>I think that deep down, mental illness is not really accepted as something real. We tend to believe in free will and how people are responsible for their own a

>I think that deep down, mental illness is not really accepted as something real. We tend to believe in free will and how people are responsible for their own actions, and we tend to apply this to the mentally ill too, and this is exactly why free will is a flawed concept. It is hard when someone is developing mental illness or has hit some tipping point. Once upon a time your friend or loved one was pretty normal, and they've gradually become more erratic, hard to deal with, potentially dangerous even. And most people aren't experienced with how to deal with those issues and they're tough issues. And there's no line when friends, family, society can just take over for a mentally ill person. >we won't tolerate it and the mentally ill will never be able to accept they have a condition There's some caveats to that. Mainly being that mental illness covers a huge spectrum and people at the deeper end may not be capable of acknowledging they have an issue, or even if they can, that admission isn't the thing that will change their circumstances. The identity of self-determination in the U.S. is interesting. There is a lot of truth to how many Americans are just down on their luck millionaires. And how consistently they will work against their own self-interests, because someday they might be wealthy or powerful and they want to enjoy that maximally. And you can see some of these attitudes among many successful people who want to believe it was their effort, their hard work, their genius that made them successful, solely. Or at least those are the biggest factors, while luck, circumstance and opportunity are minimized or completely dismissed. They want to believe if they had to start over they could do it all again and the admission that that might not be the case is not what a lot of people's egos want to hear. So perpetuating that myth of the self being all. That very successful people did it all on their own. That we're all completely totally responsible for ourselves and our circumstances can enable us to feel good about ourselves, and make it easier to blame those who are beneath us on the socia-economic ladder for their own circumstances and not acknowledge that the system is broken, or stacked against some people, that some of us had significant advantages. It makes it very difficult for a lot of people to walk a foot, let alone a mile, in another man's shoes. And that permeates everything in our society, even views of mental illness.