Posted by:
Finally Free!
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Date: October 14, 2013 04:06PM
Does Mormonism exploit mental illness?
Yes, yes it does... I have several views on this subject, all from personal experience.
While I was a missionary, we were often told to search out the meek and the humble to look for converts. I watched as several missionaries actively looked for people with obvious mental deficiencies, people with learning disabilities, etc. They would justify this to themselves as "helping" the less fortunate, getting them into the church system so that the church could help lift them up. This always felt shmarmy to me, as some of these people obviously just liked the attention and some didn't seem to really understand what they were being told. Imagine later that they are told to fork over 10% of whatever income they have, or that they would be burned forever and I think that builds and argument for taking advantage of mental illness.
Then there is the personal case of my mother. She has at the very least severe depression, and has been diagnosed with Chronic Immune dysfunction (basically, she's too tired to really do anything, ever). While dealing with this, she has been the young woman's president, various teachers, a visiting teacher (luckily someone was smart enough to usually have her neighbors be the people she's supposed to "visit"), early morning seminary teacher (you try getting up at 5:30 in the morning when you're already exhausted)... All because she is one of the most TBM'iest people you will ever meet. The one and only time she asked to be removed from her calling, feeling massive guilt in the process, they told her that "They didn't release the prophet (Spenser Kimball) when he was hospitalized, we won't be releasing you either." This of course added to her guilt and she "endured" things as best she could... She still is, she feels as though she must always have a calling, no matter how small or large and that she must accept pretty much any calling that they send her way.
As for causing mental illness, I, unfortunately, have recently been learning quite a lot about mental illness, and while I'm no expert, I have a couple of thoughts. I think that some people, maybe even many people can be prone to mental illness, depression, anxiety, etc. and never "get" it unless they are pushed into it. Maybe it's genetic or something else physical that lies dormant, waiting for a trigger that may never come. The LDS doctrine pushes a lot of the buttons that can trigger these things... Group pressure to public speak, massive guilt, callings that aren't appropriate to a person's personality type, monetary issues, near constant work which allows for no down time or relief. Even mind control through repetition and peer pressure. Not to mention the disastrous cognitive dissonance that people need to hold it all together. These things are not health for the mind, they can push a normally stable person's "trigger" if they have them and drop them over the edge. It's sad, but I really believe it's true... The LDS church does not make for a healthy mind.
So, in my opinion, yes, it's very exploitive and it can very well push people into mental illness (which it can then take advantage of)