Why Mental Health Awareness Week is so hollow in NZ
With the Government spending millions on mental health and getting little in return from the beuracracy while watching a crusader like Mike King getting shat on by the Left for having the temerity to point out Jacinda has failed, we have another pointless hollow virtue signal that is Mental Health Awareness Week.
The thing I hate most about NZ Suicide – we never dare ask why.
Like a cultural scab we no longer pick at because the shame is too great and the weeping wound too painful to even acknowledge.
The horror of our suicide rate gives us a glimpse behind the ‘she’ll be right’ facade of our culture and the dark torment of an alpha male macho mental landscape that is terribly fragile.
Our under funded social infrastructure, our ‘me first’ consumerism, our 30 years of neoliberal mythology, our disconnection from one another, our untreated pain, our lack of hope from grinding poverty in a first world country, our damaged masculinity, the intergenerational consequences of colonialism, our unspoken rage culture, our inability to express emotion beyond anger – all of this demands questions we don’t want to hear as a society and the shame of suicide continues to hide and smother any healing.
In a society that has no religious faith and all the cultural maturity of a can of coke, the bonds which keep us attached are frail and disconnected. In our fetishisation of individualism we have lost the central part of the human condition – connection.
We have traded in our interwoven threads of whanau, friendship and kin for a race where no one wins.
The reason we can’t talk about suicide is because we can’t stand to talk about the dark treacle of self hate and loneliness at the core of consumer culture. We don’t dare confront the hollowness of our existence on these far flung crags of rock for fear of what we will reveal about ourselves.
Damaged individuals competing for a self identity too fragile for the storms and tempests of life.
Thanks to neoliberalism, we are further from each other than ever before.
Look at the manner in which our suicide rates jumped after the neoliberal reforms of the 1980s, where we moved away from the communal towards the individual…
…we huddle frightened on these lonely rocks at the end of the world and slowly one by one slip off into the swallowing dark. Until we are prepared to confront many of the individualism-over-all myths and rebuild our tattered communities, our suicide rate will remain reminding us of our whispered deceptions.
We refuse to ask the why of suicide because we are too frightened to know the answer is a reflection of the shallow and lonely community we have become. Instead we reel off a list of phone numbers whenever we dare mention suicide as if that means a fucking thing.
We are broken and no one wants to admit that.
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I feel so sorry for all the renters and non asset owners who have watched their friends and relatives basically win the lottery with massive house price gains just because they were born a few years earlier. There is now no hope of ever catching up and hopelessness has never been so apparent. Kiwis who were abandoned by our dear leader need to leave this greedy oppressive country ASAP. Go to a country where you still have a chance at even just an average life, refuse to let the landlord parasite class use your hard work to enrich themselves.
To get an understanding of what Kiwis are becoming just read the comments in this article. So uncaring for the plight of others. Nastiness towards others is now the norm. I am ashamed.
https://www.stuff.co.nz/travel/300412931/our-tribal-nature-explained-the-team-of-5-million-v-the-kiwis-who-just-want-to-come-home
Here’s a radical idea:
What if people who are double vaxed and have a spare room in their house, especially if they are related to the applicant, provide quarantine. They would have to follow official guidelines and be interviewed to ensure they were suitable, of course.
Don’t worry…Jacinda has ensured that the mental health of the Mob is maintained via a new fleet of Harley’s to the tune of $2.75m. She knows where her votes come from.
Mental Health Awareness Week, what a good way to spend this money on marketing, that they care!
Apparently Covid stemmed suicide, maybe having the time to stay at home and not be competing in NZ’s rat race, was a public good for mental health.
Coronavirus: Suicide rates went down during lockdown in NZ, Australia, other countries – study
https://www.newshub.co.nz/home/new-zealand/2021/04/coronavirus-suicide-rates-went-down-during-lockdown-in-nz-australia-other-countries-study.html
Mike King is a great kiwi, one of very best. Passionate about Mental Health, knows what he doing, hard working and getting absolutely fucking nowhere with the Govt/MoH. Jacinda and Co don’t even throw him some crumbs. This tantamount to deliberate abandonment of their own people, to save money. Don’t kid yourselves if you think ACT or National will be any better. Even worse more than likely as they are hard core Neo Liberals. Again, this is the root of the problem. Neo Liberal Economics. Mind you there is also a big dose of incompetence and professional neglect in there. My heart goes out to Mike King.
Good post Greenbus, can’t disagree.
Bomber. Insightful and compassionate post. Thankyou.