Self fulfilling prophecy

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I just read about Rosemary Kenedy ( http://monastic_1.blogspot.com/2005/08/ ... nnedy.html ) who was "mentally ret*d" SINCE BIRTH, and AT THE SAME TIME she BECAME ret*d as a result of her lobotomy at 23. This apparent contradiction seem to point to self fulfilling prophecy. She was quite bright during her first 23 years (as evidenced by her dairy that her mom wanted to throw away) but her parents THOUGHT she was ret*d. So they performed a lobotomy on her, which, ironically enough, MADE her ret*d, making her parents "right".

Now lets think of autism. One of the things I am complaining about is that I don't know how to approach people and innitiate conversation. But during very FEW times when I bother enough to take a shower and put on clean clothes, somehow my conversational skills improve just for that day. So I finally realized that it is OTHER PEOPLE who are sending me "subliminal messages" that I am "unwelcome", and THAT is the reason I have problem initiating conversation.

This brings me to a more general question. Do autistic people lack social skills from birth, or does the society conditions them to lack social skills because they DON"T WANT them to be social? If the latter is correct, that would make it today's form of lobotomy. Who knows, may be in the past, mental retardation was considered a common trait of schizophrenic and bipolar, all because these two groups were the most common recepients of lobotomy that CAUSED them to be ret*d.

By the way, one of the DSM 4 symptoms of schizophrenia is emotional indifference. Now, did it ever occur to anyone that emotional indifference might simply be the result of medications that they are being given, not the desease itself? Also, by the way, "paranoid ideation" (even more common symptom of schizophrenia) might be a result of abuse they suffer at mental institutions. So if the patients try to communicate to outside world about the abuse they received, what should docs do to protect themselves? They should say their patients are paranoid, and everything they say is a "dilusion".

By the way, here is a video of one of the "patients" in the mental insitution ( http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y5SfX9Nz_pY&NR=1 ). If you watch just the first half a minute of this, you would see a typical behavior of a mentally ill person, who yells and screams at the doctor and even threatens to be physical. But then just a bit later you find that she was not mentally ill to begin with. She was placed there in order to have her brain damaged enough so that she wouldn't have power to stick with a guy her father doesn't approve of. Yet, at the beginnig of a video she was just as violent as any schizophrenic patient you would find! Do you think, perhaps, THIS is the reason schizophrenic patients are violent and NOT their "schizophrenia" as is commonly assumed.

Going back to autism: do you think "temper tantrums" are true symptoms of autism, or do you think they are simply a result of built in frustration due to rejection from society (I started having tantrums on regular basis when I realized how rejected I was at 21 and, interesting enough, I haven't had any tantrums until that age). If an NT was to live in a planet where majority is autistic and he was routinely rejected for being NT, perhaps he would also develop tantrums, while none of the autistic on that particular planet would have anything to tantrum over. And then "temper tantrums" would be a common trait of NT-s.

I don't know about other people, but for me it doesn't work like that. I've had people go out of their way to try and get me to be more social, and it doesn't change my social abilities.

I do think that some mental illnesses or personality disorders etc exist mostly because society has decreed what it considers to be 'normal' and anything outside of that is seen as an illness or a sickness. Society does so like to make people conform and difference is usually frowned upon.

When they are "going out of the way to get you more social" are you cooperating with them in attempting to do the same, or do you ignore their attempts because you don't want to/ don't care?

In my case people also went "out of their way" to make me more social. But, unfortunately, it was at the time when I didn't want to, so I didn't cooperate. Then, when I finally begin to want to, they already gave up. They ASSUME I don't have social skills (wrong) because I CHOSE not to cooperate with their past attempts; so they would insist on ignoring me, making my lack of social skills into self fulfilling prophecy.

it's hard to say. When I was younger and they would try to, then I wasn't exactly "cooperating," but it wasn't because I didn't want friends or didn't care. I wanted friends. It was because I didnt really know how to "cooperate" with them. I didn't know what I was supposed to do as far as interacting with them, and that caused a lot of anxiety, so a lot of the time my ability to try was very limited. Nowadays I have less anxiety about it so I'm more likely to talk more(around more than just specific people), so I am able to be more active in a social situation when I feel like saying something, but I still don't know what to do in social situations much of the time, so, again, I can't completely "cooperate" because I have no idea what to do, even if I am trying to the best of my ability.

I think therefore I am.

True to a point, that society frames us (rather than creates) depending on your relationship with it. However, at an individual level, we create ourselves from inherited influences of the soul, our celestial influences, and our inherited DNA of our vehicle, the body.

Its like Jesus commanding a wheelchair bound pundit to stand.

