I was just listening to a podcast about transorbital lobotomies. It was a practice that was quite common in the US in the 50s. See, too many people back in the 50s were having extreme mood swings and becoming too “rebellious,” so some clever dude, good old Walt Freeman to be exact, developed a procedure to rid the world of people who were… well… different.
A transorbital lobotomy was performed by inserting an ice pick on the inside of your eyelid up into your frontal cortex to destroy the white matter tissue. It could be done to a single eye or both! Double the sadism! To add to the fun, the patient wasn’t given anesthesia. Instead they are given a massive electric shock which stuns the victi… i mean patient.
Many people believe that true “civilization” began with the industrial revolution, but I point out this little tidbit and you can pretty much ruin anyone’s argument that we are a civilized society. There are many examples of how barbaric our thinking was when it comes to mental health, but this one is truly ghastly. Sure, that was 50 years ago, but there are plenty of examples today where medical solutions are just as horrible as the maladies they were created to address… Chemo therapy immediately comes to mind.
eww… that’s just sick! Course, it makes me think of One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest… (a novel written for adults!)
I always thought mental health issues belong to us all, but very few people – even those with issues themselves, see the value of making sure our head is healthy. It’s too bad.