The notion of "fact checker" is semantic slight of hand meant to give such people an undeserved veneer of special credibility beyond the weak credibility of journalists. It lulls people into a false sense of security. "He's not a journalist. He's a FACT CHECKER. Oooo, trustworthy!" It's an arrogant title that arrogates the supposed authority to check facts and offer pronouncements on them.
All journalists, for example, are supposed to verify their claims (they don't, but that's a dereliction of duty). But here comes the "fact checker". "Stand aside, you unwashed masses. I have special access to the truth that you don't have! I have the means of verifying claims that go beyond the paltry powers of the journalist. I am...the FACT CHECKER MAN!"
The point is that the fact checker does not transcend the journalist. Investigative reporters are "fact checkers" but without the Ministry-of-Truth title of "fact checker" that's supposed to shut down conversation and ram through the "fact checker's" preferred narrative and accounting of the "facts".
Journalists are supposed to fact check, but "fact checkers" like Snopes got into the business for checking non-journalistic sources. Snopes was founded for debunking urban legends, which spread by word of mouth rather than media.
Since then the line between word-of-mouth and journalism has blurred. Journalists don't always fact check (or even explicitly slant their news to mislead), and word-of-mouth goes far beyond urban legends into current events. Snopes' focus isn't the news, per se, but the news as reported via social media. That is sometimes repetition of a supposedly-reliable news source being circulated, or it may require them to run down the original source.
There are now "fact checkers" who make the journalists themselves their primary target, which is both an unfortunate consequence of the way journalism has slipped standards and something that should have existed in the first place to prevent that. They're not supposed to be a Ministry of Truth, but just another source of journalism doing what journalists are supposed to do.
If a "fact checker" is themselves biased, all you can do is build up a web of trust for who is doing good work and who isn't. The good fact checkers have a history of doing it right. Which includes correcting themselves when they do it wrong.
Fact checkers reconcile memes/news media against primary sources/other news media while adding context, references, and journalistic integrity. Yes, they're human and inevitably bring their own biases, but do you really think we shouldn't have some folks doing that job?
I think you're trying to draw too fine a line. Fact-checking is definitionally part of the editorial process. In publications that don't have separate fact-checking departments, it would literally be part of the editor's job description.
> ...do you really think we shouldn't have some folks doing that job?
Yes. 100% it should be nobody's job to do this for you. Everyone should be doing that job for themselves. A society devolves to madness when people delegate verification of their world view to people chosen specifically for this purpose.
All journalists, for example, are supposed to verify their claims (they don't, but that's a dereliction of duty). But here comes the "fact checker". "Stand aside, you unwashed masses. I have special access to the truth that you don't have! I have the means of verifying claims that go beyond the paltry powers of the journalist. I am...the FACT CHECKER MAN!"
The point is that the fact checker does not transcend the journalist. Investigative reporters are "fact checkers" but without the Ministry-of-Truth title of "fact checker" that's supposed to shut down conversation and ram through the "fact checker's" preferred narrative and accounting of the "facts".