On 'mental health'?
How does one define sound 'mental health'?
Perhaps, mental health simply be understood as practicing good moral behavior and conduct or just living ethically?
It would seem that sound mental health is just simply being in good standing or relations with other people. In essence, mental health is defined as a relational approach to therapy with other people in mind. If so, then acting ethically or with morality in mind would seem to be the much-needed reference point or goalpost needed when addressing one's mental health. If one is of sound moral character, then one is sane? That seems simple enough at establishing the norm in regards to mental health.
Thoughts?
Perhaps, mental health simply be understood as practicing good moral behavior and conduct or just living ethically?
It would seem that sound mental health is just simply being in good standing or relations with other people. In essence, mental health is defined as a relational approach to therapy with other people in mind. If so, then acting ethically or with morality in mind would seem to be the much-needed reference point or goalpost needed when addressing one's mental health. If one is of sound moral character, then one is sane? That seems simple enough at establishing the norm in regards to mental health.
Thoughts?
Comments (57)
However, the legal system does have its subjective guidelines that are used to determine the mental health of individuals and this changes by judge and jurisdiction.
Aristotle thought differently. He describes attaining a state of eudaimonia, which would seem to be a state of clear and sound mind.
There are countless other philosophies and religions that have their own way of achieving peace and tranquility. Perhaps, truth is a pathless land or one can achieve happiness through being ethical or moral?
Yeah, well people are becoming more prone to poor mental health due to various factors that living in modern day society entails. So, perhaps if there is a benefit in treating or preventing mental health issues would be to behave morally or with ethics in mind.
Well, prime certainly are taking more drugs as every behavior is now considered and abnormal for marketing reasons. Somehow there is a direct correlation between pharmaceutical profits and the number if new diseases that the industry creates. Maybe it is the drugs that are affecting behavior?
I gather from a few mocking birds that people have a hard time even figuring out what the golden rule is supposed to be about. How on earth is anyone expected to know what is wrong and what right if we adults don’t first have a cognitively present, perfectly justified, absolute truth about what ethics are? I say adults because most all kids have such knowledge; but kids don’t count because they don’t think about their thoughts as we adults do … at least they don't count according to a bunch of learned adults that can’t settle on what the golden rule is.
Skipping some potentially important step in argumentation, in short, I find a lot of truth in the OP’s basic assertion. So, more seriously, I second that there ought to be some established clinical diagnosis for cruelty, for instance. Problem is it’s so rampant among mankind that you’d have a hard time finding someone devoid of this mental disorder to write it up as a mental disorder in the first place—and even if you did, then the majority of others would ensure that this denotation of mental insanity never makes it to the light of day.
My occasionally present dark and obtuse sense of humor, I guess. But the point to this post I think still holds.
That's an interesting point. I think there is certainly a tendency to overprescribe medications like SSRI's ADHD stimulant medication and even antipsychotics like Abilify as an augmenter to depression and antidepressant medication. The downside of this is that you have more people who are exposed to the side effects of antidepressants and other medications. In some cases, this leads to suicide.
However, the flipside is that we have fewer people being institutionalized and requiring hospitalizations or costly public upkeep of facilities for those suffering from various mental disorders.
The downside of all this is that you have the few who are pigeonholed, others who just need talk therapy rather than medication, which I talked about in another thread about the unfortunate rift between psychology and psychiatry.
Going a little deeper, most of the medications don't even work as compared to the placebo effect. Something that still boggles my mind, as you would think depression or schizophrenia or bipolar disorder are resistant to 'wishful thinking', yet that is not the case. Most of the new drugs aren't even superior to some 20 or 30-year-old Prozac or Clozapine.
Quoting Rich
Well, we have no way of knowing whether a person will respond or how they will respond to medication. So, I'm not sure what it is that you are trying to address.
Part of what my first post is implying is that there need not be a 'perfectly justified' or 'absolute truth' in practicing ethics. There can be different paths. However, eventually, some norms are established, like not killing another human being, etc.
