中国城市公共安全排名:为什么四分之一的女性会进行精神治疗

为什么四分之一的女性会进行精神治疗

Are women crazy?

女人疯了吗？

The world's mostly male "great thinkers" have tended to say so, characterising women as the weaker sex both physically and psychologically. In Plato's "Timaeus", female moodiness and misbehavior are explained with the wandering uterus theory. The wily womb, in this account, "gets disconnected and angry, and wandering in every direction through the body, closes up the passages of the breath, and by obstructing respiration, drives them to extremity, causing all varieties of disease." Several hundred years later, a Greek surgeon by the name of Galen would expand upon the Athenian's explanation. For him, ladies' mental ills stem from their sex drive: women become "hysterical", he reasoned, when they don't get properly laid.

世界上大多数男性都说一般的女性在生理和心理上都是弱者。柏拉图的《蒂迈欧篇》用游走性子宫理论来解释女性的喜怒无常与行为不当。狡猾的子宫被这样解释：“毫无系统，暴躁地在身体里四面八方地游走，关闭呼吸通道，通过阻碍呼吸作用把他们逼到绝境，从而引起各种疾病。”几百年后，一位叫伽林的希腊外科医生在雅典人的解释的基础上对其进行扩展。他认为，女性的精神疾病来源于他们的性驱力：他推断，女性在欲求不满之时就会变得歇斯底里。

From Galen's era until the mid 19th century, there were several "prescriptions" available for nasty cases of hysteria: Married women needed to have more sex with their husbands, and single females were told to seek "pelvic massages" from qualified technicians, to produce "hysterical paroxysm" (what's now known simply as an "orgasm"). The latter practice would eventually get recommended to women regardless of marital status, achieving its peak in Europe and the US around the mid 19th century. Vibrator treatments, somewhat unsurprisingly, would become one of the most popular outpatient procedures of that era.

从伽林的时代一直到十九世纪中叶，有这样几种治疗癔病严重病情的药方：已婚妇女需要与丈夫更多的性交，单身女性被告知需寻求专业人员的骨盆按摩来产生兴奋（用现在的话简单来说就是性高潮）。

Shortly after, hysteria's explanatory powers would wane, overtaken by Sigmund Freud's notion of penis envy. The Austrian psychiatrist claimed that women are batshit because, well, they just aren't men. The result? Little girls would all grow up to become masochists with daddy complexes. The proof, supposedly, was rooted in the "phallic" way they liked to plait hair.

不久之后，癔病的解释效力便衰落了，被西格蒙德·弗洛伊德的阳具妒羡理论所超过。奥地利的精神病学家称，女性之所以会精神不正常是因为他们不是男人。这会导致什么后果？小女孩长大后会成为有恋父情结的性受虐狂。证据可能在于他们喜欢用崇拜阳具的方式编辫子。

It would seem easy to laugh at these anti-woman approaches to mental health as absurdly antiquarian – until you read recently released statistics about psychiatric medication. A report from MedCo published last week notes that 25% of US women take meds for depression, anxiety, ADHD or another mental disorder. In men, that number is 15%. One article notes that more and more women have been prescribed anti-depressants in the past decade, and that nearly twice as many women are on anti-anxiety treatment as their male counterparts. One doctor's explanation behind the disparity: women might be more likely to seek help.

如果你没有看过最近发表的关于精神病药物治疗的统计数据，你会觉得通过反女性来通向心理健康看起来和荒谬的古文物研究一样好笑。梅德科公司上周发布的一个报道指出，25%的美国妇女服用抑郁症、焦虑症、注意力不集中症以及其他的精神疾病的药物，而男性的比例是15%。一篇文章指出，在过去的几十年里，越来越多的女性去开抗抑郁的药，进行抗焦虑治疗的女性数量是他们的男性伴侣的两倍。一位医生这样解释这差别：女性似乎更喜欢寻求帮助。

Not all are convinced, and with good reason: if one quarter of American women is considered to have a mental abnormality, the notion of normality becomes questionable. Also, if women are portrayed as statistically more unstable, there's concern that we're going to be cast off as "the other" – similar to the way western society's ideological lepers were dismissed as "crazy" and locked in asylums (viz Michel Foucault's Madness and Civilization). The XX Factor's KJ Dell'Antonia puts it this way:

并不是所有的人都信服，他们有很好的理由：如果四分之一的女性精神异常，那么“正常”的概念就值得怀疑了。而且，如果女性从统计学上来说更易变，那我们就该担心我们会被当为“其他人”而被处理掉。这就像西方社会中思想受人蔑视的人被认为是疯子而被开除掉关在精神病院里一样（即米歇尔·傅科的疯癫与文明）。XX因素的KJ 戴尔·安东尼娅这样说：

"One in four is too many. Even if there are bottles and bottles of medicine sitting unused. Even if some of those prescriptions went unfilled. One in four suggests that either women, or our doctors, are being sold on an ideal of mental health that's unrealistic."

