Husband has got extreme views

I see a lot of people calling CT unintelligent. I think CT are a pernicious and dangerous movement. But its simply not true that the people who hold them are unintelligent. The CT I knew were intelligent people.

CT are a much more complex phenomena than that. To reduce it to ' lack of intelligence' is, well, not an intelligent thing to do.

Look at gender theory/ the trans movement. It is clearly not true that a man can be a woman. It is patently not true that it is a nebulous and undefinable sense of gender identity, rather than sex, makes one a woman or a man. It patently not true that sex is not binary. It is patently not true that it is safe or fair on women to get rid of sex segregated spaces and services. All the data is against these claims by gender theorists. Yet intelligent people still hold all these untrue, and demonstrably, untrue positions. Intelligent people will hold false positions when their motivation for doing so it high enough. We all need to be on the look out for this in ourselves.

My husband is very similar. He has CPTSD and I think this triggered it. I’ve also recently learnt that he is a narcissist and possibly has bipolar disorder. He won’t consider the latter two. He’s very grandiose and won’t see doctors or have therapy because he thinks he knows better than everyone else or that they are just trying to sell under pressure of pharmaceutical giants etc. He’s basically a lost cause. It’s damaged my mental health so much that we’ve recently separated. You Tube is a great source of research. Look up Dr Ramini about narcissism to see if that’s a possibility. If it is then I would recommend leaving because things will only get worse.

What are the six repeatable conspiracy theories please?

I wouldn’t be able to continue the relationship.

A close friends husband went like this during covid; it reached its peak when my mum died a traumatic, awful death due to covid which left me with PTSD. He proceeded to rant to me that covid isn’t real and she couldn’t have died from it - the friendship ended even with my friend because in my grief I was so hurt that her husband was saying such things and I didn’t want to continue a friendship with a woman (or man) who was married to someone like that.
We've not spoken since.

Autistic people are over-represented in extremist movements though, including incel culture. Its not a reach to suggest it as a possibility.

You may find it tiresome when autism is offered as a possibility, but I find it tiresome when people complain about autism being offered as an explanation for behaviours which are associated with autism.

I agree wholeheartedly!

I couldn't sustain a relationship with somebody with unreasonable beliefs. I could be with someone who believed in God (although I don’t) but not if they believed that, for example, the bible was literally true, that the earth was made in 6 days, 4,000 years ago. So if they believed that scripture was allegorical rather than literally true. And the same about all the other religions and their scriptures.

A flat earther? Wouldn't waste my time on them. Neither would I waste my time with a brexiteer; the resentment would keep me awake at night...🤣🤣

Ah, silly me, I should have known, thank you. Personally, I'm a believer in the Great A'Tuin, the astral chelonian. Much better visuals. Oh, I miss Pratchett. I need him to make sense of the current chaos.

There's something about a direction of travel. He didn't have all these views when you married him right? It's as if he is getting more extreme and strange views as time goes by. It would be like marrying someone who wasn't religious or had relatively mainstream religious beliefs and over time they became creationist and stop believing in evolution or they start to prepare for the Rapture.

No we'd only get eaten by the Nephilim roaming the great ice wall... (I have really heard that one, hand on heart)
To be fair to some of those conspiracies, creatively speaking some of them end up sounding like Game of Thrones (cool if you're into the fantasy genre).

It does sound like it could be a manifestation of poor MH. The issue with faith is that only feeling faith proves it but if you want to say the moon landings didn’t you need a very coherent narrative to explain how the 12 who have been all agree they did, how the rock samples have been consistent, how equipment left behind generates data for Scientists who use it, how the data gathered plentiful and ultimately if the boffins who work the current science programs don’t see the gaps why he would expect to. I would find this very hard to tolerate for very long.

A friend became a conspiracy theorist in lockdown and she became ever more fixated on bizarre theories. Ultimately she withdrew from life and friends and her marriage failed. I never knew her ex that well but we are Facebook friends and god he looks happier! I feel real sadness for what she has lost out on and hope it hasn’t caused her daughter too much harm. I hope he recovers as you can’t live well together without respect.

Flat earthers. Do any of them know where the edge js? Can we visit it? Does it end in a big waterfall? Or is there just land with a massive drop into er, what? Space? Please let us know, we need more adventurous holidays. Most important òf all, can we fall off the edge? I think we should be told.

I’m not sure I could live with this - I’m also quite an educated person who leans to the left. Probably his views on immigration would do it for me.