Rather, it is the process of being ethical, or observing morals, that brings about the change in character or the mind which leads to happiness.
Despite saying that Socrates might have been a gadfly to be around with, we are reminded of how many schools of thought were inspired by Socrates death. Thus, it must mean something to act ethically or hold morals dear to oneself if so many people were inspired by Socrates life.
What does this say about a sound and healthy mind? It would seem to imply that having a sound mind goes along with having a sound moral system to abide by, and with that creating a character admired by many?
So two things need to be present: Actual functioning needs to be approximately, roughly, normal, and individuals need to feel satisfied that their functioning is normal. They don't have to be happy, they don't have to be highly ethical or moral.
So, if a person is experiencing depressed mental functioning, finds that memory, concentration, appetite, and libido are greatly reduced, and recognizes this as a problem...; if an individual is experiencing hallucinations (auditory or visual), intense fear, agitation, and whose sensory input seems o be quite distorted, we would also say the individual was mentally ill.
There are a batch of mental illnesses that present definite symptoms that can be identified readily.
Morality and ethics are a concern in mental health when the individual abruptly abandon an ethical or moral standard that they used to follow. So, if someone whose behavior was scrupulously honest begins to lie, cheat, and steal, it might signal a disorder which wasn't previously present. On the other hand, if lying, cheating, and stealing were always part of the individual's modus operandi, their poor moral behavior might signal nothing amiss intellectually or emotionally. People who are engaged in career criminal behavior can be mentally healthy. Tony Soprano's fellow crooks appeared to have normal mental health functioning.
I hold that people can choose to be dishonest (lie, cheat, steal) and be mentally healthy. What they can't do is be moral or ethical while they are lying, cheating, or stealing.
For instance, someone who handles a lot of cash may decide to divert some of it into their own pocket simply because at the time of collection there were no receipts. For instance, the amount of cash in a collection plate at a meeting or political rally isn't known until it is counted. If one person counts it out of sight of other people, it is quite easy to "under-count" and pocket the difference, without arousing suspicion. That's why there are controls in place when cash is counted -- two unrelated people are present, for instance, to do the counting.
That seems to be the case. Perhaps the basic mechanism of affecting mental performance with drugs was present in the first generation of psychoactive meds (like tri-cyclic anti-depressants) and hasn't really been improved upon, except for reducing some side effects.
So, postface, where are you??? Have you abandoned your computer to deal with wild fires, or something? The least you could do is respond to my penetrating thoughts before you rush away to save your hide.
I'm here. Let me meditate on what you said and see if I can muster anything up.
Surely, crime, murder, and other such acts are a sickness of the society in which one resides. Eric Fromm wrote about this in great detail. I really should read more of his books, I only skimmed his, The Sane Society. In general, I think that the term 'mental disorder or illness' is detrimental to the prognosis of the patient. It labels them as dysfunctional and incapable of performing mundane activities (coming from someone on disability and wondering if I can at least work part-time on my disability type because they vary).
But, wouldn't it be a good society if its participants were equally good, and concerned with the examined life?
Yes, I agree that conflating the two isn't wise. Perhaps, it can be argued that immoral and unethical behavior goes against what our conscience would have us do best, and that in itself is a manifestation of some disquietude in the mind of the person? Mind you, I don't have petty theft on my mind, more like murder or such acts of brutality.
I would think that an unempathetic, psychopathic, and remorseless criminal should be considered a 'mental illness' or at least some illness of some sort, one so dire and socially unacceptable that would require society to designate special housing areas (prisons) to hold such people there(?)
I know of many drugs and have researched their efficacy. They don't hold up to some older medications, like Nardil (Penelzine) or Parnate (Tranylcypromine). If you read the piles on online reports on those drugs for depression, they are considered the gold standard for social anxiety with depression.
