he/him
it's really hard for me to experientially know where you're coming from, and so i don't exactly know what to say other than even if you've given up hope, i will still be hoping for you and thinking of you. i've definitely dealt with horrible medical care before, whether mental or physical, and especially when i was younger it all served to give me the impression that my health wasn't valuable to society and, by extension, that my own life wasn't valuable to society. but, even though i don't know you i think you're valuable and worth hoping for, even if the present and future look bleak.
cannibalism? should i even ask?
i'm sorry to hear that you've had such horrible experiences with mental health professionals. my experiences with that have ranged very widely, from actively bad to life-changingly good, although the latter still had a lot of limitations given the liberal framework through which the therapy occurred. i've also have the privilege of being (mostly) physically able throughout my life and having material and social support systems to back me up through difficult times. hoping for the best for you, comrade
i used to suffer from really quite debilitating social anxiety: i wasn't able to even try and be myself in social situations because i was so scared and afraid of other people. ultimately what helped me was digging deep into my history and figuring out why i felt so scared of people in the first place. i think emotional regulation tools/skills are obviously useful too, like in this case taking deep breaths, etc
your situation sounds really tough and i feel for you, comrade. hoping you feel better soon
i'm a big fan of all ferments, but kimchi takes a special place in both my heart and stomach
thanks for the clarification! i'm really trying to take a measured approach that incorporates everyone's experiences with bourgeois psychiatry, while being as critical and curious as possible
as far as your own personal experience, i feel like there is a huge amount of variance in the way that mental health is treated in western capitalist societies. i've seen many psychiatrists, and many therapists. for both, some were so horrible that simply meeting with them made me feel considerably worse, and some of them were so great that they totally changed my life.
well, thankfully i don't think it's possible to 100% agree on anything or else we would be the same person! but, i do want to continue to challenge some of your assumptions
First, in my impression of it, even bourgeois science does not think it is immutable
see, but the example i provided you of the neurobiology of bipolar disorder clearly and directly demonstrates bourgeois psychiatry's view that the brain is immutable. the fact of emotional dysregulation in bipolar is in interpreted as though the patient was necessarily born with this brain abnormality, and furthermore that this brain abnormality will necessarily persist for the entirety of the patient's life, i.e. that it is immutable. again, this flies in the fact of neuroplasticity, i.e. the fact that our experiences in life literally change the physical structures of the brain. why isn't there, for example, longitudinal research that finds those with a high risk of developing bipolar at a young age (whether as dictated by genes, material circumstance, or both), conducts regular brain scans to check the development of the brain, and correlates differences in development with differences in experiences of the patients? this is just one example, and it's not like i'm a scientist or a researcher, but in my research i've found no such studies conducted, because the brain is seen as a mechanistic machine.
but rather liberalism and individualism blanch at the idea of forcing someone to “not be themself” in matters of personality and the like.
this is an interesting idea, but is this actually supported by the way that those with neurodivergence, disability and extreme mental disorders are typically treated under liberal societies? i certainly don't think so, even though this is a claim that liberalism constantly makes. disability is literally the extent to which those different from the norm (for a variety of reasons) are excluded from society. those who experience things that are outside the realm of "normal" or "rational" are not accepted but controlled by liberal society. the way in which medication treats symptoms (often poorly) instead of underlying problems (brain structure) is itself a rejection of neurodivergence imo: people are reigned in from their extreme experience instead of being prompted to explore it and identify why they experienced something in the first place. i'm not saying there's absolutely no place for medication, but in bourgeois psychiatry it is seen as a long-term solution instead of a tool to help facilitate actual healing and brain development.
