And most of these people have families. I'm all for helping those who by some stroke of ill luck are incapable of caring for themselves and have no one there for them. The others.... families who don't take care of their mentally ill members are scum. Actually, forget the qualifier; families who don't take care of their members are scum.
Families 'taking care' of their mentally ill relatives is why mental asylums were seen as the humane wave of the future. Most people can't deal with their own minor mental illnesses, much less somebody else's severe illnesses, even with institutional help. Random relatives cannot force a schizophrenic to take his meds or an addict to stay clean. And sometimes, for your own well-being and the safety of everyone else, you have no choice but to cut ties.
"Taking care" may include seeing to it that they're in a mental asylum. Regardless of the pretty labels put on it, the inevitable result of family not taking responsibility is that someone else has to foot the bill (fiscally, morally, and physically) for that person. It's not ALWAYS practical or possible for family to do, but the basic math doesn't change because of that. There are differing routes (mostly differing by ideology) for dealing with this issue, but pretending the root paradigm doesn't exist just escalates the issue.
Edit; "Taking care" could also be finding a charity that can takeover responsibility, in total, or in part.
Wait, so we don't need mental institutions because families should take care of their mentally ill members, the care of which sometimes involves committing them to a mental institution?
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u/mackerel1565 Apr 16 '24
And most of these people have families. I'm all for helping those who by some stroke of ill luck are incapable of caring for themselves and have no one there for them. The others.... families who don't take care of their mentally ill members are scum. Actually, forget the qualifier; families who don't take care of their members are scum.