However, there is an issue that I haven't mentioned about antidepressant medications, they tend to poop out with time. In my experience, after a while the antidepressant effects subside and your left with feeling apathetic or unmotivated.
And, motivation is an important thing, don't you think? I would say that motivation or the desire to get better is the best prognosis for remission from depression. What these drugs do is make you content with everything (mostly the SSRI's), and leave [s]you[/s] or me, from personal experience, apathetic and unmotivated. That's a hole many people get stuck in. Doing some armchair psychology, I suppose that the best time to address depression is when you first get into it, then the cause of it is easier to discern, I think.
Anyway, I went on a tangent there, but take it for what it is, some armchair psychology.
Sure, but remember: we're talking about human society here, not a society of saints and angels.
Quoting Posty McPostface
Well, people with significant illnesses are dysfunctional. If one has a severe case of tuberculosis, for instance, one is pretty much dysfunctional, whether one likes it or not. People who are paralyzed by infections, injuries, or strokes are dysfunctional. They can't function.
Mental illnesses sometimes make people dysfunctional and able to perform ONLY mundane activities, like self care. More severe mental illnesses may make it impossible for the person to even take care of their own bodily needs. But such severe consequences aren't usually long lasting. Someone who is in stark-raving-mad-psychosis will eventually calm down (especially with major tranquilizers) and then function much better. Even return to mental health.
What severe mental illness especially interferes with is higher, more complex tasks, like manipulating data, complex design work, difficult memory and learning tasks, and so on.
Well, Posty, psychopathic and remorselessly criminal behavior is considered a severe mental illness. People found to act out psychopathic murderous thoughts usually end up on death row, life in prison without parole, or in a high security psychiatric facility for life.
Some people contemplate and carry out arson, rape, and bloody murder, but most people are content to defraud, lie, cheat, steal, rob, embezzle, rip off, remove for personal use, waste, defraud, abuse, and so on -- criminal behavior for sure, but not society shattering, as long as it is kept to a minimum. All these crimes against property can wreck society if it gets out of hand. One wants a drink of water, "but the pump don't work 'cause the vandals took the handle", as Bob Dylan sang.
How does one 'return' to mental health? It seems like a statement worth exploring in how it derives its meaning.
Perhaps I should amend what I have stated in the OP.
Namely, that being concerned with ethics is indicative of sound mental health; but, not a causal factor in facilitating it. Sounds kinda strange now that I re-read it.
Yes, although I haven't done research, I would think a form of therapy for them would be in the art of ethics? Perhaps I see myself working with inmates teaching them philosophy or ethics to reduce recidivism.
One can dream.
In my long history of taking antidepressants and anti anxiety drugs, I certainly found that to be true. If they work, which they don't always do for a given individual, they eventually fail--usually. I'd say benzodiazapine drugs like Xanax or Ativan fail predictably, or in susceptible persons, become an addiction issue.
Quoting Posty McPostface
The Radical Therapist magazine (long since defunct) had for a slogan "Therapy means change, not adjustment" and illustrated their motto with a chick hatched out of its shell (change). I think that is very true, but... Most people can not simply change their circumstances and environment, however. We have roles which we want to fulfill, and are expected or needed by others to fulfill, and just up and leaving job, home, husband, wife, children, dog, and/or cat behind is not something most people want or are willing to do, and for very good reason.
But sometimes it has to be done, at least in part. Usually the job is the first to go. Maybe one goes on disability, and being relieved of the stress, sturm, and drang of the job makes for a huge improvement. Maybe the difficulties of a very stressful relationship are relieved by a separation, separate housing, or divorce. Sometimes extremely difficult situations are made better by the unfortunate death of a partner (like where there is chronic debilitating illness, old age, etc.)
These drastic changes can lead in time to a genuine recovery from depression, anxiety, and dysfunction, if the individual is able to make good on the opportunity presented.
