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Lori asked me to write something about "The sociological mind set of society concerning those who are considered to be crazy". Sounds a lot more complicated than it is. For the last decade or so I have been scratching my head wondering what the hell "crazy" is. So I guess Lori wants me to write about what I think is "crazy". Foucault wrote a book about it: "Madness and Civilization (a history of insanity in the age of reason)". Even though I love Foucault, I can't make heads or tails about it. The book is just too damn difficult. I read it twice but considering that Foucault was ánd bald ánd gay, it's no wonder I can't comprehend it.
Look at the Bell-curve. (Picture above.) Suppose at the X-axis we put the number of people and at the Y-axis we put behavior. Smack-down in the middle you'll find the "norm". The kind of behavior most people exhibit. And so we get normal. Norm becomes normal. Fuck normal! You don't want to behave just like everybody else. At the fringes of the bell-curve you'll find that kind of behavior which is either exhibited more than normal or less than normal.
Since behavior is a rather broad concept let's narrow it down to just one kind of behavior: Masturbation (This happens to me Bulbs blog after all.) Now let's say the mean is 5 times a week. Now if you are either doing it once every two weeks or 4857 times a week (like me) you can bet your ass you'll be at the fringe. And that means: YOU'RE NOT NORMAL!! YOU ARE CRAZY. YOU SHOULD BE COMMITED!
We can substitute "behavior" with any kind of behavior like: Eating, sleeping, sticking a thumb up yar ass, showering, hearing voices, dancing, cleaning, killing or automutilation. If you are at the fringes, you are deviating from the norm, you are not normal, you should be commited.

This is all dry statistical bull, but it gets interesting once you consider that the whole bell-cuve is fluid! It changes according to time and culture. (For those more imaginativeve than me: consider a four dimensional bell-curve with behavior, culture, time and number of people. If you can, call me for a free fuck.)
It changes according to time: Suppose you like to rip your enemies hearts out and drink their blood. You'd be an idiot in 2006. You'd be a great warrior in 906. Suppose you like to spend time alone, and you live alone in your apartment. You'd be single in 2006, you'd be a hermit in 1800.
It changes according to culture. Suppose you believe Jews orchestrated the whole 9/11 thing and all Jews who worked in the buildings got a phonecall telling them to stay home. You'd be an idiot if you were a Jew, Atheist, Christian or Hindu. You'd be normal if you were a muslim. Suppose you believe there is some diety that created everything and he now demands human and animal sacrifice. You'd be an idiot if you were a democrat or a republican. You'd be normal if you were a muslim.

It gets even more interesting when you have to turn towards yourself, turn towards your own time and culture and force yourself to look at what is normal and crazy. Our scientists who specialize in this subject, "psychiatrists", have been scratching their asses and thinking like mad for decades to define what is crazy and what is not. They came up with a book: The DSM IVr. In it they classify everything crazy according to traits of behavior. (Remember? Bell-curve? behavior?)
To their credit they did not (like Freud "peace be upon him") make it a dogmatic end-all work of science. They kept the option open that "crazy" changes according to time and culture. (That's why it's version IV or even V as we speak.) Often the behavioral traits are described as "... a lot more or a lot less than is normal in the patients culture."
So some geniuses figured out that "Crazy" is a function of behavior and "society". You can be perfectly normal in Indiana, US, present day, believe you me you'd have been locked up in 1800, or put to death had you been born in Mekka.

Let's stick to our present time and culture and make it even more interesting. The word is "subculture". There is a particularly nasty personality disorder called: "anti-social personality disorder". These guys don't have a cricket telling them what's good or what's bad. Furthermore, they are prone to cheating, lying, disregarding the safety of themselves and others, aggressive and "lightly touched", impulsive, unable to carry responsibility etc.
In short: these guys are crazy! Famous examples are Ted Bundy, Bulb and Sassy's ex husband. Now what the DSM IV describes are people who exhibit these behavioral traits in our time and culture.
Suppose we dress these guys in uniforms, give them a gun, a dril sergeant who can direct their impulses and point them at the enemy? What do you get??? War vets!!! That's what! We honor them.
There's another lovely personality disorder in the DSM-IV, Theatrical personality disorder. These people feel uncomfortable if they are not the center of attention. They have fluid and superficial emotions, not only are they suggestible, but they will go out of their way to make themselves and their lives a mid-point of drama and importance. They firmly belief their relations to others are more intimate than they really are.
Suppose you forced these people to live in Hollywood and make movies what do you get? That's right! Stars! And yes! In line with popular belief, they are different from us. And yes, we do honor them. (In bulbs land we have a constitutional monarchy so .... fuck you Americans.)

I could go on forever. I won't though. Critics (wish I had some), will say I'm oversimplifying, and only adressing those issues that are clearly nurture, not nature. So let's live on the edge and have a look at the one diagnosis that is the epitome and final proof of "crazy": schizophrenia.
The term "schizophrenia"was coined by one of the geniuses that inspired both Freud (Peace Be Upon Him) and Jung (PBUH): Bleuler (PBUH). "Schizein" is to split, and "Phreinn" is heart, feeling and sensibility. In other words: Schizophrenia is a split personality. Well, it isn't! A split personality is called "dissociation" or better even MPS, multiple personality disorder. Only the idiots in the scientific subculture give any credence to MPS. It's shelved next to the "recovered memories" drama.
Schizophrenia simply means: You hear voices, you see things, you think things nobody else thinks, socially you're screwed, and when you're not acting like an idiot, you're acting as if there is nothing but a empty desert in your soul.
These guys are NUTS! These guys are not only to committed to an institution, they are to be exterminated and infertilliateted (if that is even a word.)
In no culture or time were these guys ever normal! These guys are the epitome and definition of crazy. Since the white-coated doctors have taken the place of our white-coated priests, these guys are plainly Evil!
And yes, that includes the schizophreniformic personality disorder, the Manic Depressive and depressive disorder with vital signs..... any of you who hear voices and feel like shit or like a desert and see things that are not there and act like idiot!

Problem is: we all do. Everybody hears voices. Everybody sees things that are not there and we all act like idiots. We just don't do it all the time. It's not the behavior, it's the frequency that is counted on the bell-curve. We exhibit it once, we get scared shitless and run to a shrink. A couple of centuries ago, or even in our time a couple of hundred miles away, we'd run to the local shaman. He'd observe us. And if, joy-to-the-Gods, we exhibited this behavior more often, our tribe would be one shaman, one priestess, one hermit-who-could-speak-with-gods richer.

Hell I haven't even started on our high-priest doctor using his "diagnosis" as a moral judgmenent. I haven't even begun to talk about our communistic brethern locking up those who desire liberty. Did I mention Islam condemning to death, Christians, Jew,Hindu's or women who got raped? When you're not in line with the norm, you're fucked!

Next time you meet him, be nice to your local looney. He might just be talking to the Gods.

posted by The artist formerly known as the Bulb. @ 5:31 AM