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It reminds me of what Aldous Huxley wrote (about people in distress): “The real hopeless victims of mental illness are to be found among those who appear to be

It reminds me of what Aldous Huxley wrote (about people in distress): “The real hopeless victims of mental illness are to be found among those who appear to be most normal. "Many of them are normal because they are so well adjusted to our mode of existence, because their human voice has been silenced so early in their lives, that they do not even struggle or suffer or develop symptoms as the neurotic does." They are normal not in what may be called the absolute sense of the word; they are normal only in relation to a profoundly abnormal society. Their perfect adjustment to that abnormal society is a measure of their mental sickness. These millions of abnormally normal people, living without fuss in a society to which, if they were fully human beings, they ought not to be adjusted.”

agumonkey 6y ago
I tried going back to normal life but 6 weeks were enough to erode my mind way too deep.
- seesawtron 6y ago
  I think the challenging part is definition of "normal life". The burden of fitting in with the "norms" of the society by suppressing your own internal beliefs for the short-term gratification of feeling normal comes back to bite you in the long-term. Over the centuries the society has mostly been unaccommodating to those who fall on the tails of this normal distribution, ostracizing them, punishing them, so on and so forth. But I still have faith in humanity to become more accepting and understanding those who are different instead of pressuring them to be the same. So the first step is to believe that your life is not abnormal but just different from most people. I hope you find your solace in this ever-evolving world.
  - agumonkey 6y ago
    Not only self repression but also navigating the web of frail, shallow opinions and antagonistic emotions (granted the workplace under consideration is not a place of friendship) leading to non sense most of the time. It's not a place of truth.
danans 6y ago
> if they were fully human beings, they ought not to be adjusted The myth/ideal of being "fully human" is an example of essentialism, and is one the techniques that authors like Huxley and many from his era employed. It preys upon the inner authoritarian desire to normalize the world for oneself above all else, even though ironically Huxley opposed authoritarianism himself. A different take is that people's mental health as individuals is in a constant tug of war with their own circumstances, which are then in their own tug of war with the collective stresses of society. There is no normal/abnormal spectrum as Huxley would have us think. Just a complicated web of complicated agents, sometimes in harmony with their society and other times not. When the net entropy to the agent is relatively low, that's "normal". It's not a value judgement or a mark of inauthenticity the way Huxley might have you think.
- Johnjonjoan 6y ago
  I disagree. Human beings as you say are products of their circumstances and one circumstance that seems very pervasive is technology. We are no longer fully human beings. Technology had changed what it is to be human even in Huxley's time; nowadays I wonder has AI already taken over? The prevalence of computer run algorithms in human beings decision making seems to imply it has started at least.
  - artificial 6y ago
    AI gets bandied about these days. Would stoplights fall under AI?
    - Johnjonjoan 6y ago
      Sure. I wouldn't say the decisions they influence affect our humanity a great deal though.
  - cj 6y ago
    Technology has definitely changed what it is to be human. But I don’t think that means what we are today is less human than before. Technology is a very powerful tool we created. But so was the “invention” of the wheel.
Johnjonjoan 6y ago
I've studied this quote a lot and I do think it's very hard to realise who Aldous is talking about, but I don't think he's talking about those in distress. Rather those that gave in to this world and can live with willful ignorance at it's pitfalls rather than distress.
- seesawtron 6y ago
  Yes of course. He is talking about the people who have been "normlised" to be what the society or those in power need them to be: the masses who never oppose their governments, the people who give up their individuality to pursue a career to buy things they might not need, and so on. It is a reflection on those people who are NOT in distress but they ought to be rather than be ignorant.
  - rumanator 6y ago
    > the people who give up their individuality to pursue a career to buy things they might not need Everyone I met who placed all their chips in pursuing a career were pretty much expressing their individuality. It just so happened that their individuality helped them thrive in a particular environment. And you'd be surprised how material wealth, including as a status symbol, helps people express their individuality.
    - seesawtron 6y ago
      Sure I agree there are people who do that as well. That reminds me of the propaganda movement from Edward Bernays [0] how he profited the industry by convincing people that they need to buy material things (for example, new fashionable clothes) to express their individuality. [0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DnPmg0R1M04 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DnPmg0R1M04
DavidVoid 6y ago