Psychopaths don't fear punishment, and they don't develop normal relationships or human ties to place and people, either. Most psychopaths are not motivated to commit murder, but some are. In cases where people with psychopathic tendencies become business managers, they are able to carry out decisions that normal people would find quite painful -- like laying off 15,000 workers to improve profitability. The boss with psychopathic tendencies won't lose any sleep over it. A touch of psychopathy can be mighty useful in various positions--just so long as it's just a smidgeon and not a whole lot.
So teaching ethics won't help them. I don't think there is any established therapy, however. Maybe you could find one that would address their brain problems.
Yeah, can't beat homeostasis... However, there just might be the need to cycle medications over time. In my case, the Zyprexa was working too well, so I asked my p-doc to switch me to a more activating mood stabilizer, Abilify. I'm also on Zoloft, so the two are working pretty well for my needs. Eventually, once the depression goes down in magnitude, I hope to add Strattera for having inattentive ADD.
Quoting Bitter Crank
Dang, sounds like a nice magazine. Would have paid to read it. I bet the pharmaceutical industry would have destroyed it had it been around nowadays. Yeah, life isn't getting easier for the middle class and lower class people. Fortunately, the U.S. has a very progressive tax system, and the lower class often get paid for being poor, how awkward?
I happen to think that "armchair psychology" is an inexpensive way of keeping one hand on the pole while you try to deal with what life is throwing at you. So I for one, am glad that you continue to share your ideas with us because you are not alone in this ride of absurdity called life.
I can relate to being on SSRI's and Benzos for almost 30 years now and I can tell you that the reason I was put on the medications is not the same reason I am still on them today. I am on them today because as you might know, once you start on them there is really no way off. I mean sure you could stop taking them but those around you, many who have only known you on these meds, do have a bit of a say in how they are or are not affecting you. Same with the discontinuation of any med and how it affects you. When I share with the Doctor that I don't think (Insert SSRI name here for the list is long) is working anymore they either have started me on another SSRI or one even gave a secondary med to improve the impact of the SSRI. In doing so there is absolutely no way to know if you are stable without meds and when you go off the medication, how do we know if we are stable if it has taken a medication to achieve stability for over a decade? There really is no way to find the 'real you' which was a slice in time before the addition of meds because while on the meds, time has passed, anxieties have changed focus and we have grown.
I have been told that people who are manic or people who ruminate have learned to enjoy the unmedicated high and who wouldn't? I know that I still cycle on medication, I just am more apathetic so it takes a LOT to get me riled but when it does, oooo just be careful you are not in my line of fire.
Genetically and being from Chicago, I have a decent 'fight' factor in my makeup which rarely overrides my filters of logic and grace, I mean rarely, like once or twice a year but it's there. Last week it happened when the Dentist called regarding oral surgery I was scheduled to have yesterday (and did) just to give me a "little update from the surgeon" which was to say that the Doctor thinks it would be easier on me and faster for him, to sedate me via IV, as opposed to taking the time to work on me with only Nitrous. I will save you the pages of how that impacted me and cut to the chase in that I had the surgery done, on time and done right with another dentist.
There are some times when it is perfectly okay with being not okay and don't let any one person tell you different. But for me? By the time a third person says something to me about my emotions not being in line with what is 'normal', I actively work at calming to the same level as those around me.
Why isn't it? You can be the most moral person in the world, but if you don't realize what good you do do, then your mental health won't be any good. However, if one does realize that they're doing good, that they're kind, helpful, thoughtful, etc., then I very much think that one's conscience will impact their mental health for the better.
I can relate. I have no idea how I would be like without my meds. It's an appealing thought to get off the meds and live about without them; but, getting off some of my meds might cause a rebound effect. Anyway, it seems like it would be best to not fantasize too much about 'what if's' of 'maybe's'.
