This essay by T.L. Knighton is well worth the read.

I came across it after googling the name of the narrator of a ridiculous “documentary” series on Netflix. In fact, I hesitate to call it a documentary because it wasn’t a documentary — the series consisted of a person (who was not qualified to talk about what she was talking about) who spent several hours perpetuating ridiculous fringe theories, pseudoscience, and “OMG GOVERNMENT COVER-UP!”-type things.

These quotes from his post sum up the problem with these faux documentary series:

They all present it the same way.  A bit of pseudoscience, an “expert” presented as the definitive source, and a bit of rebuttal over conventional wisdom, all without really presenting the facts that lead to conventional wisdom being conventional. […]

They present someone as an authority, then present a one-sided version of the discussion as if it were the complete and total truth.

T.L. Knighton, ” Why You Should Never Take It At Face Value”

The point, he says, is that documentaries that present facts in this way are problematic because the damage they cause is very real. By presenting fringe theories as fact, fallacies get perpetuated. Then you get the general population believing that vaccines are dangerous, or that a particular virus was bio-engineered to kill the population.

Treat things you are unsure of or unfamiliar with with skepticism. Don’t take things at face value.