The Other McCain

"One should either write ruthlessly what one believes to be the truth, or else shut up." — Arthur Koestler

Crazy People Are Dangerous: Woman in Viral Rant Blames QAnon, Mental Illness

Posted on | December 1, 2020 | 3 Comments

Melissa Rein Lively was a successful Phoenix businesswoman, CEO of her own marketing and public relations firm, The Brand Consortium. She “had developed a reputation for living a posh lifestyle and organizing red carpet events, business openings, fashion shows and charity events in Arizona.” But that was before she cracked up and “went viral” in July and recorded video of herself destroying a COVID-19 mask display at a Target store. In social-media posts, Lively claimed to be spokeswoman for QAnon. Eventually, her husband called 911 and she got hauled off for psychiatric treatment. “I was canceled. My business was gone overnight”:

“I got sucked into QAnon because I was desperate, lonely, scared, and searching for answers,” she said.
She says people around her were telling her to “snap out of it,” but her obsession only grew deeper.
“It’s so crazy, this cult ideology it has. The more you read into it, the more you freak out. Somebody in my mental capacity, who was having a traumatic experience, it was the fuel to the fire and set the whole thing off,” Lively said.

She’s better now. She has been diagnosed with PTSD and bipolar disorder, but a diagnosis is just a fancy label for “crazy.”

And that’s OK. You can be crazy and functional. You’ve just got to learn how to keep the craziness under control. There are a lot of seemingly normal people out there barely hanging onto sanity, who may be just one bad day away from going completely bonkers. Plan accordingly.




 

Category: Arizona

Comments

3 Responses to “Crazy People Are Dangerous: Woman in Viral Rant Blames QAnon, Mental Illness”

  1. Wednesday Linkage « Bacon Time !!!!!!
    December 2nd, 2020 @ 3:09 am

    […] Crazy People Are Dangerous:  […]

  2. News of the Week (December 6th, 2020) | The Political Hat
    December 6th, 2020 @ 6:20 pm

    […] Crazy People Are Dangerous: Woman in Viral Rant Blames QAnon, Mental Illness Melissa Rein Lively was a successful Phoenix businesswoman, CEO of her own marketing and public relations firm, The Brand Consortium. She “had developed a reputation for living a posh lifestyle and organizing red carpet events, business openings, fashion shows and charity events in Arizona.” But that was before she cracked up and “went viral” in July and recorded video of herself destroying a COVID-19 mask display at a Target store. In social-media posts, Lively claimed to be spokeswoman for QAnon. Eventually, her husband called 911 and she got hauled off for psychiatric treatment. “I was canceled. My business was gone overnight” […]

  3. One Turn From Snapping… – Sticks, Stories, and Scotch
    December 8th, 2020 @ 9:45 am

    […] of The Other McCain, we find the sad tale of one Melissa Rein Lively, who went from successful businesswoman to cuffed and stuffed in the back of a police car after a […]