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Supposedly, humans are supposed to be a very advanced species, so then why is mental illness so incredibly rampant? From those that have some schizophrenia to men thinking they're women and vice versa. Why do humans suffer from such mental illness? Why can't we be above that?
Someone lost the instruction manual along the way.
Think about it for a moment. By what standard do we decide what is right, what is normal, and what isn't? For each situation, we as humans are trying to determine that but that determination is slightly flawed for we as humans are inside the sphere we are trying analyze.
As we go along, we may determine that something that was "nuts" is no longer. Look at the changes in the DSM.
Finally, keep in mind that stipulation in the DSM-IV (I haven't seen V yet, is it really that much different?); that a condition is only a problem to an individual if it is a problem to them (with one or two exceptions). Even if they have all the symptoms but it isn't keeping them from functioning operationally, then they aren't diagnostically that condition.
Someone lost the instruction manual along the way.
Think about it for a moment. By what standard do we decide what is right, what is normal, and what isn't? For each situation, we as humans are trying to determine that but that determination is slightly flawed for we as humans are inside the sphere we are trying analyze.
As we go along, we may determine that something that was "nuts" is no longer. Look at the changes in the DSM.
Finally, keep in mind that stipulation in the DSM-IV (I haven't seen V yet, is it really that much different?); that a condition is only a problem to an individual if it is a problem to them (with one or two exceptions). Even if they have all the symptoms but it isn't keeping them from functioning operationally, then they aren't diagnostically that condition.
DSM-5 has some very notable differences compared to DSM-IV/TR.
Symptomology causing distress and compromised functioning continues to be a large factor in behavioral diagnoses.
Per the OP, I would dispute the assertion that mental health diagnoses are "so" rampant. Particularly in the case of some of the ones noted, incidence actually is not incredibly high at all, by any reasonable measure).
Supposedly, humans are supposed to be a very advanced species, so then why is mental illness so incredibly rampant? From those that have some schizophrenia to men thinking they're women and vice versa. Why do humans suffer from such mental illness? Why can't we be above that?
Humans being gender non-conforming are not mentally ill. Much of mental illness is the result of trauma. Trauma happens, even to animals. It's a failure of our "modern" society, that it only recently has developed methods of successfully treating emotional trauma. For all our "scientific" orientation (or because of it), we've failed in this area. More so-called "primitive" societies had their ways of treating some types of trauma, so that victims could go on to live productive lives. Ours has been far behind in this realm, for too long. JMHO.
Mental illness can be so situational. What may look crazy in a New Yorker could be considered spiritual enlightenment in a foreign indigenous jungle dweller. That's why I appreciate Tabula pointing out the symptomatic distress component of diagnosis.
Conversely (and perversely) what about the seemingly "normal" New Yorker with two children, a spouse, a good job and a nice home who is desperately unhappy?
Sometimes I think a major component in what we call mental illness could be the civilized and advanced society that humans were never designed to live within! Crowding, pollution, noise and light pollution, chemicals in our food and all the recreational chemicals we take, stress, too much glass and concrete and not enough grass, water and trees - how much of a role do all these unnatural things play in a state of mental health?
Do we even have a lengthy enough measure yet of what the long-term effects of riding in a plane at 30,000 feet in the air may be on human health? Or passing rapidly through time zones? Or hundreds of thousands of radio waves traveling through our bodies?
1) we have erased survival of the fittest with modern medicine. In nature, those who can't forage, fight, hunt, etc., get culled out, and so do their genes.
2) we aren't eating the kinds of food we would in nature, and I think our diets literally make us sick and crazy, as do the medicines we are given to treat them.
So, ironically, our modern medicine keeps us alive, but makes us sick at the same time.
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