freedompass
Warlock
- Jan 27, 2021
- 768
I've been bingeing dr Phil on YouTube. I know, and I'm sorry. He kind of is a shit, it definitely is exploitative. But for this armchair (or bed) psychologist I can't seem to look away. Anyway there was this one beautiful vibrant girl who'd become anorexic and ends up having a seizure. Guess her brain got starved of oxygen or something, not sure, but she ended up severely brain damaged, confined to a wheelchair, unable to talk or do anything for herself…she's in a literal vegetative state. They wheel her onstage like an animate object and discuss her as some kind of cautionary tale to budding anorexics everywhere. To be fair it's clear there's no longer an actual person to feel humiliated…but still, right? Kinda not the point. I was absolutely horrified and honestly angry seeing her like that. Making those weird, loud, random noises that people in that state will make…yes I must refer to her as a person, for her dignity, but you gotta say there's really nothing there anymore. The mum and the dad wait on her hand and foot 24/7. Is this what they ever pictured for their lives? Of course not. Yet you could still see the absolute devotion in their faces as they fussed around her…
Please, someone. Explain me how that is a desirable outcome for anyone. What goes through these parents' heads. How do they rationalise this. What makes it ok. Don't they suffer crippling cognitive dissonance? I know I would. Are they comforted and grateful that she's still there with them in body being wheeled onto National TV as a freak show to scare young girls straight?
To me that is and always will be just. So. Wrong.
Please, someone. Explain me how that is a desirable outcome for anyone. What goes through these parents' heads. How do they rationalise this. What makes it ok. Don't they suffer crippling cognitive dissonance? I know I would. Are they comforted and grateful that she's still there with them in body being wheeled onto National TV as a freak show to scare young girls straight?
To me that is and always will be just. So. Wrong.