Essay About Mental Illness

“…human society has always known mental illness and has always had a way of dealing with it.” Dealing with it. Dealing with mental illness. As if it were a pesky little fly buzzing about your house and you were stuck with it there for the day or it being impossibly hot outside and you had to mow the lawn. These are examples of things you have to deal with. Mental illness is not one of these examples. It’s not just something you can roll up a newspaper, smash it into a wall and it be gone with. It is constant and it is everywhere, an estimated 26.2 percent of Americans (18 and older) suffer from a diagnosable mental disorder in a given year. But again, these sufferers are not just statistics, they are living, breathing human beings and that’s what the people who just want to “deal” with them fail to realize. When did all the harsh treatment begin? Who helped in the movement to better their treatment? How did it improve? What laws were passed? Who’s responsible for them and finally, what are their rights?

First things first, when exactly did this harsh treatment begin? The first documented account of mental illness was in the 8th century BC. Many cultures have viewed mental illness as a form of demonic possession or religious punishment. In Ancient Greek, Roman, Egyptian, and Indian writings, mental illness was categorized as a personal or religious problem. They felt as though they couldn’t be helped because they thought these mentally insane had but themselves in that position. This mentality was spread all the way into the 1800’s and unfortunately did not improve. The conditions of the ‘insane poor’ were put through during this period (and sometimes still are today) were not only insincere but inhumane. They were chained to wa...

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Finally the rights of the mentally ill; the right to: The right to be informed of what is happening in their body’s, what medicine they’re taking and how much. No person can have psychological treatment forced upon them. The patient can refuse any medication they do not want to take. The patient has a right to see a minister of their own faith, and it’s their right to a clean hygienic facility, to undisturbed peaceful rest, it’s the patients right to be around people their own age, the right to discharge yourself at any given time and the right to be discharged without hesitance, having committed no crimes or offense, the right to be treated without discrimination as to race, sex, color, language, political opinion, social origin, and lastly (the right that all people deserve) The right to be treated as a fellow dignified human being.