“四分之一太多了。即使还有一瓶瓶的药没有被使用，即使有些医药处方空了，然而四分之一意味着女性或者我们的医生都在被理想中的不切实际的心理健康出卖。

I'm not sure, however, that the explanation is that simple. Obviously, sexism often comes into play into these diagnoses, as it has since the classical era. 

但是，我不太确定这个问题的解释是否真的那么简单。显然，从古至今，性别歧视总是在这些调查分析中得到体现。

Much has been written about how women aren't taken seriously by their doctors, who have been known to dole out Valium just to shut them up. On the other hand, it's entirely realistic that so many women feel imbalanced. It's almost shocking that the number isn't much higher, considering that rape culture – and its dire psychological ramifications – remain prevalent in America. (See riot by supporters of Joe Paterno, which shows more intense sympathy for a football coach who seems to have largely overlooked the sexual abuse of minors taking place on his watch at Penn State, than it does for the victims of the alleged perpetrator, Jerry Sandusky)

其中很多都是在说关于女性怎么不重视这些发放少量安定剂让她们闭嘴的医生。从另一方面来说，那么多女人觉得不平衡是很完全真实的。就强奸文化——和它可怕的心理学分支在美国依然盛行而论，这数字没有再高令人匪夷所思。（看看乔·帕特诺的支持者的暴乱，它表现出他们对严重忽视在其任期内发生的性侵未成年人事件的橄榄球队教练有着更多的同情，超过了对受到犯罪嫌疑人杰里·桑达斯基侵害的受害者的同情。）

It's not beyond the realm of reason to think that a widespread psychological malaise might be a very realistic symptom of a broader problem. The Rape, Abuse and Incest National Network reports that one out of every six American women has either been the victim of attempted or completed rape – 17.7 million American women. For men, that number is 3%.

我们并不能排除普遍心理不适可能是一个更宽广的问题的现实症状。强奸、虐待和乱伦国内网报道说，在1770万美国妇女当中，每六个中就有一个是强奸未遂或强奸既遂的受害者。而男性的比例是3%。

"Girls ages 16-19 are four times more likely than the general population to be victims of rape, attempted rape or sexual assault," RAINN stats indicate. The numbers also suggest that 7% of girls in grades 5-8 and 12% of girls in grades 9-12 have been the victims of sexual abuse. For young males, this number is less: 3% and 5%, respectively. Some 60% of these attacks go unreported, and even when reported, bringing cases to trial and obtaining convictions is notoriously difficult, meaning that a mere 6% of rapists wind up doing jail time. 

16-19岁的女孩成为强奸、试图强奸或性侵犯的受害者的概率是一般人的四倍。RAINN统计表明。统计数字还指明，7%的5-8年级的女孩子和12%的9-12年级的女孩遭到性虐待。男性的比例则较少，分别是3%和5%。这些侵犯案件的60%没有被报道，即使被报道了，案件进入审判程序并定罪也是很困难的。也就是说，只有6%的强奸犯最后进了监狱。

Understandably, victims of these crimes tend to feel traumatised, often experiencing depression, anxiety, post-traumatic stress disorder and suicidal thoughts, RAINN notes. That could certainly explain a significant proportion of the mental unease reported by women. Of course, a significant proportion of women aren't going to feel "normal" and "happy" when they have been victimised – and live in a society where they tend to get blamed and ostracised for these aggressions. Of course, a significant number of women aren't going to feel "balanced" and "rational": even if they aren't the victims of sexual violence, the threat constantly looms. From early adolescence, we are taught to be on our guard and vigilant at all times. After all, if something bad happens – from a subway masturbator to a brutal assault – authorities might turn a blind eye, or suggest that the victim's way of dress prompted the attack.

RAINN表明，我们可以理解这些受害者极度受惊，往往会绝望，焦虑，创伤后压力心理障碍，有自杀念头。这当然很大比例地解释了报道中的女性心里不安。当然，大多数的女性身受其害时不会感觉正常和快乐，他们生活在一个会因为遭侵犯而被人们谴责和排斥的社会。当然，很大一部分女性不会觉得平衡和理性，即使他们并不是性暴力的受害者，因为暴力威胁若隐若现。在青春期前期，我们一直被告诫要保持警惕。毕竟，如果有什么坏事发生了，从地铁手淫者到残暴侵袭，政府当局可能会视而不见或者暗示是受害者的着装激起了攻击。

Even non-violent pressures – such as sexual harassment, from which far more women suffer – collectively chisel away at our sense of self-worth. It's naive to think that self esteem – required for mental health – can flourish in an environment that routinely tells us that what we are is just "T&A".

甚至非暴力如更多女性遭受的性骚扰的压力，也会集体凿掉我们的自我价值。在这样一个例行公事地告诉我们只能得到或接受的环境里，认为心理健康所必需的自尊能兴旺那真是太天真了。

That one in four women takes mental health medication should not be that surprising. That we're still treating the symptoms of our sick-making sexual politics in 2011, rather than the cause of the epidemic, should be surprising and entirely inexcusable.

四分之一的女性进行精神治疗并不稀奇。我们2011年仍然在研究病患的性关系症状而不是传染病的起因，这才令人惊讶并且完全无法辩解。