Examples Of Mental Illnesses In The 1940s
Faith Gonzalez
Ms. Christine
English 10B
23 February 2016
Views on Mental Illnesses in the 1940s
During the 1940s not much was understood about mental illnesses. People often thought that those people with mental illnesses were crazy or that there was a supernatural reason why they acted that way. They didn’t really understand that these people are sick and that these people can be treated. There are people know who you will never even notice that they have a mental illness because they are normal civilians like anyone else, but in the 1940s others didn’t understand that they saw insanity. During World War II Hitler decided that people with mental disabilities were not the “perfect” race so he decided to eliminate them, people with mental illnesses …show more content…
Hitler’s problem was that he wanted to have a “perfect” race which meant no one with any disabilities or any sort of mental illnesses should be a part of society so he decided that he was going to kill anyone who wasn’t seen in his eyes as “perfect.” In the book “The Nazi Doctors: Medical Killing and the Psychology of Genocide,” the author Robert Jay Lifton says “... Mental patients were out of fear of ‘national degeneration’ and of threat to the health of ‘the civilized races,’ were seen to be ‘biologically plunging downward.” Mental patients were seen as a threat to the “perfect” race that Hitler had in his head, so this quote states that people with mental illness were supposedly a threat to “the civilized races.” People with mental illnesses were always seen as a threat, not because they are, it was because people didn’t understand mental disabilities …show more content…
There was a neurologist named Walter Freeman that thought he knew the cure of mental illnesses and for a while his procedure was very common among people who were mentally ill. “The Lobotomy Files: One Doctor’s Legacy” explains his procedure “An eminent neurologist Walter J. Freeman, and his partner treating a mentally ill patient by slicing through neural fibers in the brain.” So what they did was cut pieces of your brain and it was supposed to “cut out” the mental illness. This procedure had a one-third percent chance of working. Some people would go home and live a perfectly normal life or some would go home and not be able to eat or drink on their own or some would not go home at all. The weirdest thing is that Walter Freeman won a Nobel Prize in medicine for this but the chances of you actually getting better were very
Ms. Christine
English 10B
23 February 2016
Views on Mental Illnesses in the 1940s
During the 1940s not much was understood about mental illnesses. People often thought that those people with mental illnesses were crazy or that there was a supernatural reason why they acted that way. They didn’t really understand that these people are sick and that these people can be treated. There are people know who you will never even notice that they have a mental illness because they are normal civilians like anyone else, but in the 1940s others didn’t understand that they saw insanity. During World War II Hitler decided that people with mental disabilities were not the “perfect” race so he decided to eliminate them, people with mental illnesses …show more content…
Hitler’s problem was that he wanted to have a “perfect” race which meant no one with any disabilities or any sort of mental illnesses should be a part of society so he decided that he was going to kill anyone who wasn’t seen in his eyes as “perfect.” In the book “The Nazi Doctors: Medical Killing and the Psychology of Genocide,” the author Robert Jay Lifton says “... Mental patients were out of fear of ‘national degeneration’ and of threat to the health of ‘the civilized races,’ were seen to be ‘biologically plunging downward.” Mental patients were seen as a threat to the “perfect” race that Hitler had in his head, so this quote states that people with mental illness were supposedly a threat to “the civilized races.” People with mental illnesses were always seen as a threat, not because they are, it was because people didn’t understand mental disabilities …show more content…
There was a neurologist named Walter Freeman that thought he knew the cure of mental illnesses and for a while his procedure was very common among people who were mentally ill. “The Lobotomy Files: One Doctor’s Legacy” explains his procedure “An eminent neurologist Walter J. Freeman, and his partner treating a mentally ill patient by slicing through neural fibers in the brain.” So what they did was cut pieces of your brain and it was supposed to “cut out” the mental illness. This procedure had a one-third percent chance of working. Some people would go home and live a perfectly normal life or some would go home and not be able to eat or drink on their own or some would not go home at all. The weirdest thing is that Walter Freeman won a Nobel Prize in medicine for this but the chances of you actually getting better were very