A 'case study' by psychiatrist Erich Kasten tells the horrifying story of a man who tricked everybody around him to accede to his mental illness--it's yet another revolutionary push
This is what must arise if [Normal] is abolished in favour of "everything is on a spectrum", and if [Rights] are made into something existing externally from the human mind/perception; Rights made into some kind of deity to be worshipped and obeyed no matter any real consequence.
If there's a normal to diverge from, we can then adjudicate the divergence as being a threat and a danger, or not, and act accordingly.
If rights are tied to demonstrated ability and observed behaviour (i.e. if they are conditional rather than universal and automatic or even autonomous), then we can strip away or restore said rights based on someone's behaviour.
Sometime between the 1960s and 1970s and the reports of the frankly often abhorrent conditions in many asylums and institutions, to present day, there was a change-over from too much in one direction, to too much in the opposite. If you have ever tried to walk on a suspended rope, you know that the more you try to compensate, the more you swing the other way, until you fall off.
In this case, we have to "fall off" in order to correct, and accept that the cost will be tens of thousands, perhaps hundreds of thousands or even millions of lives ruined one way or another, simply because [Normal] was removed and unearned [Rights] were made omnipotent.
A minority of one appears sufficient to import every kind of 'change' on everybody else.
This is, of course, insane, and while you're correct about the deplorable state of asylums before the 1970s, the pendulum is swinging so far into the opposite direction, I'm merely asking myself about the magnitude of the backlash.
Douglas Adams explored the logical opposite end of that: Wonko the Sane. Deciding that the world was indeed mad, he built an inside-out house he called "The Asylum", thereby putting the entire world in it, and himself on the outside, where he lived in comfort.
That's the logical end, when Normal is something everyone decides individually - everyone but Me Myself and I is Not Normal, since I'm Normal according to My metrics, and My metrics are the only real ones since they come from within Me, unimpeded by sensory/social input and interpretation of reality.
Very Lovecraftian too, if you think about it: Reality existing as a dream in the unmind of Azatoth the Blind demon-sultan at the center of Everything. Should he awaken. . .
This is what must arise if [Normal] is abolished in favour of "everything is on a spectrum", and if [Rights] are made into something existing externally from the human mind/perception; Rights made into some kind of deity to be worshipped and obeyed no matter any real consequence.
If there's a normal to diverge from, we can then adjudicate the divergence as being a threat and a danger, or not, and act accordingly.
If rights are tied to demonstrated ability and observed behaviour (i.e. if they are conditional rather than universal and automatic or even autonomous), then we can strip away or restore said rights based on someone's behaviour.
Sometime between the 1960s and 1970s and the reports of the frankly often abhorrent conditions in many asylums and institutions, to present day, there was a change-over from too much in one direction, to too much in the opposite. If you have ever tried to walk on a suspended rope, you know that the more you try to compensate, the more you swing the other way, until you fall off.
In this case, we have to "fall off" in order to correct, and accept that the cost will be tens of thousands, perhaps hundreds of thousands or even millions of lives ruined one way or another, simply because [Normal] was removed and unearned [Rights] were made omnipotent.
Exactly.
A minority of one appears sufficient to import every kind of 'change' on everybody else.
This is, of course, insane, and while you're correct about the deplorable state of asylums before the 1970s, the pendulum is swinging so far into the opposite direction, I'm merely asking myself about the magnitude of the backlash.
Douglas Adams explored the logical opposite end of that: Wonko the Sane. Deciding that the world was indeed mad, he built an inside-out house he called "The Asylum", thereby putting the entire world in it, and himself on the outside, where he lived in comfort.
That's the logical end, when Normal is something everyone decides individually - everyone but Me Myself and I is Not Normal, since I'm Normal according to My metrics, and My metrics are the only real ones since they come from within Me, unimpeded by sensory/social input and interpretation of reality.
Very Lovecraftian too, if you think about it: Reality existing as a dream in the unmind of Azatoth the Blind demon-sultan at the center of Everything. Should he awaken. . .