Sent to Asylums for the Wrong Reasons
Doctors Sent Patients to Asylums for Non-Mental Health Reasons
In the 20th century, European asylums were often filled with individuals who had no actual mental health issues. Doctors frequently sent patients to these institutions for reasons as trivial as disobedience, alcoholism, or even just being inconveniently ill. It wasn’t about mental health; it was about social control and hiding away the undesirables.
Diagnosing Madness
Criteria for committing someone to an asylum were shockingly loose. Women were often admitted for being “hysterical,” a term used to describe any behavior that deviated from societal norms. Men might be sent away for drinking too much or simply being uncooperative at work. The threshold for defining someone as mentally ill was disturbingly low, making it easy to lock away those who didn’t fit in.
