[2641] in Depressing_Thoughts
Re: suicidal thoughts
mingliu@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (mingliu@ATHENA.MIT.EDU)
Sat Dec 14 17:11:25 1991
>Going back to the "suicidal thoughts" thread, I know if I was ever in such
>a situation, and if my friends/parents went directly to a stranger (and I
>don't care how competent they might be) instead of trying to calm me
>down/cheer me up themselves, I would feel even worse.
Hmm....one thing to keep in mind is that, IMHO, there are often
break-downs in the communication channels during such crisis and often
what a professional would attempt to do is to first re-establish that.
On a similar note, all these reminded me of one thing. BTW, I am not
trying to put down the profession in general. However, it is true that
in majority of the coutries in the world today, people get by "fine"
(depend on what one's own interpretation) without the benefit/aid of
therapists and psychologists/psychiatrists that seem to have become an
integral part of American life. This seems to poing to cultural
elements at work. Any idea what such cultural factor could be?
On the note of being individualistic sometime I wonder if much of the
psychotherapies are part of the social mechanisms of enforcing
conformity. (e.g. it's not right that you are not communicating with
your siblings....go get therapy; it's not right that you are thinking of
killing youself...get therapied....) The line is very blurry.
Furthermore, at current rate of advancements, it's conceivable that
within 50 years (it's within most of OUR lifetime!) we will possess the
ability to manipulate human genome to the extent that, if there are
enough will, people can set up committee and define standards just as
people do today to set up committee and set up ANSI standards on CL,
C++, C...etc. IMHO and in a wicked sense, this is worse than the
development of nuclear weapons, for the bombs go off and existence is no
more. With the mis-use of the biotechnology, humanity will
exist as...well, I think you can imagine for yourself. I don't think
the social climate, even in the States, is totally prepared. Yet the flip
side of the argument is: then do we let child born with ostensible birth
defect or genetically inherited disease go on and potentially becomes a
even greater burden on the society as a whole. The line, IMHO, IS
blurry.
...depressing thought of the day...sigh.
