So recently, governments have been using 'conspiracy theorist' to attack basically anyone who does not accept government narratives. If you don't believe in their good will and morality, you are a conspiracy theorist. In fact, a local paper once claimed that people who believe that politicians are corrupt, or that the media is pushing an agenda, are conspiracy theorists. So much for that.
It doesn't matter if it actually involves a conspiracy or not. For example, if you believe that 9/11 was an inside job, then you are a conspiracy theorist. However, if you believe that the Nord Stream sabotage was NOT an inside job, you are a conspiracy theorist. The only thing those two have in common is that you are not a conspiracy theorist if you say the US government did nothing wrong.
Regardless of the double standards, the problem is the conspiracies do happen. Now, what actually is a conspiracy theorist? Because there are a good number of totally whacked people out there, who believe in wildly implausible conspiracies.
My best way to explain it is as follows: people who exclusively or preferentially explain things with 'conspiracies' are conspiracy theorists.
Eh I think you dodged it by forcing us to define conspiracies instead.
Conspiracy theorist is less a mode of thinking and more of a label attached to people who believe certain common explanations. It's more of a (fan) club. Everybody believes in conspiracies. If you believe in the ones that use to be on Coast to Coast then you're a conspiracy theorist.
Not necessarily conspiracies, as some conspiracies are real. So the mere fact that someone asserts or hypothesizes a 'conspiracy' is not proof positive that he is crazy. But there are crazy people out there, and many of them think a lot of things are going on that ain't.
Now, I'm a bit more familiar with conspiracy thinking, because the favored explanation for everything in my country of origin is a conspiracy. It's sort of a reverse Ockham's razor.
I don't think I'm trying to say that believing in conspiracies makes people crazy.