That said, the reason I used ADHD as an example is because the research makes me doubtful that an ADHD person can simply apply therapy tactics and “fix” their brain.
exactly what research gives you this impression and why? i've honestly done very little research so far, but have found several examples of people with conditions that are typically considered permanent fully recovering.
i think it makes sense for you to have reticence towards the liberal anti-psychiatry movement, in that it totally rejects everything in liberal psychiatry and is therefore open towards eugenicist claims towards those with autism, for example. but, i think the way in which those with disability and neurodivergence are treated under liberal society have much the same problem: leaving those on the fringes with at best extreme hardship and at worst death is eugenicist to me too. furthermore, i don't claim that all examples of permanent neurodivergence as dictated by liberal psychiatry are actually impermanent and treatable, just that some are. and, the only way to actually distinguish that difference is to conduct socialist research that bourgeois psychiatry is incapable of conducting.
i'm jealous of your kimchi
wow, that's some wild shit. it's almost hard for me to believe that i used to look up to this guy as a kid
But then there are things like ADHD which are shown to be at least partly the brain itself, not just a reaction to the environment.
i think there's a lot of truth to your post, but this in particular is something i want to challenge because it is a pillar of bourgeois psychiatry.
as dialectical materialists, we know that all things are subject to change. but, out of all of the organs and systems of the human body nothing is as subject to change as the brain. neuroplasticity is backed up by plenty of research and is a scientific fact: if you haven't read norman doidge's "the brain that changes itself" i would highly recommend it, there are several incredible stories.
and so, pointing to the fact that some disorders are associated with physical changes in the brain is not the slam dunk you might think it is. correlation does not equal causation. for example, i was recently researching the neurobiology of those with bipolar disorder, and while there is a lot of variance in how the disorder presents both physiologically and behaviorally, it's commonly accepted that those with bipolar disorder are more likely to have less-developed regions of the brain associated with emotional regulation, and that those regions of the brain are less likely to be as connected to other regions of the brain.
neurons that fire together wire together, but by the same token neurons that don't fire together don't wire together. and so, it is perfectly plausible to suggest the hypothesis that, in the case of bipolar disorder, a lack of emotional regulation skills (especially in early life) leads to a less-developed and interconnected brain, which can then lead to what we call bipolar disorder. this may or may not be true, but it is a hypothesis worth testing. bourgeois psychiatry does not even consider testing this hypothesis, its mechanical materialist framework ignores the fact of neuroplasticity and still treats the brain as immutable, as something primarily derived from DNA, if not entirely. in addition to the fact that the profit motive gives them no material incentive to test such a hypothesis.
like all bourgeois science, i think bourgeois psychiatry is both fundamentally progressive and fundamentally flawed, it's just a matter of piecing which parts are which. i feel like this, the idea that physical changes or abnormalities in the brain are necessarily inherent to someone's genes, and furthermore that these changes are necessarily immutable (i.e. irreversible), is a fundamental flaw because it flies in the face of basic neurobiological research. it is an idea worth challenging, but it will never get challenged by bourgeois psychiatry.
i think there's a lot of insight to reflect on here. the idea that (good) therapy is useful within the context of growing up in class society, but that it may not be necessary if people had strong, healthy relationships with others and their community is something that i've thought a lot about in the past week.
and the commodification is also a very important aspect, both as it relates to therapy but also psychiatry. just like any commodification of what should be basic public services, one can never be truly certain as to whether the primary reasoning behind any treatment is profit or health/science, when the two are diametrically opposed. therefore skepticism of bourgeois science and medical practice is not only rational but necessary, while also accepting its progressive nature. it can just be a very challenging thing to balance, i think.
as far as it relates to your sober lifestyle, that's really interesting and totally makes sense to me: feelings are signals that you need to process something, or act in some way, and dulling those senses (especially long-term) can even be dangerous in the right circumstance. personally i've found mind-altering substances useful both as coping mechanisms but also just as ways to know what it's like to experience a lack of chronic mental health symptoms, which then gives my unaltered mind insight as to what the underlying mechanisms for those symptoms may or may not be.
that's definitely true, but it's also true that the abolition of all exploitative class relationships necessitates the abolition of patriarchy, a long-standing system that has a deep and self-evident effect on the raising of children given the centrality of the patriarchal family unit.
i'll also say that, while children (who are not forced into labor, many are) are not exploited for their labor in school, that doesn't necessarily mean that school is not alienating to them under capitalism. schools are modeled off of prisons, and their primary function is as a daycare for children rather than to optimally raise and teach children. just think: would schools be so underfunded and understaffed in a better world, and what effect would that have on the children in them?
