Nikki Adebiyi, Founder, Bounce Black
September is Suicide Prevention Month, and this year’s thematic emphasis is on starting conversations and being the difference.
So, I want to start a conversation about the mental health impact of organised harassment. Specifically, I want to address the misconceptions about organised harassment that create risk factors for suicide.
Black Women Professionals: You Okay, Sis?
Earlier this week, a post on LinkedIn made the rounds in my network which immediately drew me in.
Written by an independent journalist named Denise Marie Thomas, the post highlights an alarming trend:
…emerging among Black women professionals—many are meeting tragic ends to their careers, either through sudden death, suicide, or being driven out of opportunities after raising concerns about mistreatment or inequity.
The post highlighted the names and stories of four Black women:
- The late Sharon Chuter, esteemed Beauty brand foudner, who recently passed away suddenly and unexpected under mysterious circumstances amidst a lawsuit
- The late Dr Antoinette Candia-Bailey who took her own life as a result of the stresses of workplace bullying.
- Ella Gorgla, former Executive Director at MAC Comestics/Estee Lauder, and Founder of 25 Black Women In Beauty. Since calling out inequity at her former workplace, Ella has been facing organised harassment.
- Michelle Igunbor, a former Texas State University student who became targeted with organised harassment after reporting a professor’s inappropriate behaviour.
Four Black women with more than just their ethnicity in common, but sadly also their end: loss of livelihoods or lives after standing up for what is right.
This being a commonality that I, too, share, I was moved to share my own story and commented on the post with some links to some of the content on this website for the sake of spreading awareness.
The responses I received were mostly positive, kind and compassionate.
But one comment stood out to me, and I felt it worth sharing here.
Organized Harassment: Schizophrenia or Systematic Abuse?
In response to my Hidden In Plain Sight blog detailing some of my personal experiences with harassment of this nature, the following comment was made by a reader named ‘Grace’:
Most people won’t tell you this.
They’ll empathise, sympathise, and hold space for you to validate the feelings you’ve been experiencing.
These people are well-meaning, and you’re fortunate to have them in your corner.
But what they won’t tell you is that it’s clear you may be experiencing a bout of heightened paranoia.
This could even be mild schizophrenia, as delusions of persecution are a common symptom.
Whilst I do not wish to deny the validity of your experience, it’s important not to ignore the way in which you’re processing it.
I strongly suggest you seek advice and support from a therapist, counsellor, or another trusted mental health professional.
This is not to dismiss your experience but to safeguard your long-term mental wellbeing.
Whilst blaming others may sometimes be accurate — and even justified — taking full ownership of your own situation is the only real way to true liberation.
You might be tempted to assume these comments have come from yet another “enemy.” That, however, would be too easy to assume — and for the record, it isn’t true.
As someone who has witnessed others display the same responses to workplace trauma, I can honestly say this: admitting you may be struggling with mental health challenges, and seeking professional help on your own terms, will be the fastest route to overcoming them.
It can help you achieve a sense of closure so that you can move forward, pursue your passions, and live freely.
And from the way you write, it’s clear you will do this successfully — when you finally choose to gree [sic] your mind by laying down the cross you’ve been carrying.
Ironically, as someone who has spoken to many and varied people about the phenomenon of organised harassment, the sentiment behind the comment is probably actually shared by most people when they hear about it.
For this reason, it warrants the focus of this blog during this particular month because whether people realise it or not, this discussion can be a life or death issue. So, treading carefully is critical.
The Problem With Pathologising Victim Testimonies
Most people haven’t been through organised harassment and therefore understandably cannot conceive of it. And because they lack a concept of it, they will lack empathy about it.
Paranoia and psychosis is a typical characterisation of such experiences because they are so out of the ordinary that unless you go through it, or know someone who does, you just cannot imagine it.
However, as I have argued in the Surviving Organised Harassment guide, not everyone who claims persecution is delusional.
Organised harassment involves psychological warfare. This is an assault on the mind. So, of course, it’s going to sound unbelievable because that is what makes it so effective.
And as I have written elsewhere:
Organised harassment, sometimes associated with a controversial term that [is used to describe] only part of the wider experience (‘#gangstalking’) is a product of unprecedented corruption. Until you become a target, you might dismiss such claims as paranoid delusions and mental illness.
This is by design. Secret police and their tactics are not supposed to be discernible to the naked eye. It would not be effective otherwise. Rather, it thrives on classical conditioning aka learning by association and plausible deniability.
It thrives on using everyday stimuli (e.g. cars, coughs, phones, clothing, etc) to make someone become hypervigilant and fearful through over-exposure to that particular stimulus, such that when it occurs again, the victim will associate it with the perpetrator and fear.
It’s not the easiest to explain or imagine because I would never have known this stuff existed if I didn’t go through it. I have no background with conspiracy theories etc. Don’t care for the illuminati or other secret societies. But this?! It’s high level and well hidden.
