Earlier quoted context omitted.
Upvote back to +1, just because I think it's interesting how words fairly arbitrarily acquire strong signed (positive or negative) meanings, e.g. awful vs. awesome, collaboration vs. collusion. It's not at all stable across languages. If you call someone a "collabo" (collaborator) in France, that's a huge insult (referring to Nazi collaborators in the Vichy era).
I think my comment is valid and on-topic. People make fun of conspiracy theories, but the fact is that conspiracies go on all the time. There is even a crime called "conspiracy", after all. It would be better to say "implausible crank theories" or something when that is what one refers to.
I find it amusing when well-meaning people try to dictate what a given word or phrase should mean. Language evolves in a chaotic way, often against logical arguments. You might be right, but "conspiracy theory" already has an established meaning, and you are not going to change that.