self_made_human
Kai su, teknon?
I'm a transhumanist doctor. In a better world, I wouldn't need to add that as a qualifier to plain old "doctor". It would be taken as granted for someone in the profession of saving lives.
At any rate, I intend to live forever or die trying. See you at Heat Death!
User ID: 454
self_made_human
Kai su, teknon?
14hr ago
Indeed. When I need to send someone to a therapist, I tell them it's a sign of both confidence and competence when they make it clear that's there's a time limit for that. Either they note you making good progress, with an end goal in sight, or they tell you straight up that you're not a good fit and send you on.
Not that people can't need prolonged therapy, but maybe I'm just jaundiced from all the girls I've spoken to who should be wearing grippy socks. But they need Jesus, or his brother in the asylum.
incidence of mental illness has skyrocketed in step with the wide spread adoption of therapy culture
That is hopelessly confounded. For most of history, the only treatment for mental illnesses was beatings, blood letting, the asylum, or maybe some mercury if it was syphilitic.
They barely had the conceptual framework to understand mental illness in the first place.
Besides, we know that the stressors of modernity are bad for mental health in of themselves, just look at social media and dating apps for recent examples. Atomization of families, loss of the (false) comfort from religion and so on.
Not everything is a mass psychogenic illness. I would bet a great deal of money that things like depression, BPD, bipolar disorder and the like aren't. And therapy helps, at least when we now recognize and formally diagnose those who could need it.
My own ADHD would certainly have gone undiagnosed, as would so many other conditions (not that therapy does anything there, the drugs help).
therapy itself is mostly trash (which is why we can't make any meaningful improvements to the practice after over a hundred years), it only works in as much as it is the socially acceptably path to resolve such issues. I imagine if we could check, running amok would have been found to be an effective above placebo 'therapy' as well
I feel like my citations speak for themselves here. Is it a good thing that we have the option of paying money to talk to someone in private instead of running about with a machete? I'd be curious to hear how that's not the case.
I'm not defending therapy culture. It's infantilizing to say the least. But actual therapy works well enough that we often consider it the firstline treatment before resorting to the funny drugs. And that's a considered decision made by multiple independent bodies, on the basis of a great deal of evidence.
self_made_human
Kai su, teknon?
2d ago
I fail to see how this analogy is remotely appropriate.
The primary reason that people who are vegan/vegetarian (for non-religious reasons, and even plenty of those) condemn the consumption of meat is because their heart aches at the idea of eating cute little animals, with souls, emotions and a life of endless frolicking in the pastures to look forward to. Most of the arguments advanced alongside that primary concern, such as "sustainability" and environmental issues or resource consumption, are there just to buttress their core concern.
I wholeheartedly agree with @Quantumfreakonomics when he says that:
I am not a person that cares much about the suffering of animals, especially not the ones that taste good. Still, strictly speaking, the suffering is not an integral part of the process. If it could be removed, all else being equal, that would not decrease my utility in any way. I am agnostic on lab-grown meat. If it tastes good, is cheap, and is of comparable healthiness to legacy meat, I will eat it.
After all, I've repeatedly said much the same myself.
Hence the recent fad, only just losing steam, of feverishly trying to find vegan substitutes for meat products. Impossible Burgers and all that jazz. Vegans, begrudgingly, note that they either like meat or that people who otherwise care dearly about animal welfare are dissuaded by the dullness of a life without nice steaks or a side of ribs to go with it.
So lab grown meat completely cuts the Gordian knot. No cute animals were hurt (or at least far fewer, if you don't look too closely at where fetal bovine serum comes from, but presumably we can avoid that too). What's there left to object to, on primary moral grounds? A chunk of vatgrown muscle tissue is probably less sentient than an equivalent amount of fungi.
But of course, like the environmentalist movement and the cleanest and greenest source of energy we had/have/can have*, nuclear, much of the opposition arises from the abhorrent idea that their self-flagellation and virtue signaling will become entirely redundant. What brownie points do you get for not eating a cow, when the average Joe who just wants to grill is using a steak that's indistinguishable from one made the old fashioned way, tastes just as good, and might even be cost competitive?
We're not there yet, and the last overview I read of the topic suggested it's not going to be easy at all, but the sheer idea that their performative ascetism is moot must gnaw at their bones (veganly).
*Barring fusion, or farming black holes I guess.
self_made_human
Kai su, teknon?
