PicoBlog

I agree with most of this.

However, there are such things as delusional beliefs and shared delusions. I don’t generally call people crazy. However, it is very strange to be around people in religions which have beliefs which seem almost identical to the delusions a person has when psychotic such as the idea that Satanic forces can be in toys or shampoo or board games, etc. You watch these people discuss things in different youtube channels and you see them reinforce a wholly magical conception of their reality—where, e.g., your desire not to go out with your friends on Saturday night because you feel tired is the devil intervening and talking you out of it because you need to go to their function in order to find a husband —and the devil doesn’t want you to find a husband.

These are actual conversations I’ve seen on youtube. They are attempting to pull other people into this world view that they lack all agency and the devil is constantly controlling their minds.

One can hear it on Christian radio as well—people are given a narrative that if they adopt they will also be embracing many psychotic features such as grandiosity and paranoia. However, they usually don’t become fully immersed in their delusions (though there is a risk of this) to the degree that they cannot function.

These religious groups engage in manipulation and so forth. They end up getting people into a state which is not too dissimilar to a psychotic state but is more balanced. When functional, it perhaps is more like a highly imaginative child’s state. I would not call it healthy!

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