ginland - Tumblr blog

[ginland]

Thesis: Mental health problems are (largely) due to chemical imbalances in the brain, and should be treated with psychiatric medications. (Biomedical model).

Antithesis: Mental health problems are (largely) due to harmful societal structures, from abusive relationships and the nuclear family all the way up to the nation state and capitalism itself, and should be treated by abolishing these structures. (Social model).

Synthesis: If not for capitalism, the meds would be free.

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people who couldn’t afford therapy have been doing postgraduate trauma work in communion with one another for longer than you or I have been alive

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the psychological literature is literally like "for some reason, kids have more pathological demand avoidance than teens or adults! we have no clue why that could be!!"

um because teens and adults have some ability to control their own bodies and lives and to revoke consent. like, why is it surprising that humans who have freedom are less disturbed by having things demanded of them than ones who dont

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In a piece that’s very much giving stop buying avocado toast, Buzzfeed asks a financial planner for advice on how to get out of debt when you have ADHD.

Debt is framed simply as a result of “impulse spending”, and capital management expert Daniel DeWitt’s tips include things we’ve all been told a thousand times, like not using credit cards, cancelling subscriptions, and cutting back on that pesky expense, food.

It’s a classic American message of personal responsibility filtered through a diagnostic lens, the solution to economic hardship presented as learning better “self-management” skills to generate more wealth. I can’t help but think about the idea of false consciousness here — those structures or ideas that hide the real nature of a capitalist economy.

In this case, it’s the idea that a brain disorder is the cause of your money problems. The DSM is being used to obscure the real cause of economic hardship: exploitation.

Svend Brinkman has described diagnoses as “anchors” in a modern world that is constantly shifting and accelerating. They can be a kind of answer (see: the rock bottom to “it finally all makes sense!” trope in diagnosis stories), but they can also take all the politics out of our pain.

A biomedical view of ADHD explains economic hardship with a detached neurological lens that seems to exist somewhere outside of history. But debt isn’t caused by Bad With Money Disorder — it’s a tool of class warfare, and ADHD or not, we’re all being targeted.

yet another absolute banger by Jesse Meadows. Check it out.

[ginland]

i have got to admit that it weighs heavily on me that no matter how often and how clearly i explain that appealing to the authority of diagnostic professionals is counter to the goal of autistic liberation, i still receive numerous daily questions from readers about whether or not their self diagnosis is "valid."

i understand people have reasons for seeking a diagnosis formally, this is not about that. it's about the fact that even people who profess to love my work keep understanding autism through the lens of pathology and keep believing they need an authority figure to approve their identity, when all my work has been about disproving that idea.

like. what's the use in writing at all, if even the people who love my work do not internalize its message.

[ginland]

!!!!!

They removed benches from subway to prevent homeless people sleeping on it

[ginland]

Hey asking this here because you don’t allow comments or messages on your IG. Why are you comparing Vyvanse (an adhd med) to heroine? Don’t you think that’s super ableist? (It is)

It's super ableist and racist to claim that one substance is inherently morally superior to another. We are harm reductionists and substance neutral here. You as a Vyvanse user aren't any better than your neighbor who takes meth to be able to clean his house.

People who use substances in order to function have been demonized, arrested, stripped of agency, and treated as morally suspect for as long as the police state has existed. The people who advocate for incarcerating illegal drug users are coming for people with prescriptions too. It happened to people on opioid painkillers and abortion pill seekers and now it's happening to folks on ADHD meds and HRT.

I hope one day for your sake that you realize that other drug users are your natural allies and that we are all in this together. You're not "one of the good ones" because you're dependent on a substance that makes your boss like you more.

[ginland]

This is exactly what I mean when I say the society even more “progressive” societies are inherently ableist

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I just linked to this in a post, but I want to highlight it more explicitly. This guide is really illuminating, and if you are not a trans femme you should still read it too, because we all need to know what transmisogyny affected people are constantly going thru and how much danger we can present to them and how we fail them as bystanders

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‘Resting ones personality’

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the myth of neurotypicality

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jellyfish lake

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not caring if people think you're stupid is a life hack. recognising that you are kind of stupid is an even bigger life hack. we build entire societies to take care of each other bc we're all kind of stupid. it's fine.

[ginland]

ANDREW GARFIELD as Caravaggio’s “Boy with Fruit” in Simon Schama’s The Power of Art (2006)

[ginland]

adhd hacks and my internalized ableism

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Louis Vuitton F/W ‘23

[ginland]

shibazuke, my love