2009-02-20
Diagnose the Irony
Anyone who has been through a college psychiatry class will be familiar with the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM).
If you're like me, some of the first PC oversensitivity I ever remember was expressed by psychiatrists on TV talk shows. The behavior (which I am briefly withholding for comedic effect) would typically occur when a non-psychiatrist would make a casual reference to someone's mental state. It was so predictable it became a sitcom stereotype.
The sense of proprietary outrage from certain doctors (not the industry as a whole) always seemed a little trumped-up. So I'm sure this next little clip will amuse you:
If you're like me, some of the first PC oversensitivity I ever remember was expressed by psychiatrists on TV talk shows. The behavior (which I am briefly withholding for comedic effect) would typically occur when a non-psychiatrist would make a casual reference to someone's mental state. It was so predictable it became a sitcom stereotype.
The sense of proprietary outrage from certain doctors (not the industry as a whole) always seemed a little trumped-up. So I'm sure this next little clip will amuse you:
"Robert Spitzer, the head of the DSM-III task force, has publicly criticized the American Psychiatric Association for mandating that DSM-V task force members sign a nondisclosure agreement, effectively conducting the whole process in secret: 'When I first heard about this agreement, I just went bonkers.'"
