I guess after breaking up both this system and its terminology we have to redefine who we would declare a danger to our society, but without having to be cast into either a crime or madness framework. I guess we also would see a lot of bad behaviour disappear. For example, bot ‘autistics’ and ‘schizophrenics’ don’t tend to be violent people if others don’t freak out around them and if there’s freedom to change environments and fulfill sensory needs (vs. being locked in a classroom, hospital room, prison cell, office for x hours at a time). Society will get more peaceful when people can relearn and get better at raising children with love (which also gets easier as we fulfill the needs of all, not just the rich).
The fact that now there’s so many people imprisoned doesn’t mean we’ll see the same numbers or even close to that in a solarpunk society. Now, we have people imprisoned because it makes some people rich, we have people imprisoned because we believe only people who can keep up with awful working conditions are worthy of a dignified life, we have them imprisoned because we created a society that traumatised them to shit, we have people imprisoned because they like the wrong substance. Or we medicate them or put them in the psychiatric ward if they are weird and don’t play along.
In solarpunk we share what we have, we don’t hoard, so what is there to fight about, what is there to steal? We don’t work long hours, there’s time to take care of yourself - so mental problems will stay low. I think this could lead to where we would find if and how the cases look that remain - the rare cases of people we don’t want to have around. I’m not really sure how that would even look - I feel too locked into current society and its ‘bad’ and ‘mentally ill’ people. Maybe the thought path leads to that having to admit that as long as we are ruled by psychopath bullies, an un-psychopathic society could never exist.
Narcissist here. My NPD is a mental health issue. My parents abused me, and I never learned to love myself unconditionally as a result. The ego I do have is a fragile facade. Threats to my ego can feel subjectively like threats to my life, because when I don’t have my false ego, I don’t think I’m worthy of life. Some narcisstists perceive threats to their egos as violence, and they respond with violence. I don’t act that way, but I do perceive attacks on my disability as violence, and I don’t believe anyone should have to hear that.
Material conditions are never going to solve my NPD, because I’m too old to learn to love myself unconditionally. The brain loses plasticity as it ages, and what we’re talking about is early childhood stuff. What I can benefit from is a more caring and understanding environment, and one that doesn’t attack narcisstists for being abuse victims. One that understands my special needs and provides them, even when they are social needs as opposed to physical needs.
I used to be married to someone who got damaged so seriously so early in life that a normal relationship with him was ultimately impossible and I couldn’t really provide the social needs this person needed without completely denying my own needs. The only way I found to deal with it was to move very far away. I guess if we hadn’t been married and forced ourselves to live together it could have been different - another factor here was the lack of healthy community.
I’m curious about what you perceive as attack on your disability. If it is the terminology thing: I’m ranting rather about the terminology (Narcissist, Autistic, Schizophrenic, Psychopath) as a symbol of an authoritarian, abusive psychiatric system that judges people as being disordered, out of order, without addressing the underlying causes - the trauma, the abusive setup of society, the competitive setup that causes people to be aggressive … so yes, we are all damaged, and each of us in different, specific ways that can be categorized and their categorization can be helpful for our self-awareness-process - but I don’t want to use the language of people who call me disordered when really I’m just mainly neurodiverse and for the rest mostly traumatized.
The challenge for each of us in a solarpunk society is to find a place where we are somewhat useful, or at least not of harm to others. As a neurofunky person I have already chosen a place a little away from other people because the weirded-out-ness is mutual and I need it quiet. I try to be of use without meeting too many actual people and what used to be ‘my mental health’ is now only just me again, which is very good.
I couldn’t really provide the social needs this person needed without completely denying my own needs.
