Because pseudoscience relies on being able to sell itself as nonfiction to potential viewers it has to disguise itself well enough to pass as something credible enough to be believed. An excellent way to do this is to co opt a format that people have been trained to trust, and to do it well enough that people aren’t motivated to question the claims being made.
We grow up watching documentaries. In school teachers often show programs related to a topic being studied, and so we learn to trust that they are selling true information rather than falsehoods. There are certain markers that we learn to accept as part of the documentary format: talking head interviews, people with PhDs, a narrator with a particular kind of voice and inflection, and certain pieces of camerawork.
TV and movies mimic these tricks is to elicit a special kind of believability that they might not otherwise have. However, with fictional examples like The Office or Best In Show the documentary aspect is never taken far enough to make it seem like they are claiming to be nonfiction. The names of actors, writers, and producers are listed as credits to remind the viewer that what they are seeing is actually a carefully curated version of reality.
The critical difference between these fun and harmless TV shows/movies and the psuedoarchological documentaries that air on the History channel and other networks is their relationship with the truth. Programs use the cloak of trusted documentary tropes to lure their viewers into complacency, and then never make an effort to clarify that what they’re selling is actually a giant candy covered horse turd.
Programs like Ancient Aliens pray on our ingrained trust of a certain format, and then use that trust to exploit the basic human desire for knowledge. They discourage critical thinking in order to trick viewers into believing their hoaxes.
The dagger comes in the element of belief. If a person falls into the mindset of believing whatever these programs are trying to tell them they lose their ability to make informed decisions for themselves. It’s also worth mentioning that psuedoarchaeological programs often have racist or xenophobic undertones– why is it so hard to believe that Egyptians were able to build they pyramids all by themselves? (Hint, the answer is racism).
Right now we live in a world where racism and xenophobia are powered by ignorance fed to us through the media. It is dividing our society and leading us down a destructive path. I think that it’s worth arguing that any program that relies more on fiction than fact when selling itself as the truth warrants a close look. Why are certain members of our society so fascinated with a tailor made version of the truth, and what can we do to fix it?