Live data from Hacker News

Mental health is still an issue in the workplace

medium.com

311–320 of 352 posts

Re: Mental health is still an issue in the workplace

#311

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Respectfully, I'm not sure you fully understand these issues that you seem to have a very strong opinion about. Teenagers around the US do not as a rule have convenient access to contraceptive pills. That's because the FDA refuses to approve them for OTC sale, despite their safety relative to many other OTC meds. The stated reason for refusing OTC sales is that allowing them would prevent women from seeing their doct…

The lack of access to chemical birth control is a major issue, I agree. However, to the best of my knowledge, condoms are still fairly universally available to members of both sexes - which, while not ideal for a number of reasons, are certainly more effective in preventing the transmission of STIs as well as being effective in preventing unwanted pregnancy. Perhaps that might be a more charitable interpretation of t…

Beyond pointing out the obvious fact that teenaged girls in the US are living in a society that goes to some lengths to actively obstruct them from using the most reliable forms of contraception, I'm not really interested in digging further into the details here.

Re: Mental health is still an issue in the workplace

#312
post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> I've never heard of anyone here being asked for a verification, but it would tend to discourage people doing the "sanity day" sort of thing. I suspect that the lack of trust this indicates on the part of the company (not to mention foster on the part of the employee) is probably a sign that you're past the point of no return. I suspect a company that asked for verification was not doing so to see if you were genui…

You're generally correct for the folks who have decent salaried careers. If I got asked to justify a regular random day or two I took off as PTO I'd tell HR to pound sand as anyone rightfully should. Get into hourly low wage stuff and you are treated like children, many shops require a doctor's note for any and all absences with 1 or 2 dermits until you're fired. This has reasons from both ends of course. When I was…

PTO is not the same thing as sick leave. Generally PTO, be design, does not require any justification whatsoever. I don't see how your anecdotal experience is relevant to this discussion.

Re: Mental health is still an issue in the workplace

#313

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The lack of access to chemical birth control is a major issue, I agree. However, to the best of my knowledge, condoms are still fairly universally available to members of both sexes - which, while not ideal for a number of reasons, are certainly more effective in preventing the transmission of STIs as well as being effective in preventing unwanted pregnancy. Perhaps that might be a more charitable interpretation of t…

Beyond pointing out the obvious fact that teenaged girls in the US are living in a society that goes to some lengths to actively obstruct them from using the most reliable forms of contraception, I'm not really interested in digging further into the details here.

Fair enough.

Re: Mental health is still an issue in the workplace

#314

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Everyone has access to birth control though. It's common knowledge how reproduction works. You have condoms, birth control pills and copper rings among other options. If you miss that you got plan b. Let's set aside your personal vendetta against the pro lifer Christians. How can you claim that the vast majority of pregnant teenagers don't choose to get pregnant?

Respectfully, I'm not sure you fully understand these issues that you seem to have a very strong opinion about. Teenagers around the US do not as a rule have convenient access to contraceptive pills. That's because the FDA refuses to approve them for OTC sale, despite their safety relative to many other OTC meds. The stated reason for refusing OTC sales is that allowing them would prevent women from seeing their doct…

Ondansetron is associated with long QT. The FDA does not like that side effect for OTC meds.

Re: Mental health is still an issue in the workplace

#315

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is more than sex involved, but that was the biggest factor - at least in my experience which could well be different from typical. I carefully avoided passing a moral judgement on their acts. However the fact is sex at 16 immediately jumps into moral issues (not just Christian - most world religions encourage marriage). I did my best those to focus on the fact that as a result of that choice they have eliminate…

In what way does sex at 16 immediately jump into moral issues exactly? I don't buy for a second that being sexually active as a teenager somehow equates to lack of moral fortitude. There's plenty of teenagers that are aware of birth control and use it appropriately. Do they lack moral fortitude, too?

Having a kid at 16 will screw you up. Most people have a moral objection to screwing up their life like that, as well as the practical objection. Most religions of the world have some form of moral objection to sex outside of marriage, it can be easily argued that the moral objection comes form the practical issues. (most religions predates any form of effective birth control. Today you can argue that the moral is obsolete)

Or put it another way, you cannot talk about kids having sex without everybody bringing their own different morals up. The two are very intertwined.

