| So one thing to distinguish from is: a) Having emotional/mental/psychological distress b) whether you classify that as "mental illness", and what effect classifying it as mental illness has. My gut reaction is that with regard to (a), people are having a lot of emotional distress these days, and that this is not a response or effect of focusing on mental health or suggesting that everyone has mental illness. I think it is probably cultural, but for deeper and more structural cultural reasons than "whether we believe everyone has mental illness" (or even whether we believe everyone has "emotional distress"... although clearly everyone does to some extent? i think in any culture?) But as to (b), how we understand emotional distress and how we classify it is definitely very culturally defined. I am not convinced that, for instance, classifying it as a "disease" or "illness" is accurate or useful. (useful? In helping people experience less distress or live the lives they want, I suppose). I am especially not convinced that classifying it as the result of a "neurochemical imbalance" is accurate or useful. I think the way we classify and understand this kind of emotional distress matters for how well we deal with it, and we may not be doing so very well. But I don't think that "unhelpful classifying" is what's causing the, I think, actually escalating levels of mental distress. And in general, I think acknowledging that lots of people feel a lot of emotional distress these days is helpful, that you are not alone, that you are not broken, that in fact that you may not be "ill" or have a "disease" (which doens't mean you aren't having a problem, or that things can't change for you). The category of illness or disease, after all, is necessarily exceptional rather than universal, right? You may or may not agree with my analysis (I'm not sure how we'd investigate in an evidence-based way, or if we can), but perhaps still find the distinction between (a) and (b) helpful. |