Sorry, I can't watch some videos where I am at. But, I noticed this in a comment below.
They can then choose to accept, accept with changes or decline. All of which comes with comments. If the paper is declined it is usually because either it doesn't fit the journal or it is not good.
If someone proposes an alternate theory that is not accepted by the journal, then you won't be published. Sometimes it turns in to a Catch 22. You can't be published unless you are part of the group. You can't be part of the group unless you are published.
This is an issue found when Ben Davidson tried to get a NASA scientist who refuted his research to review his research. He told him to get his alternate theory on the Sun and the connection to Earth quakes published and peer reviewed, before would look at it.
Sometimes, but the example you gave makes perfect sense to me. Why would a NASA scientist waste their time with every crank (not saying Ben is a crank, I know nothing about his claims) they refuted? It would be like asking a car repairman to work on your airplane engine. Sure, it's related, but wouldn't it be better to submit to a journal who's livelihood and profession directly deal with reviewing scientific claims? That's what they do. That's the role of the editor.
True.
In this particular case, the NASA scientist called out Ben and then refused to review his work.
Does that matter? The burden of proof is on those who are willing to go through scientific peer review. Sounds to me Ben was given good advice. If he thinks his work is above reproach, it should be easy to get published.
He tried to get it published. They told him he had to be peer reviewed first.
In the end he had to get peer reviewed outside of the established community and published that way. Not 6 months later, the established scientific community is releasing similar papers.
Peer review is not a separate thing, it occurs as a part of the submission process and is done by the journal you submit to. It is not done by the researcher. It is a tool for the editor to know whether other experts in the field can find scientific validity in the work. The editor then takes their recommendations into consideration, if the comments are too bad (and the article is hogwash) it's rejected. If the reviewers say ... Well maybe but I want to know "blah" then the reviews are sent back and the author gets a few months to respond, make changes and resubmit. Then the process repeats. Until the reviewers and editor are satisfied in the quality of the work.