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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsFox Host Tells Caller Her Bipolar Disorder Is "Made Up" And "The Latest Fad" For Money
http://mediamatters.org/blog/2015/01/30/fox-host-tells-caller-her-bipolar-disorder-is-m/202349Sullivan, who is also a frequent Fox Business contributor and guest anchor, began his January 28 program by complaining that people with mental illness have figured how to "game the system" by receiving disability benefits. "They're mostly government employees and they know how to do it," he added. Sullivan also defended Sen. Rand Paul's (R-KY) controversial and false statement that "Over half the people on disability are either anxious or their back hurts."...
Sullivan responded by telling her, "I've got to tell you, if you haven't been told, I will tell you. I think bipolar is like the latest fad. Everybody and their brother is getting diagnosed with bipolar. And last time I checked, we all have good days and we all have bad. And I don't consider that an illness. And I don't consider it a disability."
He added that bipolar disorder is "something made up by the mental health business just to be able to give people prescriptions and keep them coming in, and keeping you -- paying them money."
Is he a $cientologist?
underpants
(182,281 posts)They've hated SSDI and Disability coverage for a loooong time. Everything else they directed their hate/rage/Oh-me-the-victim machinery has turned on them so now they are literally attacking the weakest of the weak.
KamaAina
(78,249 posts)I did know that they hate psychiatry (the "mental health business" .
underpants
(182,281 posts)They shield their story as "get over it" but this really started as the created their propaganda operation. Aside from facts they don't want professionals pointing out the really basic psychological measures they use to manipulate their people.
Lars39
(26,093 posts)Terra Alta
(5,158 posts)Her disorder is certainly not "made up"; it's something she takes medication for and struggles with on a daily basis. She does work, but it is a constant struggle.
Both this guy and Rand Paul are assholes.
Nevernose
(13,081 posts)There are only about 25,000 of them worldwide. They have a much larger influence than heir numbers would indicate (probably due to the blackmail and brainwashing). For comparison's sake, there are about 30,000 Eckankar-ians and about 50,000 Mormon fundamentalist polygamists.
Linky?
Nevernose
(13,081 posts)Is considered a Scientologist by the "Church." So, according to them, it's ten million.
This seems more realistic: http://blogs.villagevoice.com/runninscared/2011/07/scientologists_1.php
KamaAina
(78,249 posts)like everyone who's ever taken one of those phony light-meter tests.
Hell, I'll bet there are 25,000 of them just in Clearwater.
hunter
(38,264 posts)Just because he's never experienced anything like it, or been close to anyone who has, it doesn't exist???
Yes,
I wonder what other diseases he thinks are "made up?"
Multiple Sclerosis, ALS, Measles ... Ebola???
Bipolar can be as deadly as any of those at either extreme of the cycle.
ck4829
(34,977 posts)Plaque is a figment of the liberal media and the dental industry to scare you into buying useless appliances and pastes. Now, I've heard the arguments on both sides, and there is nothing to convince me of the need to brush your teeth.
daredtowork
(3,732 posts)Biological causes ahoy: http://www.newsweek.com/inflammation-causes-depression-many-cases-study-says-302799?piano_t=1
I also read something about research in bacterial/immune response causes a couple months ago, too.
It seems to me that getting tested for these things for people at the poor end of the scale (i.e. on Medicaid/Medi-Cal) would be very difficult, though). I have a neurological disorder, and I just get drugs for symptom control. I've never gotten referred for an MRI or PET of my brain even though there is a thriving brain-imaging academic industry right in town. I keep volunteering as a test subject just so I can get that info for myself, but I haven't gotten lucky yet. Dang online volunteer system is as bad as an online job application system.
Btw, I'm not that familiar with SSDI/SSI for mental illness, but I was under the impression that it's quite tricky to get. You have to have a "clinical" rather than a "personality" disorder. Is bipolar "clinical"? Can a psychologist diagnose a "clinical" disorder or does a psychiatrist have to diagnose that? Do you have to be prescribed a certain class of drugs and have to be taking them for the rest of your life to be considered disabled in SSI/SSDI terms?
While researching the terms for medical rides under Medi-Cal in California, I found out you can't even get bus tickets to your therapist unless you have gotten a referral to see a therapist 3 times a week for more than 90 days. This kind of referral must take some kind of major mental illness since I didn't even get that when I was supposedly in "crisis" when I lost my eye sight (it took 6 months to get a therapist when I was "in crisis" - hahaha). Anyway, the therapy offices aren't normally in the 'hood of people on Medi-Cal, so this disinclination to offer bus tickets (used to be cab rides for the mentally ill!) for people who may have no direct income to people who would mostly get the "standard" therapy referral of once a week seems like a sneaky deliberate barrier to access. Sneaky because most of the policy-makers would just think "well we provided the mental health service", but they weren't involved the transportation piece of it.
Ps. I note I'm the only one who recced this. It seems to me that SSI/SSDI issues tend to fall over a cliff on DU through "official silence", and this omission of support makes it seem like a lot of people agree with Sullivan thought they think it isn't politically correct to say so, and they want to avoid any argument or unpleasantness. In another thread I did argue with a DU person who actively pushed GOP/Tea Party/Fox talking points on cutting SSDI/SSI. If this is the case there seriously needs some TRUTH/FACT push going the other way, and the people who know the truth can't remain silent. They have to start taking a stand. Now. Lives are on the line here.
tallahasseedem
(6,716 posts)Bipolar disease is absolute hell...not only on the person that suffers from it, but their family and friends as well. It is a day to day, sometimes, even an hour to hour battle.
Fuck this guy.
KingCharlemagne
(7,908 posts)not strike until late adolescence\early adulthood. But it can appear in young children, children as young as 5-6 (or maybe even younger). Problem with childhood sufferers of bipolar is that the meds that work so well for adults, e.g., Lithium, can often have unpredictable and contrary outcomes for children. Then add in that all the children who are not afflicted may lose out on parental care because so much care must be given to the ill child. And the stress between parents who are frequently at their wits' ends and getting little or no help from society.
This radio guy should have to live with my brother for a week while he's not on his meds. He'd change his tune in a flash.
Whatever. But I'm with you: "Fuck this guy."
shenmue
(38,503 posts)I've suffered with biploar for years. It is not fake.
kentauros
(29,414 posts)when they began the destruction of mental health in the country?
AngryOldDem
(14,061 posts)Not that mental illness was understood all that well before Reagan. But Reagan made it perfectly acceptable to be willfully ignorant about the subject.
kentauros
(29,414 posts)But they had to have some idea of an outcome from shutting so much of the mental health infrastructure. I just wonder if they realized it would also affect their "own kind" with the likes of Louie Gomert and Sarah Palin getting elected into office
sendero
(28,552 posts)... cranial-rectal inversion is not made up, this dude's a definite sufferer.