Reminds me of what Martin Luther King, Jr., had to say about the word "maladjusted" [1]. “You who are in the field of psychology have given us a great word. It is the word maladjusted. This word is probably used more than any other word in psychology. It is a good word; certainly it is good that in dealing with what the word implies you are declaring that destructive maladjustment should be destroyed. You are saying that all must seek the well-adjusted life in order to avoid neurotic and schizophrenic personalities. But on the other hand, I am sure that we will recognize that there are some things in our society, some things in our world, to which we should never be adjusted. There are some things concerning which we must always be maladjusted if we are to be people of good will. We must never adjust ourselves to racial discrimination and racial segregation. We must never adjust ourselves to religious bigotry. We must never adjust ourselves to economic conditions that take necessities from the many to give luxuries to the few. We must never adjust ourselves to the madness of militarism, and the self-defeating effects of physical violence.” [1] https://www.apa.org/monitor/features/king-challenge https://www.apa.org/monitor/features/king-challenge
- bobbiechen 6y ago
  And from George Bernard Shaw: “The reasonable man adapts himself to the world: the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man.”
  - taurath 6y ago
    Which is a distinctly western sort of thought, that insists on a person being somehow outside and not of the world in which he inhabits.
    - dragonsngoblins 6y ago
      I disagree that it insists on that. You can be part of the world but the world is still external to you.
      - 6y ago
mistermann 6y ago
A lot of philosophers have had similar (but different) takes on this phenomenon over time. Plato: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theory_of_forms https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theory_of_forms https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/plato-metaphysics/ https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/plato-metaphysics/ Jiddu Krishnamurti: https://charleseisenstein.org/video/it-is-no-measure-of-health-to-be-well-adjusted-to-a-profoundly-sick-society/ https://charleseisenstein.org/video/it-is-no-measure-of-heal... https://www.wildmind.org/blogs/quote-of-the-month/krishnamurti-measure-of-health https://www.wildmind.org/blogs/quote-of-the-month/krishnamur... Terence McKenna: https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/7391624-we-have-gone-sick-by-following-a-path-of-untrammelled https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/7391624-we-have-gone-sick-b... https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/5998836-the-reason-we-feel-alienated-is-because-the-society-is https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/5998836-the-reason-we-feel-... https://www.goodreads.com/author/quotes/9243.Terence_McKenna https://www.goodreads.com/author/quotes/9243.Terence_McKenna Interestingly, this sort of phenomenon is rarely if ever discussed in the mainstream - rather, when any such ideas are discussed, they are typically mocked, trivialized, discredited, misrepresented, framed, "debunked", etc. It makes one wonder why things are this way - is this consensus perspective accidental, or might something else be going on? Can we point to any other historic examples of people being deliberately (mis)led, by coordinated and powerful actors, to believe certain things to be true, that are not actually true?
- seesawtron 6y ago
  Quoting Ernest Becker from his "The Denial of Death" which is again derived in a way from Plato's Ideas/Forms: "In man a working level of narcissism is inseparable from self-esteem, from a basic sense of self-worth. His sense of self-worth is constituted symbolically, his cherished narcissism feeds on symbols, on an abstract idea of his own worth, an idea composed of words, sounds and images, in the air, in the mind, on paper." > Can we point to any other historic examples of people being deliberately (mis)led, by coordinated and powerful actors, to believe certain things to be true, that are not actually true? I think the whole Public Relations (aka propaganda) movement would be an example of this delibrately misleading people to believe in certain things and force them act accordingly. The modern pioneer of this would be Edward Bernays [0] how he profited the industry by convincing people that they need to buy material things (for example, new fashionable clothes) to express their individuality or helping the Tobacco industry to get rid of the taboo of smoking among women. But I would argue that this idea of misleading masses goes back in history. I would go out on a limb here but isn't the whole idea of Church based on fear of hell in order to make people act according to "Christian" values to seek eternal heaven and save their soul? Seems like delibrating misleading people in a coordinated manner to believe in ideas that are not actually proven to be true. [0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DnPmg0R1M04 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DnPmg0R1M04
dpweb 6y ago
Also, what is the appropriate threshold where we call it mental illness. The article, Jenna's boyfriend cheated. She's seriously depressed. That ain't illness, it's normal. That doctor is a quack. I feel part of the problem is the expectation that humans are supposed to be happy. Happy is just a state of mind, not necessarily our default state. Depression and mental pain have their uses. They alert us, something is wrong - make a change! Working through pain, not self-medicating, strengthens you. Even if you 'don't know what's wrong', the unconscious WILL act out on, repressed childhood trauma, for instance. We're destined to suffer, if for no other reason the horrific reality that we will all be annihilated one day. Everything beautiful in the world will be taken from us. Our existence will end. So happiness is not our default state, or even where we SHOULD get to. Why would it be? There are certainly people who need intervention before they suicide, and people with real chemical imbalances (for people prescribed meds - -is this EVER proven scientifically? EEG? blood test?), but we conflate those people with others who are just very rightfully sad about the circumstances in their lives. Often these people (alcohol, food, drugs, phone) instead of making the difficult changes.
