Making America Sane Again

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PSYCHIATRIC VIEWS ON THE DAILY NEWS

This afternoon, there is a conference at The National Press Club on “The More Dangerous State of the World and the Need for Fit Leadership.” It focuses specifically on past President Trump, asking “Is Past President Trump Mentally Fit to be President?” The conference sort of skirts around the psychiatrist Goldwater Rule by having most of the presenters come from other professions.

The Goldwater Rule mandates psychiatrist must not make professionally informed public comments on public figures, but this does not apply to an attempt to analyze the mental health of our country. That is what I will now focus on as a complement to the conference.

You may have noticed that I have been a private pro bono community psychiatrist for about a dozen years. That means that in addition to individual patient care, I view my community’s mental wellness as a priority. To try to accomplish that, I connect with my communities in many ways: small Town Hall meetings answering any questions about mental health; letters to the newspaper editors; and serving on community boards. Often, I am called their “resident psychiatrist.”

As part of these community activities, one of the common concerns of the public is our mental health. There is a sense that it is deteriorating under the undue stress of our world today. There is the leftover mental health damage from the trauma and losses from the COVID-19 pandemic; the loneliness epidemic; the political divisiveness which extends into families and friends; burnout; cultish thinking; and the climate-related grief, anxiety, and depression, among other mental challenges.

Even our democracy is thought to be in trouble. Ancient Rome in the time of Tiberius is used as a warning of what could happen to us.¹

Democracy itself is a signpost for collective mental health. That is why I have taken out my old self-designed t-shirt spelling out: Make America Sane Again!

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.

Reference

1. Weiss B. How Republics Unravel: From Rome to . . . America? The Free Press. September 26, 2026. Accessed September 27, 2024. https://www.thefp.com/p/how-republics-unravel-from-rome-to-704