While working my way through college and from time to time since, I have served as research assistant for somebody who was working on a dissertation or some similar project. And every once in awhile it is in an area that I have just enough knowledge to be dangerous and in which the alarm bells sometimes went off that what was being put down on paper, so to speak, was not entirely kosher. Well of course the research assistant can't intervene or say much--not if she wants references and a chance to work ever again--but one time I happened to be working for a person I knew very well on a social level. And finally I asked him if he had considered whether a particular set of statistics and data he was including might be flawed? He looked straight at me and said that if I ever repeated it, he would deny it, but of course they were flawed. But he had to include them to get to the conclusion he felt he had to defend. And sure enough, when that work was peer reviewed, he was careful to make sure it would be reviewed by 'peers' who would not question that material. And they didn't. And no doubt, over the years since, others have incorporated some or all of that 'rigged' study into their own research.
Fortunately such unethical methods are not common among honorable educators, theologians, and scientists, but it happens often enough, I think, that those of us who want the truth instead of just a scholarly looking argument will double check and cross check what we use for evidence before trusting it entirely.
But because so many don't care whether they link honest information or propaganda on these message boards and don't want to even think their point of view might be flawed, we invariably have those circular arguments of did too - did not - is too - is not. Many don't even bother to really read what they link because they don't care what it says. And to me those kinds of arguments--you can't really call them discussions or debate--become really boring really fast.
I blame modern education that is focused almost entirely on dogma, doctrine, propaganda, and that indoctrinates rather than teach and encourage critical thinking skills.