~2min
“As a psychologist, People come to you with mental illnesses and that’s almost never true. People come to you because their lives are so damn complicated they cannot stay on top of them in any way that doesn’t make it look like it’s just going to get more complicated. And so then that causes symptoms.”
Exactly. Mental “illness” is what we get labeled for having a perfectly NORMAL response to a SHIT LIFE. While there are people with true mental illness, most of us just have shit lives. Improve our conditions and our “illness” goes away. And if it goes away, then it was never an “illness” to begin with.
I’m not saying depression isn’t real- oh it sure fucking is. Just saying it isn’t a “mental illness” where there is something wrong with US but instead is a NORMAL response to a shit life.
If you have a shitty life, a shitty job with a shitty boss, shitty or no friends, a shitty or no partner, a shitty or no income, shitty health, then you’re going to be depressed af.
People do alcohol or drugs smoke or SH or have an eating disorder. Those are symptoms of depression or a shit life, and NOT the cause of a shit life. Take away the shit life conditions and most ppl tend to stop being alcoholics or druggies.
6 comments
Please don’t minimize mental illness as this speaker appears to be doing in the video you posted. Mental illness is very real, and most people who see a therapist or psychologist have an actual, diagnosable mental illness. Thank you.
As stated in the post, I’m not saying what we struggle with isn’t real- my issue is that it’s labeled as a “mental illness”- labeling it as such tells us and everyone in society that there is something wrong inside US, instead of our very *normal* responses to trauma, pain, horrible life situations etc.
I am not saying what we struggle with aren’t real. I am saying I don’t agree with the term “mental illness” that we are labeled with.
that particular guy…. doesn’t have much scientific credibility, to put it that way. He’s well known, but not for the reasons you want to be well known if you are a scientist.
I think I get the thrust of where you’re going with it, that there are real life stresses, real problems not just chemical imbalances in many of our cases. The problem being, that it’s easy to get chemical correction, but to get lifestyle correction is very hard.
but yeah, back to that guy, I’ve run into him a few times, and he’s well spoken…. he’s just demonstrated more loyalty to his political beliefs than to actual science.
I’m not agreeing with all the other stuff he says, bc I don’t listen to him. I just saw this ONE clip and in this ONE instance, I agree that ALL of us get brushed into the “mental illness” category as if there’s something wrong with US. The reality is, if “normal” ppl were put through trauma, SA, shit life conditions, they would respond just as we do, so our responses are “normal” and isn’t an “illness.” I hate how they label us as “abnormal” bc we respond in a very normal way to stressors, trauma, shitty conditions, etc.
That is what I was trying to say in my post. We are responding normally to shit life situations, events, traumas, etc, so we aren’t necessarily mentally “ill.”
I think I can agree with Mr. Peterson, for my case anyway. Not sure I’d call it a “complexity problem” tho, but it sort of make sense. He is a very experienced clinician, and a very, very smart dude so, there is that.
My dad died of pancreatitis, in 3 days, when I was 17, he was 46. He smoked and drank, but he was still very functional, had a job, hobbies, a dog, etc. When he did die, my mom went ape shit and drank like you couldn’t believe. She broke many bones over the years just falling off, etc.. anyway, turned out I slowly began to hate her. When she sold the summer house my dad and grandfather built themselves, that the terrain was given to my dad by my grandfather, she gave me nothing of the sell, that made me extremely angry. The summer house was under his name only too. Since he didn’t have a will, I mean, who has time to write one in 3 days, 2 of which he was unconscious, they used the marriage contract as a reference but, I wasn’t even born when that was written. She also used me as her own psychologist, all through my childhood, also complaining about that summer house, how ironic.
I believe I would’ve made an excellent engineer. Always liked things, electronics, computers, car mechanics, working with wood, metal, leather, etc. She always told me she’d pay for an education, and when I actually asked her to go to university in mechanical or electrical engineering, she said to ask my grandfather. Man, what a liar.
Anyway, long story short, lost my dad, sort of lost my mom too but I still have to cringe and talk to her, and I didn’t really pushed my education enough to use my talents so, I guess that sorta makes my life shit? Also, since I hate my mom, never really got anything going with women, I think deep down, all I can see is weak, liars.
Pretty lonely and frustrating life, to say the least. I manage tho but, if I’d have a gun at home, I’d most certainly be dead by now.
Can’t say my situation is that bad I mean, but I guess I ain’t strong enough to brush it off and do ok.
I tend to agree with Marx that Material conditions shape psyche and human behavior. Almost all human conditions/features are result of environment he is subjected to. Society wants us to behave in contradictory ways, for example it runs on money but want people to be selfless and not money hungry. This produces neurosis.