The Last Psychiatrist

Comment on "Gossip Girl Is Going To Corrupt Someone"

2009-11-07T17:39:19Z

andrew is spam

http://thelastpsychiatrist.com/2009/11/gossip_girl_is_going_to_corrup.html#c006053

Comment on "You Want To Be Don Draper? You Already Are"

2009-11-06T23:19:59Z

I suspect that you may have irritated or angered a lot of people with this article. Frankly, I found it interesting. I might have to read it again to get a firmer grip on it. But what I have read so far sounds interesting.

Comment on "Gossip Girl Is Going To Corrupt Someone"

2009-11-06T19:06:27Z

I smell a scam, it's like that video game based on Dante that staged fake Christian protests.

Comment on "Gossip Girl Is Going To Corrupt Someone"

2009-11-06T16:47:27Z

"Blame Canada" of course...

We have to blame someone else before someone thinks of blaming us...

Comment on "How Am I Going To Get Paid If It Isn't Autism?"

2009-11-06T15:39:55Z

Too Loud, Too Bright, Too Fast, Too Tight is a book about being highly sensitive to stimuli that most people are comfortable with or can ignore.

It seems plausible to me that there's be enough human variation that some people can't handle "normal" stimuli. I'm not in the diagnosable range, but loud music that almost anyone can enjoy is really painful for me. I wouldn't be surprised if there are people who find the texture of clothing labels to be intolerably distracting.

Comment on "50% of American Kids Receive Food Stamps"

2009-11-06T14:18:12Z

caela - Actually I agreed with you that ideologies look good on paper but fall apart in the real world. I find it odd that you seem to think that my critique of Rand is an endorsement of Marx and that this is about Rand vs Marx (certainly it was in Rand's head and it's, sadly, very common in the US to frame all politics as the "godless commies" vs the "American freedom myth"). Of course Rand's ideology is a mirror image of Marx's - it's entirely reactionary and based in an emotional reaction to her family losing status and wealth in Russia (and "common" people being accepted into the film school Rand was attending). (The ultimate narcissistic wounds for the young Rand...or Alice Rosenbaum, her real name that she changed into something that didn't sound Jewish or female, and did sound like a fictional character.) For all her claims to be a champion of freedom, Rand was - like all narcissists - a fascist. It's intensely ironic that she's become such an icon of the American right since she was an atheist, a philanderer and used sex to sell her books and ideas. Not that I'm condemning her on moral grounds myself, it's just ironic that she's the darling of politicians and pundits who get all outraged at atheists, try to control science on (irrational) religious grounds, who promote "the sanctity of marriage" and so on. Of course, that's really just about manipulating the "parasites" so the "elite" can get what they want. People are just objects to be used to provide narcissistic supply (and wealth obviously). This has been playing out rather spectacularly in the American banking system and corporate culture recently. Sure everyone can be greedy but only a narcissist would run a business into the ground, expect a government handout, take a massive bonus because they "deserve" it and still tell themselves they're a self made man and the elite in a meritocracy. Corporate culture is particularly conducive to promoting narcissism and narcissists since they're spectacularly unconcerned with the human cost of their actions.

Comment on "50% of American Kids Receive Food Stamps"

2009-11-06T12:51:49Z

Alone,

In this you are skewing the perspective towards foodstamp manipulation. I receive $26 more in benefits allowed for a single person to receive foodstamps. 44% of my income goes to an unsubsidized apartment, that is already 39% below fair market value for my city.

I also pay full utilities, that thankfully only consume 12%. Medicare only covers psych visits at 50% their negotiated rate. That with some of my uncovered meds, consumes 18-26% of my income, depending on how symptomatic I am.

My vehicle is an additional 12%, and I am unable to arrange med transport, so either I have a car, or I don't see my doctors. The rest goes towards food, household stuff and debt.

Thing is, I don't live alone, my partner who despite a recent 45 day hospitilization, is not disabled and is inelegible for foodstamps because she returned to college, and can not find a 20-hr a week job, as required in her recert. Let's also add in her 12% of medical bills, 0 income, and now a lawsuit from said hospital.

Now to manipulate the system and prove your point, I could have a kid. Baby would bring me $600 from federal, plus my full foodstamps, and enough for her, full medicaid coverage for both baby and me.

