Guavanaut posted:

Which is exactly the same logic that they used when saying that runaway slaves, outspoken women, lazy servants, communists, anti-communists, unwed mothers, and homosexuals should be locked away. We believe in free will, but obviously no sane person would do that, therefore we need to lock up anyone doing that. What do you mean we're just saying this because they're inconvenient to our social values?

They're just as likely to be right this time. I'm not sure how we can live in a society where dragging a life into existence without its consent is approved, encouraged even, but a consenting adult who decides that they no longer wish to exist is proscribed, and then turn around and say that as a society we value consent. But I guess that's why they have to medicalize it in order to brush inconvenient thoughts about existence under the carpet.

Same goes for Alexander's Rat Park and the idea that some people remain constantly narcotized because their day to day existence sucks, rather than because of some intrinsic evil of the chemical itself. It's as if it's much easier to ban chemicals and institutionalize people than it is to make their lives suck less, because .