Through socialization and education we learn about what behaviours are appropriate and how one should feel and think about things. If individuals are judged to be “damaged” or “just not right”, they are sent away to be properly assessed and corrected.
Do you question authority? Fail to accept conventional wisdom? Lose your temper when you hear a politician make a promise that you know he or she can’t keep?
If so, you may be mentally ill, according to the most recent revision of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM). In this revision, psychiatrists hope to add dozens of new mental disorders. Unfortunately, many of these so-called illnesses target people who merely think or behave differently from the majority population.
FIVE YEARS ago, I found my 17-year-old son dead in his bed, and apparently five years is too long to be manifesting the symptoms of sadness: sleeplessness, the sudden and inexplicable onset of overwhelming memories and tears, the occasional entire day spent lying in bed. My time was up two weeks after we found him, according to the proposed fifth edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders. If the new edition is approved, my symptoms will be diagnosed as a major depressive disorder.
With drafts of the latest edition of the world’s leading psychiatry manual emerging, critics question the growing medicalisation of life’s problems. Over the past three decades, unhappiness has been redefined as depression, shyness has been reclassified as social anxiety disorder – even trivial complaints such as fussy eating are now being viewed through a psychiatric prism. Some of this is due to a single book, the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual , which critics claim is contributing to the ever-expanding empire of mental health. The next official edition of the DSM will be published in May 2013, but draft versions are currently doing the rounds.
McGorry and Mendoza are adept at capturing media attention, using emotive statistics and feel-good messages as powerful soundbites. However, few people seem to have critically examined their claims, which have been widely accepted at face value. We have examined several claims, and found them seriously problematic. Not only is there a high degree of spin in the rhetoric but also there is misrepresentation of evidence.