mental illness shaming

[Bjorn Against]

9. I can't totally disagree

While I would not try to diagnose her myself, I must admit that Sarah Palin does show signs that she would benefit from seeing a psychiatrist. I won't deny that, but I still think we need to be careful to ensure we don't stigmatize the mentally ill by associating them with extremists. While there are no doubt some Tea Party members who are mentally ill, I have seen nothing to suggest they are any more likely to be mentally ill than any other group of people. Most of them are just ideologues who commit themselves to crazy ideas, but they got those ideas through propaganda rather than any sort of illness.