Re: Mental health is still an issue in the workplace

#316

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If I recall correctly, Morgellon's Disease is a mental illness that spreads via social interactions with an affected person, or journalism featuring such a person. The disease itself is a delusion, regarding microscopic fibers in the skin. Sufficiently impressionable people simply hear about it, convince themselves that they have it, then they go on to try to convince others that it is a physical ailment rather than…

As far as I've read, Morgellons is only "contagious" in the sense that people who already had symptoms of delusional parasitosis or undiagnosed/misdiagnosed skin conditions gravitate toward it as an explanation.

Contagions always spread through only the susceptible fraction of the population. Prior to mass communications, there were too few susceptible individuals in any given population for it to spread. The herd was immune, because any infected person would die before ever meeting another susceptible person.

Enter the Internet. Now all the susceptible people can aggregate around their own forums/boards/podcasts/groups/subreddits and infect each other with their unique strains of madness.

There's no more herd immunity, because all the susceptible people can find each other instantly.

Re: Mental health is still an issue in the workplace

#317

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Everyone has access to birth control though. It's common knowledge how reproduction works. You have condoms, birth control pills and copper rings among other options. If you miss that you got plan b. Let's set aside your personal vendetta against the pro lifer Christians. How can you claim that the vast majority of pregnant teenagers don't choose to get pregnant?

Respectfully, I'm not sure you fully understand these issues that you seem to have a very strong opinion about. Teenagers around the US do not as a rule have convenient access to contraceptive pills. That's because the FDA refuses to approve them for OTC sale, despite their safety relative to many other OTC meds. The stated reason for refusing OTC sales is that allowing them would prevent women from seeing their doct…

You didn't mention the most obvious solution which is condoms. I bought them easily as a teenager 18 years ago. You can get them for free in many places these days.

You're also giving teenagers a pass for having unprotected sex as if they don't know there's a risk of 1) getting pregnant and 2) getting an STD.

Certainly some birth control measures are less accessible to teenagers, but what I'm arguing is the parent's claim that "The vast majority of teenage mothers in the United States do not choose to get pregnant"

That's not accurate unless what is meant is that "the vast majority of teenage mothers don't want to get pregnant (but choose to forego readily available birth control / condoms)". I'd believe that.

Re: Mental health is still an issue in the workplace

#318

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Respectfully, I'm not sure you fully understand these issues that you seem to have a very strong opinion about. Teenagers around the US do not as a rule have convenient access to contraceptive pills. That's because the FDA refuses to approve them for OTC sale, despite their safety relative to many other OTC meds. The stated reason for refusing OTC sales is that allowing them would prevent women from seeing their doct…

You didn't mention the most obvious solution which is condoms. I bought them easily as a teenager 18 years ago. You can get them for free in many places these days. You're also giving teenagers a pass for having unprotected sex as if they don't know there's a risk of 1) getting pregnant and 2) getting an STD. Certainly some birth control measures are less accessible to teenagers, but what I'm arguing is the parent's…

Without getting into any of the rest of this comment: that's not what you said. You blamed teenaged girls in part for not taking advantage of contraceptive pills. Specifically, you wrote:

It's common knowledge how reproduction works. You have condoms, birth control pills and copper rings among other options.

That's simply not a reasonable argument. Don't move the goalposts now.

Re: Mental health is still an issue in the workplace

#319
post #278

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Easy: a lot of states teach abstinence-only sex education, and there's a prevailing set of social norms (often imposed by "pro lifer Christians") that makes frank discussions of birth control, sex, reproductive biology, etc. all but impossible. It sounds crazy - and, IMHO, it is - but large parts of the US operate as de facto theocracies, especially where it comes to education. Under those circumstances, it's not sur…

If you don't understand that sex can lead to getting pregnant, I think you're not old enough to be left outside unaccompanied.

That's exactly the line of thinking that leads to societies where women must be accompanied by men in public.

It's strategic: prevent women from accessing the tools and knowledge to keep themselves safe, then justify denying them rights "to keep them safe."

Post reply on HN