by saying, "oh, that's just a conspiracy theory". Independently of whether you believe there was a conspiracy or whether those doubts are based on crazy paranoid ideas, it is a factual question whether the CIA used the term with the purpose to discredit. Even if in a subjective opinion the object of discrediting would somehow "deserve" it, the action of discrediting is still a fact, isn't it? – A. Donda Aug 07 '15 at 18:34
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    @Sklivvz: Of course 9/11 was a conspiracy. The question is who the conspirators were, al Qaeda or the CIA? – jamesqf Aug 07 '15 at 18:46
  • I believe the above [two](http://skeptics.stackexchange.com/questions/28701/did-the-cia-promote-the-use-of-the-concept-conspiracy-theory-to-deligitimize-c?noredirect=1#comment109547_28701) [comments](http://skeptics.stackexchange.com/questions/28701/did-the-cia-promote-the-use-of-the-concept-conspiracy-theory-to-deligitimize-c?noredirect=1#comment109549_28701) already show we don't agree on what constitutes a "conspiracy" and whether that is a dismissive term... – Sklivvz Aug 07 '15 at 19:29
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    Nice, a conspiracy meta-theory. But why stop there? Maybe this claim is being spread in order to discredit the CIA. Or maybe the CIA is spreading the claim that this claim is being spread by its detractors, in order to discredit *them*. Etc... – Nate Eldredge Aug 07 '15 at 20:11
  • @Sklivvz, ok, I give up. That "conspiracy theory" is a dismissive term is to my knowledge not disputed, see only https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conspiracy_theory#Acquired_derogatory_meaning. And I don't see how it is OK that this question is being put on hold by a single person, only because they personally don't agree with this sentiment. As I said, I'm open to improving my question, but apparently I'm being stopped in my tracks. – A. Donda Aug 07 '15 at 20:59
  • @NateEldredge, I would call it a meta-conspiracy theory. But I'm not proposing it, the claim has been made by others, apparently even in a book by an academic (de Haven-Smith is a prof at U of Florida), and I'm interested to know whether it holds any water. I assumed skeptics.SE is the place to ask such things. – A. Donda Aug 07 '15 at 21:01
  • @Sklivvz, once more, the question is not about what constitutes a "conspiracy", but about a particular alleged event in the semantic history, if you will, of the *term* "conspiracy theory". – A. Donda Aug 07 '15 at 21:08
  • I thoroughly revised my question, making clearer which specific claim I'm interested in here, and also changed the title accordingly. As far as I can tell, all criticism voiced in the comments should be addressed by this. – A. Donda Aug 08 '15 at 12:56
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    The question remains unclear. I'm not even sure what "the US government does not support conspiracy theories any more" means. Let's lose the English translation of the German summary of the English claim, and just go straight to the [source of the claim](http://www.amazon.com/Conspiracy-Theory-America-Discovering/dp/0292757697), and find a specific claim in there that you doubt. – Oddthinking Aug 08 '15 at 16:09
  • @Oddthinking, I understand and agree that the quote is unclear. That doesn't mean my question is unclear, does it? That question is given in italics towards the end of the text. This question I boiled down to its bare bones, and I do believe an answer of the form "yes it is supported by facts" or "no it isn't" should be possible now. So are you saying, I cannot ask a question about this until I've read the book myself? Isn't it possible to leave my question open in case someone here knows about this? – A. Donda Aug 09 '15 at 13:15
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    @A.Donda: We try to make sure our questions are about notable claims, to avoid wasting time. This question seems to be based on a rather mangled and unclear claim, with your own, non-notable intepretation of what the author meant. It would seem to be more sensible to quote the author of the claim to prevent us tackling a strawman argument. – Oddthinking Aug 09 '15 at 15:45
  • This question appears to be asking whether a certain claim is true, but there's no evidence of the claim itself being made. The sources cited claim that the CIA tried to discredit JFK conspiracy theories, not discredit the term "conspiracy theory". – AmbroseChapel Aug 10 '15 at 00:42
  • I guess that if the first time the term "conspiracy theory" was used in a derogatory way it was by the CIA, that would justify this particular conspiracy theory. – Benjol Aug 10 '15 at 11:50
  • @Benjol, exactly my thinking, which is why I believe my question is sufficiently clear to be answered. But apparently the powers that be disagree. – A. Donda Aug 10 '15 at 18:57
  • This is an interesting start: [Google Ngram Viewer](https://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=conspiracy+theory%2Ccover-up&year_start=1800&year_end=2000&corpus=15&smoothing=3&share=&direct_url=t1%3B%2Cconspiracy%20theory%3B%2Cc0%3B.t1%3B%2Ccover%20-%20up%3B%2Cc0) apparently conspiracy theory just wasn't used that much at all before the 60s. – Benjol Aug 11 '15 at 05:28
  • Related: [Was the term "conspiracy theorist" made popular by the CIA?](http://skeptics.stackexchange.com/q/31319) –  Jan 08 '16 at 23:29

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