band-aid or transformation?
what bipolar means to me: important questions to ask
In this video I read through the headings & subheadings of my 2019 paper - shout-out to Dr. Jonathan Lukens and the Master of Social Work program at Salem State University.
My dear friend Gina Zurlo - one of the world’s most sought-after speakers/thinkers on World Christianity, quantitative social science, and gender studies* - told me when I started my master’s program that I should focus on making my headings and subheadings catchy, because professors just start skimming when they’re exhausted.*
Watch the end of the video for a few extra musings, but when Dr. Lukens told me I won the prize for his favorite headings/subheadings in someone’s final policy paper, I felt as good as if Gina had told me I won a free ride to Harvard.*
Here’s the breakdown of my carefully written paper. Bold font indicates a heading, ordinary font is a subheading, numbered means it’s a sub-subheading. Happy Monday, ladies, gents, men, women, boys, girls, drag queens leading story hours, and open-minded liberals who nonetheless feel uncomfortable when they see drag queens leading story hours … we’re all in this together.
Social Welfare Policy
KENDRA’S LAW: IS THIS THE BEST WE CAN DO?
Introduction: The Allure of Reductionism
Historical Overview: Who’s to Blame? Who’s to Pay?
Colonial times: It’s their own fault.
The 19th century: Maybe it’s society’s fault. Let’s find a place to put them.
But it’s complicated.
The effects of war and the Great Depression: We’ll care for broken bodies. Broken minds we’re not so sure about.
Moving through the 20th century: Okay, it’s society’s problem. We’ll help. No wait, we won’t. Or maybe we will. Or maybe we won’t.
1946 Mental Health Act.
The 1960s and 1970s.
The 1980s and 1990s.
It’s still complicated: the rise of trans-institutionalization.
The 21st century.
So here we are now.
The Target Population: Who Wins Thanks to Kendra’s Law?
And the award goes to…
…But who exactly ends up reading the acceptance speech on the podium?
So who actually wins?
What’s Beneath the Surface? The Ideological Values of Kendra’s Law
To institutionalize or not to institutionalize?
To coerce or not to coerce?
Band-aid or transformation?
So Does it Work?
Can We Do Better?
A step up from AOT: Assertive Community Treatment (ACT)
Better still: Empowerment and empathy.
Peer-based intervention.
CommonGround intervention.
Conclusion: Redefining Recovery
*Side note, Dr. Gina Zurlo’s day job is working for Harvard, so she could drive me there any time, I just have to show up at her house wicked early ‘cause she goes in early to beat the traffic. More on Gina: her frequent cool vacations center around lecturing on her passions, and her kids may sometimes act annoyed by her but actually deeply love and admire her. She’s living the dream of almost every human walking the planet. Maybe it’s okay to be a beauty-full, brilliant, takes-no-B.S. woman working full-time and raising kids after all. hee hee. We already knew that was true. (Or did we?)
Bonus content: a few of my favorite recent pics of/from team members in 44.4 the musical … each person elevates a favorite quote.