Quoting ArguingWAristotleTiff
Yeah, some people don't take the consequences of their disorder under serious consideration and go through life unmedicated. Sure, that's possible; but, if you want to have a family or maintain a stable job or have friends, then what's wrong with taking a small pill once a day(?) Then there's the issue of people self-medicating. Better to do it under the supervision of a doctor than yourself, methinks.
So, it might be that having a sound mental health goes together with being ethical.
I don't know of any person who wasn't sane and concerned with ethics or practicing good moral standing.
Again, I’m in overall agreement with the sentiment the OP proposes, but I don’t yet see this sentiment being in any way applicable in today’s world--in terms of concrete results. The DSM could easily incorporate among its metal-disorder indicators something about unethical behavior—regardless of type or degree. One might be surprised at how trite some of the there listed mental disorders are. Yet there are complications:
You mention murder as an example. In war, there can be both killing of humans as well as murder, the later often entwined with extreme cruelty. Skipping the examples, in today’s world would there be any interest to then have those who engage in the latter diagnosed as insane?
Ask most any young enough child if cruelty—toward other humans, toward animals, or in any other form—is good and they will answer, “no”. Us adults, having a history in which we’ve all more or less had instances of being cruel toward some other at some point in our lives (even if indirectly, such as in our eating of veal knowing the cruelly required for its production), will then justify such instances of not being saints or angels as often excusable, if not utterly normal and necessary. Or worse, we go about pretending that we actually are saints or angels, somehow separated from the swine, because this is less painful than being honest about our own faults. Regardless, we all nevertheless know that cruelty is wrong. Yet to make the case for this to be an un-health of mind would then affect all of us adults in manners that most of us would not like. And so, we adults are generally ambivalent in terming cruelty a wrong. It all depends, we most often say.
Don’t want to draw this out in other directions in relation to ethics. I simply believe that generally, insanity will be minimally contingent on the given behaviors standing out from the norm. There’s this modified quote I picked up on that I like, “When the lunatics take over the asylum their beliefs become the dogma of the sane.”
I very much agree with the original argument that being aligned to a moral compass can only make a mind healthier. Yet if one become too moral one deviates from the norm—at a certain juncture can even become harmful to the norm (such as by exposing too many deceptions, etc.). And this generally does not lead to good results for a social individual. I could fathom that some wise individual might be able to hold onto both an integral moral compass and a general accord to the practices of the norm, but I don’t yet understand how the tension would not yet remain … it would not be the serene happiness that I take is most often associated with eudemonia.
Not that any of this is a formal argument, but I think it better expresses my quibble with the pragmatic application of holding unethical behaviors and inclinations to be aspects of an unhealthy mind. (as for murder, please see my aforementioned comments).
I did some writing on 'mood' last year. There are reams of writing on 'mood disorder', but strikingly there is next to nothing on what an ordered or normal mood is, either in psychology or philosophy. We know disorder when we see it, seems to be the thinking, even if we can't define what it deviates from.
I've been reading some different corners of Aristotle and thinking about 'eunoia'. It gets (mis)translated as 'goodwill' (which is Cicero's fault for the intervening Latin). For Aristotle eunoia is the feeling one experiences and expresses towards one's deepest friends - the baseline of his Nicomachean Ethics - and in rhetoric it's the emotional connection you make to those you are trying to persuade of something.
I like the idea of it as a kind of baseline for mental sense-making and strength. We could form a society: the Eunoiacs. (could also be a name for a band :))
Great to see you mcdoodle.
This seems to be a case where things cannot be described but shown in practice, like good behavior or acceptable behavior. (again ethics and mental health?)
Quoting mcdoodle
Yes, I think Aristotle was a pioneer in forming a framework under which acceptable behavior would be defined as practicing ethics, in this case, virtue ethics, which then the Stoics expanded on and which even modern day therapies owe in large debt to their teachings. And, quite frankly I don't know of any other system that is as elegant and sufficient to address the issue of what constitutes healthy wellbeing. Kant's deontological ethics is too rationalistic for it to be applicable to most people. Perhaps, Rawl's veil of ignorance could be applied; but, bias is ever-present. Consequentialist philosophies seem to demand some central authority with the calculus of utility already spelled out, and having this central authority dictate the workings of society as a benevolent dictator.
