Ways of surpassing out of petty mental illnesses?

I am by no means an expert, but I thought that perhaps people with conditions like ADD should try alternative activities which can perhaps better their acclaimed disorder than taking pharmaceuticals. One thing that helped me with focusing was acting. I am not saying this is suitable for everyone, but it may provide a good idea of how one can improve themselves. Starting out in high school my grades were so-so. Sometimes an A or two, but mostly B’s and C’s. In tenth grade I started taking the drama courses my high school provided. The more I acted the more my grades seemed to improve. By the end of high school I was getting mostly A's and a few B's. I am not sure if acting is the exact reason why my grades improved, but it was an activity that taught me self-discipline, awareness, and how to think critically. 

This is because the activity [acting], as Aristotle might say, gave me happiness and provided me challenges. It made me better myself and filled my life with meaning and purpose. Music or a particular sport may be other activities which can have similar effects. 

Another way people could try taking over these lesser ‘mental illnesses’ is by meditation. This allows a person to discipline his or her mind. For instance, if a child was taught to meditate for a half hour each day, perhaps then their focus would be better in class and they would not have to take prescription drugs. Meditation also brings many other great benefits. Finding an activity that will help a person think critically and give them meaning seems to have a positive effect on mental health, which can disperse negative effects that cloud the brain. This could allow an individual to live up to their full potential and not be reliant on drugs, but a positive, and even virtuous, activity that will allow them to be happy. 

Refusing One's Nature with Pharmaceuticals?

Are the solutions of ‘mental illness’ trying to refute a person’s nature?

I'm going to focus the way pharmaceuticals are used in America and other developed countries. If someone is diagnosed with a mental disorder it seems like this is going against the individual’s basic nature. The pettier mental illnesses which are apparently taking over many people in first world countries interests me. It seems that society, or maybe more specifically the government, has devised a way to make people act and behave similar. For instance, giving Adderal to a person who apparently ‘lacks focus and concentration’ can start taking the drug to help with his productivity building a certain amount of ‘x’. This ability may undermine the nature of an individual and can contribute to a variety of factors such as social control and ridiculous profits by the selling of pharmaceuticals.

 When doctors issue prescription drugs they are not really treating the illness at all. They are really just putting a cognitive bandaid on their patient’s brain. They are giving humans drugs which are ‘safe,’ but these drugs have only become popular since the late 20th century. They may appear to be safe, but what are the long term consequences of having your brain altered every day in a way it doesn’t normally function? When DDT first came out it was considered safe, but then it effected entire ecosystems and cause devastating effects on the well-being of many creatures. So what is Adderal for people with ADD really doing? Children will probably not develop the same if they are subjected to irregular mental states caused by the drugs. But this again calls to the question of what a proper mental state is,

This way of giving prescription drugs seems rather hypocritical when juxtaposed to the banning of narcotics and other drugs. What qualifies for a drug to be legal and illegal? If regulated and illegal drugs are both having such profound effects on the brain what makes one more valid than the other. Countless people testify on the behalf of spiritual experiences which seem far more greater to mental health than perhaps Zoloft or Concerta. Inner and transcendent awareness can help people regulate the body’s natural energy in a more concise manner by understanding the self and their own biochemistry. Marijuana for instance is another greatly debated drug, but why in the land of the free, should big corporations be able to distribute their drugs and not a naturally growing substance which someone could just happen to stumble upon it the wild (unlikely, but possible). 

I’m not saying that everyone should take illegal narcotics and everyone be under the influence of powerful psychoactives all the time. But they should have the choice to take them. Obviously people would need to use it in moderation, but distribution doesn’t necessarily concern me. Illegal drugs should be enforced similarly to alcohol laws, but depending on its power perhaps a way of prescription and diagnosis before hand. Driving while intoxicated should never be allowed for instance. It just brings back the question though of why chemical X is okay, but chemical Y is not. It seems that the idea of soma, such as in Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World, is coming to be a real thing. How we deal with our stresses and mental problems by taking the various pills proves it. Just because a doctor provides it and it has a nice commercial doesn’t mean it is necessarily good for you. The way we live by watching television and most diets today (and various other conditions) don’t seem to be effecting the health of mental functioning positively, so we turn to these quick fixes. We take our soma. Instead of looking for permanent solutions for our problems or “mental illnesses” we turn to synthetic drugs. Maybe instead we should be try finding other ways to change ourselves.