I don’t believe in that. I think you made the right choice moving away and I’ve had to make similar choices in the past. Our abilities are not limitless. But I don’t believe in what you said, either. Life experiences and an inquisitive mind have given me a tremendous ability to deal with BPD and NPD people. I learned how other people and myself think with these disorders, and now I can see straight through all the trauma mechanisms and the bullshit, and I can manage people who have it. I don’t think this ability is inherently beyond anyone, it just takes the right experiences coupled with tenacity and curiosity. I don’t believe you had access to those experiences and I hold your accountable for nothing that happened. But I am frustrated with the unwillingness of some neurotypicals to deal with NDs that comes from statements like this. Inclusivity is a skill. It can be taught and learned. Nobody is beyond help from a mentor with the right skillset.
That you would dismiss my inner reality and ‘kindly’ reframe it as ignorance feels rather condescending, but here we go:
I’m ND and wouldn’t dream of forcing anyone to deal with me and how I am. Why some people think others are obliged to deal with them and whatever they bring to the table I cannot understand. What part of other people’s time do you feel you are entitled to? Please mind I’m showing my ‘wtf’ reaction in my writing here but I am very interested how this inner reality of yours looks.
I’m also not sure this is what inclusivity means.
Inclusivity for me means that I don’t have to give any kind of performative attention to others - and this very thing seems to explicitly trigger people with traumas like yours - they feel shunned, left alone, like this - violently in bits.
I think this is the discovery of a very archetypal conflict in relationships and communities. I’m glad we are discussing this in a space that invites thoughtful discussion.
I don’t have to give any kind of performative attention to others
When I hurt someone’s feelings, I say sorry. When I meet a neopronoun user, I learn and use their neopronouns. I think apologies and pronouns are forms of performative attention.
Apologizing and using pronouns is all part of being a decent human being, nothing wrong with that.
But for example, I was once trying to work on a project together with someone who was trying to convince me that yelling at me was part of her creative process. For me one the other hand, being yelled at was not part of my creative process, so I ended the common project.
Or the night my ex-partner wanted to discuss the problems now and kept me forcefully awake for that while angrily gesturing at me. No thanks.
But it might be that you put the right people together and they yell at each other while creating great art, or yank each other out of bed at night fixing their relationship. Not going to judge, I’d be happy for them. It’s just not my intensity level of being. So, what can be part of a decent performance level for one person can be felt as emotional abuse for another person. Which leaves us in a situation where nobody has to be the bad guy, we just have to match the right people to each other.
Yelling and forced awakeness can often be violent. Your creative partner owed you the performative attention of quietness, and your romantic partner owed you the performative attention of patience.
Failing to accommodate for your volume and sleep needs is a failure on their part to accommodate for your lack of ability. Needing sleep isn’t a disability, it’s completely normal, but it’s still a lacking ability that they failed to address. My points that performative attention and accommodation for disability are owed apply just as well to your abusers as they do to you. I hold them to the same standard and I hold them accountable for choosing violence. I believe they had the potential, under the right circumstances, to learn to get along with people who enjoy quiet and sleep. Just as I had, and fulfilled, the potential to get along with narcissists and borderlines. I believe all these skills can be learned by anyone.
You hold strongly to the ideals of Solarpunk in your discussion, it is apparent in the tone your text conveys. Also I had never seen that website before, I may have to look at it in the future.
I have seen the damages the mental health system does, compared to just leaving people alone and do their thing. It’s a people-destroying atrocious system of uncare. I watched it and tried to believe in it for 20 years and I’m just done. No more. The first thing one can simply give up is self-pathologizing - why declare myself ill, if first of all the setup of society is ill, and my mental unwellness is a reaction to my powerlessness to change anything about it?
I will not deny that in many situations there is damage caused by the current Mental Healthcare Model, I have seen many who suffer from the stigmatization of their struggles, both self-inflicted by how they are told to view themselves as well as inflicted by those that they hold trust towards; however, I cannot truly agree with your belief of it being people-destroying, but that is due to my own observations and experiences on both sides of the glass window.
As I had mentioned earlier in my own comment, one of the most important steps to be taken is to change the stigma of the labels, including the label of client or patient.
