Noam Chomsky,contrasts conspiracy theory as more or less the opposite of institutional analysis, which focuses mostly on the public, long-term behaviour of publicly known institutions, as recorded in, for example, scholarly documents or mainstream media reports, rather than secretive coalitions of individuals. So if anyone seeks to analyse what we are fed by the mainstream media we can be dismissed as loons in tin hats. Of course nothing happens unless people challenge the structures within society and I am very glad some people do not neatly tick boxes with the way that they think.
Also historically conspiracy theories were seen in a neutral light as simply putting forward an oppositional view. In recent times conspirators have been largely silenced by a move to make all oppositional views seem "coooky" I wonder why?
When a conspiracy is retrospectively analysed and found to be true the emphasis shifts from it being a conspiracy which was proven correct to it being a historical fact. Nixon, watergate, CIA dealing drugs, the CIA training al-Qaeda, many of the events that occurred during the cold war and the reasons behind our involvement in chile through to the assassination of lincoln.
One of the really fundamental characteristics of traditional, right wing, torry thinking seems to be that we must not challenge the status quo (this is a tory philosophy) we must not challenge institutions and structures, dominance and hierarchy. Just look at Gove for a clear picture of how torries like to set society in a backwards aspic mixture of floral pinnies, pith hats and cupcakes. It's a lie and a sham and life in the 50's was never full of singing steel workers, bonnie babies and happy housewives, now that, I might say is also a conspiracy.