No further evidence is needed to show that 'mental illness' is not the name of a biological condition whose nature awaits to be elucidated, but is the name of a concept whose purpose is to obscure the obvious.
Thomas SzaszRead
In the United States today, there is a pervasive tendency to treat children as adults, and adults as children. The options of children are thus steadily expanded, while those of adults are progressively constricted. The result is unruly children and childish adults.
Interpretation
What this quote means
The quote critiques societal trends of reversing the roles and responsibilities typically associated with children and adults.
Thomas Szasz highlights a concerning trend in modern society where children are granted freedoms and choices often reserved for adults, while adults are stripped of their autonomy and responsibilities. This inversion leads to a generation of unruly children lacking discipline and adults who are immature and irresponsible, questioning the very nature of growth and maturity in societal roles.
Themes
ChildrenAdultsResponsibilitySocietyMaturity
In practice
Example use cases
During a parenting seminar, one might quote Szasz to emphasize the importance of teaching children responsibility.
More from Thomas Szasz
All quotes →Classifying thoughts, feelings and behaviors as diseases is a logical and semantic error, like classifying whale as fish.
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Addiction, obesity, starvation (anorexia nervosa) are political problems, not psychiatric: each condense and expresses a contest between the individual and some other person or persons in his environment over the control of the individual's body.
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In the past, men created witches: now they create mental patients.
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Self-respect is to the soul as oxygen is to the body. Deprive a person of oxygen, and you kill his body; deprive him of self-respect and you kill his spirit.
Thomas SzaszRead
Adulthood is the ever-shrinking period between childhood and old age. It is the apparent aim of modern industrial societies to reduce this period to a minimum.
Thomas SzaszRead
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