Psychiatry
Daily
Observer
Religion,
Insanity, Psychiatry
S.Q. Lapius had just explained the four psychiatric models
currently in use, the medical, psychological, behavioral, and social, none of
which dissolved the clots of confusion that obstructed my mind. The medicinals that James the bartender
dispensed, although not diminishing the confusion, somehow made it seem less
important.
“There, Harry, you feel better,” Lapius noted.
“Alcohol is no solution,” I replied.
“But it’s relaxing,” soothed Lapius, already quite relaxed
himself.
“I guess we’re the alcohol generation.”
“Spiritus fermenti, Harry, is a time honored remedy.”
“Fifty years from now some one will be saying that about
marijuana and heroin, I guess,” I said morosely.
“Perhaps.
Particularly if we learn to govern their use.”
“Certainly the prevalence of these drugs, alcohol included,
is testimony to the failure of psychiatry to spread its benefits quickly and
economically to the majority of the public.
Man’s mind is like an iceberg, about 10 per cent of which is rational,
the other 90 per cent buried deep in the unconscious. There is no unwritten law that says the mind
of man has to be rational, that it is born rational.”
“How do you define rational?”
“I think of it in terms of the system in which a person
lives. In western civilization it means
some logical process of thought, that came down to us from the Greeks, got lost
somehow in the dark ages, and was resurrected by the arduous ‘thinking’ labors
of Bacon, Descartes, Copernicus, Newton, Einstein. Our entire technology has been built on the
logical sequences that we have extracted laboriously from nature. Science has an appealing advantage in that
truths can be proved, and problems can be solved. But there are civilizations in which it is
rational to be entirely religious, and in these societies there is very little
technology. In fact there is poverty,
but it is accepted as part of the nature of things. We in our society would consider that
irrational, and they would of course return the compliment.”
“What has this to do with psychiatry, which is what I
thought was the subject.”
“Simple, Harry, the ‘irrationalities’ of those religious societies
are being introduced into our society.
Of course you must remember that all religion is fundamentally not
rational, as it is a function of faith.
But the traditional religions are acceptable irrationalities, in that
they function for the society in which they are predominant. In the western world the Judeo-Christian
religion until recently has satisfied man’s yearning for knowledge of the
metaphysical, so that the rest of his mind has been free to investigate, build,
create on a logical basis. Ergo, our
technology has developed. Some of the
far-eastern religions, however, are so encompassing, that there is no mental
energy left over for creative thought.
Ergo, no technology.”
“It sounds simple, Simon.”
“Harry, please don’t use those words in juxtaposition. Anyway, what I was trying to say is that
psychiatry is an attempt to quantify the great unconscious. Successful religions simply harness it; they
don’t try to define it. But here in the
west, we try to adjust it to our traditions of logic and measurement. The new breed will dispense with terms like
schizophrenia. They will say that a New
York schizophrenic transplanted to India will not be a schizophrenic. That everyone has several different
personalities. The concept seems to have
originated in the literature of Herman Hesse, a book called Steppenwolfe, sort
of a bible to the youth. He felt that
the people had a right to express their different personalities without being
incarcerated in asylums. Then comes J.D.
Laing, who claims that schizophrenia is merely a sane response to an insane
world.”
“Yeah I’ve heard that stuff.
The earth is the insane asylum of the universe.”
“Ha ha ha, that’s a good one,” Jimmy the bartender said.
“Please, James,” Lapius admonished. This is a serious conversation.” Then he turned to me. “Precisely, Harry. Anyway, what has happened is that the
ungovernable unconscious in western civilization is no longer bound irrevocably
to the Judeo-Christian tenets and is floating free. There is mass floating anxiety, the
depression of the drug-users, and the unacceptable irrational pseudo-religions
that have sprung up. Psychiatry used to
have a base-line from which to work. But
now it is splintered in direct proportion to the splintering of the religious
base of the nation.”
“Do you believe the nation has lost its spiritual base?”
“No, not lost.
Splintered. Instead of one belief
there are many. Hindu mysticism is
becoming popular. Thousands of people
are reciting mantras before bhagwans, swamis and self-proclaimed maharishes and
gurus. There are witchcraft clubs in
California. Thousands seek peace and
unity in the lotus position and others proclaim salvation while standing on
their heads. The entire society has lost
its sense of unity.”
“Are you saying that our society in America is
schizophrenic?”
“No.” Lapius said
bluntly, “I am not saying that.”
“Excuse me. It
sounded like it. After all, if our
society has lost its unity, it has become many different selves.”
“Correct, Harry, but here is where I differ with the
latter-day soothsayers with their denial of the existence of
schizophrenia. Certainly an individual
can have many different selves, but if he is normal, he is aware of the
different faces he exposes to different conditions, and deep down, recognizes
them as extensions of a unitary self.
The same with our nation. To date
we can indulge the splintering because the nation still has a sense of itself
as a unitary society. Only when that
deep intrinsic sense of unity is destroyed will the nation become
schizophrenic.”
“Then what.”
“It will falter. It
will lose its cohesiveness. It will lose
its identity.”
“And psychiatry?”
“Psychiatry can’t function in a void. It has to have a value system to relate to.”
“Then psychiatry itself is becoming schizophrenic.”
Lapius drew a deep breath, then said, “I’m afraid so, Harry,
I’m afraid so.”
“No hope, then.” I muttered pessimistically.
“I didn’t say that.
Of course there’s hope.
Civilizations manage to become unified through some value system or
other. A God they can all believe in.”
The drunk next to us smashed his glass to the floor and
shouted jubilantly, “Out with the old God, in with the New.”
Lapius watched in astonishment. “But we may be in for a very difficult
transition, Harry.”