- grugagag 6y ago
  I somewhat agree that depression could be a good thing under certain circumstances, circumstances that can be fixed and are not outside the control of the subject. Also I feel that I need to add that there are different personalities, and disorders of personality. In a lot of cases the narcissistic usually comes on top exploiting and causing depression and insecurities in others. I don’t find that this type of depression is useful. And generally society is becoming more narcissistic which rises the level of distress in others and that can’t be easily fixed.
- closeparen 6y ago
  Symptoms of depression are bad news for difficult self-improvement projects. Sometimes you need your emotional system to stop punching you in the face before you can climb out of the hole. Negative emotions can easily slip from encouraging action into preventing it. And without the capability to feel pleasure, even success will seem pretty empty. Sometimes your life is actually great and the failure is in your perception. See the unreasonable effectiveness of applying basic rationality to your thinking, i.e. CBT. Relief from depression is not happiness, it’s neutrality, the space to work, and the ability to feel the fruits of your work.
razakel 6y ago
Some more food for thought - occasionally doctors will privately admit that many of their patients aren't really depressed, they're in fact suffering from "shit life syndrome" - in other words, their mood is the normal and natural response to the circumstances they are in. Here's an FT article about Blackpool, a deprived seaside town in the north of England. It has the highest unemployment rate, some of the lowest life expectancy, highest rate of prescription of antidepressants, and highest rate of hard drug abuse (heroin and spice) in the country: https://www.ft.com/blackpool https://www.ft.com/blackpool
- yomly 6y ago
  Anecdotally a doctor friend confirmed this same observation to me after doing a psychiatry rotation - they suggested that most people with depression were just sad but wanted a magic pill to cure the unpleasant emotion.
  - ip26 6y ago
    It's hard to know if you are clinically depressed. I've asked myself the question many times, and can never really say for sure.
    - Johnjonjoan 6y ago
      Usually if everyone around you would say you're one of the happiest people and you think you're also one of the saddest you are depressed. "Happiness has nothing on the overcompensations for misery" - Huxley If you're sad for a good/known reason you probably won't feel the need to overcompensate. Edit: I do not mean to say people who don't meet this criteria aren't depressed in any way shape or form.
    - jac241 6y ago
      https://www.mdcalc.com/phq-9-patient-health-questionnaire-9 https://www.mdcalc.com/phq-9-patient-health-questionnaire-9 . You deserve to feel happy and enjoy life. Don't let a stigma about mental illness prevent you from getting treatment (therapy and/or antidepressants) if you feel like you could benefit.
starpilot 6y ago
The social critic and mathematician Ted Kaczynski said, "The concept of 'mental health' in our society is defined largely by the extent to which an individual behaves in accord with the needs of the system and does so without showing signs of stress ... Instead of removing the conditions that make people depressed, modern society gives them antidepressant drugs. In effect, antidepressants are a means of modifying an individual’s internal state in such a way as to enable him to tolerate social conditions that he would otherwise find intolerable ... Without the entertainment industry the system probably would not have been able to get away with putting as much stress-producing pressure on us as it does." The entire concept of "boredom" to him is a state of unease brought on by the modern working lifestyle. "Depression" is really a healthy, normal response to horrible conditions that we've adjusted to, like a fish that doesn't realize he's surrounded by water.
- sjtindell 6y ago
  I agree strongly with this view. People often refer to the lessons we learned putting rats in cages. Cages that contain the things rats really need make them happy. Cages that don’t, make them unhappy. It’s not the rats mentality that needs to change, the cage needs to change or they need a new cage entirely.
- seesawtron 6y ago
  I like that you reference him solely as social critic and mathematician. I would recommend one should read his manifesto [0] to form their own opinion. Additionally you might also enjoy the Adam Curtis's documentary series [1]. [0] https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/The-Unabomber-Manifesto-1-Industrial-Society-and-Kaczynski/1ac5ae3a279a5833cf83fb320cd77e9010769c63 https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/The-Unabomber-Manifest... [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DnPmg0R1M04 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DnPmg0R1M04
  - ColanR 6y ago
    Ideas should be evaluated on their own merit, unbiased by anyone's view of their originator.
sixstringtheory 6y ago
Reminded me of the more succinct: > It is no measure of health to be well adjusted to a profoundly sick society. Jiddu Krishnamurti

