I'm a social worker who works with adults, and in our agency, we teach that you can never fix another human being-- the impetus for change can only come from within them, and it's not there until it's there. Sometimes people have no reason to change until they have experienced a lot of loss and suffering from the life they have so far been living.

Our role is to keep believing that they can change, and to keep reminding them that they are worthy of a better life, and that they are capable of doing the hard work and make the hard choices between here and there. We can also model a different way of doing things, a way of living which they never saw in their families or neighborhoods and which they may only dimly believe is possible-- a way of living that only exists on television, where they come from. If you can do these things, then you are not helpless at all. You're doing everything you can possibly do.

"A woman in New Mexico has filed a restraining order against David Letterman, claiming that he's been tormenting her with secret, coded messages through the television.... The "mental cruelty" and "sleep deprivation" that Letterman allegedly inflicted on Nestler apparently came in the form of gestures and eye expressions, songs sung by guest bands on the show, and the letter C on baseball caps. "

These are classic examples of the delusional thinking which accompany the serious brain disorder known as Schizophrenia. I love Salon on a pretty daily basis, but making fun of the behavior of mentally ill people is crossing a line. This poor woman surely suffers enough from her (progressive, incurable) illness alone-- making her behavior into a joke which is then published, along with her name, in a national news journal is excessive and cruel.

In this age of deinstitutionalization, getting a patient with terrifying and debilitating delusions into a hospital for treatment can be next to impossible, and it is not always possible to stop the symptoms of schizophrenia through medication, anyway, although, mecifully, it can often be done. The restraining order which was provided in this case actually puts Mr. Letterman under no inconveniences at all, whereas it may have provided a great deal of relief to the woman with schizophrenia, who sincerely believes her paranoid delusions. To asume that a judge, who probably sees mentally ill people in his courtroom pretty frequently, did not know what was happening is unjustified. He probably realized that he could not convince the woman that her fears were groundless, and he did what it was in his power to do to give her some sense of safety. The harm being done by these articles is to the mentally ill woman, and to the others who will be continue to be ridiculed for their behavior as long as this sort of thing is tolerated. Neither the law which protects other frightened people nor Mr. Letterman has been injured in any way.

Thanks for the link to the Alternatives site-- I thought I was the only one out here who gets steamed that I would have to get married to get benefits at my domestic partners workplace, or to give him benefits at mine. I don't want to get married! My partner and I have been together for 15 years, but we're not religious, and we don't see any good reaason (besides the financial benefits) to allow the government into our bedroom. We own a house together, and that's harder to get out of than a marriage-- what greater sign of commitment do they need? Also there's my second wave thinking that marriage is mostly an institution designed to take women's rights away from them. I'm close to buckling under the pressure to get married, as we get older, but hearing that there are organizations like this one out there makes me think about keeping up the fight. Equal pay for equal work, indeed.

It may turn out to be the most enduring remnant of this entire hilarious story. I saw it in the Nashville Film Festival last year, where it was prefaced by a letter from "the author" which was read by the movie's producer. Although I'm certainly no critic, I think it was a very well-made piece of art. It really is not exploitative, but investigates the characters of two lively survivors of abuse. The books are still on my Amazon wish list, and now I don't know if I'll bother purchasing them, but I'll cheerfully watch the movie a second time, if it makes it's way back to the Bible belt someday. (It was filmed in Knoxville, hence the Nashville screening.)

Besides, what is truth? How many people do you know who are willing to put their real selves out there for inspection by everyone all the time? We all have masks; some are just a little more intricate than others.