Quoting mcdoodle
Hah, as long as it's not related to hedonism!
Ah, reminds me of Plato. So the immoral person is mentally ill?
Plato. Heavy name to throw out, and I often try not referencing him due to my limited readings of his Dialogues and The Republic.
Quoting Mitchell
I would argue that this goes to what Thrasymachus said about justice and the lack of response from Socrates.
Another issue is that Plato spoke of the good life as something that originates from within, which Socrates talked about a 'daemon' that informed him about what is right and just. It can be argued that this 'daemon' or 'conscious' or whatever other cultural names have been devised for that inner voice that informs us about what is right or just to do is paramount to living a good and examined life. Platonists took this idea to mean that people must have a spirit, and listening to it is what constitutes being a good person. I might be wrong, but, I think Plato put a strong emphasis on conditioning the weak and frail body to realize the potential of this inner voice or soul. However, this form of education would be a far cry from what we have nowadays. The closest comparison would be some officer training program in the military nowadays. After all, Plato can be called an anti-materialist, I think?
Anyway, don't want to ramble any more than I have already.
In other words, you are not likely to find bad behavior is generally the result of bad intentions. The worst atrocities of history as well as the mundane daily affronts to our sensibilities, are caused by people who mean well but understand the world differently than we do.
When we level accusations of immorality against someone, we are expressing our own puzzlement and failure to make sense of the other's thinking from within their own perspective. It's a form of hostility on our part, an attempt to rectify our failure by forcing the other to comply with the way we expected them to act.
What about the golden rule? It seems that most cultures with a long enough history of thought have some version of it in their moral or ethical works? It really wouldn't be too difficult to practice the golden rule and maintain a stable mental health with respect to other people.
to your ethical standards do you attribute this to his evil intentions or do you explain this on the basis of a different worldview on his part? The golden rule is worthless without insight into the other's way of construing the world. Without this insight, one is forced to impune the other's motives and this simply justifies endless wars of righteousness.
Different worldviews don't matter as long as we are both being ethical towards each other. In this case applying the golden rule.
Quoting Joshs
So differing worldviews are incommensurable? Applying the golden rule would seem to suffice for any person, as long as they aren't aliens of some sort, perhaps?
Quoting Joshs
Wars of righteousness aren't ethical or at least the ones I know of weren't based on ethics of any sort, perhaps an ethics of might makes right?
"So differing worldviews are incommensurable? Applying the golden rule would seem to suffice for any person, as long as they aren't aliens of some sort, perhaps?"
That's the whole point. We ARE alien to each other to some extent. That's why we call people from other cultures foreigners or aliens. Each time we get into intractable disagreements with others it's because we fail to see eye to eye on interpretations of actions.
Differing worldviews dont have to be incommensurable. But in order to bridge the gap between them, someone from one or the other side must be able to translate and subsume the other's perspective within their own. This doesnt have to require that either side take on the behavior of the other, but it will alleviate the urge to condemn and punish.
"Wars of righteousness aren't ethical or at least the ones I know of weren't based on ethics of any sort, perhaps an ethics of might makes right?"
What about the current verbal war of moral righteousness between U.S. progressives and Trump conservatives? The left attacks the right as selfish, greedy, bigoted and dishonest, The right accuses the left of similar immoral intents.
Neither side is able to fathom the gulf in worldview that separates them and so justifies their own actions as ethically based but condemns the other using ineffective standards like the Golden Rule.
“What does it mean to be a well adjusted Nazi? Is that mental health? Or is a maladjusted person in a Nazi society the only one who is sane?” -- Ken Wilber
Nice quote. I don't think I can comment on that without making a faux pas.
