I understood psychiatry a bit more squarely than my classmates in college. I loved the subject, and I must’ve told you that in an earlier column. As the topic persists in today’s social narrative, allow me to talk some more about it.
I do not quite remember how the topics were arranged in the syllabus then, but I do remember a diagram: it was a wellness-illness spectrum, and humans, unstable as we are, sway from one end to the other at various times in our waking life. The semester started on one end, which is the wellness end, and we talked of various forms of defense mechanisms humans employ consciously or unconsciously. Say, when you find yourself at the losing end of a survey, your mind automatically switches to “sour-graping” mode: “Surveys are bull! They should be banned!” Akin to that is the “sweet lemon” mode: “Oh, well, at least it’s not Manny Villar.” Or, perhaps, into the sublimation mode: you go ahead and rip a candidate’s campaign poster. Or denial mode: “We will win!”
These defense mechanisms may be employed, too, at the other end of the spectrum, which is the illness end. But let’s get to that later.
As the class went deeper into the lessons, towards the illness sphere, many discovered that, in one way or the other, certain degrees of those pathological traits were present in every one of us. It was not uncommon that every now and then, anyone in class would cringe secretly with a little bit of guilt in his corner when a lesson or two hit him.
I realized how blurry the line is between normal and mad. If a media personality consistently wears white, from top to bottom, that could be an indication of either a fetish or obsessive-compulsive behavior. But that doesn’t mean he had crossed the pathologic threshold, which is why I don’t propose he should get into a psychiatric test for fear of endangering the minds of the public that patronizes him. Should I push for a nuttiness check, the burden of proof will fall on my shoulders, not on him.
If you think you can heave the country’s famished body politic to a life of affluence, you could have delusions of grandeur, and you’re bordering on the mental illness end of the spectrum. On second look, however, there could be a blurry line between Don Quixote who fell into the obsession of titling windmills and a presidential candidate who wishes to salvage the country from a sea of filth. For one thing, there’s a blurry line between idealism and madness, although if you say idealistic things for the sake of sound bites, that raises you to another level of mental illness: psychopath. But I wrote about that already.
So, thank God, there’s the Psychological Association of the Philippines to tell everyone, unlettered in the discipline of mind-reading, to put some sense into the sordid mudslinging in the name of psychology. The PAP considers it an affront to the profession. Doubted as it already is as a “pseudo-science,” it may not help to reinforce our naivete on the discipline of psychology and the circuitous workings of the human mind.
All of a sudden, everyone is a psychiatrist. How can you tell that a person who comes into a cockpit is sick in the head? He’s bringing a duck. How can you tell the people are nuts? They bet on the duck. Just because it looks like a cock, some people want to dignify a dubious psychiatric report by proposing a head check. Too late in the day of the grand derby and funny, your cock is dead. But, as the song goes, “only fools rush in.”
No comments:
Post a Comment