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Sanism
Sanism, saneism, mentalism, or psychophobia refers to the discrimination and oppression of people based on actual or perceived mental disorder or cognitive impairment. This discrimination and oppression are based on numerous factors such as stereotypes about neurodiversity. Sanism impacts individuals with autism, learning disorders, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), fetal alcohol spectrum disorder (FASD), bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, personality disorders, tics, intellectual disability, and other cognitive impairments.
Sanism may cause harm through a combination of social inequalities, insults, indignities, and overt discrimination. Some examples of these include refusal of service and the denial of human rights.
Sanism does not only describe how individuals are treated by the general public. The concept also encapsulates how individuals are treated by mental health professionals, the legal system and other institutions.
The term "sanism" was coined by Morton Birnbaum, a physician, lawyer, and mental health advocate. Judi Chamberlin coined the term "mentalism" in a chapter of the book Women Look at Psychiatry.
The terms "mentalism", from "mental", and "sanism", from "sane", have become established in some contexts, although concepts, such as social stigma, and, in some cases, ableism may be used in similar but not identical ways. While "mentalism" and "sanism" are used interchangeably, "sanism" is becoming predominant in certain circles, such as academics. Those who identify as mad, mad advocates, and in a socio-political context where sanism is gaining ground as a movement. The movement of sanism is an act of resistance among those who identify as mad, consumer survivors, and mental health advocates. In academia evidence of this movement can be found in the number of recent publications about sanism and social work practice.
The term "sanism" was coined by Morton Birnbaum during his work representing Edward Stephens, a mental health patient, in a legal case in the 1960s. Birnbaum was a physician, lawyer and mental health advocate who helped establish a constitutional right to treatment for psychiatric patients along with safeguards against involuntary commitment. Since first noticing the term in 1980, New York legal professor Michael L. Perlin subsequently continued its use.
In 1975 Judi Chamberlin coined the term mentalism in a book chapter of Women Look at Psychiatry. The term became more widely known when she used it in 1978 in her book On Our Own: Patient Controlled Alternatives to the Mental Health System, which for some time became the standard text of the psychiatric survivor movement in the US. People began to recognize a pattern in how they were treated, a set of assumptions which most people seemed to hold about mental (ex-)patients regardless of whether they applied to any particular individual at any particular time – that they were incompetent, unable to do things for themselves, constantly in need of supervision and assistance, unpredictable, likely to be violent or irrational etc. It was realized that not only did the general public express mentalist ideas, so did ex-patients, a form of internalized oppression.
As of 1998 these terms have been adopted by some consumers/survivors in the UK and the US, but had not gained general currency. This left a conceptual gap filled in part by the concept of 'stigma', but this has been criticized for focusing less on institutionalized discrimination with multiple causes, but on whether people perceive mental health issues as shameful or worse than they are. Despite its use, a body of literature demonstrated widespread discrimination across many spheres of life, including employment, parental rights, housing, immigration, insurance, health care and access to justice. However, the use of new "isms" has also been questioned on the grounds that they can be perceived as divisive, out of date, or a form of undue political correctness. The same criticisms, in this view, may not apply so much to broader and more accepted terms like 'discrimination' or 'social exclusion'.
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Sanism
Sanism, saneism, mentalism, or psychophobia refers to the discrimination and oppression of people based on actual or perceived mental disorder or cognitive impairment. This discrimination and oppression are based on numerous factors such as stereotypes about neurodiversity. Sanism impacts individuals with autism, learning disorders, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), fetal alcohol spectrum disorder (FASD), bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, personality disorders, tics, intellectual disability, and other cognitive impairments.
Sanism may cause harm through a combination of social inequalities, insults, indignities, and overt discrimination. Some examples of these include refusal of service and the denial of human rights.
Sanism does not only describe how individuals are treated by the general public. The concept also encapsulates how individuals are treated by mental health professionals, the legal system and other institutions.
The term "sanism" was coined by Morton Birnbaum, a physician, lawyer, and mental health advocate. Judi Chamberlin coined the term "mentalism" in a chapter of the book Women Look at Psychiatry.
The terms "mentalism", from "mental", and "sanism", from "sane", have become established in some contexts, although concepts, such as social stigma, and, in some cases, ableism may be used in similar but not identical ways. While "mentalism" and "sanism" are used interchangeably, "sanism" is becoming predominant in certain circles, such as academics. Those who identify as mad, mad advocates, and in a socio-political context where sanism is gaining ground as a movement. The movement of sanism is an act of resistance among those who identify as mad, consumer survivors, and mental health advocates. In academia evidence of this movement can be found in the number of recent publications about sanism and social work practice.
The term "sanism" was coined by Morton Birnbaum during his work representing Edward Stephens, a mental health patient, in a legal case in the 1960s. Birnbaum was a physician, lawyer and mental health advocate who helped establish a constitutional right to treatment for psychiatric patients along with safeguards against involuntary commitment. Since first noticing the term in 1980, New York legal professor Michael L. Perlin subsequently continued its use.
In 1975 Judi Chamberlin coined the term mentalism in a book chapter of Women Look at Psychiatry. The term became more widely known when she used it in 1978 in her book On Our Own: Patient Controlled Alternatives to the Mental Health System, which for some time became the standard text of the psychiatric survivor movement in the US. People began to recognize a pattern in how they were treated, a set of assumptions which most people seemed to hold about mental (ex-)patients regardless of whether they applied to any particular individual at any particular time – that they were incompetent, unable to do things for themselves, constantly in need of supervision and assistance, unpredictable, likely to be violent or irrational etc. It was realized that not only did the general public express mentalist ideas, so did ex-patients, a form of internalized oppression.
As of 1998 these terms have been adopted by some consumers/survivors in the UK and the US, but had not gained general currency. This left a conceptual gap filled in part by the concept of 'stigma', but this has been criticized for focusing less on institutionalized discrimination with multiple causes, but on whether people perceive mental health issues as shameful or worse than they are. Despite its use, a body of literature demonstrated widespread discrimination across many spheres of life, including employment, parental rights, housing, immigration, insurance, health care and access to justice. However, the use of new "isms" has also been questioned on the grounds that they can be perceived as divisive, out of date, or a form of undue political correctness. The same criticisms, in this view, may not apply so much to broader and more accepted terms like 'discrimination' or 'social exclusion'.