That is a stance not too disimilair from what the Anti-psychiatric movement would outline as the basis for its criticism of the pseudo-science behind psychiatry.

Kind of an all-or-nothing approach. Quite a few conditions do make people threats to themselves, unable to take care of themselves, etc. I've also seen criticisms of conditions that legitimately cause the people who have them distress.

I don't think psychiatry is a pseudo-science, but I do think that it's built upon a lot of poor science.

Yes I would agree with the poor science not pseudo-science statement. Thats why I couldn't buy into the anti-psych approach. But I think it has interesting perspectives.

I read Thomas Szazi's book on Mental illness being a myth that he wrote in the 60's. When he was effectively saying people with "mental health" conditions should just simply pull themselves together and take responsibility it kinda irked me the wrong way and my inner professional trainning kinda went hmmm this is a bit too simplistic more than "radical" in thinking

Yeah, telling disabled people to suck it up and try harder? That sounds exactly like everyone else.

Yeah.. With me the "suck it up and try harder" thing is just a meltdown waiting to happen.

He does seem to make a lot of valid arguments, but he also seems to make a lot of peculiar ones. I mean I totally agree one of the areas in which psychiatry is horrible is in stigmatizing behavior that isn't pathological at all - two of Szasz' examples being drapetomania and hysteria. And like, the use of lobotomies? Institutionalization?

But how do people with mental illnesses pull themselves together and take responsibility? What is the process here, and is it unreasonable that people often need assistance due to depression, etc?

Seems like he had a lot of reasonable ideas and then swings them into the extreme.

He was referring to people with mental health conditions not disability

What is the distinction here? Depression, anxiety, PTSD, etc. are mental health conditions and qualify as disabilities.

I only list those as examples, a lot of other conditions are also disabling.

How do you know about this? Did these people SAY they can't take care of themselves, or did other people DECIDE they can't?

Here is an example. I went to a conference a week ago. It went fine, except for the very last day that ruined it because apparently the prof who invited me was worried i would get lost or robbed or what not. It took 5 minute discussion in order to have him LET me walk around and see town.

Now what happened? Well I didn't know Hindi so I couldn't explain the Indian driver where I want him to take me. Then I started asking all of the people we drove by to call the conference organizor so he can tell the driver the name of the place he suggested I go. Now the people got upset at him as to why was "this kind of person ALLOWED to dravel without escort" to begin with. After so many people gave him calls in this nature, he himself was of this opinion and then he scolded the professor who invited me for not doing the same.

Now lets look at facts. I traveled plenty of times, and nothing ever happened to me. Now, yes, sometimes I was stuck for an hour or two finding my way. But it happened ONLY when I could afford it -- like that last day when there were NO scheduled plans ahead. Now, when there IS something scheduled, I know how to deal with it, I simply get out of the house an hour or two early, dependding on a situation and/or printing a map (which I havne't done that time since I assumed I have all the time on the earth).

Now, why did they react so strongly? I am sure some people would have just as much difficulties when others don't know English. It is HOW I deal with it. Namely yell and scream and draw a lot of attention to myself, which makes it sound like an emergency. Was there an emergency? No, I was simply pissed at the "stupid Indians". If I was in France and had similar issue I won't be nearly as pissed and I won't be yelling either, even in the similar situation. Once I fianlly got to my hotel I was no longer pissed, I completely forgot about it all, moved on happilly with my day, and hten was SURPRISED that everyone else were worried, it tooke me good 10 minutes to REMEMBER that anything happened to begin with

Now lets look at the broader picture. Why did this happen to me and not someone next to me? Lack of social awareness. Most NT-s, when they say something, they downpay whatever it is. But I say it as it is, and forget to downplay. So, others decide it is something horribe when it isn't. Like with grades. Officially, A= wonderful, B= good, C= fair. But on practice A = good, B = fair, C = bad. NT-s say things as they are IN PRACTICE. But, as an aspie, I forget to do it and say as htey are "officially". So when I am "okay" I give my situaiton C. Then I give it C over and over, every day. And then people all of a sudden decide something is wrong. And I am like "what happened? I never gave a single D, everything is C".

BOTTOM LINE: I can manage just fine, but I do it in ways other than what most people are used to. So they DECIDE that I can't take care of myself.

Now lets go back to your quote:



How do you kown these people who "can't take care of myself" really cant? Did they SAY they can't, or did others say this about them. In the latter case it could well be a miscommunicaiton and/or unwillingness on the part of OTHERS to undrstand different way of thinging.

Last edited by Roman on 05 Apr 2011, 9:17 am, edited 2 times in total.

Those have recovery models of approach towards treatment.

Disability does not, unless you are using a bastardised medical model of disability