Godincarnateme Hell Thread
ChastMastr
Shipmate
in Hell
Because people keep doing Hell-style posting about @godincarnateme over in the Styx and Purgatory, this is a thread for that sort of thing so it doesn’t keep infecting other threads.
Comments
(ETA confusing typo, DT)
Whether delusional or not, the poster is sticking to their own threads and not being disruptive. I see no reason for condemnation.
(ETA quote of confusing typo, DT)
Yes.
I made an unkind remark on the Purg thread, and was duly admonished. I repent me of what I said, and hope that this thread will have a short life.
I see that the threads on which godincarnateme is posting appear to be generating some discussion.
(ETA quote of confusing typo, DT)
Okay. But I personally am of the view that @godincarnateme is likely just an armchair philosopher spinning arguments based on general solopsism, for the sake of self-entertainment and possibly the entertainment of others. So, that's the assumption on which I prefer to base my interactions with the poster.
The advantage of not doing these things being if the poster is a philosopher with a thought experiment you lose nothing, and if they are vulnerable and unwell you haven’t been a complete dick.
The guy the thread is about gives troll vibes. It is difficult to work out what is true
But it's possible to be kind and careful at the same time.
If godincarnateme starts to post on other threads and tries to derail them, that will be a different matter. That's the sort of behavior which destabilises the site. But at the moment, we have two threads which are easily scrolled past.
On much of the internet and real life talking about a man who is God, who was executed and raised to life, who sent a Spirit who appeared like fire and had people talking strange languages would also be whacky, weird, potentially disruptive etc.
This is the forums for the Magazine of Christian Unrest, not a kindergarten protecting you from reading stuff you may disagree with.
Not for me. For me it’s because he’s clearly insane.
I see stuff which is “whacky” and “unorthodox” and “alternatives to what I believe” all the time, on the Ship and off.
There are people who have mentioned having mental difficulties of their own, with occasional delusions, but they’ve also said that those delusions are periodic. I think that’s a different matter—they come back to themselves afterward.
How exactly charity for someone who is messed up in this nonstop, neverending way should play out, specifically on an internet discussion board, I genuinely don’t know. Can we help him? I don’t know. Is it healthy or helpful to act as if his delusions are worth arguing with? I don’t know. Since we (presumably) don’t know him in real life, the various ways in that case one might be there for someone with those kind of persistent delusions are not an option. This is apparently stuff even his family doesn’t know about him.
And all of this is predicated on the idea that he’s not just trolling all of us for some perverse sense of fun. This might still be possible.
The whole “I know I’m God and you believe in your silly little ideas (Christian or otherwise) because you’re deluded fools” business is also rude and unbelievably irritating. I wrestle with responding to that—it pushes my “basic human interaction” buttons badly—because he’s clearly insane. I don’t want to have special rules that require handling him with kid gloves, unlike any other Shipmate.
What should be done? I have no clue.
Diagnosing complete insanity is not really something anyone here is competent to do.
That's certainly a possibility.
I also think calling someone ‘clearly insane’ because they are irritating stigmatises mental illness. And how does any of us know if their supposed delusion is not temporary? And if it is permanent does that make them less deserving of God’s love shown through us?
You’re kidding, right? Unless you think he’s trolling, and simulating someone being insane.
He claims to have just woken up one day and “realized” that he was God, that the universe was created when he was five years old and that it will blip out and restart whenever he dies.
How is this not definitively, clearly insane?
From what he has said, it’s gone on for years now. He has not suggested that it is periodic at all. I hope he gets better somehow. I don’t know how I or the board can help with this, other than prayer and suggesting therapy.
As for the stigma of someone being identified as insane, yes, it’s a sad thing, but… how else would you describe his level of mental illness?
Again, I don’t know how an online discussion board should handle something like this in general or in this case.
As I said above,
Me:
I can think of numerous situations where people make what I guess to be false claims about mystical experiences and revelations, but I would not take it as an automatic sign of psychiatric illness. A cult leader trying to pull in cash and groupies, for example.
This particular poster may well be extremely irritating, making statements and propounding theories that are impossible to prove, but - as I keep saying - you can simply ignore them. By all means add them to your list of people to be remembered before God in prayer, if you feel that's something positive you can do, but leave it there.
Please - for your own sake...
