[Rapunzel]

I used to get emails from a political action group that supported family and traditional values. There have been a few times they took a position against something that I was working for, almost always having to do with support for people with mental illness. A couple of weeks ago they sent one asking us to fight against mental health parity:

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House Attempts to Expand List of “Mental Disorders” Covered by Employers
Urge your Representative to Vote NO on the Mental Health Equity Act!

Most Americans probably hear the phrase “more affordable health care” roll off the lips of certain presidential candidates on a daily basis, so why are Members of Congress trying to pass a bill that they claim would “increase coverage,” but would actually make it more expensive?

This Wednesday, March 5th, the House is scheduled to vote on the Paul Wellstone Mental Health and Addiction Equity Act of 2007 (H.R. 1424). Introduced by Rep. Patrick Kennedy (D-RI), H.R. 1424 would impose federal mandates on both private insurance companies and on employers who choose to offer mental health coverage as part of their group health insurance plans. The bill would incorporate into federal statute the fourth edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-IV) as the basis for which group health plans offer coverage for mental health conditions. The DSM-IV classifies a variety of mental disorders. The following is just a sampling of those diagnoses for which employers would be mandated to provide benefits: nightmare disorder, caffeine-induced sleep disorder, caffeine intoxication, sibling relational problems, academic problems, substance-induced sexual dysfunction, and pedophilia.

Other problems with H.R. 1424:

Increases the cost of Health Insurance. CBO estimates that this bill will impose mandates on private companies totaling $3 billion a year by 2012. By increasing the cost of coverage, the risk of greater numbers of uninsured Americans rises, as some employers may decide to drop group health insurance coverage altogether or not offer mental health coverage at all in order to avoid conflicting with strict state regulations.

Codifies a Treatment Mandate. Incorporating the DSM-IV list of mental disorders into federal law will obligate employers to cover “disorders” such as “jet lag,” “caffeine intoxication,” and “transvestic fetishism.”

Does not contain a “conscience clause.” The bill does not contain an exemption for health insurance groups or businesses to exclude coverage of disorders for which they have a religious or moral objection, e.g. pedophilia.


H.R. 1424 was placed on the suspension calendar, which means that no amendments may be offered and a two-thirds majority is necessary for passage. Currently, the bill has 273 cosponsors, so it is clear that the bill has close to two-thirds support. View the list of co-sponsors. Call your Representative today and tell them you have major objections to this bill!

Take Action

Urge your Representative to vote NO on H.R. 1424 today!



Call Your Representatives Today!

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I couldn't believe that a group that I support would be against help for people who need it, but apparently they are. I sent them the following reply, and have apparently been kicked off the list because I have not heard anything else from them since.

</font><blockquote><div id="quote"><font class="small">Quote:</font>
It's issues like this one where I do know a lot about what is at stake, that cause me to question supporting the *****. I have suffered from mental illness throughout my life. My depression and anxiety have limited or delayed my growth and development in all areas of my life from the time that I was a child, and still are painful and sometimes debilitating. These are real illnesses that have a very real impact on physical and spiritual health as well as emotional, social, and psychological (which I consider every bit as important, although I question that the ***** values emotional, social, and psychological well-being).

I am familiar with the DSM-IV, as I am now a counselor intern.. The attached flyer suggests that we should not have mental health equity because the DSM-IV classifies various sleep disorders and adjustment problems. The flyer selects various classifications that are rarely if ever the main focus of any mental health treatment, while deliberately refraining from mentioning the very serious and often life-threatening conditions that people seek treatment for, including schizophrenia, eating disorders, major depression, autism, etc. People die from these disorders. My brother did die from some of these disorders. He committed suicide one year ago, after being denied treatment for his schizophrenia, depression, and pervasive developmental disorder. I have come all too close to succumbing to suicide too many times myself. I do not have health insurance through my employer because they don't offer mental health coverage, and that is the main thing that I need from health insurance. Without that, it's worthless to me.

Although I support the family and traditional values, I never asked to receive these emails. In fact, you are sending them to my private email address that is not to be given out to anyone. I'm not sure how you got that address (I am replying from a different one). At this point, I am not at all sure that I want to be associated with this group. There is something fishy about any group that strives to tell people how to vote or how to think. I would be much more interested if you were presenting objective information about issues that affect families and values, and then encouraged people to pray about it and choose what they feel is best, using their own agency.

Please do support Mental Health Equity. It is sorely needed, and there is no conflict between the importance of mental health services availability and family or traditional values. Mental health services often support families, as they well should.

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Feeling under attack from both sides is a very lonely place to be.

[Fuzzybear]

((((((((((( Rap )))))))))))

I always wonder what 'family and traditional values' are supposed to be...

The reason they seem opposed to parity is the following:

> nightmare disorder, caffeine-induced sleep disorder, caffeine intoxication, sibling relational problems, academic problems, substance-induced sexual dysfunction, and pedophilia.

So...

What is the mental health parity argument again? ALL psychiatric disorders should receive unlimited funding... Or... What?

Would we spend thousands on treating a 45 year old woman who can't conceive (infertility)?

Of course we wouldn't. No matter how distressing she found her infertility to be.

The idea is to treat like as like. The trouble is everything is alike in some respects and not alike in others. What are the relevant likenesses? An interesting issue...

It is an empirical issue whether health parity would save the country money.

But really, I don't understand what treatment parity even means.