May I ask of your thoughts on this thread, Mitchell?
Would greatly appreciate your input on thoughts about what Plato or Aristotle had to say or other philosophers.
I was able to wean myself off benzodiazepines and tri-cyclic antidepressants without much difficulty, but that was...30 years ago, and I had not been on them very long. And how many pounds of antidepressant since then?
I'm not against taking medications. I've taken drugs for glaucoma for some 30 years too. They have worked well--keeping pressure under control, preserving vision, preventing pain. But, as luck would have it, they stopped working in one eye. (Odd how a drug can work in one eye and stop working in the other one.)
I am grateful that these drugs have been found to control various acute and chronic conditions. Without the pharmacopeia we have, life would be nastier and shorter. Most people don't mind that they receive background doses of fluoride, but there are some who are militantly opposed. Likewise for the lunatic anti-vaxers.
Even if some drugs have toxicities, even if they fail sometimes, many lives have been better with them than without them. I think most of the people who have severe epilepsy, for example, find that drugs are better than frequent seizures, even though the difference between the therapeutic and toxic dose of some of the drugs is very small.
Predictably, some people are opposed to the anti-Herpes Zoster vaccine (prevents or reduces the severity of shingles). Don't know why; it's against nature, god, or something. Anyone who has had or knows someone who has had a bad case of shingles will opt for this godless unnatural vaccination without thinking a second about it.
It would seem that Plato and other philosophers* took the idea to heart and went to elaborate lengths to describe an ideal state that would let people flourish and live without an 'ill mind or spirit'. Maybe other philosophers didn't take the idea at face value; but, it seems intuitively clear that what is good is ethical, and what is right is good, and a good mind is a healthy one?
I suppose Aristotle couldn't improve on Plato's Republic, so he settled with describing how people ought to behave.
*Other philosophers include but are not limited to Hobbs, Mill, Roussou, Hegel, Marx, Rawls, Nozick, etc.
Now, do you think this attempt to envision an 'ideal' state has been futile in the past and present?
I have a ton of questions but I'll leave it at that.
No.
[b]"There is of course no disputing that in modern Western society whites often oppress blacks and men often oppress women. This is bound to be the case in a social context in which people are forced to compete for scarce resources and to differentiate themselves from each other in any way which will accord them greater power, however illusory that power may be (nothing, after all, could be more pathetic than the belief that 'whiteness' confers personal superiority or that men are in some way to be valued more highly than women).
However, it is a conceptual mistake of the first magnitude to attribute the causes of such oppression to internal characteristics or traits of those involved. So long as sexism and racism are seen as personal attitudes which the individual sinner must, so to speak, identify in and root out of his or her soul, we are distracted from locating the causes of interpersonal strife in the material operation of power at more distal levels2. Furthermore, solidarity against oppressive distal power is effectively prevented from developing within the oppressed groups, who, successfully divided, are left by their rulers to squabble amongst themselves, exactly as Fanon detailed in the case of Algerians impoverished and embittered by their French colonial masters.
It is not that racist or sexist attitudes do not exist - they may indeed be features of the commentary of those who exercise or seek to exercise oppressive, possibly brutal proximal power. But that commentary is not the cause of the process that results in such proximal oppression and it is as futile to tackle the problem at that level as it is to try to cure 'neurosis' by tinkering with so-called 'cognitions' or 'unconscious motivation'.
This, I think, explains the otherwise puzzling success of 'political correctness' at a time when corporate power extended its influence over global society on an unprecedented scale. For this success was in fact no triumph of liberal thought or ethics, but rather the 'interiorizing', the turning outside-in of forms of domination which are real enough. The best-intentioned among us become absorbed in a kind of interior witch-hunt in which we try to track down non-existent demons within our 'inner worlds', while in the world outside the exploitation of the poor by the rich (correlating, of course, very much with black and white respectively) and the morale-sapping strife between men and women rage unabated.
