Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. Flexible and made to last.

Meet the Other Phone.
Flexible and made to last.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Talk
Covid

Mumsnet doesn't verify the qualifications of users. If you have medical concerns, please consult a healthcare professional.

Original poster

Conspiracy rantings from friends?

137 replies

julieca · 01/12/2021 07:01

I am not interested in hearing conspiracy views around coronavirus on this thread.
Does anyone else have friends who believe in some of the conspiracy theories around coronavirus? I have one friend who is lovely, and this has taken me by total surprise. She is generally liberal, a bit left-wing and as a brown woman a bit suspicious of government. But I have never heard any conspiracy theory stuff from her before.
Now she rants on social media about vaccines and what they might be injecting us with, the nefarious reasons they are trying to make us have a vaccine, and how it is all about controlling us to introduce a fascist state.
I just find it really difficult. I suspect she is very anxious and this is a way to deal with it. But any gentle enquiries about her mental health just lead into a rant about how I am living in fear and she is shocked that I would fall for this hysteria and submit to authority.
Is anyone else dealing with this? How do you respond or deal with it? I feel in a way like I have lost a friend. Its such a weird situation I would never have predicted could happen.

OP posts:
sleepwouldbenice · 02/12/2021 00:30

@Hawkins001

The thing that puzzles me, is some people read a couple of articles on a website, or see a.couple of YouTube videos and suddenly they are the lone, gunmen or fox Mulder and dana scully. If your perspectives warrant sharing , at least they could have plenty of research to back it up.
I think the problem is it's like everything on social media. Once you start looking then more and more comes up on your feeds or whatever so you see more and more articles that validate your view or take you deeper

I have a social media friend ( from online, we've never met) who has really fallen deep. But in that time her Facebook friends have gone from c1000 to c4000 and nearly all the new friends are antivax. So that's what she will see all day every day. And that's just Facebook

I've snoozed her and just pop on occasionally to like non anti vaccine posts

WhatMattersMost · 02/12/2021 09:30

@Wowwhatalife

But…what if they’re all right, and we’re all wrong 🤷🏻‍♀️It worries me tbf!
But they will be right on a number of things. That's not the point for me. The point is that any kind of black and white thinking - something is "all good" or "all bad" - is unrealistic and maladaptive. Shades of grey are often difficult to handle psychologically and emotionally, so many of us split one way or the other.
hyperbyke · 02/12/2021 09:38

@Wowwhatalife

But…what if they’re all right, and we’re all wrong 🤷🏻‍♀️It worries me tbf!
Right about what? The vaccines are poison? The Earth is flat? Wildfires are caused by Jewish space lasers?

I'll take my chances.

bumbleymummy · 02/12/2021 09:42

Hmmm. Depends on what you mean by ‘conspiracy theories’. Vaccine passports, mandates and quarantine camps were considered ‘conspiracy theories’ a few years ago and look what is now considered acceptable in countries across the world.

bibop · 02/12/2021 09:43

@TheFormidableMrsC

Yes I lost a friend. She currently believes she's has cured her Covid with vitamins and knows more than the Doctors on ICU. All you need is big doses of Vitamin C. Covid is no big deal according to her. She blocked me when I questioned her. She won't be having a "DNA altering" vaccine either. I could go on and on. What worries me is sensible mutual friends have totally fallen in with this line of thinking because of her. It's dangerous to say the very least.
All kinds of things can alter and damage our DNA. I didn't know this until recently but breathing in petrol fumes at the pump can damage DNA. DNA can get damaged by toxins, and then subsequently repaired all the time. So even if a vaccine damages DNA, our bodies know how to repair it. It's not a problem.
50ShadesOfCatholic · 02/12/2021 09:48

@bumbleymummy

Hmmm. Depends on what you mean by ‘conspiracy theories’. Vaccine passports, mandates and quarantine camps were considered ‘conspiracy theories’ a few years ago and look what is now considered acceptable in countries across the world.
That isn't true at all. For starters, c19 was only discovered in late 2019 and not outside of China until 2020 so "a few years ago" it wasn't even a thing.

Quarantine was introduced immediately in many countries, it was always on the cards, vax passes were mooted late into 2020, as were mandates though no country could introduce a mandate until vaccines had been available to everyone.

femfemlicious · 02/12/2021 09:50

A lot of black and brown people are VERY suspicious about the vaccine. They make me feel like im going to turn into a werewolf when i say ive had it. They act like im dooomed!

50ShadesOfCatholic · 02/12/2021 09:54

@femfemlicious

A lot of black and brown people are VERY suspicious about the vaccine. They make me feel like im going to turn into a werewolf when i say ive had it. They act like im dooomed!
That I can understand. People of colour have every reason to mistrust government. Vax programmes need to be delivered by community leaders, not the usual white-middle-class-led authorities.
Original poster
julieca · 02/12/2021 10:06

I know that. Which is why many leaders and well known people have been speaking out in support.
I know the government haven't helped by constantly lying. I get all the time - see they lied about this. That is true. It doesn't mean that vax conspiracies are true though.