agumonkey 6y ago

I tried going back to normal life but 6 weeks were enough to erode my mind way too deep.

seesawtron 6y ago
I think the challenging part is definition of "normal life". The burden of fitting in with the "norms" of the society by suppressing your own internal beliefs for the short-term gratification of feeling normal comes back to bite you in the long-term. Over the centuries the society has mostly been unaccommodating to those who fall on the tails of this normal distribution, ostracizing them, punishing them, so on and so forth. But I still have faith in humanity to become more accepting and understanding those who are different instead of pressuring them to be the same. So the first step is to believe that your life is not abnormal but just different from most people. I hope you find your solace in this ever-evolving world.
- agumonkey 6y ago
  Not only self repression but also navigating the web of frail, shallow opinions and antagonistic emotions (granted the workplace under consideration is not a place of friendship) leading to non sense most of the time. It's not a place of truth.

danans 6y ago

> if they were fully human beings, they ought not to be adjusted The myth/ideal of being "fully human" is an example of essentialism, and is one the techniques that authors like Huxley and many from his era employed. It preys upon the inner authoritarian desire to normalize the world for oneself above all else, even though ironically Huxley opposed authoritarianism himself. A different take is that people's mental health as individuals is in a constant tug of war with their own circumstances, which are then in their own tug of war with the collective stresses of society. There is no normal/abnormal spectrum as Huxley would have us think. Just a complicated web of complicated agents, sometimes in harmony with their society and other times not. When the net entropy to the agent is relatively low, that's "normal". It's not a value judgement or a mark of inauthenticity the way Huxley might have you think.

Johnjonjoan 6y ago
I disagree. Human beings as you say are products of their circumstances and one circumstance that seems very pervasive is technology. We are no longer fully human beings. Technology had changed what it is to be human even in Huxley's time; nowadays I wonder has AI already taken over? The prevalence of computer run algorithms in human beings decision making seems to imply it has started at least.
- artificial 6y ago
  AI gets bandied about these days. Would stoplights fall under AI?
  - Johnjonjoan 6y ago
    Sure. I wouldn't say the decisions they influence affect our humanity a great deal though.
- cj 6y ago
  Technology has definitely changed what it is to be human. But I don’t think that means what we are today is less human than before. Technology is a very powerful tool we created. But so was the “invention” of the wheel.

Johnjonjoan 6y ago

I've studied this quote a lot and I do think it's very hard to realise who Aldous is talking about, but I don't think he's talking about those in distress. Rather those that gave in to this world and can live with willful ignorance at it's pitfalls rather than distress.

seesawtron 6y ago
Yes of course. He is talking about the people who have been "normlised" to be what the society or those in power need them to be: the masses who never oppose their governments, the people who give up their individuality to pursue a career to buy things they might not need, and so on. It is a reflection on those people who are NOT in distress but they ought to be rather than be ignorant.
- rumanator 6y ago
  > the people who give up their individuality to pursue a career to buy things they might not need Everyone I met who placed all their chips in pursuing a career were pretty much expressing their individuality. It just so happened that their individuality helped them thrive in a particular environment. And you'd be surprised how material wealth, including as a status symbol, helps people express their individuality.
  - seesawtron 6y ago
    Sure I agree there are people who do that as well. That reminds me of the propaganda movement from Edward Bernays [0] how he profited the industry by convincing people that they need to buy material things (for example, new fashionable clothes) to express their individuality. [0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DnPmg0R1M04 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DnPmg0R1M04

