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Perhaps you or someone you love has stayed at a mental health center. It also might have been called a psychiatric hospital, state hospital, development center, for the ultimate anonymity and political correctness just a “center,” or to make us all feel a little more comfortable, the crazies and noncrazies alike, it may have been called a “retreat.”
I’m sure I don’t have to point out mental health politeness has not always been evident. But I would like to point out how incredible unpolite it has been.
If you step back in time, a retreat would have been referred to as a:
Lunatic Asylum
Asylum for the Insane
Insane Asylum
Hospital for the Insane
These were the accepted polite terms that were officially used to name a facility. As time progressed, many of these “retreats” went through a more politically correct name change. Northern Indiana Hospital for the Insane, for example, later became Logansport State Hospital.
Using the word insane, makes me feel judged, ostracized, rejected, and I hate to say it, but even ashamed. I don’t feel embarrassed or ashamed to be crazy, but I feel terribly ashamed of being insane. Insane just sounds so…awful. Beyond awful, really, but being referred to as insane provokes a feeling in my gut, not necessarily a descriptive word.
Insane is a word we use regularly in pop culture, and I am guilty of using it myself. I can hear myself right now, “What? That’s insane.”
So what’s the difference? Why can I say it but not have others say it about me? Why can Jewish people make Jew jokes? Why can Africans Americans call each other niggers? Oohhh, you are probably offended just reading that last word, as I was writing it.
By using the word insane I am putting one of life’s double standards into action. But when I say, “What? That’s insane,” I’m not referring to a person. I’m using it to describe a situation or thing that is crazy or ludicrous or as dictionary.com states, deserving of derision. Wow, I just offended myself. Why would I use a term that refers to me as something to be ridiculed?
It seems as if I am partly the problem. Apparently I am using words in which I haven’t bothered to read the dictionary definition. Maybe you do this too?
What’s worse – so bad I shouldn’t even say it - is that I have been guilty of using the word Nuthouse. The difference is that Nuthouse and Looney Bin, although incredible insensitive and derogatory, are not the cultural acceptable terms. Everybody knows it’s rude. Everybody knows when they use it they are saying something politically incorrect and taboo. It is not what our culture has accepted as a term to officially name a facility. You don’t hear Northern Indiana Nuthouse.
However, there is a word I can appreciate. Looney Bin. Maybe it’s because of Looney Tunes, but Looney Bin sounds like a fun place.
Let me demonstrate.
Me: “I’m going to the Northern Indiana Hospital for the Insane.”
You: “Ohhh...gosh I’m sorry to hear that. Yikes.”
*insert nervous expression here*
Let’s try this again.
Me: “I just got out of the Loony Bin.”
You: “Really? That’s cool. Sometimes I think I belong in the Looney Bin too!”
*insert look of jealously here*
See how exciting the second scenario is?
Perhaps it is the humor in the second scenario, or maybe it shows a certain level of comfort the crazy person has about being in a Looney Bin; but it’s not really scary to have someone tell you they are in the Looney Bin.
BUT – dom dom dom
It can be outright terrifying to imagine someone in an Insane Asylum. Looney Bins have Dixie cups of rainbow pills and Scatergories. Insane Asylums have straight jackets and lobotomies.
And retreat – why that’s a great place. Everyone wants to go to a retreat. People might even sign up for a mental illness just to get to go to one. They hear retreat and think of green hills and hiking trails, yoga, massage, gourmet vegetarian meals...
People think a retreat is an escape from reality and a special privilege to go. “If only I were so lucky to be crazy to get to live in a retreat instead of the real world.”
So what do these evolved terms do? Do they help make people feel being crazy isn’t such a scary thing, or does it make people think you’re lucky if you’re crazy and your life is easy if you’re crazy because you get to go to retreats instead of facing reality?
What do you think? How do the words Insane Asylum, Looney Bin and Retreat make you feel?
Until next time...
