I’ve got an article in The Observer on the misunderstood relationship between truth and madness.
The definition of a ‘delusion’ has just been changed so it no longer has to be considered a ‘false belief’.
It turns out that this issue turns up regularly in world events, owing to the sad tendency for whistle-blowers to be ‘accused’ of being ‘mentally ill’ when others don’t like what they’re saying.
It’s not clear who forcibly sedated her in 1972. It’s not certain that she was admitted to a psychiatric ward in the following year. What’s definite though is that many people thought she was mad as she ranted about conspiracies in the White House during eccentric phone calls to the press. Questions about Martha Beall Mitchell’s sanity were encouraged by the Nixon administration, who consistently briefed against her and probably had her medicated against her will. But ultimately her claims were proven correct when the Watergate scandal broke.
It’s worth bearing in mind that we’re not talking about the everyday use of the term ‘delusion’ (typically meaning mistaken) but the psychiatric definition which describes intensely held beliefs that are impervious to reality.
They are fascinating in many ways but, as the article discusses, they do not necessarily mean that the person is wrong.
Link to Observer article on truth and delusion.
Mind Hacks 
One of the tenants of narrative therapy is to help the client understanding the place of this thought, vision, belief within their lives rather than the therapist taking the position of “authority and holder of truth”. I’ve found this practice helpful for people who have been labelled “psychotic” in finding coherence within themselves and reducing the anxiety that comes to us when the society around us rejects us as mentally incompetent.
something along those lines has recently been uncovered in germany
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gustl_Mollath
In Australia, the opposite can happen: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cornelia_Rau
Interesting point… but then again what is truth an what is delusion can be a matter of perspective. Sometimes it can be hard to break out of your own to realize that the presumed insane is right instead.
Truth is dead, replaced by “truth by consensus”. You are fired if you can’t take direction. If directed to agree to a lie, a sane person refuses and is fired. Only the insane survive, and they create the ball of confusion that contributes to the market demand for psychiatrists.
Martha Mitchell? Google “Hemingway FBI
NY Times FOIA”. Hemingway was followed
by J Edger Hoover & the FBI for 20 years
since the early 1940’s to his death as
per FOIA evidence obtained fairly recently.
My point? FBI methods of surveillance
deliberately mimicked the symptoms of
psychosis when the person being followed
tries to report what is happening to them.
As the actor in the recent movie “Closed
Circuit” says at one point, “I guess I’m
supposed to be paranoid”, when he finally
catches on to all the coincidences that
weren’t. Hemingway was a big drinker?
Yes he was. Hemingway was nuts? Yes he
was. But apparently when “the Feds”
really are after you they apply “nudge”
theory b4 there was such a thing and
if you can’t be nudged you are shoved in
certain whatever direction “they” want.
Until the person of interest is made aware
they are being scrutinized at which point
the ppl doing the scrutinizing don’t care
if you know b/c your reputation has been
ruined.