The DSM-IV does not say that anyone who questions or disobeys authority figures is mentally ill.
It regards a pathological attitude in which an individual only acknowledges authority if the authority rules in that person's favor and ignores or attacks authority figures if they are ruled against.
There is an enormous difference between the mind that disobeys an illegal order or an unjust law as a reasoned act of civil engagement, and the mind that believes that no laws or rules apply to him and that he is free to disobey any authority or break any law if he feels he is being personally inconvenienced.
A normal person realizes that sometimes a law can be beneficial to the community and to himself as a whole, but can simultaneously be onerous or burdensome to him at this particular point in time.
1. This diagnosis is listed under the category: “Disorders Usually First Diagnosed in Infancy, Childhood, or Adolescence”. We all know the kind of kid they're talking about here.
2. I've never seen the diagnosis carried over into adulthood: usually this evolves into a Narcissistic Personality Disorder, an “Axis II Disorder,” ie not a “major psychiatric disorder” of the sort that can be used to bring one to the attention of the authorities for detention or commitment.
3. I've never seen anyone admitted to a hospital, voluntary or otherwise because of this diagnosis alone: a major Axis I psychiatric disorder that leads to danger to self or others or grave disability (inability to meet basic needs for health and safety) is required to get into a hospital: insurance otherwise won't pay for it, and courts certainly won't order it involuntarily. It may happen at some adolescent treatment facilities somewhere, but I've never seen it.
4. In Washington State where I practice now, the inability to carry concealed or buy a firearm is based on involuntary commitments due to major Axis I conditions, and is determined in court under due process, not at the whim of a psychiatrist.
5. By the time our political system has devolved to the point where people are denied possession of a gun on the sorts of grounds this post is concerned with, they won't need some trumped up charge to be confiscating them.
You are not looking at the whole picture here.
The DSM-IV does not say that anyone who questions or disobeys authority figures is mentally ill.
It regards a pathological attitude in which an individual only acknowledges authority if the authority rules in that person's favor and ignores or attacks authority figures if they are ruled against.
from above:
So now according to the ebook it states that:
The essential feature of Oppositional Defiant Disorder is a recurrent pattern of negativistic, defiant, disobedient, and hostile behavior toward authority figures that persists for at least 6 months.
I am opposed to everything that obama does. I have seen nothing he has done as being constitutional, or good for this country. Everything he does is against us. I do not expect my opinion to change on this. He has been in office for just under 2 years.
According to the definition given above, I am mentally diseased.
Do you doubt that the democrats would invoke such an interpretation to destroy their enemies? I don't. The socialists ALWAYS go down this path (See the Soviet Union mental health system)
There is an enormous difference between the mind that disobeys an illegal order or an unjust law as a reasoned act of civil engagement, and the mind that believes that no laws or rules apply to him and that he is free to disobey any authority or break any law if he feels he is being personally inconvenienced.
And there is no difference between how the democrats will repsond to the first and the second.
We saw in DSM-III how the APA is an entirely political organization (The de-listing of homosexuality as a mental illness was entirely political). I'd bet that most APA menbers are democrats and are manipulating the system to get rid of tehir opponents.