OP posts:
ILoveHuskies · 02/12/2021 10:08

Yep. the mum of dd12's best mate

She removed (Dds best mate) her dd out of school at the beginning of year 7 due to being unhappy with the covid rules like masks and bubbles etc (which actually I can understand). but genuinely believing the max COVID conspiracies like "they" would take your kids away if they got covid and all sorts of batshit stuff

Her dd is apparently "unschooled" now. While her and her dh sit around smoking weed and talking to other conspiracy nuts online

Sometimes I have her dd over for a sleepover, she says misses school and has no friends other then my dd. She never goes anywhere or sees anyone and is allowed to just please herself, no set bedtimes, no schoolwork, no set wake up times. It really worries me 😞

Original poster
julieca · 02/12/2021 10:34

I have had the warnings that my kids could be taken away from me by my friend. As if the government even have the capacity to look after thousands of kids with low-level covid.

OP posts:
DaisyNGO · 02/12/2021 11:24

50 - I think there might be some language misunderstandings.

My CT crazy friend - I won't go into it as I had a whole thread already - mentioned vax passports in April 2020. The officialdom might not have talked about it till late 2020, but while I think she is mad in many ways - she was a CT long before social media - she has been right about vax passports and I say that as someone who is triple jabbed.

She has also warned us about DC being taken away. It wasn't a Covid CT that did for us, but we have stepped back from her.

ChaToilLeam · 02/12/2021 11:45

I know one guy, total conspiracy loon, he is very right wing in his views. Interesting to see people like him buddying up with crystal waving hippy types against mask wearing and vaccination. 🤔

A friend of mine is a bit paranoid generally and I am just glad she doesn’t spend much time on social media, because I think it would just feed her anxieties. She is vaxxed now but held out for a long time.

SLH2003 · 02/12/2021 12:08

@Hodl

Some of what 'conspiracy theorists' predicted has come true though... Vaccine passports, mandatory vaccinations, etc.
Nothing that could be considered part of a conspiracy has come true.
Triffid1 · 02/12/2021 12:24

I don't think vaccine passports or mandatory vaccines come under the "conspiracy theorist" grouping in themselves and certainly, I thought there was a chance they might get to the point of insisting on them. It turns into a conspiracy theory if you believe that vaccine passports or mandatory vaccines re because they want to be able to track populations in real time or insert them with 5g chips.....

ShortColdandGrey · 02/12/2021 13:00

Yep my BIL but he was into chemtrails, other shite conspiracy theory's before covid came along. He blocked me on Facebook because I don't agree with him. I am civil when I see him but don't get into any conversations with him. I also have someone on Facebook that has fallen deep into the covid conspiracies. I muted him but my DH told me to unmute him because he gets a laugh out of the stuff he posts.

ILoveHuskies · 02/12/2021 13:06

@julieca

I have had the warnings that my kids could be taken away from me by my friend. As if the government even have the capacity to look after thousands of kids with low-level covid.
Where do they even get this shit from 🤦‍♀️😩
Smokeyfish · 02/12/2021 14:10

@femfemlicious

A lot of black and brown people are VERY suspicious about the vaccine. They make me feel like im going to turn into a werewolf when i say ive had it. They act like im dooomed!
These comments are really weird.
Smokeyfish · 02/12/2021 14:11

That I can understand. People of colour have every reason to mistrust government. Vax programmes need to be delivered by community leaders, not the usual white-middle-class-led authorities.

And this

Smokeyfish · 02/12/2021 14:11

Why are we separating people out so much like this and putting each other in boxes?

bumbleymummy · 03/12/2021 17:29

@50ShadesOfCatholic are you seriously trying to argue against my point because I said ‘a few’ rather than ‘a couple’ Grin I stand by my point. The things that have happened and that are being accepted were called conspiracy theories not too long ago.

Dontforgetyourbrolly · 03/12/2021 17:37

Not conspiracy but ignorance / misinformation. I'm not sure if it's anxiety , lack of understanding or what but I've given up trying to explain . Think , ignoring government advice in favour of " neighbour's cousin who works in icu "
I don't respond or reply to these messages anymore

Multicolouredsequins · 03/12/2021 18:00

I have a friend who sent me a video by Judy Miskovitch spouting absolute nonsense, how sea and sand could cure Covid, and that's why government doesn't want us going to the beach, how masks will make you ill, how she found the cure for HIV decades ago but US 'big pharma' won't let her share it. Absolute discredited quack selling her new nonsense and books online, making a fortune. Friend of course refused the vaccine and doesn't really believe in Covid. She's perfectly intelligent and reasonable in other respects but is determined to ignore science and statistics in favour of this online crap. I feel like this will probably end our friendship and conversation is too difficult now, it's really sad. The phenomenon is really strong in middle aged, middle class women apparently. Not sure why.

User13490358923 · 03/12/2021 18:03

I have a friend and a relative who fell down the rabbit hole. However I noticed that both had a prolific, almost manic, phase of posting anti-vaxx propaganda but have calmed down a lot recently. It's almost like the energy can't be sustained for over a year and they simply moved onto other things.

Also makes me wonder if many of the conspiracy people have undiagnosed (or diagnosed) ADHD or MH issues like bipolar, paranoid personality disorder etc. The pattern of obsession is a lot like ADHD hyperfocus or bipolar mania, coupled with the "grandiosity" of feeling superior to everyone else because they can see behind the conspiracies.

bumbleymummy · 03/12/2021 18:14

Right… everyone who decides not to have this one particular vaccine is not only ‘anti-vaxx’ now but they also have mental health conditions. Hmm