One out Five of us has a "Personality Disorder"
Did you ever hear the old expression "Everyone is insane except thee and me, and I'm not so sure about thee" ?
That's what I thought of this a.m. when I was reading the "scroll" on my favorite early morning news program. The message said "One out of every five young Americans has a personality disorder and thus is more likely to abuse
alcohol and drugs."
Well, there's been really shocking and dismaying news lately (especially about the economy), but this little newsbit disturbs me greatly. I'm no math whiz, but one in five makes 20%. Twenty per cent of America's young people have personality disorder? That's really deplorable.
Then it occurred to me -- just what constitutes a "personality disorder"? There are the obviously dangerous traits (anger management issues, a tendency to violence, and so on), but what about other "personality disorders"? There are several types of obsessive-compulsive disorders, attention deficit disorders as well as depression, which may or may not require professional treatment according to their severity. But what about other quirks: self-esteem issues,excessive (some may say "pathological") shyness, introversion, as well as the other end of the spectrum: arrogance, "bullies," passive-agressive personalities and so forth. Maybe arrogance is merely misdirected aggressiveness, to which all little capitalists are taught to aspire?
Sometimes an individual's personality can cause problems
for his or her family and other times only is a manifestation of the fact that "it takes all kinds to make a world."
I wonder if contemporary society is a bit too tuned in to
mental and emotional disorders so that we go looking for it
in an attempt to fix something that ain't exactly broke. (I'm not talking about the epidemic rise of autism in this country, which has rapidly shot from 1 case in every 166 births to 1 in 150. Part of this may be the result of the development of diagnostic techniques which didn't exist when my daughter was young, and thus there weren't as many choices for treatment, part may be the result of as-yet unidentified factors in the environment.) But I am talking about other aspects of human behavior to which we are quick to judge as "abnormal."
We're told that schools are overcrowded. Thus some already overwhelmed teachers may recommend, if not insist, that an unruly or rambunctious child be seen by a physician who is likely to prescribe Ritalin and other behavior-modifying drugs. Many kids do benefit with pharmaceutical treatment, but are drugs bandages to cover the inability or unwillingness of the education system to cope with students who are "different"? Some pediatricians are alarmed at the over-medicating of our nation's children.
True psychological problems are one thing; personality quirks are another. I guess there is a natural tendency to place people in easily recognizable boxes, to "peg" somebody as being a certain "type." Folks in medieval
and Renaissance times believed that human beings could be divided into 4 distinct "humours." According to the pseudoscience of astrology, everybody can be filed under one of the twelve signs of The Zodiac.
But we're individuals! Everybody's DNA (and psychological profile) is different! Who wants to live in a society where everybody looks, sounds, and acts the same?
If you want a picture of such a world, just look at the top female pop singers. Can you tell any of them apart? I can't either.
I may be wrong, but I think individualism is what makes humans-- warts and personality "disorders" and all --human.
What say you?
