Thread by @QOrigins

It's easy, of course, to sneer at QAnon people when they say stupid things.

And some of them ARE remarkably uninformed about how the world works.

Here's the thing, though: *everyone* is vulnerable to the same kind of thinking they engage in, even professors.

So you or I might think, "Ah, I could never be THAT ignorant!" -- and sure, maybe you couldn't. Maybe you DO know more about life than PatrQT1717 or whatever.

But you are *absolutely* capable of being wrong and then doubling down, & doing it again and again. That's very human.

I have a book called "The Osiris Complex" that... well, the author is a psychiatrist, and he THINKS it's about how he was able to see the truth of Satanic Ritual Abuse and (what was then called) Multiple Personality Disorder.

(Also: ping @abbieasr -- get the book, it's so good)

But you know what it's *really* about?

It's about the pivotal moment in his life: the time when he, a few weeks into his first job, *absolutely* got snowed under by a con artist who claimed she had MPD and THAT was why she passed bad checks w/different names in different cities.

Most people would respond to that by saying, "Aw, dang, I DID get fooled there, huh? Ah, well. Happens to the best of us."

His supervisors *urged* him to respond like that. Learn your lessons, right? Move on with your life.

But our dude here *doubled down*.

Our guy dug and kept on digging -- hit bedrock and rented some construction equipment.

He developed DEEPLY unhealthy relationships with a whole bunch of patients, insisting that they'd been ritually abused and had MPD and were in imminent danger from the Cabal.

Was there any evidence to support their SRA claims? In his view, it wasn't his job to find out. (Which is true.)

It was only his job to *believe* them. (Which is not true, of curse; his job was to *treat* them.)

Was there really a Cabal that was after them? Sure. He believed.

And this must have been a huge relief to his patients, right? And it must have met HIS emotional needs, too -- he was this heroic, world-saving figure to them. He was the doc who believed.

Only here's the thing. His patients weren't getting better. They were getting much worse.

People would come to him with fairly standard-sounding complaints, and he'd interpret this as a sign of SRA and repressed memories and the whole nine yards,

and later on he'd casually reveal that ten years later he was still seeing her 2x a week, and she had 40 personalities.

This man was absolutely *burning down* people's lives, leaving a trail of debris almost unimaginable -- like, without question just making the whole world worse by living in it -- & he was *entirely convinced* he was helping the patients

And why? Because he chose to double down.

Don't be that person.

You WILL double down on a mistake *sometimes*, of course. It's a normal human behavior.

But don't wrap your whole life around it, when you do. Just 'fess up and learn from your mistakes.

Think how much happier that doc & his patients & their families...

Hell, think how much better *hundreds of real human lives* would be if that doctor -- way back when he was just a little newbie who'd never seen a psychopath before -- had listened to his supervisors and gone: "Welp. You live and learn!"

Do THAT.

You'll be happier.

I promise.