1d ago
Errr.. I didn't actually realize that was publicly visible. I was trying to put that in the internal mod log, and levity is one way of handling that job, which can be thankless at times. It was more of a joke than anything else, I genuinely do not have a strong opinion on the matter.
It's right below. Given that nobody pays me for the job, an in-joke suffices.
I'm not the strongest advocate against single-issue posting. My usual approach is to simply minimize the thread, since I make it a point not to block anyone at all, no matter how odious/tedious they might be, and quite a few people are more so than SS. However, as a moderator, I do my best to follow the guidelines I signed up to enforce, and being neutral on SIP means I don't particularly care either way.
Is he SIPing and scaring the hoes? Seems obviously true to me. We probably have the highest tolerance for witches around, but we want multiple kinds, not just someone making this particular cauldron their bandwagon.
Is that against the rules as written? Yes. As interpreted by someone who doesn't have strong feelings either way too? It was.
I suppose I can't get away with "just following orders" can I? Though this is tangentially in favor of the Jews.
Because I figure we're about halfway to the point where "just post a youtube video about goat noises or something" suddenly becomes "ackshually we have to feel like they're good posts with sufficient effort" or whatever.
Demands for effort are maximal on top level posts in the CWR thread, or standalone posts on the front page.
I would presume funny goat noises belong in the Friday Fun Thread, and I haven't seen anyone get policed for lack of effort there.
self_made_human
Kai su, teknon?
16hr ago
We do at least still have beatings and alcohol, and blood letting too, if you're diagnosed with hemochromatosis.
Frankly speaking, while depression might be more prevalent today as a disease exacerbated by modernity, I can't imagine our ancestors weren't anxious or stressed the fuck out.
self_made_human
Kai su, teknon?
16hr ago
I just went to the trouble of citing a million studies and meta analyses on the matter, what else can I add that isn't anecdotal? Exercise certainly helps, it's far from the only thing that helps. Antidepressants aren't very good drugs, but they beat placebo at the least.
Are you a psychiatrist? If so, that obviously gives you special insight but also clearly a bias.
I've been accepted into psychiatry residency in the UK, starting in a few months. But it's always been my penchant, so consider me the least biased I could possibly be, or at the least I wouldn't have chosen that subject if I felt it was fraudulent.
self_made_human
Kai su, teknon?
12hr ago
Hmmmmmmm....
self_made_human
Kai su, teknon?
19hr ago
I don't deny the existence of mass psychogenic illness. I agree with Scott that it's the most reasonable explanation for things like bulemia, or even gender dysphoria.
I entirely reject that it covers the majority of psychiatric conditions, especially the ones I mentioned, which also happen to be amenable to therapy.
You'll find that the "incidence" of most diseases sky rocketed in short order over the past century. Mainly because if we don't know a disease like that exists, due to a lack of diagnostic tests or plain awareness, there won't be a diagnosis.
self_made_human
Kai su, teknon?
3d ago
but I didn't know how to phrase any of it in a way that would be "leaving the rest of the internet at the door".
Look dawg, I'm an admin and even I have no idea how to enforce that rule without ruling out about 95% of everything that gets posted here. I presume it mostly exists to avoid petty drama and forum flamewars from leaking through.
Until someone tells me what the hell it's supposed to mean, I'm just going to slink away whistling. I don't recall seeing anything ever reported as a violation of said rule, and that should tell you something, given how certain users here consider themselves the effort police and report with a zeal worthy of the Stasi.
self_made_human
Kai su, teknon?
16hr ago
It's routine (or at least best practice) to order a whole heap of blood tests when doing a work up for someone with depression. Add on polysomnography too.
Thyroid deficiencies, sleep apnea, neurological issues like Alzheimers or Parkinsons, they all can produce depression, or be comorbid with it.
So while there's no blood test to diagnose depression-in-itself, any decent psychiatrist will figure out if there's something else wrong with the body, and treat accordingly. But in the end, we have no reliable way of pointing an instrument at someone and get DEPRESSED or NOT DEPRESSED back. Hence the whole talking to them and using standardized questionnaires, which does work mind you, even if we don't have anything significantly better once we've ruled out the body fucking with the mind in other ways.
To no one's surprise, Scott has written about this at length and I feel like there's little for me to contribute, yet.
For example, this one https://slatestarcodex.com/2020/01/15/contra-contra-contra-caplan-on-psych/, though he's written more about it on ACX not that long ago.
self_made_human
Kai su, teknon?
