351–360 of 397 posts
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That's a strawman argument. They are not arguing that it's good for people to live on the streets. What they are arguing is that the abuse associated with making it easier to incarcerate mentally ill people is too great of a risk.
Seems to work in civilized countries. The solution is obviously to treat patients well, not abandon them.
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Higher minimum wages are the last thing those people need. We're talking about the least productive workers. If minimum wage is $20 and their labor is only worth $10 then no one will hire them at all. They will remain dependent on handouts and never have the opportunity to gain real work experience. Under the Mental Health Parity and Addiction Equity Act (MHPAEA) of 2008, medical insurers are already required to cove…
You, nradov, are the problem. Paying people a living wage is not a handout. Raising the minimum wage is not a handout. These people are working, hard, harder than you do, for way less. These people are being taken advantage of. It's not just fast food workers, it's bank tellers, it's farm workers, it's orderliness and custodians at hospitals, it's the backbone of our society. What do you get paid to do? I would argue…
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True facts. Depsite the challenges, we must try. The existence of these challenges does not mean we shouldn't try. I think that's the problem, we spend so much energy arguing about the shoulda coulda woulda's that we never actually get started doing anything meaingful.
> we must try Start with the existing system then. If you think we can do better, prove it. Bring that same level of optimism into improving existing standards of medical care -- then come back and we'll talk about expanding those systems. > we never actually get started doing anything meaingful. I think this regularly gets pulled out as a justification for expanding systems that have significant problems, and critic…
That is exactly what this original article is about.
The article, and me in these comments, have been proposing to do exactly this. Bring back much of the old system that has been sustematically dismantled over the last 70 years, with improvements of course.
I think you are missing a lot of the context here.
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A hell of a lot better than in most places that have tried a “moonshot”. Russia in 1917 being the major example.
Don't you remember Apollo? That was more recent, and was successful, and widely considered as a good idea. It's weird to choose an obscure, older historical reference to suit your point, while the literal best example possible, the example that created the term, is sitting right there.
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Such 'benefits' are yet another lock and key; another hurdle that people in need must jump over. It's baby formula. You are just reiterating their point.
You're missing the point. For the most part, people stealing baby formula aren't doing so because they need it and can't afford it. Most baby formula theft is conducted by organized shoplifting rings. It can be easily sold or bartered on the street, and police don't focus on such crimes so the risk is low.
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> we must try Start with the existing system then. If you think we can do better, prove it. Bring that same level of optimism into improving existing standards of medical care -- then come back and we'll talk about expanding those systems. > we never actually get started doing anything meaingful. I think this regularly gets pulled out as a justification for expanding systems that have significant problems, and critic…
>Start with the existing system then That is exactly what this original article is about. The article, and me in these comments, have been proposing to do exactly this. Bring back much of the old system that has been sustematically dismantled over the last 70 years, with improvements of course. I think you are missing a lot of the context here.
That is not at all what I meant by "existing system" :)
"Start with the existing system" means "prove the US is capable of imprisoning people without regularly subjecting them to horrible conditions." That we used to run an even more expansive prison system doesn't mean that bringing that prison system back under the guise of medical care wouldn't be an expansion of the current system. The old system was torn down for a reason, and reintroducing it now would be an expansion of the current prison system.
We very deliberately systematically dismantled the old system of asylums because they were incredibly abusive. And unfortunately, the remnants of that system are still abusive today. My point is that "we have a long way to go but we have to try" doesn't mean very much when it's just words. Advocates for asylums should start by addressing some of the abuses that are still rampant today in the systems that are operating right now -- let's see some evidence that re-expanding the prison system won't be a horrible disaster for human rights, let's see some actual improvements to prisons that already exist today to back up that optimism.
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The risk behind untested optimism is that every expansion of the prison system can be excused this way. Any abuse that results in cutting back on incarceration becomes temporary and it's assumed that "getting back to normal" and reintroducing those systems is the normal desired state, rather than a dangerous step backwards towards a system that was consciously rejected for good reason. And advocates that argue (deliberately or not) for expanding and reintroducing systems of abuse can just keep saying "we'll do better this time, this time we'll have reforms."
