‘Isn’t the same person’: Wife’s heartbreak after husband sucked into world of conspiracy theories

A devastated woman has revealed a “hidden problem” in Australia that has caused a shocking change in her once “normal” husband.

A shattered Queensland woman whose husband was rapidly radicalised during the pandemic is sharing her family’s story about the dangers of online conspiracy theories.

The woman, who is aged in her 50s and who spoke to news.com.au on the condition of anonymity, said she was speaking out to describe the “other side” and show what it’s like “being married to a person that has changed since Covid”.

She said she had been happily married to her husband for decades and that they had raised children together before his rapid descent into the dangerous world of conspiracies and disinformation.

She noted that while her husband wasn’t yet a “sovereign citizen” – the term given to the ever-growing far right movement whose members refuse to recognise the authority of the government, laws and police force – he “does share some of their ideals”.

The man was quickly radicalised by social media and certain websites. Picture: iStock

“My husband was normal up until Covid and now he isn’t the same person,” she said.

“We do have moments where he is his old self. However, he believes in all sorts of things, and can even contradict himself in the same sentence.

“I have heard everything from the vaccine will kill you, to Trump, to change of the money system, to we need to buy silver, to child trafficking, to the world is flat, to they are trying to starve us/kill us. You name it, my husband believes it.”

The wife blamed her husband’s unwelcome transformation on the online community that spread rapidly during the pandemic.

“Social media and certain websites (BitChute in particular) have led to his downfall even though he can’t see it,” she said, adding that his new-found beliefs had seriously damaged his closest relationships.

“Both our extended families have been pushed away because of what he believes. Even our children have a very strained relationship with him and have told me to leave him,” she said.

“For a variety of reasons, at this stage I won’t leave, but also I have hope that one day he will turn a corner. I don’t want to give up on him as I understand the reality of what this choice will bring for him, as I am the main income earner.

The woman's husband changed dramatically during Covid. Picture: iStock

“He won’t be able to afford to live and he will be alone from his family with no support.”

The woman said her situation was far from an isolated one, and that it was “very much a hidden problem in Australia today”.

She added she was “sure there are plenty of other people in the same situation in Australia that need to know that they aren’t alone”.

“What someone posts (whether it be true or not) can have major consequences on innocent partners and families that have to bear the brunt,” she said.

“There needs to be more censorship on these websites, even though it is too late in my case.

“More people need to be prosecuted for posting false information as well.”

She stressed that while her husband “isn’t a bad person”, he was “just very lost in his beliefs and can’t see what his beliefs are doing and the words that he uses can hurt people”.

Deakin University terrorism expert Greg Barton told news.com.au recently that the Covid pandemic had been an “accelerant” for a string of dangerous conspiracies that had already existed, and that it had brought people with similar outlandish viewpoints together like never before.

Cop killers Gareth and Stacey Train were sovereign citizens who were sucked into a range of conspiracies. Picture: YouTube

“Most of the people who were drawn into anti-vax conspiracies were probably not from sovereign citizen groups, but the pandemic caused people who didn’t understand science, who were sceptical of the government, who didn’t like mandates and lockdowns and who were anxious about their employment to be linked with sovereign citizen types,” he said.

“It brought people together and accelerated things.”

Prof Barton said conspiracy theories tended to snowball, and at the extreme end, adherents can come to think of taking and losing life as “some sort of crowning achievement” instead of a failure.