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Tangentially related. I think capitalism increases self-reported rates of mental illness because individuals who are not achieving the highest goals they set fo

Tangentially related. I think capitalism increases self-reported rates of mental illness because individuals who are not achieving the highest goals they set for themselves are looking for an easy excuse as to why they can't achieve them. I think levels of anxiety are also on the rise, which causes many symptoms which are similar to more severe mental illnesses. Which also reinforces my first point.

giraffe_lady 4y ago
If you're going that way you can reasonably say that capitalism is the context that makes some of these things disorders in the first place. For example it's still not clear to me whether I consider my adhd a disorder in a vacuum. It definitely is here, I can't consistently execute the tasks that that will allow me to safely live. But there have definitely been times and places where "weirdo who is good with kids, calm in an emergency, and knows a lot of infrequently-used-but-valuable skills" is a role people are allowed to occupy. I'm definitely disordered within a context where each individual must labor effectively or die. There have been other arrangements though. This is probably true for some, but not all or even maybe most, mental illnesses and neurological disorders as well.
- z9znz 4y ago
  There are some life situations where having ADHD is probably a lifesaver. Those situations are likely far less common these days than 100+ years ago, so that aspect of humanity is now less relevant. But the evolutionary behavior will take a long time to eliminate itself... There were parts of the book, The Highly Sensitive Person, by Elaine Aron, which were eye-opening to me in how they illustrated facets of myself (and how they showed the human value of some of those facets). There's definitely a place in the world for fixers, watchers, and people with unusual behaviors. I suspect there may be uniquely valuable things to be learned or received from autistic people; but we haven't figured out how to bridge the communication gap. So while most people would assume that autistic means broken or useless, it's possible that the rest of us are just not ready or not capable of comprehending what's actually available.
ralusek 4y ago
No, surely a system in which duties and resources are distributed along the lines of "from each according to his abilities, to each according to his needs" will absolutely not encourage people to maximize needs while minimizing abilities.
- jklinger410 4y ago
  We can talk about the issues of modern capitalism without whatabouting to communism.
logicalmonster 4y ago
> individuals who are not achieving the highest goals they set for themselves are looking for an easy excuse as to why they can't achieve them. Other than becoming a social media influencer, what goals are young people actually striving towards? I'm not sure what you're seeing, but I'm not seeing hordes of young people crying because they're trying to become a medical researcher or engineer or achieve some other tangible goal and can't make it for some reason.
smoldesu 4y ago
This is somehow more likely than the possibility that capitalism encourages people to self-diagnose because it's profitable? I think Occam's Razor would suggest that the much simpler explanation is that a nation of supposedly sick people is a great audience to market your panacea to (see: Adderall, opioids, amphetamines, etc.)

giraffe_lady 4y ago

If you're going that way you can reasonably say that capitalism is the context that makes some of these things disorders in the first place. For example it's still not clear to me whether I consider my adhd a disorder in a vacuum. It definitely is here, I can't consistently execute the tasks that that will allow me to safely live. But there have definitely been times and places where "weirdo who is good with kids, calm in an emergency, and knows a lot of infrequently-used-but-valuable skills" is a role people are allowed to occupy. I'm definitely disordered within a context where each individual must labor effectively or die. There have been other arrangements though. This is probably true for some, but not all or even maybe most, mental illnesses and neurological disorders as well.

z9znz 4y ago
There are some life situations where having ADHD is probably a lifesaver. Those situations are likely far less common these days than 100+ years ago, so that aspect of humanity is now less relevant. But the evolutionary behavior will take a long time to eliminate itself... There were parts of the book, The Highly Sensitive Person, by Elaine Aron, which were eye-opening to me in how they illustrated facets of myself (and how they showed the human value of some of those facets). There's definitely a place in the world for fixers, watchers, and people with unusual behaviors. I suspect there may be uniquely valuable things to be learned or received from autistic people; but we haven't figured out how to bridge the communication gap. So while most people would assume that autistic means broken or useless, it's possible that the rest of us are just not ready or not capable of comprehending what's actually available.

ralusek 4y ago

No, surely a system in which duties and resources are distributed along the lines of "from each according to his abilities, to each according to his needs" will absolutely not encourage people to maximize needs while minimizing abilities.

jklinger410 4y ago
We can talk about the issues of modern capitalism without whatabouting to communism.

logicalmonster 4y ago

> individuals who are not achieving the highest goals they set for themselves are looking for an easy excuse as to why they can't achieve them. Other than becoming a social media influencer, what goals are young people actually striving towards? I'm not sure what you're seeing, but I'm not seeing hordes of young people crying because they're trying to become a medical researcher or engineer or achieve some other tangible goal and can't make it for some reason.

smoldesu 4y ago

This is somehow more likely than the possibility that capitalism encourages people to self-diagnose because it's profitable? I think Occam's Razor would suggest that the much simpler explanation is that a nation of supposedly sick people is a great audience to market your panacea to (see: Adderall, opioids, amphetamines, etc.)