Once again, we are stuck with the immaterial processes of 'psychology', unable to think beyond those aspects of commentary we take to indicate, for example, 'attitudes' or 'intentions'. The history of the twentieth century should have taught us that anyone will be racist in the appropriate set of circumstances. What is important for our understanding is an analysis of those circumstances, not an orgy of righteous accusation and agonised soul-searching."[/b] -- David Smail, Power, Responsibility and Freedom
For those who do not feel like ever reading Smail's work, I can give you this summary: psychological distress--the thing that brings people to the mental health clinic--is the result of distant social forces and an individual's place in networks of power, interest, etc., not something inside the individual. Clinical psychology is uniquely positioned to help individuals see the distant external sources of their psychological distress. Clinical psychology has, however, historically said nothing in therapy about society, power, interest, etc. and has instead focused on internal features of the individual such as memories, self-talk, etc.
It is probably not the best, most accurate summary, but hopefully anybody reading this gets the idea. Psychological distress--and the suffering that accompanies it--can only be addressed at the level of social systems. A lot of what we call mental illness and attribute to the isolated psyches of individuals is really symptoms of life in oppressive social networks of power, interest, etc. Changing the individual will not address the causes/sources of the problem.
Smail may be right or he may be wrong. But I do not believe that anybody can truly understand mental illness without considering his work.
That's a pretty common theme not exclusive to some philosophers who criticise social structures for creating psychological distress. Im sure many socialist and Marxist psychologists and social theorists should come to mind.
Hence my last post. Has this focus on creating an ideal society been futile and instead we should just focus on the individual and their beliefs about and in relation to society?
Does the following sound like some Marxist calling for the realization of a utopia? To me it sounds like a health care professional trying to help people see the real sources of their suffering. I do not think that it is much different from a public health professional saying, "Historically the medical community has focused on the lifestyle choices of individuals. But this distracts us from the real causes of our illnesses that individuals have no control over: radiation, air pollution, etc." Read the following and tell us if you still think that it is somebody calling for the ideal society--for utopia--rather than somebody addressing social reality and social reality's effect on individual and collective suffering:
[b]"The standpoint from which I write is a 'clinical' one, and the (tentative and provisional) conclusions I come to are the result of having struggled for years to make sense of the kinds of distress people bring to the psychological clinic, and how they cope with it. In the course of that struggle I have found myself constantly wandering into territory that is only partially familiar to me and being forced to use tools not routinely found in the clinical psychologist's kit. Though this is not a work of sociology, politics or philosophy, it will at times seem as if it is trying to be; but I want to insist, still, that it is a work of clinical psychology, and that is because it is throughout rooted in and informed by 'clinical' experience.
Even then, however, I have heavily to qualify the use of the word 'clinical' because it carries with it so many false assumptions. The majority of those who find themselves in distress in Western society turn to the clinic because there is nowhere else to go that carries the same promise of relief. They, as well as most of those who treat them, believe that they are hosts of a personal illness or disorder that can be cured by established medical and/or therapeutic techniques. That belief, however, is in my view (and the view of many others) false, and it is clinical experience itself that reveals it as false.
By 'clinical psychology', then, I do not mean a set of medically or therapeutically based procedures for the cure of emotional distress, but rather a privileged opportunity to investigate with people the origins of their difficulties and to consider the possibilities for change."[/b] -- David Smail, Power, Responsibility and Freedom
Amen! Only with lots of therapy and/or medication. Or with a very solid upbringing that recognizes the sick state of society, and offers proper tools for coping and living within it.
I believe that's what Marx was trying to do.
I would say that Plato was first and foremost against incompetence, which Aristotle expanded on or left off where Plato stopped, and philosophers have continued that tradition captured in Whitehead's footnote comment about Plato and Western philosophy.
At the heart of the issue seems to be the matter of educating the public, as Plato might say.
Please do go on.