finally, i think there's a good argument for saying that while children may not directly feel the effects of alienation due to exploited labor, they do so indirectly. not only in the context of schools, but in the context of the patriarchal family unit: in the same way that men use the patriarchal family as a means to exploit women in service of venting their frustration at being exploited at work, i feel that this must have a negative effect on children from a very early age as well. it is not a situation conducive to healthy and loving familial relationships imo
i think the question that anti-psychiatry (at least, the part of it that seems useful) is asking isn't whether or not your depression would magically go away under socialism, but rather if you would have developed depression in the first place had you always lived under a socialist mode of production, or perhaps communism. and, i think that's a much more challenging question to answer. what do you think?
hahaha there's a spoooky ghost haunting the modlog...
but no that makes total sense, both to explain what happened and in terms of the rationale for being able to delete a banned user's content. thanks for explaining that!
thanks for looking through the modlog for me! i don't even know how to do that, so that's useful
Comradeship // Freechat @lemmygrad.ml did there used to be an anti-psychiatry community on lemmygrad?
i think the most essential and simple way to counter this argument is to explain how biology is a fundamentally insufficent explanation for the development of society
the biology and genome of today's human and the humans of ~20,000 years ago are functionally the same, if not identical. and yet, all of modern history has occurred within that period. how do we explain the explosion of population associated with the development of capitalism, the extreme advancement of technology etc with a biological reasoning? it just doesn't make sense
then you have separated biological and social darwinism. there is some truth to the latter in that the superior or more efficient survive, whereas the weak will eventually fall to the wayside. the catch is that this applies to social systems, and not individuals. and, what determines social systems if not biology? the production of what sustains us, what satisfies human need. this would be a good time to demonstrate how things like the development of the factory system and the socialization of production explain the rise of capitalism and the overthrow of feudalism. i think this is a good start
what are some of the everyday situations in which you were trying to apply it to? it's probably best to start there
i know this might be hard to hear and it might sound cruel, but if that's the case the only thing that will force him to become aware of his need for help is, in fact, deteriorating conditions to the point where there is no other option but for him to become more self-aware. your job is not to tell him what he needs (people always have to help themselves first and foremost), but to support him as much as you can through that process. at best you can slightly nudge someone in the right direction. truly, best of luck to you
imo, i think one of the most vital aspects of understanding the class composition of the US is that, because of its settler-colonial nature, those who are hyperexploited constitute a qualitatively different class than those who are not. and, i think those that live under the constant fear of becoming hyperexploited also belong to this class, sort of in the same way that the proletariat lives under constant fear of becoming unemployed and homeless. the three classes that i see that fit this definition are:
- the indigenous, who often live in the worst conditions and have limited to no sovereignty. the reservation system continues to be a product of settler-colonialism
- black people, with particular reference to the effectively forced labor systems in prisons. slavery is still technically legal according to the constitution, with the stipulation that slavery can be applied to prisoners. their status as prisoner gives them next to no legal rights or means to bargain with their employer, and they are paid a pittance as a result if anything at all
- foreign and/or hispanic people and their families, with particular reference to undocumented immigrants. there are many strong incentives for white capital to hyperexploit these people: because they have no documents, usually have little education and often have a strong language barrier, they also have next to no bargaining power with respect to their employer. this results in the most horrible of working conditions: slums on company property, extra-long work days with considerably less pay than those who are documented, child labor, etc.
the irony here is that, because of their undocumented status, they are in fact much less likely to commit crime than the general populace, because it risks losing access to their family, their job, and their means of life. structures like ICE typically have existed in order to strike fear into those who are at risk, similar to gangs of whites being given arms in order to combat or dissuade slave revolts in early american history (which was the derivation of the 2nd amendment, the right to bear arms).
but, now that ICE is actively deporting and killing the undocumented and anyone who has anything to do with them, it's literally self-defeating because settler-colonialist structures rely on hyperexploitation to keep the wheels turning, especially as it relates to much of the menial labor in the core. not to mention that its different and more prominent use of force is obviously having the effect of making people more class conscious as well.
first time i've ever heard of this person, looked into it and promptly got disgusted. could you go into more detail, since you seem to have background knowledge that i lack? why does it say a lot?