Phil,
As I understand mental illness to be, it is a combination of a person being
unable to control their thought processes in a manner which allows them to
function according to societies rules. If a person is acting in a manner
that is somewhat uncomfortable for others this of course does not constitute
mental illness. If a person does not accept social norms this in itself does
not constitute mental illness. If a person is unaware of their immediate
surroundings and connot navigate their environment in a manner that will help
them to be safe or the people close to them to be safe then we are starting
to touch upon what constitutes a mental illness.
An idiot would be able to make correlations in environmental stimuli but may
contribute extraneous circumstances to an event's outcome. An idiot may
score in the normal range on an IQ test but when it comes to understanding
social cues this person would gladly pick playing cards in a courtroom
instead of being quiet.
An imbecile would score in the 60 to 80 standard of an IQ test that has 100
as the average score. The imbecile would have been asked to leave many a
large social gathering instead of others having to put up with their constant
questions and unwelcome comments.
A moron is well into the retarded range and is unable to formulate ideas
which recognize abstract thought as a tool for communication.
Diane and Phil I ask of you what good is society doing by ignoring that there
are people in this world who fall into these categories? I am not asking
that we use categories, classifications, and name-calling so that we can
control them, I am asking that we acknowledge the power of words to express
basic differences in human functioning. We are not all equal in our
capabilities and, quite honestly, a look at the difference between how many
people are accepted into Universities and how many graduate should be some
indication that the bar for acceptance has been set too low. I say keep the
expectations the same and provide the supports that will allow the 'at-risk'
students to overcome their personel obstacles. One more question; how can
anyone be expected to overcome an obstacle unless it has been properly
identified? I say let us work to identify the obstacles and provide the
suppport necessary in order to insure the less fortunate succeed. For
example, if a person has suffered major trauma due to parental neglect and
subsequently they are anxious in all large group settings we shouldn't
protect that individual by having them avoid large group settings; instead we
should work with that individual to negotiate those situations in a
functional manner. Through relationship building we can come to a point in
the relationship where it is possible to be blunt about social blunders that
individual is doing which are retarding their social growth, if using the
word idiot gets this message across then what is the harm in using that word?
What is the big hang up about words?
Eric
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Mon Oct 01 2001 - 01:02:18 PDT