DavidVoid 6y ago

Reminds me of what Martin Luther King, Jr., had to say about the word "maladjusted" [1]. “You who are in the field of psychology have given us a great word. It is the word maladjusted. This word is probably used more than any other word in psychology. It is a good word; certainly it is good that in dealing with what the word implies you are declaring that destructive maladjustment should be destroyed. You are saying that all must seek the well-adjusted life in order to avoid neurotic and schizophrenic personalities. But on the other hand, I am sure that we will recognize that there are some things in our society, some things in our world, to which we should never be adjusted. There are some things concerning which we must always be maladjusted if we are to be people of good will. We must never adjust ourselves to racial discrimination and racial segregation. We must never adjust ourselves to religious bigotry. We must never adjust ourselves to economic conditions that take necessities from the many to give luxuries to the few. We must never adjust ourselves to the madness of militarism, and the self-defeating effects of physical violence.” [1] https://www.apa.org/monitor/features/king-challenge https://www.apa.org/monitor/features/king-challenge

bobbiechen 6y ago
And from George Bernard Shaw: “The reasonable man adapts himself to the world: the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man.”
- taurath 6y ago
  Which is a distinctly western sort of thought, that insists on a person being somehow outside and not of the world in which he inhabits.
  - dragonsngoblins 6y ago
    I disagree that it insists on that. You can be part of the world but the world is still external to you.
    - 6y ago

mistermann 6y ago

A lot of philosophers have had similar (but different) takes on this phenomenon over time. Plato: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theory_of_forms https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theory_of_forms https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/plato-metaphysics/ https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/plato-metaphysics/ Jiddu Krishnamurti: https://charleseisenstein.org/video/it-is-no-measure-of-health-to-be-well-adjusted-to-a-profoundly-sick-society/ https://charleseisenstein.org/video/it-is-no-measure-of-heal... https://www.wildmind.org/blogs/quote-of-the-month/krishnamurti-measure-of-health https://www.wildmind.org/blogs/quote-of-the-month/krishnamur... Terence McKenna: https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/7391624-we-have-gone-sick-by-following-a-path-of-untrammelled https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/7391624-we-have-gone-sick-b... https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/5998836-the-reason-we-feel-alienated-is-because-the-society-is https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/5998836-the-reason-we-feel-... https://www.goodreads.com/author/quotes/9243.Terence_McKenna https://www.goodreads.com/author/quotes/9243.Terence_McKenna Interestingly, this sort of phenomenon is rarely if ever discussed in the mainstream - rather, when any such ideas are discussed, they are typically mocked, trivialized, discredited, misrepresented, framed, "debunked", etc. It makes one wonder why things are this way - is this consensus perspective accidental, or might something else be going on? Can we point to any other historic examples of people being deliberately (mis)led, by coordinated and powerful actors, to believe certain things to be true, that are not actually true?

seesawtron 6y ago
Quoting Ernest Becker from his "The Denial of Death" which is again derived in a way from Plato's Ideas/Forms: "In man a working level of narcissism is inseparable from self-esteem, from a basic sense of self-worth. His sense of self-worth is constituted symbolically, his cherished narcissism feeds on symbols, on an abstract idea of his own worth, an idea composed of words, sounds and images, in the air, in the mind, on paper." > Can we point to any other historic examples of people being deliberately (mis)led, by coordinated and powerful actors, to believe certain things to be true, that are not actually true? I think the whole Public Relations (aka propaganda) movement would be an example of this delibrately misleading people to believe in certain things and force them act accordingly. The modern pioneer of this would be Edward Bernays [0] how he profited the industry by convincing people that they need to buy material things (for example, new fashionable clothes) to express their individuality or helping the Tobacco industry to get rid of the taboo of smoking among women. But I would argue that this idea of misleading masses goes back in history. I would go out on a limb here but isn't the whole idea of Church based on fear of hell in order to make people act according to "Christian" values to seek eternal heaven and save their soul? Seems like delibrating misleading people in a coordinated manner to believe in ideas that are not actually proven to be true. [0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DnPmg0R1M04 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DnPmg0R1M04

dpweb 6y ago

Also, what is the appropriate threshold where we call it mental illness. The article, Jenna's boyfriend cheated. She's seriously depressed. That ain't illness, it's normal. That doctor is a quack. I feel part of the problem is the expectation that humans are supposed to be happy. Happy is just a state of mind, not necessarily our default state. Depression and mental pain have their uses. They alert us, something is wrong - make a change! Working through pain, not self-medicating, strengthens you. Even if you 'don't know what's wrong', the unconscious WILL act out on, repressed childhood trauma, for instance. We're destined to suffer, if for no other reason the horrific reality that we will all be annihilated one day. Everything beautiful in the world will be taken from us. Our existence will end. So happiness is not our default state, or even where we SHOULD get to. Why would it be? There are certainly people who need intervention before they suicide, and people with real chemical imbalances (for people prescribed meds - -is this EVER proven scientifically? EEG? blood test?), but we conflate those people with others who are just very rightfully sad about the circumstances in their lives. Often these people (alcohol, food, drugs, phone) instead of making the difficult changes.

