Quotes About Stigma

Trying to prove you're not a psychopath is even harder than trying to prove you're not mentally ill,' said Tony.

When I asked Robert Spitzer about the possibility that he'd inadvertently created a world in which ordinary behaviours were being labelled mental disorders, he fell silent. I waited for him to answer. But the silence lasted three minutes. Finally he said, 'I don't know.

There are obviously a lot of very ill people out there. But there are also people in the middle, getting overlabeled, becoming nothing more than a big splurge of madness in the minds of the people who benefit from it.     Bob

There are obviously a lot of very ill people out there. But there are also people in the middle, getting overlabeled, becoming nothing more than a big splurge of madness in the minds of the people who benefit from it.

But they're being labeled bipolar. That's an enormous label that's going to stay with you for the rest of your life.

He fulfilled the bipolar checklist. See? And so they gave him some pretty heavy-duty medication. It slowed him way down, to a drooling fat kid. And they declared the meds a success." It

I would also say you can never reduce any person to a diagnostic label.

A tiny little baby!' says Tam. 'People look at me like I'm an animal. People who don't know me judge me. I always remember going up to visit someone in prison, and this woman was sitting there. She was looking at me, growling a bit, and I could imagine what she was thinking: There's a pedophile! Anyway, I later discovered about her character. And I'll tell you, it outweighed anything I'd ever done.' 'What had she done?' I ask. 'Shoplifting,' says Tam. There is silence.

maybe the American Psychiatric Association had a crazy desire to label all life a mental disorder. I

complicated human behavior was increasingly getting labeled a mental disorder.

Psychiatric diagnoses are getting closer and closer to the boundary of normal," said Allen Frances.

Bryna is convinced her children are bipolar, and I wasn't going to swoop into a stranger's home for an afternoon and tell them all they were normal.

we tend to love nothing more than to declare other people insane.

the world that psychiatrists are wicked and must be stopped.

Trying to prove you're not a psychopath is even harder than trying to prove you're not mentally ill

Look! We're saying. We're normal! This is the average! We're defining the boundaries of normality by tearing apart the people outside of it.

There's a societal push for conformity in all ways. There's less tolerance of difference. And so maybe for some people having a label is better. It can confer a sense of hope and direction. (interview with Allen Frances)

they saw how well behaved I was, and decided it meant I could only behave well in the environment of a psychiatric hospital and it proved I was mad." I

Once labeled schizophrenic the pseudopatient was stuck with that label. —DAVID ROSENHAN

Many kids who would have been called eccentric, different, were suddenly labeled autistic." I

The problem with the Tea Party is they're all ignorant hillbillies who drink moonshine and ride around on mules. And they believe in stereotypes too.

A lot of people don't realize depression is an illness. I don't wish it on anyone, but if they would know how it feels, I swear they would think twice before they just shrug it.

he was afraid that if the idea that he was depressed gained currency, he would forfeit his right to his opinions. He would forfeit his moral certainties; every word he spoke would become a symptom of disease; he would never again win an argument.

Poor people smoked, poor people ate Krispy Kreme doughnuts by the dozen. Poor people were made pregnant by close relatives. Poor people practiced poor hygiene and lived in toxic neighborhoods. Poor people with their ailments constituted a subspecies of humanity that thankfully remained invisible to Gary except in hospitals and in places like Central Discount Medical.