<p>When to step in?
I don’t have much contact with my younger brother, ( retired military, electrical engineer), and mostly ignore emails he sends me. Even if the links were 100% verifiable and I agreed with them, what difference does he think that is going to make?
I don’t know how to tell if he is mentally ill, or just kooky.
We do have mental illness on both sides of family.
I really don’t need any more complications in my life, but how do you tell if someone needs help?</p>
<p>Does he have a wife or kids you can talk to? They would be your first source of information. If not- look up lists online for depression et al. Also- is this a sudden change, or just more along lines of his thinking from decades ago? Mental illness is a medical issue, extreme views are not. People have the right to disagree with what others feel is right. The problem I think you are worried about is whether he may be a danger to himself or others. His extreme views may just be that but you may need to skim his emails to see if he is becoming involved in any actions.</p>
<p>Good luck. I guess I’m not the only one with a brother I don’t see eye to eye with.</p>
<p>He’s divorced, twice.
I talk to his grown son & daughter on facebook, they live in the general area, but are mostly estranged.
I haven’t tried talking to hus most recent ex wife, he also has a daughter who is in high school.
Since he has been in the military, most of his adult life, he hasn’t lived in the area, until about five years ago.
He had extremely conservative, even libertarian views then, but they just struck me as political, not anything more.</p>
<p>Have a BIL like that. EVERYTHING is Obama’s fault. When Clinton was in office, he was a “republican”. When George W Bush took office, he took no blame for what Bush did because he was now a “libertarian”.</p>
<p>Contrarian–will take the opposite view of any issue just to tweak and anger people. Wears a Red Sox hat in NYC and a Yankees hat in Boston just to torque people off.</p>
<p>Guy is annoying.</p>
<p>I admit I used to enjoy wearing my fake nose ring & my doc martens to events in the suburb where I grew up ( like Santa Barbara, but with evergreen trees), but I was much younger.
I also got my car keyed there when I had a freedom of choice bumper sticker.
Keep it classy, pro- lifers.</p>
<p>but how do you tell if someone needs help?
_</p>
<p>Are you just basing your worries about emailed articles he sends that you ignore? I don’t think you can form an opinion on someone’s mental state without having an actual conversation with him ( preferably face to face).</p>
<p>Probably, but I was trying to avoid that.
He has always been a bombastic misogynist.
I was the oldest, but he was the <sound the="" trumpet=""> Boy!,
I could have gotten over that a long time ago, if he didnt pick up that ball and run with it.
I do care about him, but I dont think he has ever listened to anything I say.</sound></p>
<p>It’s good of you to be concerned.
People can get ranty on their pet peeves, but maybe just a neutral phone call asking how he is etc would set your mind at ease?</p>
<p>Im gonna try contacting him & see if he can talk about a subject other than a govt conspiracy.
About our kids for example.</p>
<p>You wouldn’t believe the mind control stuff the govt is doing to your kids.</p>
<p>I can see how it would be harder to tell now. Once upon a time if someone said that Richard Nixon was talking to them through the filing in their teeth you’d pretty much know that they invented that from whole cloth and worry. Now I think no matter what your tendencies are you can find a group online or other media to feed and support them. People who are perfectly normal (for the most part) can live in a self-selected echo chamber when that is not only their reality but the reality of everyone they know. </p>
<p>A number of years ago I ran into a woman who I had worked with extensively at a non-profit and liked and respected. She had 2 great daughters who are bright and accomplished and to my knowledge was sort of middle of the road Presbyterian in a large, prominent local congregation. She started in on how one of our elected officials literally IS The Antichrist. Not that she didn’t like him or thought he was bad or had unpatriotic intent but actually The Antichrist and a portent of the apocalypse. It was very disconcerting as this kind of talk used to be a sure sign of some kind of mental health crisis or chemical imbalance, but I know that she didn’t make it up and was simply living in an internet echo chamber of some kind. </p>
<p>And I was able to successfully guide the conversation back to her daughter’s internship :D</p>
<p>Even if it’s mental illness, there isn’t much you can do if they don’t want help and aren’t a danger to anyone.</p>
<p>I end up listening to tons of “stuff” (even the World Cup, other major sporting events, and the lottery + any court cases are fixed, you know) and ignoring it or getting a laugh with my own family.</p>
<p>I’ve heard folks can be significantly improved on meds, but if they don’t think anything is wrong and/or won’t take them, there’s little you can do. Even the authorities just have to show up, write their reports, then likely have laughs back at the office.</p>
<p>^A number of the recent nutcase events have been perpetrated by people associated with those groups. I would probably cautiously visit some of the sites to see if they seem like people ranting in their basements or if there seems to be any indication they are actually fomenting some sort of anarchy. Sometimes it doesn’t take a lot to drive someone off the rails.</p>
<p>Just because somebody is nuts doesn’t mean that they are mentally ill.</p>