Nah. Let's see some of those reforms in existing prisons as they exist now for regular prisoners. Let's see standards rise for the prisoners with and without mental issues that we already have in jail today. Then we'll talk about whether expanding from what we have today is wise.
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>People here are advocating that the government should have the ability to forcibly commit someone to an asylum. The state already has the ability to forcibly confine people. We just think that some people would do better in a hospital than a prison.
I think you should be honest that you're talking about putting people into a prison and then calling that prison a hospital. And given the state of prisons in the US, I know what that "hospital" would end up looking like. And I think it's kind of weird and very vaguely gross to try and distinguish. There really aren't many reforms or programs for an asylum that aren't applicable to existing prisons -- normal prisoner…
It's a classic case of perfect being the enemy of good, and it's a major reason why the USA has problems like this, because of it's vetocracy structure.
IMO the first step to prison type sweden would probably be getting rid of the drug war and dismantling the DEA, much of the 'load' comes from that.
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Mental healthcare coverage in Canada is pretty abysmal. It's barely covered at all unless you're in a crisis situation, which is not very different from many US states.
That’s fair. Though to be clear the following are covered: * Family doctor or clinic visits for mental health * Psychiatrist visits * In most provinces, medications Talk therapy through a psychologist is what is generally not covered outside of work insurance. That’s a big gap, but also not quite right to say “not covered at all”.
Additionally, because of artificial constraint in the supply of psychiatrists (and doctors in general to a lesser degree), the wait time to see one can reach ~1 year, which doesn't have anything to do with how healthcare is financed but is still a problem in Canada.
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Not the person you're replying to, but I'm curious: what's wrong with position (3)? That's kinda where I am right now.
It’s pretty bleak and pessimistic for one thing. If you want to solve a problem you have to at first believe that it’s possible to solve. Otherwise, why wouldn’t you just give up?
So, two objections:
First, "bleak and pessimistic" or "realistic"? There are a number of rights that we guarantee specifically because we don't believe there's a good way to police bad actors without harming good actors.
Our entire justice system is built around occasionally taking the worst outcome and refusing to convict people specifically because we're so scared of how easy it would be to abuse a system where people had the power to correct those injustices.
"State power can be abused" is not really uncommon sentiment for any political group in the US, and it's a big part of our country's DNA. I'm not sure I'd phrase that as fatalistic or unhelpful, it's a big part of the backbone of our current democracy.
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Second, it might well be that the problem is solvable, but even if that's the case it doesn't mean it's wise to give abusive regimes more power right now. Having optimism about our ability to build a society that does not stigmatize mental health and does not use mental health as an excuse to harm minorities, oppressed groups, activists, or social outcasts does not preclude saying "but we clearly don't have that society yet, and right now it would be a giant disaster to give our current society this level of power, and we know from history what a society that looks like ours typically does with this kind of power."
I might be optimistic that my kid will be able to learn to drive some day. I do not express that optimism by buying them a car when they're 10 and letting them start it up and start driving down the highway unattended. I am optimistic that Flatpak sandboxing is going to eventually be good. I do not express that optimism by throwing out all of my VMs and using Flatpak as my only sandboxing tool right now. I understand that my optimism about the future does not change the current state of the world.
I am optimistic that transgender rights are going to eventually improve over time, including in states like Florida and Texas. But I am realistic about how those states are run and managed at this moment, and I am realistic about what those states will do if granted these powers.
Optimism does not require naivety.
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Emergency use authorization is experimental. Otherwise it wouldn't be "emergency use".
Here’s a simple metaphor to illustrate the difference, if we’re going to argue the meaning of terms of art by their dictionary definitions. When Sully Sullenberger pulled off the Miracle on the Hudson, that was an emergency use of the airplane’s water landing capability. It wasn’t experimental. Airbus designed a “ditching” button for the A320, they knew more or less what it would do, and the regulators (here the FAA)…
Why are you so adverse to accepting the reality of the situation?
"The process for issuing an EUA is different than an FDA approval. Under an EUA, the FDA authorizes uses of medical products based on a reasonable belief that the product may be effective based on the best evidence available at the time, without waiting for all the information that would be needed for an FDA approval."[1]
[1] https://www.fda.gov/consumers/consumer-updates/understanding...