I think a lot of our thoughts are thought by those other participants, and we have no opportunity to be aware of them.

I come back to my very first response in which I said that this is a "fatalistic" way of seeing humans.
So, as a consequence I can give up on every perception I think I have, for I am anyway a puppet towards collectiveness. If true or not, it still leaves me with the thought: Why bother at all and when I die, I really don't care if anyone wants to have some kind of ceremony, or wake or farewell, uttered in a cultural context, which anyway cannot be tested wrong or right. It leaves me actually without anything to cope. I am so sorry to hear/say that.

It plays right into the likeness of those you probably call "overlords", who do not adhere to any rule whatsoever but claim they do, and for the best of humanity. It's what my mom called "godless".