Demanding recognition on the basis of shared paranoias
There are people who identify as victims of an organized group of stalkers, who are everywhere.
At first, Mr. Trespas wondered if it was all in his head. Then he encountered a large community of like-minded people on the internet who call themselves “targeted individuals,” or T.I.s, who described going through precisely the same thing.
The group was organized around the conviction that its members are victims of a sprawling conspiracy to harass thousands of everyday Americans with mind-control weapons and armies of so-called gang stalkers. The goal, as one gang-stalking website put it, is “to destroy every aspect of a targeted individual’s life.”
Mental health professionals say the narrative has taken hold among a group of people experiencing psychotic symptoms that have troubled the human mind since time immemorial. Except now victims are connecting on the internet, organizing and defying medical explanations for what’s happening to them.
The community, conservatively estimated to exceed 10,000 members, has proliferated since 9/11, cradled by the internet and fed by genuine concerns over government surveillance. A large number appear to have delusional disorder or schizophrenia, psychiatrists say.
Well psychiatrists are part of the conspiracy.
For the few specialists who have looked closely, these individuals represent an alarming development in the history of mental illness: thousands of sick people, banded together and demanding recognition on the basis of shared paranoias.
They raise money, hold awareness campaigns, host international conferences and fight for their causes in courts and legislatures.
It’s a new intersection.
Perhaps unsurprisingly, the community is divided over the contours of the conspiracy. Some believe the financial elite is behind it. Others blame aliens, their neighbors, Freemasons or some combination.
What about fluoride?
Some prolly are under surveillance while others are FBI operatives obfuscating and giving us the old razzle dazzle. The legacy of JEdgar.
I’ve heard of this sort of thing before.
There are also websites by and for anorexics, to support each other’s delusions in the face of concerned outsiders’ opinions. I suppose any delusion held by more than one person can become the focus of an online community.
Given their fear of government surveillance, how do they explain being able to organize and discuss things on the Internet?
“thousands of sick people…..demanding recognition on the basis of shared paranoia”
Nothing new there, it’s called a religion.
…nothing new under the sun…
—So I Married an Axe Murderer (1993)
As the article suggests, some these people are doubtless paranoid schizophrenic.
The rest are just nuts.
“Some believe the financial elite is behind it. Others blame aliens, their neighbors, Freemasons or some combination.”
Obviously it is the Jesuits. They are aliens; they are our neighbours; they are a financial elite; they invented freemasonry………