Well said. I was a psychotherapist, but I don't go round diagnosing insanity. What should Christians do? What would Nietzsche do?
As I keep saying, I don’t know what the board should do about a poster in this situation.
I think when someone—anyone, generically, not just this specific person—says things like this, if they really believe them and aren’t just trying to troll people or manipulate them or whatever as someone suggested above, it’s a really basic “by definition, yes, they are insane” situation that does not remotely require someone to be “qualified” in some special way.
(Unless, of course, they are God. If Jesus was wrong about being God, then yes, sorry, He would indeed be insane.)
I’m simply astonished (and frankly disturbed) at anyone suggesting otherwise.
I talk with deluded people often, it’s really not that difficult.
It may be the case that godincarnateme is subject to mental health issues - we don't know, and shouldn't try to diagnose, anyway - or it may be that they are simply telling fibs about themselves in order to wind us up. In itself, that may be something of concern, but we simply don't know.
As I said above,
Right this minute, you do not seem to be having the kind of episodes you’ve mentioned above. If you were in the middle of one, I’d try to be polite and kind and wait for it to subside.
Exactly.
@ChastMastr - I think you're making a big mistake in trying to diagnose insanity on the internet. It just isn't possible, and I fear you're digging yourself into a hole by insisting that it is...
Then the definition has changed in a relatively short period of time.
If he really believes this, then yes, he’s insane by any reasonable, traditional definition of the word. If I genuinely believed I was a hamster or a poached egg—or God, I would also be insane.
I find it deeply jarring that I appear to be in the minority in thinking this.
If this is what the board has chosen, then so be it.
I hope his situation works out, certainly, and that he gets the help he needs. I have prayed for him and I will pray for him.
I don’t know what else to say here.
That might be the best course of action, yes.
I just don't read it. It's not hard to do.
The definition in English law,goes back 700 years, and it is primarily a legal category regarding mental capacity.
You would have a delusion, and it would not necessarily stop you leading a normal life - in everyday life it might not be obvious unless you were choosing to talk about it with someone.
I work in mental health and have known many people like that, I have had colleagues who would occasionally be off sick with psychosis and then come back to work. It does not help for others to react like they’ve just seen a Martian with two heads just because someone says something a bit weird they themselves don’t happen to believe. People with mental illness are just people like everyone else, as good and as bad, as brilliant and as confusing..
I do not know if this poster has a mental illness, but whether or not he does, we explicitly don’t have a no blasphemy policy so if he abides by forum rules he can post what he wishes.
What I don’t understand is why this is such an issue for you, he is not going to reach through the screen and interfere in your life.
ETA - managed to reverse the edit so what you posted at 9.28pm UK time should now be as you originally left it *phew*
It's also a standard term used for a very very long time to describe the condition of being extremely mentally imbalanced or deeply delusional. If someone says that someone is "insane," people know what they mean. They don't say, "Oh, have they committed a crime they may not be responsible for?"
People don't generally speak in exclusively technical jargon at all times and in all situations.
godincarnateme’s belief is certainly counterintuitive, but so are aspects of quantum physics. The belief is also, AFAICT, incapable of logical proof or refutation. I think it might be interesting as a thought experiment, though I find it hard to see what real world consequences it might have.
Somebody holding such a belief might be deluded, but not necessarily legally insane.
I read all the posts in Purgatory because I am a Purgatory Host, but I only engage in the ones that interest me. I rarely expect to convince someone that there position is wrong. I don’t think the internet is a good forum for that.
You are not giving the impression that you care about the impact of how you talk about mental illness, or delusions specifically, has on people who who live with such a condition - at least one of whom is actually posting in this thread.
How would you feel if they started posting random crap about a health condition that affected you ?
Yes, that too.
@Doublethink said
It's not. I'm just replying to people about this the same way you and everyone else on the thread are. We (I and the others on the "other side" of the issue) apparently disagree on something that I thought was the basic, common, nigh-universal understanding of such matters. If anything is an issue for me, I think it's that, but, well, it is what it is. I assume that @godincarnateme is not a danger to himself or others, but I hope he gets counseling or help of some kind, regardless. I wish him well.
There are other issues on the Ship I don't say much about, which I seem to be in a tiny minority on, at least on the current Ship; this is just another one, I suppose. *shrug* It's been startling, but it is what it is.