I’m a little shocked how many people still seem to equate sociopaths, psychopaths and narcissists with other mental issues, or how we still all use a lot of the terminology brought into existence by an abusive psychiatry. I don’t see the so called ‘mental health care system’ as much better than police - they are there to keep people in line and functioning, and have been uncaring and untrustworthy every step on the way much like the police.
I guess after breaking up both this system and its terminology we have to redefine who we would declare a danger to our society, but without having to be cast into either a crime or madness framework. I guess we also would see a lot of bad behaviour disappear. For example, bot ‘autistics’ and ‘schizophrenics’ don’t tend to be violent people if others don’t freak out around them and if there’s freedom to change environments and fulfill sensory needs (vs. being locked in a classroom, hospital room, prison cell, office for x hours at a time). Society will get more peaceful when people can relearn and get better at raising children with love (which also gets easier as we fulfill the needs of all, not just the rich).
The fact that now there’s so many people imprisoned doesn’t mean we’ll see the same numbers or even close to that in a solarpunk society. Now, we have people imprisoned because it makes some people rich, we have people imprisoned because we believe only people who can keep up with awful working conditions are worthy of a dignified life, we have them imprisoned because we created a society that traumatised them to shit, we have people imprisoned because they like the wrong substance. Or we medicate them or put them in the psychiatric ward if they are weird and don’t play along.
In solarpunk we share what we have, we don’t hoard, so what is there to fight about, what is there to steal? We don’t work long hours, there’s time to take care of yourself - so mental problems will stay low. I think this could lead to where we would find if and how the cases look that remain - the rare cases of people we don’t want to have around. I’m not really sure how that would even look - I feel too locked into current society and its ‘bad’ and ‘mentally ill’ people. Maybe the thought path leads to that having to admit that as long as we are ruled by psychopath bullies, an un-psychopathic society could never exist.
Edit: mark oldschool psych terms
Narcissist here. My NPD is a mental health issue. My parents abused me, and I never learned to love myself unconditionally as a result. The ego I do have is a fragile facade. Threats to my ego can feel subjectively like threats to my life, because when I don’t have my false ego, I don’t think I’m worthy of life. Some narcisstists perceive threats to their egos as violence, and they respond with violence. I don’t act that way, but I do perceive attacks on my disability as violence, and I don’t believe anyone should have to hear that.
Material conditions are never going to solve my NPD, because I’m too old to learn to love myself unconditionally. The brain loses plasticity as it ages, and what we’re talking about is early childhood stuff. What I can benefit from is a more caring and understanding environment, and one that doesn’t attack narcisstists for being abuse victims. One that understands my special needs and provides them, even when they are social needs as opposed to physical needs.
I used to be married to someone who got damaged so seriously so early in life that a normal relationship with him was ultimately impossible and I couldn’t really provide the social needs this person needed without completely denying my own needs. The only way I found to deal with it was to move very far away. I guess if we hadn’t been married and forced ourselves to live together it could have been different - another factor here was the lack of healthy community.
I’m curious about what you perceive as attack on your disability. If it is the terminology thing: I’m ranting rather about the terminology (Narcissist, Autistic, Schizophrenic, Psychopath) as a symbol of an authoritarian, abusive psychiatric system that judges people as being disordered, out of order, without addressing the underlying causes - the trauma, the abusive setup of society, the competitive setup that causes people to be aggressive … so yes, we are all damaged, and each of us in different, specific ways that can be categorized and their categorization can be helpful for our self-awareness-process - but I don’t want to use the language of people who call me disordered when really I’m just mainly neurodiverse and for the rest mostly traumatized.
The challenge for each of us in a solarpunk society is to find a place where we are somewhat useful, or at least not of harm to others. As a neurofunky person I have already chosen a place a little away from other people because the weirded-out-ness is mutual and I need it quiet. I try to be of use without meeting too many actual people and what used to be ‘my mental health’ is now only just me again, which is very good.
