My sister is a conspiracy theorist - the whole tooty: Icke, 5G, Bill Gates, Plandemic. She is very convincing, and rather than ranting goes into low-register mode when she talks. She appears to be the height of reasonableness. It is only occasionally that the mask slips, and I think that's when she feels she's losing control in some way, or when she is by herself. She has paid thousands of pounds to try to convince others of her beliefs, financing videos, and, we think, lawyers' letters to journalists who have written about the vaccines.
We had a difficult childhood. It was privileged in some ways, but riddled with abuse, addiction, and neglect. I always thought my sister had somehow dealt with all of this, and I realise now how much I once colluded with the idea that we could heal ourselves through our beliefs. I took the therapy route; my sister chose spirituality and the New Age. I think this is what made the difference: I chose something that refused to pander to my delusions and my defences.
I can no longer speak to her. Not because of the conspiracy theories as much as her sense of superiority. It is hard trying to maintain a relationship when the other person refuses to acknowledge the damage our upbringing did to us and instead uses it as a weapon to prove to me that she has risen above it all and healed herself, and that one day I'll be ready to do that too. I'm too far into the sibling dynamic to be able to detach from my rage at this point.
In truth, I think it has been harder for her. I was the outcast in the family, and so realised quite early on that something was very wrong (or, rather, back then I thought something was very wrong with me), and I sought help earlier.
So behind each conspiracy theory story where the details of what they believe and what they extol feel very similar there lie many different stories of just how the true believer has ended up the way they have. It's rarely a happy tale.