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Nobody has a personality anymore: we are products with labels

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Re: Nobody has a personality anymore: we are products with labels

#171

Post by drewcoo »

deanCommie wrote: post #65
hresvelgr wrote: post #53

The lovable aphorisms we had for people with character quirks were largely from our original support systems. What no one is talking about is the reason therapy-talk has become so pervasive is because all those support systems: family, friends, and local communities (religious or otherwise), have all degraded so severely for most that therapy is the only option for reaching out and getting help.

except they weren't really "support systems" i mean they were, if you got lucky. If you were neurotypical; if you bought in to the local religious sect's particular flavour and embraced it wholeheartedly; if you followed the other local cults of sports fandoms; if you were lucky enough to either have family without their own trauma that didn't take it out on you OR decided to repress it in exactly the same way that t…

> It's why there's now suddenly an influx of ADHD and Autism diagnosis

I claim the DSM-5 is why. We changed diagnostic criteria then we diagnosed. People who used to be "normal" were suddenly "undiagnosed until late in life." But the people themselves hadn't changed much, just the diagnostic criteria.

Re: Nobody has a personality anymore: we are products with labels

#172

Post by 65 »

I have a different perspective on this. I've always been interested in reading about the science of left handedness, because I am one. It's interesting to see how my brain is literally wired differently than others. How motivation and language processing are in different hemispheres of my brain compared to righties. But I never thought something was "wrong" with me, I just thought it was interesting.

Those who actually have diagnosed afflictions like autism and ADHD may also be interested in their brain wiring.

I think the trend comes from completely normal people who want to find an excuse to be a victim, which means they can defer responsibility of their lives to their "mental disorders," which of course has the effect of making highly insufferable people.

Re: Nobody has a personality anymore: we are products with labels

#173

Post by pmg101 »

Tokumei-no-hito wrote: post #161
stevenAthompson wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The author's concerns would mostly all be ameliorated by logging out of TikTok and never logging back in. They seem to think that "TikTok" and "Society" are synonyms. They are not.

you seem unaware that over 60% (150M) of the US uses tiktok and around 70% of that (100M) are 18-30. it's unclear on the i don't think it's unreasonable, particularly when she qualifies gen-z, to conflate tiktok and society. it's really out of hand. the brain rot, beyond just the psych labeling she touches on, is crazy.

What do you mean by "brain rot"?

Re: Nobody has a personality anymore: we are products with labels

#174

Post by gsf_emergency_2 »

dsubburam wrote: post #165
Aurornis wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> - if you give people the chance to place a label on themselves to give a name/form to a problem, they’ll take it. This one is widespread among the young people I’ve worked with recently. It’s remarkable how I can identify the current TikTok self diagnosis trends without ever watching TikTok. There’s a widespread belief that once you put a label on a problem, other people are not allowed to criticize you for it. Man…

This parallels the debate about free will and determinism. If you were in the determinist camp, believing that all that one does was predetermined by prior environmental causes, could you still hold people responsible for their actions? Hobart makes a convincing argument that you can: "Fatalism says that my morrow is determined no matter how I struggle. This is of course a superstition. Determinism says that my morro…

Reposted to address: labels on clusters of belief such as "free will" and "determinism"

tlb or pg has a pithy saying that I can't find now goes smth like

"we should avoid labels [on people] not because they are useless (they aren't) but they are hard to get right. Adding the cost of being wrong to that makes them not worth it"

There's some connection to the "build skill or taste?" dilemma threaded earlier

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44469163

You can make proper use of labels-- that requires taste. To build skill, you try to find new labels that can go viral ;)

E.g you combine them like Hobart :)

Re: Nobody has a personality anymore: we are products with labels

#175

Post by rahimnathwani »

peab wrote: post #170
Walf wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm sure there are those who self-diagnose without really suffering from a condition, but you do realise time blindness is a real issue, right? https://www.simplypsychology.org/adhd-time-blindness.html I don't watch TikTok videos, I don't use Instagram, but I have been plagued by these symptoms my entire life, and don't really care about others opinions on it. You probably don't have it if those symptoms don't resona…

“Time blindness” is not named anywhere in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fifth Edition (DSM-5, 2013) nor in the DSM-5-TR (text-revision, 2022). It is not recognized as a stand-alone disorder or an official diagnostic criterion.

Even if it were in DSM-5-*, would that mean it's a standalone disorder?

I haven't read much psychology, but this article suggests a lot of psychological diagnoses are just labels for symptoms:

https://slimemoldtimemold.com/2025/02/06/the-mind-in-the-whe...

  Imagine that your car breaks down and you bring it to a mechanic and he tells you, “Oh, your car has a case of broken-downness.” You’d know right away: this guy has no idea what he’s talking about. “Broken-downness” is an abstraction; it doesn’t refer to anything, and it’s not going to help you fix a car.

