I too feel the effects of the gaslighting actively happening. A friend of mine deeply believes the still completely unverified bits about babies being beheaded all because "eyewitnesses on the ground". Which turned into a heated back and forward where I tried reminding them of as many similar lies and misinformation as I could. Also trying to remind them of how so many people have been sent to prison and/or death-row all from "eyewitnesses" either just making it up or otherwise not realizing the trauma of a situation caused them to misremember. One of the larger things I brought up was how almost literally the same kind of fake story was used to get the final nudge for getting people behind invading Iraq in the 90s. Also that fascists on the ground can say they saw all kinds of shit, but of course they will because the fascists always try to use very extreme fake stories or add extreme lies to an event that did happen.

In the end I think my friend will just mark it as me being a useful idiot (as they do for literally anything China related) or just denying bad shit. The "proof" is always on me, and never "correct" (again basically anything China). But they refuse to see how if everyone just blindly spreads shit on those really extreme stories and fully embrace allowing real evil things to keep being done (like 9/11 did/does for the US). And ends up with no amount of information and investigations that find otherwise will be enough to change their minds. Ignoring that the for-profit "news outlets" push these stories because profits go nuts, and even if full proof is found not anywhere near as much effort (or any at all) is put into retracting/correcting the misinformation. So the last thing the average person remembers ever is just the claims of fucked up shit being "true".

In the end I will continue to not simply run away from efforts to push through with them or anyone I care about. Because these things matter and if I can't keep trying with them, I can't say that I am also a revolutionary. Fear at all levels is used to keep the masses fighting the wrong enemies and is how fascism is manifested and allowed to win.