The Off Topic Topic

[Valmy]

That's the way it is here too.
Which some people are trying to change as it means people are afraid to see doctors about these conditions and get treatment whilst it's still manageable, meaning they're more likely to blow up in a bad way.

That is not how it works in the United States. Crazy people cannot be locked up here without a court order. Mental health is very much a voluntary thing, if you are a total wacko you have a constitutional right to be out in society creating chaos until the justice system takes action. Which is why mentally ill people are everywhere in our prison system.

It is hard to come up with a good system for this kind of thing.

[The Larch]

Institutionalization of the mentally ill is a thing of the past in the West, AFAIK, I have no idea where Tyr got that that was the case in the UK.

I have a cousin who is not legally able to be independant due to schizophrenia, and he isn't locked up in a padded cell and had the key thrown away, as it would have happened in the past. He's actually living in a regular appartment with other patients, under the tutelage of an NGO who has his legal custody.

[Josquius]

My ex was a lunatic.
The system took zero action until she actually made serious suicide moves. They kept her a day or two then decided at that moment she wasn't a danger anymore so released her into the wild again.

If there was actually a system in place to encourage people to come forward with mental health issues and actually give them help then we could get far fewer people snapping and acting on dire impulses whether it be suicide, paedophilia, a killing spree, or god knows what.

[Grey Fox]

Yeah, I am still surprised by the different attitudes to mental health between the West and China/Hong Kong.  Here, the job of psychologists is to identify risks to society and lock those people up before they go on a rampage.  You are either crazy, in which case you deserve to be locked up, or you are normal.  And if you are normal, then you cannot suffer from conditions like depression.  Because if you are depressed, then you are crazy and need to be locked up.  If that's not true, then you are normal you need to sort out your issues yourself.

Now, that's fucking stupid.

Depression is like breaking your leg, it happens.

[Valmy]

My ex was a lunatic.
The system took zero action until she actually made serious suicide moves. They kept her a day or two then decided at that moment she wasn't a danger anymore so released her into the wild again.

If there was actually a system in place to encourage people to come forward with mental health issues and actually give them help then we could get far fewer people snapping and acting on dire impulses whether it be suicide, paedophilia, a killing spree, or god knows what.

Ok so you say that people are afraid to come forward about their mental health issues for fear of becoming locked up and now you say that the system doesn't lock anybody up.

Color me confused about your point.

I agree that the "system" does not really know how to handle people who voluntarily decide to remain ill and untreated.

[Josquius]

If you are seriously ill and judged to be a danger they lock you up.
They offer no help before that point.
Thus people see that coming forward with these issues is needlessly putting themselves at risk.
Not to mention there's a lot of negatives other than going as far as a 1950s style padded room that come of being branded.

[Valmy]

If you are seriously ill and judged to be a danger they lock you up.
They offer no help before that point.
Thus people see that coming forward with these issues is needlessly putting themselves at risk.
Not to mention there's a lot of negatives other than going as far as a 1950s style padded room that come of being branded.

Well that is not true in the United States. You can freely seek all sorts of mental health services. But they will not lock you up against your will unless you are actually a danger, but that is very difficult to prove. Obviously dangerous people get let out on the streets all the time.

So you are saying that in the UK if you have a diagnosed mental illness the NHS refuses to treat that illness? They just tell you to fuck off until it is so bad you commit some kind of dangerous crime? Not to mention the fact that if you are voluntarily seeking treatment there is no reason to get a court order to lock you up.

That sounds incredibly stupid. "Oh you want to voluntarily get treatment? Sorry, we have to lock you up against your will first." Why? What is the point of that? Sounds expensive and pointless.

[The Larch]

I guess it depends on what we understand by "locked up". Is it being forcibly hospitalized and/or heavily medicated? Is it being subjected to electroshocks in a sanatorium worthy of a Gothic horror novel? Is it forced lobotomies, cuckoo's nest style?

Being "locked up" in this day and age is not as it was in the past. I know a few people who have been in and out of it, and at least over here it mostly seems to consist on going off the charts for a couple of weeks because of some crisis, being hospitalized and given some kind of treatment, and then released once the crisis dissappeared and they can be out safely.

[garbon]

The NHS is more likely to just assign someone to see a psychiatrist at some distant point in the future, if asked.

[Valmy]

The NHS is more likely to just assign someone to see a psychiatrist at some distant point in the future, if asked.

Well how helpful of them!

[The Brain]

I didn't know that the UK didn't treat moderate mental illness. Will the Brexit money help with this?

[Iormlund]

...they will not lock you up against your will unless you are actually a danger, but that is very difficult to prove.

This is the same in Spain.

[Josquius]

My direct experience was in Switzerland not the uk.
But I gather the same attitudes hold in the UK. The last few years seem to be seeing things finally changing but before mental health was not something one talked about. It wasn't a real issue. Until it was a huge one.

As mentioned with my ex it was a case of doctors doing nothing and even most of the hospitalizations just being short stays to get through the immediate crisis with no effort to tackle the problem.

[garbon]

As mentioned with my ex it was a case of doctors doing nothing and even most of the hospitalizations just being short stays to get through the immediate crisis with no effort to tackle the problem.

I think that's probably fair generalisation of the situation in the UK. Only different if you have private insurance.

[viper37]

A Vegan Youtube star not so vegan...
https://is.gd/hWEosI

I am amused