In his new book, Crazy Like Us: The Globalization of the American Psyche, author Ethan Watters writes that American culture is not only changing the way the world treats mental illness, but is actually altering the symptoms and prevalence of the diseases themselves. He talks about the recent spread of American ideas of psychiatric disorders and asks: is it really good for the world's mental health?
Comments [12]
General Anthony Clement McAuliffe (July 2, 1898 - August 11, 1975) was the United States Army general who commanded the defending 101st Airborne troops during the Battle of Bastogne, Belgium, during the Battle of the Bulge in World War ll. He is famous for his single-word reply to a German surrender ultimatum: "Nuts!" The brave men of this battle would give their lives and souls to give birth to world that denies “The Holocaust” to this day, and the Nuremberg Tribunals which enriched humankind's’lexicon with the recognition of “genocide” in shadows of mushroomed clouds of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. We in postwar America grew up hiding under our school desks reading “Mad magazine”, in fear of the M.A.D doctrine thanks Herman Kahn in the book On Thermonuclear War (1961) collected his thoughts over the years and the content of his public lectures. He described the horrible side effects of radiation on the human body. Even after graphically describing the mutations possible, Kahn nonetheless concluded, "War is a terrible thing, but so is peace. The difference seems to be a quantitative one of degree and standards". “What Me Worry?” is the jingoistic mantra of the “Baby Boomers”, maybe it’s all in our heads a bad case of post global proxy psychosis
I agree with you completely, HC, very nicely put.
How people experience mental illness directly correlates with how they are dealt with. If merely pathologized they will become pathologized. What is needed is how to work on and develop each person's strengths, in part because the brain is plastic (flexible) and not fixed.
Actually I am Navajo and a large part of Navajo medicine is based around restoring mental balance and so they are not adverse to using western and traditional techniques in healing . Western to start and Navajo to finish.
But don't we have to abandon our rigid definitions and concepts of mental illness to come to an understanding which doesn't condition and generate the actual symptoms? What the psychiatric community seems to refuse to understand is that in determining the boundaries and definitions of so called mental illness we are also generating the means of expression which might lie outside of the norm. The problem is that we try to treat the mind in the same way that science attempts to treat an object. It is a devastating reduction of the mind to a narrow minded quantifiable over determination. Too bad psychiatrists seem to think they can learn nothing from philosophy. Nietzsche already knew this over a hundred years ago (Genealogy of Morals).
Every mental illness example talked about today has focused on girls. Mental illness diagnosies has always been used as a controlling device by men towards women.
This is really fascinating.
I'm an epidemiology phd student and I've meet traditional healers and/or witch doctors in Central Tanzania (a little west of Zanzibar) while doing malaria research in the area.
I found the traditional healers very willing to take up western medicine. Have you found any Western or traditional healers that were successful in blending the two healing traditions?
gw how interesting that sounds logical.
I remember reading in my 1st year at Columbia College as part of the core curriculum , Colton and Palmer on Western European History. In the text book, in describing the middle ages, Europe was described as suffering from mass neurosis and paranoia. This was due to the traumas from the black death and little ice age as well as cultural isolation. I have always thought that this legacy of mental illness is still with us today incorporated into European culture. Isn't it interesting in some of the neurotic traits of western civilization?
I lived and worked overseas in the second part of the 90s. When I came back TV advertising medicine to consumers had become legal and ubiquitous. When I reported to my GP, requesting every sort of medicine and test I had seen on TV, he called my parents to tell them their kid had gone bonkers!
is it possible for a nation to be mentally ill? I see symptoms everywhere.
in what ways has the the exportation of US economic principles contributed to the mental health issues of people in other nations?
Leave a Comment
Register for your own account so you can vote on comments, save your favorites, and more. Learn more.
Please stay on topic, be civil, and be brief.
Email addresses are never displayed, but they are required to confirm your comments. Names are displayed with all comments. We reserve the right to edit any comments posted on this site. Please read the Comment Guidelines before posting. By leaving a comment, you agree to New York Public Radio's Privacy Policy and Terms Of Use.