Good diagnosis, wrong prescription
Headline:

We Should Cure the Ills of Society to Combat the Depression Epidemic

Concluding paragraph:

There is an epidemic of depression in developed Western nations because normal emotional reactions to adverse socioeconomic conditions are increasingly labelled as medical illness. This has led to a massive medicalisation of unhappiness, that is, overdiagnosis of depression and overprescribing of antidepressants. Intense sadness, despair and sorrow undeniably can be very burdensome and painful, but they are part of the human experience. Except possibly in endogenous melancholic depression, there is no scientific evidence that depression episodes are the result of (inherited) brain pathology. Instead of medicalising individual reactions to adverse living conditions, we should primarily intervene at the community level and try to combat the root causes of depression, in particular socio-economic hardship. Prescribing evermore antidepressants will not cure the ills of society.

Mostly right. The automatic use of drugs to cure all sorts of oddness is a first step toward a pogrom. Drugs rarely work, and drugs often produce a lethal bounce on withdrawal. When drugs fail, the next medical response will be euthanasia.

But changing external circumstances is impossible and misguided. Any enforced national or global change to accomplish this purpose will fail, leading the organizers to seek more change for more budget. Parkinson.

Innate tendencies are part of the problem, but this is irrelevant. All tendencies, talents and traits are partly innate. All tendencies can be controlled, all talents can be improved or atrophied, all traits can be used to advantage or misused.

In particular socio-economic hardship. The author misses the DYNAMIC nature of perception. Depression doesn't result from lifelong constant hardship. Constant conditions have zero neural response. Depression kicks in when you attempt to break out of a low-status position and fail. Depression is learned helplessness.

The cure is to regain a sense of control, even if you're not really controlling the high-status oppressors.

Two words.



MAKE is a variable. Within the limits of your opportunities and abilities, find a way to CREATE value and beauty that didn't exist before. Start with one-day MAKES, so you can see completion. As you gain more confidence and control. MAKE bigger and longer.

WALK is a simple constant. WALK at least once a day. Stay vertical, keep moving.

= = = = =

For clarity: We desperately need to change the economic system back to real-value industry, but doing it specifically to make people feel better will mis-shape the change. We don't need sheltered workshops for addicts. The entire country needs to focus on MAKING instead of BANKING, for reasons of NATIONAL SURVIVAL.

Labels: Make or break, Natural law = Sharia law

  ¶ 3:07 PM