The Venetian Government's Order vs. An Artist's Mind

This is a late entry, but one I wished to post due to my involvement with the Theater Department’s Mainstage show Scenes from an Execution. The plot in the show is a perfect example of how we discussed the sides critical thinking and critical pedagogy. The Venetian government sets up to commission a painting of the Battle of Lepanto with the best and most famous artist of the time Anna Galactia. The will of the Doge and his council represent the embodiment of critical pedagogy, for they wish to have the painting rendered in a particular way to glorify the event. Galactia however, being the creative and critical artist she is, depicts the battle in a way she sees fit being that of a slaughter. 

The collision of the two sides soon ensues as the show progresses. The original motivation for Doge Urgentino is to “teach” Galactia what a good painting should be with undertones of sexual desire (as this is the theater of seduction). Urgentino can never flat out say what he wants though. That is how Howard Barker’s plays work, there is always a secret that is driving the action of a particular scene, the secret of the Doge being that he wants the painting to have a positive emphasis on the strengths and dignity of the Venetian people. Galactia disregards the wishes of the Doge and continues to paint the battle as a horrible depiction of death. Galactica is thereby taking the matter into her own hands, by trusting her own decisions on what is the truth, and putting her life and reputation on the line for her message. 

Eventually the Inquisition, led by Cardinal Ostensible, arranges a case against her and she is imprisoned. By the end of the show she is released and the painting is a success instead of a blasphemous work. The Doge has had a complete reversal in terms of his aesthetic ignorance, although the Cardinal is unable to reach such a perspective due to, “the credit of his Jesuit professors.” It shows the stubbornness that results from sometimes sticking with a particular order or way of thinking. He is not able to, like the Doge, to approach the idea of a, “great nation . . that shows its victories not as parades of virility, but as terrible cost.” 

Is there still gender bias in America? (Q&A9)

Is there still a biased society in America today on women or are we making progress? 

Today in most parts of where I have lived it seems that people treat gender with a sense of neutrality, or at least they seem to talk about it in that way (but who knows what they could really believe). This view could just be enforced by the fear of the law as today stresses that sexual harassment in the work place and in general is wrong. Still there is a broad scale of standpoints in America and throughout the world that have not reached a level of moral maturity or critical thinking that sees through the idea of supremacy among gender. Some radical feminists for example tend to do the opposite of what most feminists are advocating, the radical one’s express that females have a superiority over men. As much as I prefer the company of women over men, I still think that both genders should have equal standing on all grounds. The exception being anatomical implications of gender. For we would not prescribe “the pill” for a male as that would be doing little good for the man it was prescribed for.

As much as I wanted to believe we were making the progress in moral activity, the recent presidential election arises some concerns. It seems illogical that birth control issues should be of any consideration within the law as most people who are Pro-life have a religious background. This is not to say someone should have abortions left and right, but if someone was raped for instance or the pregnancy was by failed birth control that the impregnated woman should have a say about the baby. The opposition, about a 1/3 or so of the country, seems to have forgotten the principles of America and its division of church and state. It is religious affiliations in most cases that often prevents critical thinking and allows an individual to only have a narrow scope in terms of ideas such as freedom and equality (this is not to say all Christians are woman haters or anything like that, but for some of these religious affiliated people male supremacy is something they believe to be almost a divine right). 

Everyone is a person who will be different from everyone else. This is the main idea of Standpoint theory. Although we can not discover who is more right by this method, we can have an awareness of how a particular person feels on a matter based on who they are and their experiences. To demonstrate how gender affiliations are obsolete, especially today, I will use an example from my own life. My girlfriend likes football. I do not. Men are typically characterized to be interested in football, but in this case it is a female who likes the sport instead of the male. This stereotypical opinion on how men like this sport can show a male and female having a gender reversal on a particular topic. Although this is sort of a silly example, it could be demonstrated to show how a form of progress in gender identity and equality can be forming in America and hopefully the stretch of the planet. 

Ancient Greek Dualities and Gender Roles? (Q&A9)

Could the idea of opposites in Greek philosophy have caused male-dominated society? 

The idea of opposites was a fundamental way of scrutinizing the way reality was within the minds of the ancient Greeks. Empedocles for instance spoke of the two forces, love and strife, one that brings things together and one that tears things apart. This view influenced other Greek philosophers, and the idea of a duality within our reality became quite apparent and believed. This perspective seems very reflective of their society and the way they viewed women and other people who were not acclaimed citizens. 

