Where is the line between conspiracy theorist

[umpteennamechanges]

...and actual mental illness?

I have at least a couple of people I know who have gone FULL ON conspiracy theorist over COVID.

I mean the whole nine yards - the virus doesn't exist, it's the 'deep state' trying to control us as part of the 'Great Reset' which is the 'deep state's' agenda to introduce the 4th Reich. She knows because she has gone through a spiritual awakening...more crazy people are aware of the 'real facts' now because it's part of a 'great awakening'.

It's actually led me to wonder where is the line between 'not mentally ill but believes a conspiracy' and 'in psychosis'?

Where does one cross over to the other?

Is there someone who works in mental health that could give an idea?

I'm in no way close enough to the people involved to take any action either way so it's just curiosity really.

I attach some of her posts...

And I say this as someone who has bipolar disorder.

I mean...I have a serious mental illness. So how the fuck are all these people the 'normal' people and I'm the mentally ill one?

I've seen so many people copy and paste that same text on Facebook today

@Stationfork

I've seen so many people copy and paste that same text on Facebook today

I mean...it's so weird.

I feel like these people are really on the edge between sanity and serious mental unwellness.

It's like watching someone have a serious mental breakdown, but kind of a collective mental breakdown so they have all convinced each other that they are the sane ones.

Because...what is sanity?

Usually, if you think the CIA is 'after you' and everyone else thinks that's nuts then you are diagnosed with some kind of mental illness due to psychosis.

But what if 20% of people agreed with you. Are you still nuts? What if 50% agree?

It starts to dig up some weirdly deep questions I think 🤔

Also what will happen to these people once we all get vaccinated and things return more or less to normal?

Do they recover?

Do they have a full mental breakdown now that reality so clearly contravenes the 'truth' they believed in?

Do they go deeper into the conspiracy like those cults that keep moving back the day the world ends?

Is there any precedent for this scale of collective weirdness?

It can go on for millennia - see also religion

So if I read her message and accept it, then what? What changes?

The first thing you attached read like satire, if I saw it on any of my friends feeds I'd assume it was tongue in cheek.

There’s one one here who got obsessed with me not believing her, I made a comment to another poster and apparently “there I was again getting my knickers in a twist” when I pointed out I wasn’t the one so very upset some one didn’t believe me and that she was quite welcome to believe in fairytales I wasn’t going to convince her other wise. Her response was “I can’t believe your not curious about the world”

Oh I am, I’m autistic, so the slightest thing I tend to know what it is, how it works and why.

I however just tend to find the answers in this really weird thing called oh science!! The thing that can be proved to be true!

I’ve also had one tell me they can’t be bothered to spoon feed me (nonsense) because I was countering them with science every time and they ran out of arguenent

@Love51

So if I read her message and accept it, then what? What changes?

The first thing you attached read like satire, if I saw it on any of my friends feeds I'd assume it was tongue in cheek.

Sadly it isn't.

She has also gone out of her way to find and friend people who think exactly as she does so her latest thing is setting up a Telegram group on 'Resisting the Great Reset' for which these other mentally unwell? people have thanked her and declared her a 'true spiritual leader'

I was briefly looking on Google for some kind of info on the line between conspiracy theorist and mentally unwell/psychosis and found this which suggests conspiracy theory 'addiction' as a response to anxiety and loss of control.

Quite interesting...

www.addictioncenter.com/drugs/conspiracy-theory-addiction/

I just meant my friends are sarcastic cynics, I'm sure people do mean it! I wonder about the person who wrote it in the first place though. What's in it for him (her)? Notoriety?
There is a link between mental illness and addiction (because the drugs are a mal-adaptive way of managing the mental illness) and I've noticed a sort of triad with believing weird bullshit. I noticed it at uni - why is this strange message being revealed to people who can't function effectively? And although they are trying to warn me that can't form a coherent sentence to tell me what about!

Hahaha OP I think we have the same Facebook friend.

The person on my Facebook proudly talks about cutting off family members and friends who have disagreed with her views or raised concerns about her mental health.

Seriously though. These types have been around for years, but COVID seems to have brought them all out of the woodwork, I've never known anything like it.

I've been wondering about this myself, OP. I'm not a doctor, but there must be a fine line between these things. And if you did get someone assessed, not all doctors agree with each other. Not all psychiatrists agree with each other, if they were to see the same patient. If you think someone may be mentally ill, at what point does your opinion or belief become a fact? I don't know if there's always a definitive answer. It's very difficult.