So I mean, the very first antivaccine movement involved firebombs (https://qualitysafety.bmj.com/content/13/1/82) not to mention some questionable research ethics; maybe none of this is really new.
Your comment reminds me of something I read a few years back and CANNOT find again which I think said something like:
* The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders criteria for a delusional disorder have sort of a carve-out for religion.
* Specifically if a lot of people live together in a community and all believe something disconnected from reality but it isn't hurting their day-to-day life this isn't a mental illness, it's just part of their culture and it should not be diagnosed as a mental illness.
* Modern use of the Internet has made it easy for people who share common interests to come together in a community and hang out together, where previously they would have formed an extreme minority of their community and had what were obviously non mainstream views.
* For example, people who believe that radiation causes terrible illness (electromagnetic hypersensitivity) can all live together in a city with no cell phones or power lines and maybe none of them would have any kind of mental illness because their beliefs were a norm - which previously would have been impossible.
I was struck by this observation but could never find it written down again.
Well, I don't know anyone who has the absolute truth, and people claiming they do is a good sign for me to avoid them.
So in general I am very tolerant for weirdos and the general right of people to live their own ways, if they are not harming me.
But I think it is a bad idea pushing people further into radicalisation amd isolation and this is what I see is happening now worldwide, on a new scale unseen before.
Your comment reminds me of something I read a few years back and CANNOT find again which I think said something like:
* The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders criteria for a delusional disorder have sort of a carve-out for religion.
* Specifically if a lot of people live together in a community and all believe something disconnected from reality but it isn't hurting their day-to-day life this isn't a mental illness, it's just part of their culture and it should not be diagnosed as a mental illness.
* Modern use of the Internet has made it easy for people who share common interests to come together in a community and hang out together, where previously they would have formed an extreme minority of their community and had what were obviously non mainstream views.
* For example, people who believe that radiation causes terrible illness (electromagnetic hypersensitivity) can all live together in a city with no cell phones or power lines and maybe none of them would have any kind of mental illness because their beliefs were a norm - which previously would have been impossible.
I was struck by this observation but could never find it written down again.