This is a list of commonly considered opposites in ancient Greek philosophy:

 Hot – Cold 

Dry – Wet 

Limit – Unlimited 

Odd – Even 

Right – Left 

One – Plurality 

Male – Female 

Resting – Moving 

Straight – Crooked 

Light – Darkness 

Good – Bad 

Square – Oblong

The two columns were often associated together such as the left side pertaining to light and goodness. However, we can see that females would be clumped together with the more negative associations such as badness, coldness, and darkness. This probably started to put in place within their society an assumption that men were the stronger half, for they in the Greek perspective, were more fond of logical thinking as opposed to emotional thinking. In Plato’s Republic he talks of his society saying, “we pride ourselves if we are able to keep quiet and master our grief, for we think that this is the manly thing to do and that the behavior we praised before [emotional suffering] is womanish.” This clearly distinguishes the idea of logical and emotional, which seems to be associated with men and women. This is an interesting point to think of as much of the ancient Western philosophy would have tolls on the way Christianity was perceived and how it would effect the course of society and gender roles for centuries to come. 

Does a religious affiliation dictate how one views animals? (QA7)

          When thinking of someone’s morality it is often derived from religious affiliations in the determination and perspective of what is right and wrong. For example, a Catholic may blindly accept their religion’s authority and to be a ‘good Catholic’ one must constantly embrace their ideology because that is how ‘God’ insists they behave. To this end they must look down on gays and abortion, which are two of the most popular issues in politics today. Had they never been religious they probably wouldn’t have had these negative connotations which evidently arise by social pressures of authority and peers. Regardless of whether the issue is right or wrong by means of fairness and analysis, it can be seen that religious acceptance will eventually develop an idea of what good moral standing is. 

Can this effect someone’s view on animals however? In Christianity, man is created in the image of God, which in turn means they are similar to God. They might not be equal to him, but they definitely have the reassurance of self-importance by this fact. This sense of self however seems to mean that they are separated from the animal kingdom and they are their own superior group, Catholics especially. I can remember going to Catholic mass with my girlfriend last Easter (for her to appease her family [they basically just go because their grandfather is quite religious]) and having them play music with the lyrics saying something along the lines of, “we are the most holy people on Earth.” Another thought that made me raise this question was when my brother was going to Sunday School he asked the pastor if animals went to heaven. He said no. This  could be another reason why I disliked authority and ridiculous religious principles because most dogs I meet are better than most humans I meet. They are protective, loyal, and if you hurt by accident by stepping on their tail will not retaliate with aggression. To this end dogs are more Christ-like than followers of the Catholic faith from what I have witnessed. 

It is in this sense that religious perspective can then view that animals are lesser as they cannot go to heaven or Catholics by having a heightened self-importance which can make one believe they are above the animals. In that case, killing them is not necessarily wrong but can be viewed as God’s will. He created them for us to eat otherwise why would they be here? This is of course taking on a view of Christian creationism which is absurd due to the constant reinforcement in scientific observation that evolution is possible, has had happened, and is still happening. The question though of animals being treated differently by a religious affiliation is yes and for partial and self-focused reasons. 

Is hunting morally wrong? (QA7)

Hunting on the most basic of levels seems to be justified in terms of past historic conditions. Today, however it seems to be more a pleasure with game hunting and such (and of course we have poaching which is wrong morally and by the law). I was discussing this topic with my housemate who is a environmental studies major. In the past hunting was a way to get one’s dinner for the night. Native Americans would hunt buffalo by herding them over cliffs, yet they still had a deep connection and respect for all things around them. In regards to ethics today, it seems that the killing of animals is immoral. I still eat meat, although have considered becoming a vegetarian (although I will never eat veal), but I don’t think there is any way to justify my actions in support of killing for food when there are so many alternative ways to still get protein. In the same way, I supposed meat is similar to smoking cigarettes; you know you shouldn’t smoke, but you smoke anyway [if you are a smoker]. 

Game hunting I initially thought was an immoral practice, although their are some benefits to hunting which may assist with protecting the environment. To this extent could hunting be a force for good paradoxically? Fisheries are created for the breeding of fish in lakes which are in turn helping population control by rising populations of fish in ecosystems. Many of the fish die on the way of transport, but the ones that survive go and replenish the stock of the wild. Now it may seem that hunting would be bad in this aspect as it is depleting the stock, but the agencies that are replenishing may very well be putting more fish in lakes and rivers and, therefore, actually helping the environment. This is all funded by hunting associations which, I assume, are required to regulate hunters in the first place so environments can be protected.

It seems then that game hunting can help keep environments functioning, which thus protects animals and biodiversity, which is then morally good. Although a some fish have to die, the greater goal of keeping the ecosystem functioning and healthy keeps alive, which is similar to many situations in historical circumstances. Could we get to a point however, where instead of having regulations, people are just eager to assist the welfare of the environment because they know it is for there own benefit? That seems to be the biggest problem of our age and a constant threat to the ideas of big business which we are forced to bow down to.