grugagag 6y ago
I somewhat agree that depression could be a good thing under certain circumstances, circumstances that can be fixed and are not outside the control of the subject. Also I feel that I need to add that there are different personalities, and disorders of personality. In a lot of cases the narcissistic usually comes on top exploiting and causing depression and insecurities in others. I don’t find that this type of depression is useful. And generally society is becoming more narcissistic which rises the level of distress in others and that can’t be easily fixed.
closeparen 6y ago
Symptoms of depression are bad news for difficult self-improvement projects. Sometimes you need your emotional system to stop punching you in the face before you can climb out of the hole. Negative emotions can easily slip from encouraging action into preventing it. And without the capability to feel pleasure, even success will seem pretty empty. Sometimes your life is actually great and the failure is in your perception. See the unreasonable effectiveness of applying basic rationality to your thinking, i.e. CBT. Relief from depression is not happiness, it’s neutrality, the space to work, and the ability to feel the fruits of your work.

razakel 6y ago

Some more food for thought - occasionally doctors will privately admit that many of their patients aren't really depressed, they're in fact suffering from "shit life syndrome" - in other words, their mood is the normal and natural response to the circumstances they are in. Here's an FT article about Blackpool, a deprived seaside town in the north of England. It has the highest unemployment rate, some of the lowest life expectancy, highest rate of prescription of antidepressants, and highest rate of hard drug abuse (heroin and spice) in the country: https://www.ft.com/blackpool https://www.ft.com/blackpool

yomly 6y ago
Anecdotally a doctor friend confirmed this same observation to me after doing a psychiatry rotation - they suggested that most people with depression were just sad but wanted a magic pill to cure the unpleasant emotion.
- ip26 6y ago
  It's hard to know if you are clinically depressed. I've asked myself the question many times, and can never really say for sure.
  - Johnjonjoan 6y ago
    Usually if everyone around you would say you're one of the happiest people and you think you're also one of the saddest you are depressed. "Happiness has nothing on the overcompensations for misery" - Huxley If you're sad for a good/known reason you probably won't feel the need to overcompensate. Edit: I do not mean to say people who don't meet this criteria aren't depressed in any way shape or form.
  - jac241 6y ago
    https://www.mdcalc.com/phq-9-patient-health-questionnaire-9 https://www.mdcalc.com/phq-9-patient-health-questionnaire-9 . You deserve to feel happy and enjoy life. Don't let a stigma about mental illness prevent you from getting treatment (therapy and/or antidepressants) if you feel like you could benefit.

starpilot 6y ago

The social critic and mathematician Ted Kaczynski said, "The concept of 'mental health' in our society is defined largely by the extent to which an individual behaves in accord with the needs of the system and does so without showing signs of stress ... Instead of removing the conditions that make people depressed, modern society gives them antidepressant drugs. In effect, antidepressants are a means of modifying an individual’s internal state in such a way as to enable him to tolerate social conditions that he would otherwise find intolerable ... Without the entertainment industry the system probably would not have been able to get away with putting as much stress-producing pressure on us as it does." The entire concept of "boredom" to him is a state of unease brought on by the modern working lifestyle. "Depression" is really a healthy, normal response to horrible conditions that we've adjusted to, like a fish that doesn't realize he's surrounded by water.

sjtindell 6y ago
I agree strongly with this view. People often refer to the lessons we learned putting rats in cages. Cages that contain the things rats really need make them happy. Cages that don’t, make them unhappy. It’s not the rats mentality that needs to change, the cage needs to change or they need a new cage entirely.
seesawtron 6y ago
I like that you reference him solely as social critic and mathematician. I would recommend one should read his manifesto [0] to form their own opinion. Additionally you might also enjoy the Adam Curtis's documentary series [1]. [0] https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/The-Unabomber-Manifesto-1-Industrial-Society-and-Kaczynski/1ac5ae3a279a5833cf83fb320cd77e9010769c63 https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/The-Unabomber-Manifest... [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DnPmg0R1M04 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DnPmg0R1M04
- ColanR 6y ago
  Ideas should be evaluated on their own merit, unbiased by anyone's view of their originator.

sixstringtheory 6y ago

Reminded me of the more succinct: > It is no measure of health to be well adjusted to a profoundly sick society. Jiddu Krishnamurti