The discriminatory standards of constructing ‘patienthood’ of the ‘mentally ill’ within public health (original) (raw)
Arguing that ‘Mental disorder’ scoped by psychiatry sits awkwardly within the frame of ‘public health’, causing various degrees of harm to its subjects, this paper draws from human rights movements and critical psychiatry. The paper throws light upon what constitutes the awkwardness, even ‘dis-ease’, having the effect of a disparity within medical disciplines. People diagnosed with ‘mental illness’ seem to be a different and lesser species of a ‘public health patient’, vulnerable to lowered standards of care; degrading, inhuman and torturous ‘treatments’; and a nonexistent medical ethics. We clarify that, we are not considering here the ‘reform’ of ‘bad practice’, but rather the very geneology, design and practice of the discipline of psychiatry; Neither are we asking whether ‘psychiatrists are bad’, but rather, ‘Why and how did psychiatry and psychiatrists arise (the past); What spaces do they occupy (the present)? And, perhaps, being aspirational, what is their future role, in human development (the future)?’ This raises questions about the possibilities of responses of public health theorists and practitioners when it comes to the field of ‘mental disorder’, and also the psychiatrists, what is the history of their practices, the present nature of their relationship with human society and future engagements with health and disability.
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