Re: Nobody has a personality anymore: we are products with labels

#176

Post by Tokumei-no-hito »

protocolture wrote: post #118

[flagged]

when the taxonomy is weaponized then we have lost something. taxonomy that is used in earnest to improve and adapt is fine. when it used to promote victimization that begets the control of other people it's a net negative.

Re: Nobody has a personality anymore: we are products with labels

#177

Post by Walf »

peab wrote: post #170
Walf wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm sure there are those who self-diagnose without really suffering from a condition, but you do realise time blindness is a real issue, right? https://www.simplypsychology.org/adhd-time-blindness.html I don't watch TikTok videos, I don't use Instagram, but I have been plagued by these symptoms my entire life, and don't really care about others opinions on it. You probably don't have it if those symptoms don't resona…

“Time blindness” is not named anywhere in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fifth Edition (DSM-5, 2013) nor in the DSM-5-TR (text-revision, 2022). It is not recognized as a stand-alone disorder or an official diagnostic criterion.

Because that's a colloquial name given to a range of specific symptoms people experience, and it is in the DSM, covered by 1.e.:

> Often has difficulty organizing tasks and activities (e.g., difficulty managing sequential tasks; difficulty keeping materials and belongings in order; messy, disorganized work; has poor time management; fails to meet deadlines).

The DSM doesn't list all minutiae of every general problem.

Re: Nobody has a personality anymore: we are products with labels

#178

Post by Aurornis »

Walf wrote: post #167
Aurornis wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> - if you give people the chance to place a label on themselves to give a name/form to a problem, they’ll take it. This one is widespread among the young people I’ve worked with recently. It’s remarkable how I can identify the current TikTok self diagnosis trends without ever watching TikTok. There’s a widespread belief that once you put a label on a problem, other people are not allowed to criticize you for it. Man…

I'm sure there are those who self-diagnose without really suffering from a condition, but you do realise time blindness is a real issue, right? https://www.simplypsychology.org/adhd-time-blindness.html I don't watch TikTok videos, I don't use Instagram, but I have been plagued by these symptoms my entire life, and don't really care about others opinions on it. You probably don't have it if those symptoms don't resona…

That article is not claiming that “time blindness” is a real standalone condition. As the other commenter already explained, it’s not among the conditions with actual diagnostic criteria and agreed-upon symptoms.

The first sentence claims that it’s something people with ADHD might experience, not a specific condition. In other words, it’s just the therapy-speak way of saying “chronically late”.

Note that the date on the article is also very recent: Only a few months old. This date is after the trend was popular on TikTok. It was likely written in response to the trend, as a way of capturing search engine traffic from people searching for it.

This is representative of the issue I was describing: There’s a sense among some people that using the therapy-speak terminology for something transforms it into a different type of personality attribute, for which they can’t be held responsible. Saying “I have a problem with being on time” and “I have time blindness” are functionally equivalent, but some people want to believe they the therapy speak labeled version warrants different treatment.

Re: Nobody has a personality anymore: we are products with labels

#179

Post by zdragnar »

dsubburam wrote: post #165
Aurornis wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> - if you give people the chance to place a label on themselves to give a name/form to a problem, they’ll take it. This one is widespread among the young people I’ve worked with recently. It’s remarkable how I can identify the current TikTok self diagnosis trends without ever watching TikTok. There’s a widespread belief that once you put a label on a problem, other people are not allowed to criticize you for it. Man…

This parallels the debate about free will and determinism. If you were in the determinist camp, believing that all that one does was predetermined by prior environmental causes, could you still hold people responsible for their actions? Hobart makes a convincing argument that you can: "Fatalism says that my morrow is determined no matter how I struggle. This is of course a superstition. Determinism says that my morro…

The problem is conflating one's identity with the label allows a person to project all of their problems onto the rest of the world.

By "being" the label, one has little to no agency over it. Without agency, there is no responsibility, nor incentive to change. Without responsibility or incentive to change, there is no problem for the individual; rather the problem is everyone else.

This isn't just something that a person can do to themselves- it's something society can do to people. The phrase "bigotry of low expectations" describes a behavior of assuming that a label identifies a person, and that they have no personal agency to overcome it. The behavioral shift of everyone around that person molds the image the person has of themselves to a limited, restricted version of what they're actually capable of.

Re: Nobody has a personality anymore: we are products with labels

#180

Post by tootie »

_benton wrote: post #16

Fascinating article. It's think the author's experiences are fairly context-dependant, with where you live, the political leanings of your social circle, your online community etc. But I have noticed an increase in the pathologizing of normal human behaviours and traits. Maybe not all character flaws should be fixed.

I am leery to discount anyone's mental health struggles because often enough they are very real. But it can be galling to see very functional people blame the smallest imperfection on a condition many people find debilitating. ADHD and Autism are prevalent ones now, but it also is almost a cliche to call yourself OCD for a bit finicky. I think there's also an element of blaming your shortcomings in life on an incurable condition so it's not your own fault.
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