7d ago
If only all our trolls put in this much effort. Thumbs up for that alone.
self_made_human
Kai su, teknon?
3d ago
I'm almost ambivalent. The primary issue I have with a gay son is that I want genetically related grandkids, and while that's by no means insurmountable even today, I expect it to be even more of a non-issue by the time a hypothetical child is sexually mature.
My response to a gay son or thot daughter being thrust on me, fully grown, would be a huh??? rather than anything more considered.
self_made_human
Kai su, teknon?
19hr ago
Better? As far as I can tell, yes.
Unless there's some identifiable treatable organic cause for the anxiety, mood or personality disorder might the patient improve just as well be guarding against and rebuking the demons of pride, envy, sloth, lust, etc? Especially if most of the available therapy interventions perform as well as each other.
We do have identifiable organic causes for many psychiatric illnesses we did not, within living memory, once have. Subtle and variable ones, but what can other answer can you expect when asking a question that involves most psychiatric diseases under the sun?
I fail to see how the latter follows at all. It's not like therapy is the only tool in the arsenal, psychiatrists are not psychologists, we dole out meds too and once again, they work, even if some of them aren't as effective as could be desired.
Deleted because it was meant to be a reply to the OP.
self_made_human
Kai su, teknon?
3d ago
I have a great deal more empathy for all the poor bastards I've advised to quit smoking over the years when I had found myself cold-turkeying a rather strong nicotine addiction. A puff on my vape once I got home hit harder than sex.
(I had to catch a flight, and vapes are illegal to carry aboard here, I still refuse to smoke actual fucking cigarettes, so all I did was suffer rather grumpily for the better part of a week)
Notes from Hinge and Bumble's Unpaid Psychiatry Services
Right. Putting doctor/psych trainee in my bio may or may not have been a mistake. I wanted to make it clear that I'm not going to be in India for more than like 3 or 4 months, just about long enough to die from heatstroke and land when it's wet and drizzly in Scotland.
The GMC frowns strongly on a violation of a doctor-patient relationship, especially when the doctor is screwing the patient. In India? Who gives a fuck? A friend of mine, a lawyer, reported that she went with her mom to see a shrink for her depression, and the horny bastard said she didn't need treatment, just an ice cream date.
Now I'm certainly not going to date someone under my care, even in India, only 30% because they're usually grannies with terminal cancer. And their cute granddaughters are probably too distraught to appreciate it, not that I'd be so uncouth as to try.
Unfortunately, I've become convinced that either I'm drawn to crazy women, or they're drawn to me. Or at least 80% of the female population on said apps needs a therapist more than a boyfriend.
Sadly, I nurse a weakness for cute girls who desperately need my help, and my dad-energy manifests so strongly that I've matched with med students to yell at them for being on the apps when their finals are ongoing. More than once. Certainly more than twice.
In no particular order:
-
Med student I yelled at for being on the apps. Turned out to have abruptly discontinued her SSRIs and having a meltdown. She got yelled at more, since I've been on that campus and know there's a pharmacy outside her dorm. Proceeds to inform me she suspects she's autistic. I say, sure, you're a final year med student giving said finals, you can probably tell, not that a diagnosis is going to do you any good. She then goes on to reveal to me that she's been formally diagnosed with BPD. I'm screaming and reacting with a 💀 emoji. Proceeds to tell me it's not that bad, to which I earnestly disagree. Then reveals that she harbors thoughts of stabbing her classmates with HIV contaminated needles. If it wasn't obvious to you, the deal was off the moment I heard BPD. There are many kinds of crazy, but that is what I'm not going to fuck with. Then "she" proceeds to tell me she's trans, which I genuinely couldn't tell at first on a quick skim (it was obvious later, presuming you knew what to look for, but I mostly matched to yell at her). Shoulda guessed from her being 5'10 in the bio, but at any rate, time to dip. Don't stick your dick in crazy, especially not when they can stick theirs back in you.
