Posted by Mr. SadPuppyDog on September 27, 2002, at 17:09:41
In reply to stigma of mentally ill, posted by as2000 on September 27, 2002, at 15:19:09
> I am taking “feminist political philosophy” in college.
Gag!!! Manhater alert!! <kidding with you>
> Learning about radical feminism and their campaign against the subordination of women has made me wonder about the political theory of the mentally ill.
Radical feminism and severe mental illness have little to nothing in common. Both men and women get severe mental illness. Its NOT a gender thing! But I do understand what you are saying though.
> It is clear to me that the mentally ill are subordinated by the majority of society who may blame mental illness on those that have it. Some even claim that mental illness is invented by those who suffer from it. Why isn’t there more political activity in order to combat the stigma associated with mental illness.
Um...basically there is none. Not any REAL political activism of the type you are talking about. There is a "psychiatric survivors" movement, but thats not what we need. The psychiatric survivors movement is closely tied to the anti-psychiatry movement, which seeks to destroy the whole notion of mental illness being biologically based. Which any halfway smart person realizes is bull. The psychiatric survivors movement is fairly large and fairly well organized and somewhat radical, but they believe in the wrong things.
A positive type political activism movement is BADLY needed in mental illness, but suffice to say there is none. I can tell you one of the reasons is that the mentally ill do not vote much. The mentally ill, especially the severely mentally ill, dont tend to be aggressive, consistent voters. Thus we are basically invisible to politicians.
> How can I get involved with campaigns against the debilitating stigma of mental illness?
A good first step would be to get the mentally ill to vote more. To get over their "nobody cares" crap. You could join NAMI and become involved in that, but thats mostly a lipservice organisation thats been watered down a lot, mostly its for the families of the mentally ill. There are a lot of rumors that NAMI also is tied into the pharmaceutical industry closely. Its not what I consider to be the "ideal" mental illness political activist organisation.
But to sum up, if you are looking for any sort of radical political movement to join, there is none unless you want to join scientology and become an anti-psychiatrist and bash psychiatry drugs and ECT. Nobody is out there representing the other side of the coin very effectively, meaning the people who have these diseases.
Mr. Sad PuppyDog
poster:Mr. SadPuppyDog
thread:121262
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20020922/msgs/121274.html