Teenage Rebellion Has Become a Mental Illness

Teenage Rebellion Has Become a Mental Illness by Bruce Levine

I found this article a few days ago reposted here and it reminded me of fairlane's Jonestown blog -- thanks for the link by the way -- in its theme of suppression of those who question the status quo by labeling the mentally ill.

Throughout American history, both direct and indirect resistance to authority has been diseased. In an 1851 article in the New Orleans Medical and Surgical Journal, Louisiana physician Samuel Cartwright reported his discovery of "drapetomania," the disease that caused slaves to flee captivity. Cartwright also reported his discovery of "dysaesthesia aethiopis," the disease that caused slaves to pay insufficient attention to the master's needs. Early versions of ODD and ADHD?

In Rush's lifetime, few Americans took anarchia seriously, nor was drapetomania or dysaesthesia aethiopis taken seriously in Cartwright's lifetime. But these were eras before the diseasing of defiance had a powerful financial ally in Big Pharma.

In every generation there will be authoritarians. There will also be the "bohemian bourgeois" who may enjoy anti-authoritarian books, music, and movies but don't act on them. And there will be genuine anti-authoritarians, who are so pained by exploitive hierarchies that they take action. Only occasionally in American history do these genuine anti-authoritarians actually take effective direct action that inspires others to successfully revolt, but every once in a while a Tom Paine comes along. So authoritarians take no chances, and the state-corporate partnership criminalizes anti-authoritarianism, pathologizes it, markets drugs to "cure" it and financially intimidates those who might buck the system.

It would certainly be a dream of Big Pharma and those who favor an authoritarian society if every would-be Tom Paine -- or Crazy Horse, Tecumseh, Emma Goldman or Malcolm X -- were diagnosed as a youngster with mental illness and quieted with a lifelong regimen of chill pills. The question is: Has this dream become reality?

It certainly applies to more than just teens, but I suppose most deviance is "diagnosed" and "treated" at that life stage, especially if the doctors and authority figures have their way.

Now, I'm not quite this cynical about where we stand. I'm really not sure if overmedication and labeling of dubious mental illnesses is something that's been plotted in nefarious back-room meetings for decades, or if it's just something that developed organically. Certainly the pharmaceutical companies have a huge financial stake in overmedication. Therefore I think they're just seeking their best interest, totally orthagonal to any desire by authoritarians to keep the serfs docile and somewhat happy.

But still, when you think about fascism beyond people just throwing the word out at someone they don't like -- well, what exactly is the union of government power and corporate power if not what we're seeing nowadays? It really creeps me out, because I think Americans are generally too stupid and addicted to bread and circuses to realize where we stand. Just give me some sweet narratives about freedom and democracy and leave me alone to watch the football game or American Idol; I'm certainly not awake enough to really question whether I'm free or my country is democratic.

Anyway, I'm off on a rant, but.... yeah. If things aren't as bad as Bruce Levine suggests, they could easily get that bad.