And of course I'm sure that you don't mean to suggest that political action groups who proclaim to support 'family and traditional values' are where one would most expect to find a 'spiritual' bunch of people.

And of course I"m sure that you don't mean to suggest that people who think that caffine intoxication and pedophilia and academic problems aren't as bad (don't warrant the expensive treatments) that HIV and Cancer do - aren't spiritual in virtue of that belief.

And I'm sure you also don't mean to suggest that people who don't believe that jesus is the son of god don't have beliefs even less spiritual ones. I'm sure you don't believe that people who are atheists can only have their beliefs characterized in a negative 'lacking' kind of a way. I'm sure you don't think that people who believe that we should look to this world rather than the afterworld for meaning fail to understand what Easter means to those of christian faith. I mean... Those other people do know. And that knowledge is precisely what is driving their not wanting to hear others ranting about it.

[(JD)]

Sadly, tis true, there is no place for those, like me, who not only value mental health and spirituality, but try to put our feet to it. The traditional values (those standards and values that were embraced by most American families from it's earliest beginnings and include a faith in God, honor and respect for the family, diligent work ethics, absolute values of right and wrong, honesty in business practices, wholesomeness in leadership, respect toward authority, moderation rather than excess and a few other aspects) are key to having a stable lifestyle, which in turn is necessary for good mental health, according to the experts.

I support you in your decision to counter their email promotion. We all know that they don't have time for those who have other things to say, other opinions, even if more cogent.

I think the term is between a rock and a hard place. At least you know who your rock is.



edit for misspelling

Maybe there is no place for Sky and Rap because they are that much more spiritual than the rest of us...
Or maybe there is no place for Sky and Rap because they value mental health much more than the rest of us...

Or maybe they are trying to tell us that there is no place for us too?
Any of us?

I find the 'traditional and family values' thing fairly hard for a number of reasons. Keeping slaves was (I thought) a fairly traditional value in US history. When I think 'traditional values' I think about keeping slaves.

I also think eugenics. That has a history in the US too (the idea that mental illness was heritable and that future generation had more severe forms). THerefore we really should eradicate it for the good of the family. Hitler said he was promoting traditional family values (christian ones at that) while he was campaigning and he did indeed seem genuine with that. The Jewish people (or the Vietnamese people or the Iraqui people who whoever are threating our very way of life and if we value our families we will go and fight and lay down our life!' Not for however many virgins in the afterlife but for traditional family values! We don't much hear about the US history with eugenics because we have become obsessively focused with the Nazi's - but when I think about 'traditional' and in particular 'family' values I think eugenics, yeah.

And I also think about welfare distributed as the individual pleases (ie whether they want to give or not) through the churches. Instead of being a government service. And I think of the radical injustice in the distribution of wealth in the US (such extremes of filthy rich and filthy poor) and I think 'oh is that what traditional values are about'.

And so if I have a bias... Its towards socialism or something like that being a spiritual view because its founding thing seems to be that people are equal and are equally deserving of getting their basic needs met at the very least.

And so I guess there are as many views on this as there are on spirituality.

It can be hurtful to find that a group who you thought you shared so many beliefs in common with disagreed with you on something so fundamental Rap. I'm sorry.

[Perna]

There's a whole darn forum:

http://community.beliefnet.com/forum...esc&amp;page=2

I guess my trouble here is really that I think that I DO value mental health and I DO value spirituality - and I DO think that there is a place for me.

But then I've been kicked out of this forum before ;-)

I guess the trouble I'm having is with associating 'spirituality' with a very particular (and extremely controversial) political view. I guess... I have a different political view... One that (I find) is accepting of my spiritual views (in the sense that it is silent on them thinking that that is an individual personal matter that is none of the states business). And... That is my view precisely. And... They are trying to treat mental disorder... Only the health system is a bit %#@&#! up at the mo.

Sigh.

I'm not sure what the answer is.

[Rapunzel]

Please don't make this political. I didn't tell you who the group is, or how they define family and traditional values. Religion is part of what they support. Some of the members are people that I know personally, including one that I had called my best friend for a while. My response to them was designed to point out the things that would be meaningful to that group and the problems with their flyer, which offended me. No need to discuss that here.

My point is that I feel rejected from all sides, and lonely and hurt. I don't care if you respond at all, but don't take it off-topic. Perna, thanks for the link. I haven't had the time to get involved with beliefnet, and didn't know that they had a mental health forum there.

[Fuzzybear]

(((((((((((((( Rap ))))))))))))))

> Please don't make this political.

I'm sorry but I guess I thought that YOU made this political. By implying that you thought that you would be most likely to find spirituality in a group that stands for 'traditional family values' and by saying that they didn't seem to have room for your views on mental illness. Since you mentioned that they were a political group and you quoted from a political groups views on mental disorder I thought... That this discussion was political as much as spiritual.

I guess I was really just meaning to point out that one could well agree on their stance on pedophilia and nicotine abuse etc (as the majority of people in the world including the majority of mentally ill people would) while thinking that they hadn't properly considered parity of treatment for psychiatric illnesses such as psychosis and depression...

So maybe... There isn't as much disagreement as you thought. That was all...

[Rapunzel]

It isn't necessary to point out all the details that take the subject in a controversial or political direction. I don't want you to reply to my thread anymore. All that I wanted to say is that this hurts. Arguing about this and that and going off-topic is very much *not* supportive!

[DocJohn]

And on that note, and to stop causing any more unintentional hurt, I'm going to close this thread.... sorry.