mental illness shaming

[peasant one]

Can we have a productive dialog about refraining from calling individuals you disagree with mentally ill. I find this particularly disturbing since it tends to stigmatize people with psychiatric conditions. The latest estimates I've seen indicate that as many as one in five people have psychiatric conditions. Many of these people have spouses, children and careers and are active, productive participants in the world. The people I know who have psychiatric conditions are some of the most sensitive, creative and loving people around. Maybe someone on DU can think of other terms or other ways to express our common frustration with those we disagree.

[Warpy]

1. Funny, I don't call people with psychiatric issues "crazy."

I reserve it for people who walk among us, watch Pox News, go to megachurches with fire and brimstone preachers who preach bigotry, and vote Republican.

I think the bigger problem with shaming people with mental illness is telling them to snap out of it, act better in public, and generally treat them like they've got a moral failure instead of a sick organ. The brain is the only organ that gets treated that way when it becomes ill.

Besides, one thing the truly sick know for certain is that they're the sane ones and the rest of us are totally bonkers. Pejoratives like "crazy as a shithouse rat" mean little to them.

FWIW, I'm a garden variety depressive with years of experience working in psychiatric hospitals.

[MADem]

4. I agree with your take, Warpy.

Someone with brain chemistry issues is not "crazy." People who are crazy are those who do dumb-ass, shitty, mean things when they know full well that they are doing something wrong, nasty, cruel and/or unkind. They know, and they do it anyway.

Now that's some crazy shit.

I don't think we need to get all "word police" on this business either. It's not hard to figure out when someone is making fun of someone for the "crime" of being mentally ill. That's not tolerable and it should be sanctioned, but calling a jerk - asshole - meanie "crazy" or a "kook" is just saying what they are.

[Bjorn Against]

5. I think there is a big difference between calling someone crazy and calling them mentally ill

I don't have problems with words like crazy, insane, or nuts. I think those words apply to a lot of people who don't have a mental illness but do watch a bit too much Fox News and Alex Jones.

I do have a much bigger problem when people try to diagnose a mental illness on political figures, the mentally ill do not want to be associated with every nasty figure in the political world. Having crazy ideas because of ideology is not a mental illness.

[Warpy]

6. Unless it is.

I usually need to know a lot about the meanie in question before I assign a possible reason for the nuttiness. For instance, hypomania would explain a lot about Sarah Palin when she ad libs and much about her life story. I feel quite sorry for her because I know what early diagnosis and treatment would have done for her.

Most of the rest of them are just mean as snakes and going for the good money that being a fascist traitor to your country brings in.

[Bjorn Against]

9. I can't totally disagree

While I would not try to diagnose her myself, I must admit that Sarah Palin does show signs that she would benefit from seeing a psychiatrist. I won't deny that, but I still think we need to be careful to ensure we don't stigmatize the mentally ill by associating them with extremists. While there are no doubt some Tea Party members who are mentally ill, I have seen nothing to suggest they are any more likely to be mentally ill than any other group of people. Most of them are just ideologues who commit themselves to crazy ideas, but they got those ideas through propaganda rather than any sort of illness.

[peasant one]

7. thanks warpy

I understand where you are coming from but I have recently tried to stop using the term crazy as well. I agree with your assessment that people who watch fox news, attend prosperity churches and are bigots are both morally,ethically and spiritually challenged, however, we have to have some other terms than crazy or mentally ill to criticize them. Good luck with that depression--and it is not a moral failure--more, i believe a greater awareness/understanding of the reality of existence.

[Warpy]

10. Read it again

My answer didn't say what you think it did.

[Barack_America]

15. The modern use of "crazy" is more akin to "silly"

Or "ridiculous"

[conservaphobe]

2. I think we're all just one big collection of crazy.

Some on a smaller scale and some on a larger scale (like myself).

And our crazy crashes like waves against a trash-laden beach, slowly eroding what's left of our journey straight to hell...

Not the one they use to fill the collection plates, but something far more sinister.

[peasant one]

11. I agree we are on a scale regarding our mental health.

This changes on a moment by moment basis for some. I have problems with the terms that separate out people with psychiatric conditions and stigmatize these individuals as immutable conditions. Labeling individuals as "crazy" is disparaging and allows some in our society who may not be able to discern Warpy's nuanced position to lump people together as crazy or mentally ill and treat individuals with these conditions as unworthy of our love, our concern or our protection and they think that this is condoned by others who use these terms more generally.

[davidpdx]

3. I agree

With the recent suicide of Robin Williams you would think people would be a little more cautious about that kind of thing.

I have been on juries where the situation you are describing has happened and have voted to hide the post. IMHO, it's a no brainer.

Now occasionally I use the phrase "Are you crazy?" in a rhetorical way (mostly in real life not on DU), but that's quite different from what you are describing.

[undergroundpanther]

8. yes I wish the stigma of mental illness

was not reinforced every time people disagree.
Mental illness is painful. I hate people with mental illness have to reassert that people with mental illness are productive good citizens just like everyone else is assumed to be already.
Mental illness hurts enough without people using slurs like crazy to insult each other as if being a mentally ill person is a personification of
a slur/ an insult.

[peasant one]

13. I think you have articulated what I meant to say.

Words do hurt and it pains me/shocks me every time I read the words "crazy" and "mentally ill" when they are being used as an insult. There are other terms and other words to describe individuals you disagree with (and I really think it makes for a more robust discussion to find better more precise words to describe behaviors one finds abhorrent). Many people with psychiatric conditions are in great pain and have to deal with many issues that others do not even suspect. Good luck to you. Thanks Undergroundpanther,

[steve2470]

12. it's easy to get lazy and say "crazy" when you mean something else...

like irrational, stupid, science-denying, etc etc. When I KNOW that someone is mentally ill, then I do my best to refrain from that word.

We do need more knowledge of mental illnesses, compassion, and funding for public programs. This is one area where the private sector just doesn't cut it. We need drastically ramped-up funding for public sector mental health programs.

[peasant one]

14. precisely.

I think the term "crazy" is used in lots of situations when one really means something else and I totally agree that there needs to be greater funding for more mental health programs.

[99th_Monkey]

16. Aye-fucking-men

I have a 30 yo son diagnosed as "bipolar"

your post is much appreciated.

[Spitfire of ATJ]

17. Even THIS???

[Roy Rolling]

18. Advocating for years

I have been working for years to change this medically-misnamed condition. There is no organ or part of the body called "mental." It hints that this family of diseases is a choice and curing the diseases is simply as easy as willfully changing one's mind. That is not the case.

I have promoted using the term "brain disease"to assign a name to the family of diseases they have misnamed "mental illness". Please, those on DU, be at the forefront of this evolutionary change in redirecting the course of treatment and public attitudes toward this sometimes totally-incapacitating family of brain disorders.

[libodem]

19. We called it Organic Brain Syndrome

When I worked at State Hospital South back in the seventies.

To be honest the whole word policing effort to spare people's personal offence around here makes me tired.

Crazy will be this year's 'retarded'. I would never call any one with developmental delay retarded. Or ever call anyone with a major mental illness crazy. I would only ever actually insult a regular person with those terms.

I don't even use those terms. I don't call people names. But it's still how I feel.

I have a diagnosis of depression. So I do get it.

[peasant one]

20. I get the word police issue

But I think using these terms as an insult is wrong. I would love it if "crazy" and "mentally ill" would become out of fashion as insults. I appreciate that you don't call people names and I think everyone would be better off if we didn't resort to name calling so frequently.