The Deadly Days and What Makes Life Worth Living Better

PSYCHIATRIC VIEWS ON THE DAILY NEWS

We have just come out of what could be called our annual “deadly days” of Halloween and Day of the Dead. They seem to help put us on the alert for being tricked and the importance of our ancestors. Then, tomorrow, some elections provide hope that newly elected politicians will make things better, at least for those feeling disenfranchised now, including children.

No wonder that a very valued colleague asked not only why there are so many antis in the world, but why the most publicized is anti-Semitism and Islamophobia, which could also be called anti-Islam. My colleague points out, correctly I believe, that there is also too much anti-Hindu, anti-Christianity, anti-Buddhism, and more, but these are not discussed much, or discussion is so divisive. Why, and what can we do about it?

Certainly, this vulnerability relates to psychiatry. It is part of our human nature, and even we and our patients are stigmatized in a sort of anti-psychiatry and anti-mental illness. Given that anti-Semitism has been the longest-running hatred,¹ Jews have been the most common target. Anti-Semitism can be seen as the “canary in the coal mine,” being the first, but not the last, group to be poisoned by the poisoned societal fumes.

Anti-Islam and anti-Semitism are related from using Semitic languages, and are religions that originated from the same Mideast land. They are depicted in the Old Testament (Torah) as being part of the same family story. In the story, stepbrothers Ishmael and his handmaiden mother from Egypt, Hagar, are banished from Isaac, Sarah, and Abraham into the desert. There, there is divine intervention that promises the development of another people, thought to be Arabs, from the Ishmael lineage. In other words, this can be an unresolved and unforgiven family conflict.

Of all the fields, we in psychiatry should know best, not only through family analysis and treatment, but also how best to reduce xenophobias. We know about stereotyping, projection, denial, and other psychological processes that support what I call the social psychopathologies. Here’s how I would address these:

• No excuses. Stop saying that we have our hands full with patient treatment; there is room for both reducing social psychopathologies and individual psychopathologies.
• Learn more. Stop using the excuse that we do not know enough to address social psychopathologies and the other side of the character coin, psychoexemplaries; if not, all the more reason to learn and research them from our perspective.
• Start with ourselves. We must start this upgrade at home, meaning among ourselves with multicultural and interfaith relationships of trust, respect, curiosity, and caring, rather than divisiveness.
• Self-search. We also must continue the psychiatrist tradition of self-searching, but expand that to our social connections, especially since we do not have a great track record of helping patients from minority groups.
• A purpose in life. There is nothing like confrontation with death and dying, as there has been in these deadly days, to sharpen our professional and personal purposes of life, including our social purposes.

Given that this is the year approaching the 250th anniversary of our country’s Declaration of Independence, let’s declare our desire to reduce our ongoing social adverse disparities.

Dr Moffic is an award-winning psychiatrist who specialized in the cultural and ethical aspects of psychiatry and is now in retirement and retirement as a private pro bono community psychiatrist. A prolific writer and speaker, he has done a weekday column titled “Psychiatric Views on the Daily News” and a weekly video, “Psychiatry & Society,” since the COVID-19 pandemic emerged. He was chosen to receive the 2024 Abraham Halpern Humanitarian Award from the American Association for Social Psychiatry. Previously, he received the Administrative Award in 2016 from the American Psychiatric Association, the one-time designation of being a Hero of Public Psychiatry from the Speaker of the Assembly of the APA in 2002, and the Exemplary Psychiatrist Award from the National Alliance for the Mentally Ill in 1991. He presented the third Rabbi Jeffrey B. Stiffman lecture at Congregation Shaare Emeth in St. Louis on Sunday, May 19, 2024. He is an advocate and activist for mental health issues related to climate instability, physician burnout, and xenophobia. He is now editing the final book in a 4-volume series on religions and psychiatry for Springer: Islamophobia, anti-Semitism, Christianity, and now The Eastern Religions, and Spirituality. He serves on the Editorial Board of Psychiatric Times.

Reference

1. Moffic HS, Peteet JR, Hankir A, Seeman MV. Anti-Semitism and Psychiatry. Springer; 2020.