I have occasionally encountered people on the internet who are potentially mentally ill, and a few times in person. My general strategy when dealing with someone who I suspect is mentally ill is to briefly treat them as if they are not. Assume the best, and see what happens. But as soon it seems likely that they are in fact mentally ill then I will not continue to engage them about conspiracy theories. I am not a doctor, and I am not a psychiatrist. I’m a debunker, a fact-checker, and a communicator. I do not know how to cure illness, mental or physical. My attempts could quite possibly make
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