Public health, university and non-profit "experts" continually tell us how depressed we are -- which makes us depressed. The possibility of suicide is waiting around every corner, they imply. After hearing constantly repeated media warnings about an imminent worldwide nervous break-down, no one wants to be left out. An induced demand for inclusion is created -- and demand for more government services.
For media outlets, mass anxiety captures followers. It gives the depression industry something to be interviewed on talk shows about. If you're not depressed, the talkers imply, it's because you're suffering delusions of mental wellness. Everyone needs therapy, government-financed.
Actually, you can be sad and well. Sensible reasons for depression do exist. Acknowledging them is not "illness", it's realism. There are real disasters (just google "Afghanistan", "Ukraine", "Myanmar", "Brazilian rainforest" … and that's only this week's horrors). Acknowledging them is not a sign of illness, it's a sign of being awake.
Mental health means building mental hardiness -- the emotional maturity to deal with bad realities. Mental health advocates who chip away at resilience by telling everyone they are traumatized, dependent and unable to cope, are not helping. In British Columbia these advocates demand free mental health services in a province that doesn't even have free dental care or free birth control. Researchers and practitioners don't even agree on what the definition of "mental health" would be, but we know what healthy teeth are. We know whether we're in the midst of an unwanted pregnancy or not.
Rotting teeth and unwanted pregnancy themselves cause depression for any normal person. Let's put the health care dollar into things we can fix, before we get hypnotized by that favourite media question, "how do you cope with stress?" Having publicly-funded dentistry and contraception when your own income is too low to afford those things would be one way to cope. Who wouldn't be depressed, with abscessed teeth? Only a mad person.
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