24 Jul 11
1 edit
Originally posted by jimslyp69It's more a statement of fact, although how or if it applies to Ms Winehouse are a matter of opinion, the evidence suggests it does.
Now, now. Is that fact or just your own personal opinion based on what you've read in the media?
And by evidence, I mean the reported facts that she has been in rehab more than once shall we say.
24 Jul 11
Originally posted by cadwahYes yes, it's a statement of fact. I was questioning your application of it to anyone trying to sort out their lives though. You know what I meant, let's not be pedantic huh?
It's more a statement of fact, although how or if it applies to Ms Winehouse are a matter of opinion, the evidence suggests it does.
And by evidence, I mean the reported facts that she has been in rehab more than once shall we say.
Plenty of people relapse after being in rehab. It doesn't mean that the intent to clean up their problems is not there. FIghting an addiction is very hard. Do you smoke? Ever tried giving up? Succeeded?
24 Jul 11
Originally posted by finneganIn statement A you seem to exonerate her from any guilt in her own fate and in statement B you seem to blame rehab for not being able to help her.
(A)Is it not curious how nasty and insulting the attitudes are towards mental ill health and addiction? The desire to translate this into a matter of personal morality is not intelligent but reverts to pre-modern foolishness.
(B)The circumstances of her death and her psychological flaws are depressing but maybe it would help to notice that her material ...[text shortened]... "curing" her. The point being that in fact she did go to rehab and it is not very effective.
The fact is that with any mental illness or addiction, it is true in that in order to change, you must want the change. Therapy is a fantastic tool, and today's rehab is a miracle, but with so many celebrities going through it now without any meaningful desire to truly change and giving lip service to how it can change your life, many people feel that rehab is useless. Change must come from within, that is a basic tenet of therapy. As cadwah said, it is more than simply a place to recover from your latest binge. Without enough dedication to your own life and survival, rehab means nothing and is practically useless. Like most things in life, you get out of it what you put in. Treat it like a vacation and you'll come out of it no further from your demons than when you went in. Taking advantage of it to actually affect a change in your life is the goal of rehab, obviously. You must take a role in your own rehab, and seriously want to change in order for it to have any effect on your life at all. Rehab IS amazingly effective, when you actually have the desire to change your life for the better.
24 Jul 11
Death through addiction to drugs and alcohol is always going to be gruesome and not attractive as a topic for gloating voyeurism. Whether I would wish it on my worst enemy is doubful but I certainly only grieve to see it fall on such a talented artist.
Just what is the motivation of people who want to gloat over this? The purpose of presenting it as a moral failure is just destructive and nasty. If it is only that, then there is no social or moral reason to invest in the support systems that might help. People who witness these consequences in their own communites - and often their own families - want more.
Interesting that it is now 40 years since Nixon declared the war on drugs (his concern being primarily the condition of American soldiers in Vietnam) and that punitive, inappropriate and failed way of thinking is taking one community after another to hell in a hand cart. Drugs and mental illness are not only destroying individual lives, but doing so in ways that harm every community - no group is secure or immune.
It is surely time to stop blaming, insulting and criminalizing the victims and start caring.
24 Jul 11
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Originally posted by SuzianneYour post arrived as I was typing and is in a different category to the insulting gloats I complained about.
In statement A you seem to exonerate her from any guilt in her own fate and in statement B you seem to blame rehab for not being able to help her.
The fact is that with any mental illness or addiction, it is true in that in order to change, you must want the change. Therapy is a fantastic tool, and today's rehab is a miracle, but with so many celebritie IS amazingly effective, when you actually have the desire to change your life for the better.
People make moral choices and the consequences can be appalling for them or / and others. When their choices are made in the context of addiction and / or mental illness, then the morality is increasingly incidental to the affliction but I do not dispute that it exists as a major concern. What I do argue against is the attempt to discount the illness altogether by reducing everything to simplistic moral choices as though these arise in an academic ivory tower and not in the messy complexity of a life.
People over rate the quality and effectiveness of available therapies. Even in the best hands they are not magic and for that very reason rely heavily on the client's commitment to change. Trouble is, that people have to find the resources for that under all the pressure and confusion of their illness.
So from that I suggest that it is silly to believe that all one has to do is "go to rehab" and all will be well. The reality is that people may require many attempts before they succeed and in the meantime their struggle merits more respect and less of the gloating, insulting voyeurism indulged in by the media and to an extent on this thread.
If there is hatred for Amy Winehouse out there it is because of and relies on the evidence of her illness. That is shocking and horrible to see.
25 Jul 11
Originally posted by tomtom232Well done - no reason to obey that voice in your head. Tell it what you think of it. You can get through this and we are here for you.
You know I heard a voice once that told me schizophrenia was all in the mind. Based on this you only do bad things if your voice tells you to. What does your voice tell you?
Mine is telling me not to post this.