Re: terms
Silke-Maria Weineck (weinecks@mail2.sas.upenn.edu)
2 Oct 1996 02:26:29 GMT
Sylvia T. Paldhan (pald1208@tao.sosc.osshe.edu) wrote:
: > To say there are no crazy people begging on the streets is itself
: > crazy -- though the "problem in living" this time is a gullible
: > acceptance of rightwing ideology.
: Nobody said there weren't. The definition disputed is
: mental "illness" as an objective reality - in the sense that the
: bodily illness of pneumonia is- rather than a subjective label for
: difficulties people suffer.
It's a slippery path to believe in biomedicine but not psychiatric
biomedicine. If they found a physiological correlation to schizophrenic
symptoms, would you then accept the diagnosis with a greater degree of
confidence? Since that is what biomedicine does: it matches symptoms with
causes. You either believe in it or you don't. To believe in it when it
comes to lungs but not when it comes to brains is problematic.
Fortunately or unfortunately, as it may be, we are a long way from
establishing the physiology of sets of behaviors --- nonetheless, it has
been done (think of the transition of holy fools to epileptics), and it
will certainly be done again. If you want to resist biomedical
terminology, be prepared to resist it all the way. Otherwise, you run the
risk of romanticizing schizophrenia, as Szasz did and others (most
notably Deleuze/Guattari).
[...]
:
Liberty for the individual is the foundation of all liberty. Read
: Szasz again, to see the point of that.
Again, are you willing to support the libertarian agenda all the way or
just in this instance?
Silke
: --
: "Truth is mighty and will prevail."
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