Posted by Alex Birkett on July 5, 2000, at 8:39:41
There is a big black hole obscuring the subject of human emotional suffering. It seems to me that there is very little mention or debate on these pages of the causes of the pain that every one is so anxious to be rid of. There is a dangerous assumption (no doubt fuelled by the self interests of the pharmaceutical companies and the pyschiatry/therapy business) that we are all suffering from ‘illnesses’ that are a combination of genetic/physiological or moral deficits. Of course it is not one or the other nor is it some nasty combination of the two. We have become obsessed with palliative care as if treating the causes of our real suffering was hopeless, so hopeless in fact that we too often happily deceive ourselves that no such causes exist at all. To refute that our society is intrinsically ‘ok’ and that we are ‘ill’ when we feel unable to be happy in it has become a great taboo. We do suffer but not because we are morally or organically deranged. Our abilities to function in a healthy moral manner and keep our brain chemistry on course are utterly compromised by finding ourselves coerced into taking part in a social structure that alienates us from our real selves. The coercion is not brought about by some sort of schitzo-paranoid or political conspiracy but by simple bounding conditions set up by our socio-economic belief system which, far from being ‘rational/utilitarian’ is an unquestioned and perversely superstitious religion in its own right.
Our suffering is the outcome of our unnatural situation (and who says there is no possible alternative choice in our ‘free society’) and not some private personal aberration. Who are we to decide that it is hopeless and that we should have ‘medical treatment’ for being intolerant of a toxic social melieu. The ‘western way’ of avoiding any real debate is to label any criticism of capitalism as the work of evil-reds cranks, baby eaters or terrorists. There is a truly terrifying level of self and mutual deception in trying to enforce the belief that the way we live is: The pinnacle of human achievement, the outcome of (free) human nature (the only possible choice) and that it is good for our physical, spiritual and mental health. The idea that capitalism does us no harm- indeed, that the ‘mentally ill’ threaten it and must be ‘put right’ (just as in Joe Stalin’s ‘mental hospitals’) and that it must not be challenged as a truly harmful religion represents the height of totalitarian excess! To call our very real suffering an ‘illness’ (i.e. pathological) is both a tragedy and an outrage, to drug and hospitalise the refuseniks (the victims of our societies ills) a scandal of the first order. For sure people need sanctuary and help but the chronic drugging of those in pain is only going to increase the denial of the causes and will ultimately help no one other than those who profit from our suffering. Incidentally the ‘poop out effect’ often seen with antidepressant drugs confirms that the problem is not a biochemical one and that our suffering has causes elsewhere. Like a screaming child it refuses to be silenced and demands our proper attention. The recourse to therapy often fails us because it presumes that the individual is at fault and that we as individuals have ‘free will’ and can choose a better life for ourselves. In fact free will is a relative quantity, a commodity even (and certainly not God given or defended) and using it pivotally dependent on your salary and access to social, coercive and political power.
The suffering is then often rooted in causes beyond the individuals control and or cognition and we cannot be ‘fixed up’ because we are not at fault. Of course many doctors and therapists either don’t know (or want to know) that this is the case or they conveniently put it out of their minds because they make a lot of cash and/or kudos by keeping us on regimens that offer no cure. Our emotional perceptions are uncannily correct (for we do not feel ‘bad’ for no real cause, we do not imagine it) but we are foolishly self deceiving if we think we can take on ‘responsibility’ for causes beyond our limited and conditional personal ‘will power’. These ‘normative’ procedures unwittingly conspire (in spite of the best will of their practitioners) to reinforce the criplingly false notion that it is the individual who is sick and that our social structuring is healthy. If the status quo remains both beyond criticism and at the same time a cause of immense psychological suffering we are in deep shit indeed- can we, dare we, see over the top of it?
I do not believe that there is any medical salvation to be had for such ‘non-medical’ problems (unless, of course, your in the medical business). Until we overcome our fear and shaming of naming the profit motive (and the underlying assumption of our dominion over the world and everything in it) as the prime mover in our sufferings we are condemned to search for ever more unwarranted and addictive medications to stop the pain in our heads. Living like this hurts and the pain is an appropriate and healthy reaction to a noxious stimulus; it hurts because its doing us actual harm- how hard is that to understand? We cannot be expected to go feral or abandon our material achievements but we can replace ‘free trade’ (free for those with power only?) with fair trade and rehumanise our world(s) in the interests of well being and not of profit for profits sake. Our health is undoubtedly a political issue when the actual causes of our emotional suffering are maintained and blindly condoned by those who have control over political and financial power.
AB 8/00
poster:Alex Birkett
thread:39430
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20000630/msgs/39430.html