Dear Dr. Archer,
I cannot help but wonder, had your article concerned Jews or rape, would you have settled on that headline?
Also, "Archer's book grew out of his belief that mental disorders have gone from being heavily stigmatized to being almost glamorized these days." I find that wholly amusing.
I’m a retired mental health editor.
Harold
Dear Harold,
I neither picked the headline nor wrote the article, but it probably does need some explaining. Individuals who have various psychiatric traits that fall in the mid level range on the continuum all too often readily accept a diagnosis and medication when in fact, they could put those traits to work for them instead of trying to medicate the trait into oblivion.
They don't want to deal with a little pesky anxiety, some sadness, minor mood swings or distractibility, so they choose to embrace a diagnosis and medication instead.
In my 25 years of practice, I have seen a shift from patients being completely devastated by a diagnosis of say Bipolar Disorder (or ADHD, OCD, Generalized anxiety, etc…) to telling everyone who will listen that they act the way they do because they're Bipolar and there's nothing they can do about it.
That is what I mean by glamorized and that is fully explained in the book. However, there is no doubt that some, on the 10+ range of the continuum, may have a severe disorder and there is nothing glamorous about that.
I invite you to read the book and would welcome any further comments.
Dr. Archer
