Quote:
Originally Posted by magicalprince
Personally, I'm not really a believer in therapy. I think it could be done right, usually it's not. I've always essentially felt that way.
One thing I don't get about these types of sentiments, though, is why blame everything on the therapy structure itself? Why not the individual therapist(s)?
I mean, anyone who is doing a job--they can do it well or they can do it badly. There is always going to be a more or less effective therapist out there. Even if you dislike the structure, in my mind the harm is still largely created by the incompetence of single individuals.
So then, in my mind, the problem with the structure (and the field as a whole) is its thusfar inability to weed out these individuals. Clearly a degree, a license, x years of experience--those things are not enough to certify the kind of skills that are really going to be needed to RELIABLY create good outcomes and RELIABLY avoid bad outcomes in clients. I think that therapy could work, but also it is much too frequently not working.
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But if, as you say, therapy “could be done right, usually it’s not,” then why wouldn’t the problem be the structure?
These people receive similar training, have similar codes of conduct and ethical standards...so either the profession attracts a lot of incompetents (the problem is with individual therapists), or it doesn’t prepare its practitioners with proper training and doesn’t maintain standards (the problem is structural). Close to what you say in your last paragraph.
Generally the simpler solution is better to me—that means questioning the single factor, the structure, in its various aspects, rather than the multiple factors (incompetent therapists).