-
Another med student. Clearly in need of therapy, my attempt at psychoanalyzing her after a brief conversation was hilariously accurate in retrospect. Sadly, in the end, all I could provide was a good time. I was kinda serious with her (before I found out that against all odds, I did match into psych), even saw a buddy of hers, yet another med student, admitted to the ICU. Cue her falling for me after seeing my counseling skills with the distraught family and friends (it's a good way to dodge the malpractice suits). Sadly the buddy died, pontine hemorrhage and rebleed, no comorbidities or predisposing factors. Barring a love of biryani, and if that alone was lethal, I'd have passed away a decade back. Anyway, the girl had failed an exam from a prior year, and I was losing sleep trying to convince her to study for her next attempt. She told me not to worry about it, though my genuine concern meant I still did. Lo and behold, a 55 yo married professor with a daughter her age wrote her paper, in front of the entire exam hall, and submitted it in her name, this, in combination with her family being filthy rich and politically connected, meant that I left my concerns about her academics at the door. Then it turned out that she was the kind of party girl who had both a low tolerance for liquor, and a tendency to get frisky with anyone in sight. And said person wasn't necessarily always me. Some drama later, we weren't a thing, both because I simply couldn't trust her, and because she was growing crazy over the fact I was inevitably leaving. Long story, cut very short. I think I lost my most expensive watch, and she hasn't been so kind as to check.
-
Gyno final year trainee. I hit her up primarily because I was bored, and wanted to see if the uptick in market value from me being a post grad trainee extended that far. Older than me. I was justifiably incensed on her behalf and talking to her when she told me the orthopod she was seeing had dumped her over a text after seeing her for 6 months. Further conversation revealed that she's probably autistic, or just plain weird, being infatuated with me two phone calls in. Still dodging her calls with excuses of being too busy doing unpaid surgery with my dad (he's a Gyno surgeon who also happens to teach laparoscopic surgery to gyne trainees and even other consultants, I wanted to get him a new student if nothing else). But I understood why the previous poor bastard ran for the hills and didn't leave an address.
-
Fashion designer. Very cute, very sweet, very depressed. I had to talk her out of committing suicide, over the phone at 2 am after counseling another, actual suicide survivor, who wasn't my patient either. But working productively with her issues, seeing a therapist, actually listening to my concerns. Nice girl, I'm kinda sad she has to see me go, especially when she said I actually look good in Hawaiian shirts. I always suspected, but it's good to have a second opinion from an authoritative source.
-
Law student. Cute. Top of her class. Survivor of multiple suicide attempts, because she didn't take biology lessons past tenth grade, and Google wisely doesn't return results for "painless ways to commit suicide". Asked me on the first date how much paracetamol it takes to off oneself, for purely academic reasons. I had the sense to tell her I categorically refuse to answer that question. Has multiple psychiatrists and therapists. Refuses to see them, or follow their advice. When they do see her, they get depression, mine only gets exacerbated. Also, I suspect they're incompetent, or consider international consensus more of a suggestion. I've seen some absurd prescriptions, including longterm use of a combination of an SSRI and a benzo. Her anxiety is bad, but only in episodes, whereas I think she'd be way better served with a normal SSRI and benzos rarely on a PRN basis. Bunch of other medical comorbidities, but thankfully dodged the genetic mutation causing ADPKD that killed her father early and will probably get her siblings. She's pulled my hair and slapped me on a first date, the only saving grace being she's so weak only the former kinda hurt (and I need to keep my hair). As allergic to medical care as I am to textbooks, and prone to turn violent and call me old should I express any concern for her lack of care for her health.
-
A rather sweet psychologist doing a fellowship in Psycho-Oncology at another hospital. Met up after work for a date and to talk shop. Then she sees a text from her ex, and proceeds to have a full blown panic attack.. Slept with said ex recently, in the on call doctor's room at their hospital. I could tell she wasn't in any position to date from the moment we met, so I wish her well in figuring her shit out.
And so many more. And some of them, I assume, are good people, who do need a date more than counseling.
Yeah, I'm going to administer all my future dates a mental health questionnaire in the future, I pray that doesn't constitute a therapeutic relationship in the UK, especially when I get up mid date and run myself.
self_made_human
Kai su, teknon?
3d ago
Good to know, thanks! I can now recall a specific time it was invoked against me, ages and ages ago on the old subreddit, but I haven't noticed it come up since then.
self_made_human
Kai su, teknon?
3d ago
Most people would be repulsed by the idea, presented so badly. Far better to take over an existent social media site and flood it with the higher quality of bots.
Improved quality of discourse, and let's face it, once you finetune them out of their ability to say the n-word, most people would barely notice.
self_made_human
Kai su, teknon?
2d ago
Thanks for hunting that down! It's not quite the same as the post I remembered, since that used user polled data from SSC/ACX readers and even claimed that meth (which is available on prescription, as rare as that is) was the best option (according to users). Still, this one states much the same, so I appreciate you looking it up.
self_made_human
Kai su, teknon?
