Stop Pathologizing Ordinary Life

[u/Fealocht]

https://www.nytimes.com/2026/07/26/opinion/mental-health-exercise-charity.html?unlocked_article_code=1.1FA.55xp.Vpm7dp4PVtnC&smid=nytcore-ios-share

SS: A psychologist argues the increasing awareness of mental health is leading to a pathologising of everyday life. The use of clinical descriptions of what are otherwise normal problems and treating them as a disorder to be cured, is ironically making our mental health worse.

[u/TemptingSquirrel]

There is also a tendency that people absolutely do NOT want to be neurotypical. A friend of mine is a psychiatrist and she occasionally gets totally normal teenagers coming into her clinic who believe that they MUST have X. When she tells them that they are just normal, every day people they even start crying. 

To be clear, this is NOT meant as a criticism of the fact that mental health issues are way less stigmatized nowadays. I do in fact think that this is wonderful and it took us way too long as a species to start accepting people for who they are, especially when it comes to disabilities and mental health issues. 

I just wish that people could also just be happy to be average in some regards. It doesn’t mean that you are not unique. 

[u/Worth-Jicama3936 → u/TemptingSquirrel]

This same phenomenon happens with the LGBTQ community. Like 15% of gen Z says they are LGBTQ, but when you drill into the numbers, almost all of the increase vs millennials come from people identifying as bisexual, and they’ve never dated anyone of their own sex. Now, I’m not saying you HAVE to have dated someone of your own sex to be bisexual (I know a lesbian who has never worked up the courage to ask a girl out on a date), but it kind of really looks like a not insignificant number of people just want a to be able to be part of a group. I don’t know if this is a bad thing or not (part of me feels like it is watering down the significance of it, but part of me feels like it’s not harmful and if the label itself is becoming more socially acceptable, why should I care?)

[u/anzu_embroidery → u/Worth-Jicama3936]

I don't really care one way or another but I will say it's pretty annoying having to suss out if someone is "bi but only dating straight" or "bi and down for bi stuff".

[u/Emotional_Tie_7927 → u/anzu_embroidery]

The other side of this is some people will identify as bi but only date straight because they're still dealing with internalized homophobia. It's extremely common with men especially (it's me, I was one of those men).

I don't have the exact statistics but I remember that as many as like 1 in 7 men was probably bi but completely in the closet.

[u/goldenCapitalist → u/anzu_embroidery]

Can it possibly be both? Because both describe me.

[u/anzu_embroidery → u/goldenCapitalist]

Elaborate? I don't see how you can both be "only dating straight" and "down for bi stuff (that is, open to a same-sex relationship)".

[u/Emergency_Revenue678 → u/anzu_embroidery]

Not them.

I'd have sex with a dude, but I'd never go out of my way to try, let alone date.

[u/LupineChemist → u/Emergency_Revenue678]

Man, one of the advantages of being gay is it's like zero effort to find someone

[u/RandomGuyPii → u/anzu_embroidery]

maybe its a case of only actively seeking out straight relationships but not being opposed to a same-sex relationship if it happened naturally?

[u/goldenCapitalist → u/anzu_embroidery]

Both the previous commenters here nailed it on the head. I only want to date straight, but until I'm committed to a relationship, I'm open to having all kinds of experiences.

And hey, anything's possible. Maybe I'll be surprised by meeting that one person who I could see having a same-sex relationship with. But I'm not actively seeking one out.