Electing to Make America Sane Again: Addressing Our Social Psychopathologies

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PSYCHIATRIC VIEWS ON THE DAILY NEWS

Doing a weekday column on the daily news, it is becoming harder and harder not to discuss the upcoming election in the United States, now less than 2 weeks away. Indeed, it is hard to escape all the onslaught of unsolicited messaging. I suppose that could be a column of its own, how people are reacting to that. We are receiving voluminous emails from both parties, perhaps irritating enough to decide not to vote, or inspiring enough to become even more attached to their choice.

What seems missing from the messaging is much of anything from psychiatrists, other than on professional list serves directly related to influential politics. Another limiting influence is the so-called Goldwater Rule of the American Psychiatric Association and its members to not make any public professional comments about public figures. That rule does not prohibit colleague-to-colleague discussion. Just think: all sorts of pundits analyzing every sentence and word that come from the candidates, but we who are trained to also look for deeper meanings in the words of our patients are silent, except for notable exceptions.

Yet, it seems like there are areas where there could be psychiatrist coverage that is not any sort of perceived inappropriateness. That would have to do with policies, as well as general mental health disturbances, without directing the commentary at individual public figures.

Our area of expertise is mental health and mental problems in individuals. However, if we go into the land of social psychiatry, there are the social problems that adversely impact everyone, sometimes called social determinants of mental health. I have called those the social psychopathologies: the isms, antis, social phobias, and the like. If we look at them, perhaps they can be the canaries in the coal mine of how sane our society is right now. To accomplish that, I will probably pick one social psychopathology for each column until the election. We will also plan to do follow-ups no matter who wins, as is done in research studies on quality of care.

Here’s a preview. Yesterday on the news there were all sorts of mention of “good things” about Hitler and the risks of dictatorships. Historically, dictatorships have come both from the extreme right and the extreme left politically.

The late Elie Wiesel, the Holocaust concentration camp survivor who became a Nobel Peace Prize laureate, warned against silence. Silence is not golden, but an enabler of oppression. Silence conveys acceptance of the problem and can allow the problem to worsen. Hence his recommendation, and especially note the word “oppressor”:

“We must always take sides. Neutrality helps the oppressor, never the victim.”

Dr Moffic is an award-winning psychiatrist who specialized in the cultural and ethical aspects of psychiatry and is now in retirement and retirement as a private pro bono community psychiatrist. A prolific writer and speaker, he has done a weekday column titled “Psychiatric Views on the Daily News” and a weekly video, “Psychiatry & Society,” since the COVID-19 pandemic emerged. He was chosen to receive the 2024 Abraham Halpern Humanitarian Award from the American Association for Social Psychiatry. Previously, he received the Administrative Award in 2016 from the American Psychiatric Association, the one-time designation of being a Hero of Public Psychiatry from the Speaker of the Assembly of the APA in 2002, and the Exemplary Psychiatrist Award from the National Alliance for the Mentally Ill in 1991. He is an advocate and activist for mental health issues related to climate instability, physician burnout, and xenophobia. He is now editing the final book in a 4-volume series on religions and psychiatry for Springer: Islamophobia, anti-Semitism, Christianity, and now The Eastern Religions, and Spirituality. He serves on the Editorial Board of Psychiatric Times.