What is he reading could it be that his social media algorims keep feeding him this stuff, so much fake news AI driven political nonsense been pedalled about on Facebook. Is he following regulated news channels? Other than challenging the views and reducing the content I’m not sure what else you can do. People can believe anything they want but I agree living around people who are vocal about them must be exhausting.

Why does it matter if they are wrong unless they are harming someone?

I have an issue with organised religion but I can still recognise that there are plenty of intelligent people who get great comfort from it and it guides them to lead better lives.

Calling them thick doesn’t give you the moral superiority you think but instead makes you look closed minded as if you were saying “if you don’t share my world view you must be stupid…”

The bit about immigration and the great replacement theory indicates to me that it's also political, as it always ends up being. Unfortunately, a lot of those conspiracy theories stem from the same source and their agenda is nasty. The more eccentric ones may seem harmless (flat earth, moon landing) but they all share one thing: learn to distrust science and government institutions. Replace all known facts by a faith based system (conspiracies are a belief system), and make the white male great again... Beware as it could have real life consequences for you and your DC (refusing vaccinations or questioning or undermining your rights as a woman). What I'm saying may never come to pass but I have first-hand experience through someone close which I've essentially lost to that bullshit. It's like a cult. Only he can drag himself out of the pit.

There may some outward difference, but they are both wrong. 🙄

And both probably a bit thick.

It would only irritate me if he was chewing my ear off every day and boring me with it.

It wouldn't bother me if I was married to someone who had different views on immigration or how the world works.

Everyone is entitled to their opinion.

He is being indoctrinated and radicalised online as I assume he wasn’t like this when you married him? He needs help as he has clearly started to see the world in an irrational way. It’s all very negative and I imagine draining. Encourage him to see a health professional.

I think this is different to someone who is religious. Most religious people have been brought up that way and it's about more than the beliefs, its also about community and culture. Most truly religious people I know (unless they've very recently converted) are very tolerant of non believers and don't talk about their religion much unless asked.

Someone who believes the earth is flat is just stupid in my opinion (sorry). The complete lack of logic and inability to argue (countering every argument with 'that's what they want you to believe/ you're just brainwashed' would personally be a complete deal breaker for me.

However it might not be a deal breaker for everyone, I think it's a completely personal thing if you find it intolerable or not.

It's not a 'go to explanation' for all @PeriJane where have I said that? Just in ones persons specific case this may have made them more vulnerable along with additional mental health crisis. I think the situation is far more nuance and complex, people get sucked in for all different kinds of reasons! Noone would deny that some neurotypical people also believe in extreme and implausible conspiracy theories such as flat earth. What are the reasons for this, perhaps lack of education/critical thinking skills, mental health issues, drugs induced paranoia, needing to feel part of something bigger, boredom with life/midlife crisis, echo chambers and internet algorithms resulting in convergent thinking...ad infinitum. I have noticed the people I've witnessed who have been involved in this area are all men in their 50's. Could be bias though as I've worked with many people in this particular bracket, or maybe this generation were not brought up with the internet like the generations before. Who knows? But I do find it interesting and perhaps also an emerging problem for society as a whole, and even perhaps democracy.

Tbh i think a lot of differences can be overcome but values really need to align.

Are we talking a curiosity in these things or dogmatic agreement? How does he act if you disagree? Is he getting more extreme? How would you feel if he taught your children this stuff? If he sticks with this is it good enough?

Umm he is not respecting her views though is he?

OP says he “goes on about it” and if she says she disagrees, he tells her she is wrong? I don’t think that is respectful is it. She’s not constantly saying her views to him.

It’s no bad thing to critique the government and protest about issues that matter to you for sure. But that’s quite different to believing the earth is flat and not knowing why, because you’re down a rabbit hole of believing online preachers. Just like blindly believing immigration to be the root of all issues in our current society.

This, basically.

Conspiracy and anti-science thinking does tend to go hand in hand with mental illness, so I'd tread carefully OP.

Years ago I bent over backwards to accommodate a DP's increasingly odd thinking, until he lost the plot completely (now in jail, as I discovered from the national press! - but probably has undiagnosed schizophrenia). It was such a shame, as he was great in bed!!! I think that's why I made such an effort to accept his "different" worldview, but looking back on it the whole thing was bonkers.

Whilst religious people hold sone weird views I think the difference is most aren’t talking about them 24/7