9d ago
I didn't resist the urge to lecture her at length about how despite women being more likely to attempt suicide, men are far more successful at it. Got my hair pulled again for the trouble. I'm beginning to see why I always preferred women older than me, though I'm no spring chicken now.
Paracetamol is a terrible way to go, as you correctly point out. We had a scandal recently where a doctor was admitted, post suicide attempt, with liver failure. She was cheating on her husband, another doctor, and had ended up pregnant with the other dude's child.
Her own family disowned her, refusing to even consider donating their livers, whereas the poor bastard she married was willing to give up his, or that of his brother. Sadly, or happily, IMO, neither of them were compatible, and in India, people with organ failure from suicide are heavily deprioritized for transplant lists. At any rate, I don't want to imagine what swimming in unfiltered toxins did to the child.
I should ask about that case, but it's been a week and she's likely already dead.
At any rate, I refuse to seriously opine on the best way to commit suicide even here, but there are painless and relatively simple ways. Women just tend to prefer the less effective route of trying to overdose and slitting their wrists, as this girl tried.
self_made_human
Kai su, teknon?
10d ago
Missives from Indian Streets
I've had two learners licenses expire on me so far. I'd like to argue, if pressed, that I was too busy to give the driving exam at the end, with other, far more important medical exams pressing. The truth is I was simply too lazy.
But now, finding myself in actual need of one, since the NHS accepts "sorry boss, dunno how" as a poor excuse for showing up late to an emergency, I paid a good chunk of my own salary to one of the driving instructors at one of the more reputable companies around (they own a car brand, though they were mildly put out because I made it clear I wasn't a prospective customer).
The last two times, my dad coughed up the change, but this time, both actual enthusiasm and hard cash were transferred from my far more empty wallet. You'd think his modestly justified annoyance at me having wasted the money before would be outweighed by paternal pride and affection at his son adding more alphabet soup behind his name, but alas.
Up till this point, my instructors had been bad, to put it lightly. And the extent of my experience on the road was driving through quiet suburban streets and doing my best to weave through parked cars and avoid the odd cow or pedestrian.
This time, well, I got what I paid for. Far better tutors, 5 whole lessons in a simulator running Windows 10 but using software probably written in the early 2000s. Unfortunately, today I braved the midday sun in an exceedingly long walk to the motor training school (for obvious reasons I can't drive there) , I can't call myself an Englishman quite yet, but mad dog? The heatstroke left me panting.
To my chagrin, it turned out that my last simulator class was supposedly a two-in-one affair, and they expected me to hit the road again, for the first time in several years.
At high noon. On the main road carrying half the city's traffic, a fucking arterial line spewing motor oil and NO2 emissions, a far cry from the sedate streets I feel quarter comfortable in.
I didn't let on that my inner self was kicking and screaming, and followed the instructor to the awaiting training car with barely repressed terror.
It wasn't that bad. The car, that is. No obvious dents, the air conditioning and power steering worked, a far cry from the broken down beater they'd seen fit to hand me at the previous place.
The driving? Talk about being thrown in the deep end. I swear I don't feel that level of hyperfocus even the odd time I'm dragged in for a surgery. Because after all, what's the worst that could happen there? The patient doesn't make it. Whereas I'm too cute to die, and I have a lot to live for.
Miraculously, despite hitting 55 km/h on some of the busiest roads I've had the misfortune of seeing, I made it through mostly unscathed, even if the gearbox didn't.
That's it. I'm buying an automatic. I modestly hoped that self driving cars would be common enough that I could always procrastinate learning to drive to the distant future, or preferably never. Sadly the distant future is today, and the odd car that can plausibly be said to drive itself is far outside my budget.
Instead, I'm buying a Porsche, a Mustang, nah, a plain old horse. Runs off renewable energy. Confuses the meter maids enough that I might get away with it if I can't find free employee parking. Fully self driving, or good enough cruise control and lane keeping to make sure my sorry ass makes it home from the pub.
I saw God, today. He was wearing a seat belt. So should you.
self_made_human
Kai su, teknon?
3d ago
That's hardly surprising, or else we wouldn't have so many people offing themselves from COPD or lung cancer. Though the claim is that there are additional substances in cigarettes that are addictive in of themselves, or potentiate the addictive properties of nicotine.