Who wouldn't want to drop out of school and find a baby-daddy for that?

Comment on "You Want To Be Don Draper? You Already Are"

2009-11-06T12:33:11Z

I don't want to put words in your mouth but it seems to me that you're a man who thinks that they have figured out what is wrong with a generation(s), narrowed it down to a definition of narcissism they created and now feels the need/right to change the common man through a created online persona.

Has it ever crossed your mind that perhaps your seeing yourself in a lot of the world? Or at least that you've created a worldview that acts as a lens of sorts, tinting everything with narcissism? I think it's EXTREMELY narcissistic to think that YOU have figured out what is wrong with just about everyone and that it's your job to change them (instead of just giving them information and letting them make up their own mind).

Where's the humility? Where's the honesty? It really sounds a lot like the characteristics you describe in your analysis of narcissists.

Whether you like it or not it IS about you on some level because the person delivering the message plays a role in the message itself.

Comment on "50% of American Kids Receive Food Stamps"

2009-11-06T12:20:57Z

Look, like I said, I don't disagree exactly with Rand, I disagree with IDEOLOGUES. They are the ultimate narcissits IMO because they insist that the rest of us must conform to their ideas about how the world should work.

Rand and Marx are mirror images of each other. Each likes to insist that their way is the ONLY way. What I disagree with from both of them is exactly that assumption. No one system is right for everyone. Humans are a diverse bunch, and they don't fit into neat world-views that give all the answers. I think that ideas from such people can help to develop more common sense policies (I think welfare should be limited to a few years rather than being indefinate for example, and allow for job training so that people don't NEED food stamps), but no matter what the ideological system is, it cannot work all the time in all situations with all people.

You don't think that Marx was eilitist? His beliefs about the upper classes were pretty negative if you read his stuff, almost as bad as how Rand sees the poor. It's like they're almost mirror images of each other. If you hate the rich, you'll like Marx, if you hate the poor, you'll like Rand. Either way, the problems of society would go away if only THOSE PEOPLE wern't in the way. That's my objection. Trying to force everyone to look and act like you doesn't work.

Comment on "How Am I Going To Get Paid If It Isn't Autism?"

2009-11-06T11:22:24Z

Too Loud, Too Bright, Too Fast, Too Tight is a book about being highly sensitive to stimuli that most people are comfortable with or can ignore.

Comment on "Gossip Girl Is Going To Corrupt Someone"

2009-11-06T08:10:18Z

Gossip Girl online watch this...

Comment on "50% of American Kids Receive Food Stamps"

2009-11-06T08:04:55Z

I assume you found my POV arid because your fingers were so dry from thumbing through a dictionary. I am impressed at either the effort you put into your pretentious reply. If such is the manner of general discourse for you than the effort you spent on cultivating it is even more impressive (though it isn't a terribly useful skill really).

That you think stringing some random facts together like popcorn on string somehow reveals a truth is what I object to. It is however the way of life you alluded to.

Comment on "This Onion Clip Is Hilarious; Now Let Me Tell You Why It's Scary"

2009-11-06T06:40:26Z

The more I read it, the more it impresses me. I don’t know how I ever worked without hilarious and funny things in our life, Life would be so much easier especially when there's a jokes here and there. Being funny is nice because a lot of serious people are lacking with this kind of behavior that is why they are much look older. I would like to thank you for your outstanding blog post. Keep it up! Awesome!

Comment on "50% of American Kids Receive Food Stamps"

2009-11-06T06:06:58Z

P.S. I hope you write something on this Fort Hood incident. Always the quiet Muslim guy with the residency in psych...

Comment on "50% of American Kids Receive Food Stamps"

2009-11-06T06:05:02Z

I'm fairly conservative, but I don't have a huge problem with the concept of Food Stamps. I want people to be able to eat if they're unable to pay for food on their own. I'm willing to chip in some taxes for this basic level of life.

That being said, my problem is when kids grow up thinking that Food Stamps are a normal part of life. They're not. They are for special times, when you can't get by any other way. They're like Crazy Checks. They are maladaptive survival strategies that parents impose on their children. There are parents who are so abusive that they have their kids feign mental illness in order to get some SSDI. I'm not saying that parents fake poverty to get Food Stamps, but they also don't explain how they are not "income."