Invisible disabilities in the workplaces
The first part got my attention because he said that, as a child, he never considered his autoimmune diseases to be a handicap. Why? I can only think about his upbringing. Because in my research about narcissism I've noticed how some people thrive while others play the victim. It really depends on how you perceive the world and yourself. That's not some path which was predetermined by biology. Social and environmental factors play a huge role into shaping people's behaviors and minds. It's my belief that there isn't a single cause: "let's blame this gene, let's blame parents, let's blame school". No!!! Can we stop blaming in the first place? As a matter of my knowledge about narcissism, excessive blaming all things that aren't yourself is one big issue about self-absorbed / self-centered people in general. As much as excessive self-blaming is also a sign of some serious mental challenges.
I think that the core of his message is that we should avoid labelling people and relying on stereotypes. Misunderstanding and misconceptions are what cause misdiagnosis for instance. When we have too many misconceptions, too much misunderstanding. That's when we let prejudice cloud our views and in extreme cases, give birth to racism, xenophobia and wars. To give a practical example of bias and misconceptions.
Learning about narcissism made me realize that I had one bias, a prejudice of sorts. Good and bad people are not defined by disorders, physical disabilities or diseases. We tend to have a shallow view and judge based on stereotypes, such that we expect disabilities to mean low quality or low performance. Or to pity people based on disabilities. That's the point in Jason Reid's video. What if the disability is invisible? Then we, biased by this strong association between something visible and how the person performs, create false assumptions about that person. In this case, no visible disability would mean that the person must have low performance because they are (any negative attribute here). We also are very much biased to make associations between good character and bad character and disorders. With NPD (Narcissistic Personality Disorder) this is a very common misconception. Is every blind person a nice person who would never steal or lie? Not quite. Some types of criminals take advantage of bias to get by while avoiding being caught.
At school I wrote essays about how people with disabilities and athletes share the same concept of overcoming barriers in life. Now, decades later, I have a very different view on the same matter. I used to believe that a person missing a leg or an arm would never be a criminal and that most violent crimes are perpetrated by evil people and evil people must have some mental condition. This is precisely the same bias that causes people to suspect that black people are more likely to steal than white people. Dr. Guido Palomba is a famous brazillian forensic psychiatrist who tries to debunk this common sense that crimes and mental disorders are the cause or the consequence of the other. While extreme and bizarre crimes are linked to mental health, those are the exceptions to the rule.
I personally disagree about calling a disability a superpower. But that's a whole different debate that I'm not going to include here. My stance here is that a disability is a disability and whether the person with a disability is going to be good or bad at something, it heavily depends on mental health.
Fun fact: How did I found this guy? I was looking for somebody else with same name (Jason Reid) because I was trying to find another video of an important topic which is the prevention of suicide of kids. This: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PW7Cx3iYYLk
Another fun fact: I am good at writing like Jason Reid (the canadian one). But I've never thought about journalism or literature. Again, social and environmental factors. My path is completely different from his.