At least in my case I can claim it was an informed decision, I don't really have many vices, and I did come to the conclusion that if vaping is bad for you, it's an order of magnitude or less so than getting your fix through cigarettes. Certainly it's gotten me through some real stinker shifts, with far less hassle. And just nicotine, by itself? Unless you're some poor bastard with diabetes so bad your toes are liable to fall off, it's not really any worse for you than coffee is. I wouldn't call it a nootropic, but it at least lets you choose when to be at your 110%, paid back by the fact that you're 90% when not on it.
self_made_human
Kai su, teknon?
9d ago
To add to the irony, your comment caught a report for lack of effort. This job is going to age me, and I do it for free.
self_made_human
Kai su, teknon?
9d ago
Us mods aren't monolithic, though we try to present a unified front. I'm sure there are some out there who would be harsher on OP, or more keen to monitor deeper threads. You can't expect perfect consistency. But I happen to be the one up when the more Westward mods are asleep.
If it had been deeper down, then I would assume that:
A) Far fewer would have their eyeballs contaiminated. I don't recall us mods ever being involved in the most degenerate case, namely DMs, at that point one person or the other should block and move on.
B) It might have been in the context of a heated debate, where being somewhat uncharitable can be occasionally excused, if not indefinitely or infinitely. Someone can be provoked into being exasperated, or less than maximally polite, and I was giving him the benefit of the doubt.
C) His mod record is otherwise clean.
Hence I initially wanted to politely tell him to shy away from that kinda thing without putting a dent in his invisible to you mod record, but when it's a top level post, absolutely not, it's warning worthy. He's got 83 comments, and no warnings till today, so as far as I can tell, he's mostly within acceptable bounds. Unfortunately, B isn't true, though that was an error on my part while trying to clear the mod queue. At any rate, a warning would probably be the default mod action, it's unlikely any of us would want to ban him for a first infraction, even one clearly in violation of norms. Repeated misbehavior and being incorrigible? Or just something awful? Banhammer swings.
I went to the trouble of writing an effort post somewhere that was read by like 8 people, so I'll just reproduce the primary bit, and tack on additional commentary at the end.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psychotherapy
The bolded section is the one I can't easily verify, at least not when it's 9 am and I've been up all night studying.
Specifically regarding CBT, I found the following metanalysis-
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/23870719/
And when speaking of CBT as applied to more psychiatric conditions:
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3584580/
Addressing the specific claims of similar efficacy to the forms of therapy based on pseudoscientific principles:
In the particular case of BPD, after talking to @Throwaway05 I looked into the actual benefit of DBT, and was surprised to see that it was genuinely far more effective than I expected. Somewhere around the ballpark of 50% success rates in curbing symptoms and letting quite a few of them lead entirely unremarkable and functional lives. If 50% sounds underwhelming, wait till you hear the typical cure rates I'm used to.
So:
A clear no. The evidence base is nigh unimpeachable, even if, as discussed above, the most bullshit insanity inducing forms like Freudian or Lacanian psychotherapy still beat placebo.
My personal working hypothesis is that therapy acts as a decent substitute for a friend, a non-judgemental and understanding one who has seemingly endless time to listen to your problems, and is forbidden, on the pain of losing the way they make a living, from disclosing your troubles. Unfortunately, quite a few people genuinely lack actual good friends, so even such as ersatz substitute has notable effects.
This is an entirely different question from the fad we've been having for quite a few years of "therapy culture", or the insistence of people to co-opt/misuse therapy speak to lend their bullshit legitimacy. Then again, there are practising Freudian and Lacanian therapists, and few other people seem to have the same burning urge I have to burn their houses down. Even then, I must concede they beat placebo, as well as the dead horse that is repressed penis envy.
Anyway, therapy seems to beat placebo, and works synergistically with drugs, even if you cynically notice that therapy based off nonsense does much the same thing as more considered approaches, but it's not in dispute that it works. At least I have the consolation of being able to throw drugs at people instead of just talking at them as a licensed shrink in training, for all the quibbling about if SSRIs work, ain't nobody claiming their ADHD isn't being helped when they're zooted up on stimulants.
To conclude, is therapy helpful when administered by someone who knows what the fuck they're doing? Yes.
Are they/us responsible for random idiots using it as an obfuscation technique? Not really, though the upper echelons of HR are often staffed by people with degrees in psychology where I'm at.
Is it possibly a net negative for the set of {all people subjected to mealy mouthed terminology}? No clue, but you asked about the actually mentally ill, and you have my answer. No surprise that a few of them pick up on the lingo.
More options
Context Copy link