I don’t believe in that. I think you made the right choice moving away and I’ve had to make similar choices in the past. Our abilities are not limitless. But I don’t believe in what you said, either. Life experiences and an inquisitive mind have given me a tremendous ability to deal with BPD and NPD people. I learned how other people and myself think with these disorders, and now I can see straight through all the trauma mechanisms and the bullshit, and I can manage people who have it. I don’t think this ability is inherently beyond anyone, it just takes the right experiences coupled with tenacity and curiosity. I don’t believe you had access to those experiences and I hold your accountable for nothing that happened. But I am frustrated with the unwillingness of some neurotypicals to deal with NDs that comes from statements like this. Inclusivity is a skill. It can be taught and learned. Nobody is beyond help from a mentor with the right skillset.
That you would dismiss my inner reality and ‘kindly’ reframe it as ignorance feels rather condescending, but here we go:
I’m ND and wouldn’t dream of forcing anyone to deal with me and how I am. Why some people think others are obliged to deal with them and whatever they bring to the table I cannot understand. What part of other people’s time do you feel you are entitled to? Please mind I’m showing my ‘wtf’ reaction in my writing here but I am very interested how this inner reality of yours looks.
I’m also not sure this is what inclusivity means.
Inclusivity for me means that I don’t have to give any kind of performative attention to others - and this very thing seems to explicitly trigger people with traumas like yours - they feel shunned, left alone, like this - violently in bits.
I think this is the discovery of a very archetypal conflict in relationships and communities. I’m glad we are discussing this in a space that invites thoughtful discussion.
When I hurt someone’s feelings, I say sorry. When I meet a neopronoun user, I learn and use their neopronouns. I think apologies and pronouns are forms of performative attention.
Apologizing and using pronouns is all part of being a decent human being, nothing wrong with that.
But for example, I was once trying to work on a project together with someone who was trying to convince me that yelling at me was part of her creative process. For me one the other hand, being yelled at was not part of my creative process, so I ended the common project.
Or the night my ex-partner wanted to discuss the problems now and kept me forcefully awake for that while angrily gesturing at me. No thanks.
But it might be that you put the right people together and they yell at each other while creating great art, or yank each other out of bed at night fixing their relationship. Not going to judge, I’d be happy for them. It’s just not my intensity level of being. So, what can be part of a decent performance level for one person can be felt as emotional abuse for another person. Which leaves us in a situation where nobody has to be the bad guy, we just have to match the right people to each other.
Yelling and forced awakeness can often be violent. Your creative partner owed you the performative attention of quietness, and your romantic partner owed you the performative attention of patience.
Failing to accommodate for your volume and sleep needs is a failure on their part to accommodate for your lack of ability. Needing sleep isn’t a disability, it’s completely normal, but it’s still a lacking ability that they failed to address. My points that performative attention and accommodation for disability are owed apply just as well to your abusers as they do to you. I hold them to the same standard and I hold them accountable for choosing violence. I believe they had the potential, under the right circumstances, to learn to get along with people who enjoy quiet and sleep. Just as I had, and fulfilled, the potential to get along with narcissists and borderlines. I believe all these skills can be learned by anyone.
You hold strongly to the ideals of Solarpunk in your discussion, it is apparent in the tone your text conveys. Also I had never seen that website before, I may have to look at it in the future.
I have seen the damages the mental health system does, compared to just leaving people alone and do their thing. It’s a people-destroying atrocious system of uncare. I watched it and tried to believe in it for 20 years and I’m just done. No more. The first thing one can simply give up is self-pathologizing - why declare myself ill, if first of all the setup of society is ill, and my mental unwellness is a reaction to my powerlessness to change anything about it?
I will not deny that in many situations there is damage caused by the current Mental Healthcare Model, I have seen many who suffer from the stigmatization of their struggles, both self-inflicted by how they are told to view themselves as well as inflicted by those that they hold trust towards; however, I cannot truly agree with your belief of it being people-destroying, but that is due to my own observations and experiences on both sides of the glass window.
As I had mentioned earlier in my own comment, one of the most important steps to be taken is to change the stigma of the labels, including the label of client or patient.