Research does not mean you did an experiment or a study. Those can easily be part of your research, but research IS being told things by somebody else. That’s true even if you’re researching the depiction of childrearing in 1840’s Poland.
And guess what? If you publish that research, other people may use what you say in their research.
Even people who perform studies and experiments do research along with it, and that also involves using what other people have said before.
If you look up a damn toaster on Consumer Reports before buying one, or read a game review on Kotaku before buying that, you’re doing research. Your own research.
The problem is not “doing your own research.” The problem is using terrible sources for your research, which people do because they don’t know any better, and the cost of doing it that way is low.
There’s really no negative consequence of googling Ivermectin until midnight and clicking exclusively on QAnon sites to read about it. Not for you, anyway. You’re not even in danger of accidentally purchasing a terrible toaster.
By that I’m not saying that you should get an electric shock each time you click on one of those sites (though the thought is kind of appealing). But the solution is also not to tell people that they’re incapable of doing good research because they’re not and never will be experts.
Nobody’s born a scientist or expert. It’s not an inherent quality. Today’s scientists and experts were all, every single one, at some point doing their own research. A ton of it.
If what you want to say is that people are doing garbage research because they’re consulting garbage sources, then say that. That identifies the actual problem. The problem is not that they failed to get a degree before reading a bunch of other people’s words and forming an opinion— that’s a GOOD thing to do. That’s what responsible adults should do, actually.
The problem is that they don’t think critically while doing it. They have no idea what confirmation bias is, and would never admit being pervious to it. The result of that is, as these memes point out, an inability to identify a trustworthy source and a lack of desire to try.
So say that. Stop acting like scientists and experts are infallible, and other people need to shut up forever. After all, most of us aren’t scientists or experts, either. And we’re not shutting up— nor should we.