https://medium.com/@harisivaji23/dep...ct-76767b880ac

Depression: a social construct?

:o:

Raises good points about the magic pill approach to mental health but the beneficiaries=architects mindset is too conspiratorial for me. I guess that's why you posted it here.

It’s not hard science. But the malignant growths of capitalism need not be conspiratorial to be true. It’s an incremental process. A group of people didn’t get together and say hey we’ll convince everyone who’s sad to take a pill. Instead it’s like a few people take a pill for it, the pharmaceutical industry thinks hey maybe there’s a market here. They invest in advertising and sales repping relatively small scale. It works. They push more money into it and it snowballs.

Just the fact that prescription medicine is advertised on television to the consumer instead of the health care provider is indicative of something that could strictly be defined as a conspiracy. They’re definitely conspiring to sell the medication. Where that leads us is hard to say. Maybe millions of clinically depressed people are receiving help because of it. Perhaps I’m more inclined to think these drugs are wildly over-prescribed because I wear very strong anti-capitalist goggles.

I’m not sure what I believe but I’m kind of leaning into the idea that depression (not bipolar or borderline personality disorder which I’m classifying separately from “major depressive disorder” of which I’ve been diagnosed) and ADHD are largely social constructs and deeply over diagnosed and unnecessarily medicated for.

And... I’m not even sure.

PS If it’s relevant I was diagnosed ADHD as a kid but refused to take the pills.

They are definitely overdiagnosed. Like rich parents exerting pressure to get their kids diagnosed with ADHD if they don't do well in school, so they can get medicine and their grades go up.

By the way, advertising of prescription medicines is a specific Americam thing, I think. That's really disturbing.

Ja, I feel that. They're definitely leaning into it and addressing the problem in a self-serving way that won't solve it. I definitely see ////////them\\\\\\\\ trying to keep the question of which medication on people's minds as opposed to whether or not one needs medication at all. That said, I think that what they're leaning into is genuine.

There's a paradox in medicinal marketing where the least effective treatments get the most promotion. When there's reliable science behind a drug, that research speaks for itself and doctors prescribe it when necessary without as much prompting. Obviously the route of promotion via scientific credibility can be p-hacked into which is why peer review is important and all that bidness.

And only since the 90s or early 00s. It wasn't always as stupid.

That’s a pretty generous take. Maybe they’re thinking about the patient or maybe they’re thinking about a new beach house. I’ll theorize that with ailments on the periphery the beach house starts to loom larger.

If they're seeing the patient then they're already getting helped out with the beach house. Direct marketing to doctors muddies the waters a lot though.

If they’re seeing the patient every three months for five minute consultations and one minute to write new scripts they’re probably more interested in hurricane paths than their more ethical peers.