So, someone is behind it who is operating secretly. I don’t know if I’d call it a secret society in the popular sense, but it’s definitely being quietly planned and perpetrated by powerful hidden networks that only make themselves known to targets and their supporters.
If you are bombarded with a particular stimulus in a short space of time, you become sensitised to it. Enough people walk past you performing a particular action/behaviour, you start to wonder what’s happening.
Once you’re sufficiently shaken up, the foundation is laid for the wider harassment campaign. So, now, when you are in different environments and you see the same stimulus, you associate it with that hyper-exposure experience.
Thus, you become hypervigilant at best, paranoid at worst. And when you try to explain it to others? Incredulity. They don’t get it. It’s outside of their experience and their conditioning. Because it’s not normal. It’s reserved only for the unfortunate targets for punishment.
This is happening in the UK, US and many other countries. And people are suffering because they aren’t being believed, which is exactly the desired outcome. To psychologically torment people until they snap and either end their lives or commit a crime.
Not everyone is in on it because that’s impossible. But a great number of people are, from law enforcement and powerful figures to the members of the public and even some homeless people (who are often offered payment for their participation).
It’s one of the greatest crimes against which there is no law because it’s inherently difficult to prove and there is not often sufficiently encompassing legislation to prohibit these practices.
Plus, some of the people who have the power to change this are blackmailed or threatened to comply and ignore complaints from victims. There will also be those who assist from within the judicial system.
In short, this elaborate scheme is designed to break dissidents / those deemed ‘troublemakers’ who are purposely subjected to unbelievable things with no redress due to how difficult they are to prove and convince those who are not experiencing it. Evil genius, if you will.
Responding to Incredulity
Obviously, I take it that ‘Grace’ is new to Bounce Black, which would explain how they missed that this entire platform is focused on Black mental health and providing information, tools and support on that front.
If anything, I would hope that making it known that I am very familiar with both the language and diagnostic criteria of severe mental illness, including disorders of psychosis, adds to my credibility.
While I appreciate the kind concern, I have kept up with my appointments with doctors, psychiatrists and therapists. I have also studied some psychology, and I have my wits about me. So, respectfully, Grace and those who are similarly inclined in their beliefs: I said what I said.
Having no history of psychosis, nor any present diagnosis of it, I am making it a point to show that the tactics used are an abuse of power and weaponisation of behavioural psychology.
If what I describe sounds so bizarre and bad, entertain for a moment the thought that there might exist nefarious individuals and networks who wield resources, power and connections to discredit and destroy people by subjecting them to torturous tactics which mimic symptoms of severe mental illness.
Schizophrenia doesn’t hack into multiple devices, disrupting my meetings beforehand or during them.
It doesn’t take screenshots of my mail inbox.
It doesn’t bug my private phones and hotel room phones.
It doesn’t deliberately step on my feet, purposely barge into me and other things to make me uncomfortable.
Schizophrenia also doesn’t result in other whistleblowers in different parts of the world describing the exact same tactics under similar circumstances (the common thread usually being revenge or retaliation).
So, ask yourself… How would a person living through these things show up in the world?
How would a person show up with the kind of support system I have (which includes people who know me and believe me)?
Organised Harassment: Gateways to Suicide
Organised harassment is not merely a risk factor for suicide, it is actually the intended outcome of it.
Yes. You read that correctly.
The purpose of organised harassment is to cause the target as much distress as possible as to destroy them either through self-harm or criminality and incarceration.
Does this sound unbelievably evil? Of course. Because it is.
As a victim of organised harassment and multiple perpetrator stalking who has gone public about my experiences, I have received and continue to receive emails from other victims around the world.
These emails are often full of desperation and distress. And I understand it, honestly.
It’s not easy showing up to do daily life and advocacy while receiving veiled death threats, taunts and covert communications actively encouraging me to end my own life (think: MLK and the FBI).
Unfortunately, not everyone has the support system that I do. That results in some victims having greater vulnerability to contemplating ending their lives.
That’s why I make it my personal duty to speak out about this evil that is hidden in plain sight.
Obviously, I don’t intend on being a martyr, but who of our activist ancestors did?
Oppressive systems are gonna do what they’re gonna do.
And we who stand for what is right must do what we are called to do: resist.
Resistance is not participating in community-based harassment or surveillance.
Resistance is looking out for the welfare of those affected by unlawful surveillance.
Resistance is taking care not to intensify the distress that victims and targets experience, whether by dismissing or downplaying their accounts, or discouraging the sharing of them.
This is a long fight, but good always triumphs over evil.
We just must all find our ways to live to fight another day.
If you feel suicidal as a result of organised harassment, reach out to someone you trust or call the Samaritans on 116 123. Helplines for other countries are available here.
Leave a comment