Earlier quoted context omitted.
Because this actually IS the prevailing view, but it is not really actionable. What is the alternative to drugs? A real advantage of depression is you won't challenge authority so you'll be more likely to appease the Alpha members of the group. So what? How would this help a doctor treat a mental health patient?
> What is the alternative to drugs? A social safety net. A society that thinks providing the communication resources and facilities for people with common interests to socialize about those interests is as important as providing highways. > How would this help a doctor treat a mental health patient? You don't have to be a doctor to dispense pills. You can always anesthetize people who are panicking, but I'm not sure…
I believe this would be great. But perhaps not, perhaps this was only in the what Ovid calls the Golden Age -- perhaps small communities of hunter-gatherers, perhaps never in the way we imagined.
But I don't see this happening unless we revert to much smaller communities.
I think we could realistically cut world military spending by 90% before we could offer everybody that social safety net.
So we DO need pills, because we cannot realistically offer 1 in X the support they need, the best we can do is offer pills that work long enough that they help themselves or some psychotherapy.
Psychotherapy can be greatly helped in a lot of cases by pills.
I have seen the light when I started experimenting with drugs(illegal and legal) -- it is such an incredible release to know you have the power to change your mental state, even if chemically.
Having a Xanax in my walled, completely stopped my panic attacks, I haven't had one in years.