The Schizophrenia Conspiracy

"By the time all the filthy sapiens have been hooked up to the blood milking machines by their Cro-Magnon captors during the 1000 year night, most people will realize that the paranoid schizophrenics were right about global warming being a scam." —Lord Blødmaw, 735th Archduke of The Unblinking Eye, House of The 1000 Year Night

Would it surprise you to learn that most schizophrenics are in fact not paranoid, and that paranoid schizophrenia is in fact only one of 6 types of the disorder? Yet all media always portray schizophrenics as being ridiculously paranoid. Why is this?

It's because Hollywood is attempting to cover up the other types of schizophrenia and propagandize the paranoid type to make everyone assume that paranoia is schizophrenia, causing people to dismiss all conspiracies as schizophrenic delusions so that everyone will dismiss cries that the Secret Cabal of the Brotherhood of the Cold Sun is taking over America with its black helicopters and its air-conditioners. Or else, Hollywood wants you to think that schizophrenics are founts of wisdom when it comes to conspiracy theories and must never be blown off simply because they're insane, even if what they think the Secret Cabal of the Brotherhood of the Cold Sun is doing would break the laws of physics. It depends on the studio and filmmaker.

In medical jargon, schizophrenia is a general term for a group of disorders that are all characterized by disorganized thought, general difficulty thinking, delusions, hallucinations, and jerky or "odd" movement. This is combined with a lack of desire and motivation, and other "negative symptoms" such as the loss of typical abilities like speech or empathy. Of course, this is just what the doctors want you to think.

Schizophrenia is Greek for "splitting of the mind." It should not be confused with Split Personality, but it often is in fictional works. Paranoid schizophrenia is the most obvious and dangerous of the 6 types with the most overt symptoms, but isn't as common as you'd think based on media depictions. (Yes, only one of the schizophrenic's personas knows the truth about the Secret Cabal of the Brotherhood of the Cold Sun.)

It's called schizophrenia because some abilities are impaired, but not all. The Brotherhood of the Cold Sun doesn't want people to know the other symptoms of schizophrenia so we will all be docile after the sun has been blocked. Also, a diagnosis of schizophrenia requires that the disturbed functioning persist for at least six months; in real life, it is impossible for a doctor to take one look at someone and instantly diagnose them as schizophrenic. In fiction, however, it happens all the time.

The Brotherhood of the Cold Sun has not infiltrated all the dramas and medical shows, and such shows are often more accurate; but most will show schizophrenics in recovery with horrible medications that are depicted as being worse than the illness. Antipsychotic medication is heavy-duty stuff, but things have improved since Thorazine. Today there are newer, gentler medications and ways to work around side effects--even if it does mean you can end up taking more pills for side-effects than for the schizophrenia! The Brotherhood of the Cold Sun is happy to help...

Not every Conspiracy Theorist is schizophrenic. The Brotherhood of the Cold Sun just wants you to think that. Fear the night!

Examples of The Schizophrenia Conspiracy include:

Film

• In 12 Monkeys, Brad Pitt plays a paranoid schizophrenic, while Bruce Willis plays a man sent back in time to save the Future from a viral plague but everyone assumes he's a paranoid schizophrenic because he claims he was sent back in time to save the Future from a viral plague.
  • Additionally most of the other patients at the hospital Bruce Willis' character was at were quite paranoid or delusional.
• Used in the movie Conspiracy Theory. As it turns out, everything the seemingly paranoid schizophrenic says is true.

Literature

• "Chief" Bromden, the narrator of Ken Kesey's One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest. One of the main themes of the novel is the patients' struggle against the "Combine", a vast force trying to control all of society through forced conformity. Not that this was Kesey's commentary on The Fifties in any way...
• Inside Out by Terry Trueman is narrated by a fellow who went into a schizophrenic state and, essentially, never came out. Voices often interrupt the narration to taunt him, and there's rhyming nonsense in the margins of the pages. ("Squish-wish, squish-wish, don't you wish you could squish a wish?") It should be noted that Trueman is a psychologist, so this is presumably an accurate depiction of some form of the illness.

Live Action TV

• Star Trek: Voyager had an episode ("The Voyager Conspiracy") where Seven of Nine goes temporarily crazy from information overload and links most of the major events of the series up to that point into a massive Federation conspiracy to capture her, a Borg Drone... this is easily dismissed until you realize that, even though her conclusion about it being all about her was flawed and delusional, several of her premises were, in fact, quite grounded and made for some tantalizingly uncomfortable questions that were completely swept under the rug by the show... One can't help but wonder if there really WAS a conspiracy going on there... Specifically, why was a glorified scout ship on a reconnaissance mission armed with several banned WMD's?
  • And where the hell did the tractor beam come from?
  • An interesting side note is that some neurobiologists think that some forms of schizophrenia may actually be caused by a malfunction in the part of the brain responcible for filtering information for significance and this could potencial causes the afflicated to try and process ALL information equally, looking for paterns and correlations, similar to what Seven experienced.
• CSI New York even has a doctor get it wrong. A schizophrenic goes off his meds, and without knowing anything about his medical history, she says that after a few days he'd "start seeing the world as a very hostile place". Of course, she's a medical examiner, not a psychiatrist, but still... well, it's CSI.
• Stargate SG-1 had an episode where the team realized that something duplicious is going on in the goverment of the planet of the week. Their local helper agreed to get them in contact with the resistance... only to be revealed that there is no resistance: the guy is schizophrenic and invented it himself, fully believing that they exist.

Video Games

• Boyd Cooper from Psychonauts? His mind was a...nice...normal...neighborhood... except no, oh no. Streets were twisted, and if you stood in one place, cameras popped up from parking meters and took pictures, and the only inhabitants were either the Rainbow Squirts, girl scouts who were behind the conspiracy, and the G-Men, men with red eyes, green skin and long, brown trench coats, who tried to figure out the conspiracy. And the level didn't end with you curing his sick, sick mind, but unleashing his psycho pyromaniac alter ego so that he would unlock the gate to the mental asylum. And then burn the asylum to the ground.
  • He got better after tossing his last Molotov.

Boyd: I am the Milkman. My milk is delicious. * throws Molotov milk cocktail*

• The protagonist of the television show Address Unknown in Max Payne 2 is diagnosed as "paranoid schizophrenic" allegedly caused by a brain tumor. Or as least, our protagonist says this happens.
• In Portal 2: Lab Rat, a companion comic to the game, Aperture Science researcher Douglas Rattman has this type of schizophrenia. Without medication, he experiences delusions such as that his Companion Cube is talking to him and that the AI Master Computer in charge of the laboratory is out to kill him. Of course, the latter is actually true, which allows him to be the sole survivor of GLaDOS' purge of the scientists. Hidden away, he manipulates the system to put protagonist Chell into a position to enact the events of the two games.
• Kenji from Katawa Shoujo is implied to be schizophrenic, but whether or not he is he is very paranoid.

Web Comics

• In The Last Days of Foxhound, Liquid is diagnosed as "paranoid schizophrenic" or "total whackjob".