Posted by Jost on September 14, 2006, at 22:17:27
In reply to Re: internet and the manufacture of madness..., posted by alexandra_k on September 12, 2006, at 22:59:19
The article actually is about how the internet is a medium for patients to self- (or group-) reinforce an identity that takes as its basis an illness that doesn't "exist." He's concerned about ethic dilemmas and also the harm that may be done to patients who have come to identify themselves as a person with that disorder, and to feel that without the disorder, they have no self.
Such people (according to the article) insist on using the label or resist removal of the label even when psychiatrists come to believe (scientifically so to speak) that the syndrome doesn't exist. Presumably, however, they don't have the particular problem that they believe, and therefore various harms may result, when that disorder's non-existence is denied by/in the internet chat groups.
The person(s) in question may be suffering from some psychiatric condition, but not the one that they believe they are.
The example the writer is about to use is multiple personality disorder. He suggests that in the future, borderline personality disorder may also come to be discredited, and that this might have a similar identity-creating value for certain people. His concern is with groups on the internet, which are elusive to professionals, either because they don't last long, or are scattered around (many small groups exist, and they form and reform elsewhere unpredictably).
The groups are started, maintained and led by "consumers" as opposed to professionals. Presumably his further concern is that the consumers (or potential or ex-patients) whose identities are dependent on recognition of the disorder could make it harder for others in the group to disidentify, or will pressure newcomers to adopt the group identity-lablel. [That last sentence, I admit, is conjecture about what he's about to say-- but if I'm wrong, I'll note it later, but I don't think I am --seems pretty inherent in what he says so far.]
So you can pretty easily see where he's going with that. He does mention "factitious: illnesses, which apparently are a new category in DSM-- and sees some possible connection with that. Ugh. Anyway, I do wish articles could be short--
I'll have to check Mersky-- but I can't believe his writing is as bad as Aitch's (or whatever the guy's name was).
Jost
poster:Jost
thread:684913
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/social/20060911/msgs/686073.html