RE: Lay Siege to the Therapeutic State: Unmake Psychiatry
Every concept is a human construct. It's a human mind putting together ideas and creating new ones. Cancer is a human construct and it describes a wide range of diseases that aren't fully understood.
Given that we only barely understand a few things about the mind, I'm not sure how well supported it is to claim that mental illness doesn't exist. Maybe it can be measured like, say, H1N1, it's just that our technology hasn't risen to that level yet.
I'm skeptical of the explosion in named mental illnesses. For example, I think ADHD is way over-diagnosed. Peter Breggin has a lot of interesting things to say about that.
But to say that mental illness does not exist at all seems just as wild and specious a conclusion as all of these ADHD diagnoses and the explosion in named mental illnesses.
So I remain skeptical.
Yes all things are human constructs. That does not mean that anything you want to be a disease is a disease. Show me evidence for your claims and I will consider them. There is plenty of logical and scientific proof for biological diseases like viruses and bacteria. I have yet to see any logical and scientific proof for mental illness aside from people who simply equate "socially aberrant" behavior to "illness."
That's exactly what I'm saying. Show me the evidence that mental illness doesn't exist. I'm seeing a very wide-ranging blanket absolutist claim here that would probably require thousands of pages to build any convincing case for.
It's difficult for me to take you seriously on this topic. Are you a trained psychiatrist or psychologist? Have you lived with someone with schizophrenia or some other serious mental dysfunction? How many times have you visited mental hospitals?
Like I said, I'm no fan of psychiatry. But if you want to make outrageous claims, you'd better have spectacular evidence if you want to be taken seriously.
It's considered an illness because it interferes with a person's ability to live a normal life, hold down a job, raise a family and enjoy life. Depression is a horrible thing to live with and I wouldn't wish it on anyone. I am not a fan of Big Pharma and I believe mental illness has been exploited for profit. But don't go saying that depression isn't an illness. I can assure you that it is because I've lived with it for 40 years. When everything in your life is going great and you have everything to be thankful for yet you're still sad for no apparent reason, one cannot say "oh, nothing is wrong with me, it's all in my head," because that solves absolutely nothing.