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Men are opening up about mental health to AI instead of humans

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  • I can't believe I'm going to have to explain this, but it's a meme reference: https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/instead-of-going-to-therapy

    Yeah, memes, common jokes, can be employed for unhelpful purposes, in unhelpful ways.

    You are basically saying 'its just a joke bro!' when its clear that a lot of people, in general, and here in this thread, are tired of this joke, as it is dismissive and reductive.

  • You're still confusing the two sentences. Haah, why do I even bother?

    Probably because you can't read

  • Therapy is just littered with bad therapists, that do more harm than good and give the practice a bad name.

    This has long been my experience. Although I believe that great therapists are out there, I have yet to encounter someone who didn't blame me for the problems and cause me to feel rejected. The last person I went to looked over the intake testing and told me that nobody would want me as a client. No joke. I convinced him to let me stay but nothing happened and I burned out after 3 months or so and stopped going.

    I'm sorry, you don't deserve that.

    If you have the mental energy/space, there are usually state therapists boards of some kind that you can call and report that behavior too... Too few people do that, though (and I'm including myself on that list), because a lot of people who seek out therapists are in a bad, vulnerable state and just don't have the mental space to go through with reporting these assholes like they deserved.

  • Part of me is ok with this in that any avenue to get mental health resources can be better than nothing. What worries me is that people will use ChatGPT for this sort of thing and these models will not be good help.

    I'll admit I tried talking to a local deepseek about a minor mental health issue one night when I just didn't want to wake up/bother my friends. Broke the AI within about 6 prompts where no matter what I said it would repeat the same answer word-for-word about going for walks and eating better. Honestly, breaking the AI and laughing at it did more for my mental health than anything anyone could have said, but I'm an AI hater. I wouldn't recommend anyone in real need use AI for mental health advice.

  • Part of me is ok with this in that any avenue to get mental health resources can be better than nothing. What worries me is that people will use ChatGPT for this sort of thing and these models will not be good help.

    Honestly of they could program a halfway decent AI therapist then art least it could take some of the load off our already insufficient mental health professionals by dealing with the lighter-weight cases, leaving the psychotherapists free to deal with the especially sick people.

  • Like... yeah?

    Tried to open to a girlfriend about a sensitive topic - she got the ick.

    Tried to make an appointment with a psychiatrist - got a very hateful rejection because of my place of birth.

    Damn, even when I try to uplift a friend, I use phrases like 'you got this before, you'll get it now'.

    I don't know how to be a man, mentally

    Become a rich jacked sociopath.

    That’s most manly thing you can do apparently.

  • The best therapist in the world can still end your career by causing your clearance to be revoked or rendering you unqualified for your unit’s mission.

    (Suicide is a big problem in the military, I lost a buddy to it.)

    The cheapest therapist in the world may still not be covered by your insurance. (And nothing you write in reply will alter that.)

    They should work to make AI therapy better while keeping it totally anonymous. If it were really good it would be the number one use for running a local and disconnected and air gapped LLM: perfectly private therapy with no “we just use telemetry to improve our product” bullshit.

    Then maybe a lot more men would seek help/talk about their thoughts and feelings.

    The best therapist in the world can still end your career by causing your clearance to be revoked or rendering you unqualified for your unit’s mission.

    I'm not in the military but I've worked with ts/sci cleared folks at a tech company, and this sounds odd to me. Can you explain a little more here? What's an example of a problem that, if discussed in therapy, could result in revocation of a security clearance?

  • Probably because you can't read

    Haha, don't project your own problems onto me, man.

  • Honestly of they could program a halfway decent AI therapist then art least it could take some of the load off our already insufficient mental health professionals by dealing with the lighter-weight cases, leaving the psychotherapists free to deal with the especially sick people.

    The real problem becomes when bad or non scientific advice gets regurgitated to people over and over.

  • A profound relational revolution is underway, not orchestrated by tech developers but driven by users themselves. Many of the 400 million weekly users of ChatGPT are seeking more than just assistance with emails or information on food safety; they are looking for emotional support.

    “Therapy and companionship” have emerged as two of the most frequent applications for generative AI globally, according to the Harvard Business Review. This trend marks a significant, unplanned pivot in how people interact with technology.

    AI is what cracked my egg shell, fucking wild...

  • A profound relational revolution is underway, not orchestrated by tech developers but driven by users themselves. Many of the 400 million weekly users of ChatGPT are seeking more than just assistance with emails or information on food safety; they are looking for emotional support.

    “Therapy and companionship” have emerged as two of the most frequent applications for generative AI globally, according to the Harvard Business Review. This trend marks a significant, unplanned pivot in how people interact with technology.

    As long as the AI doesn't suggests violence.

  • i pivot to wealth inequality because the wealthy have all the resources and the rest of us don't have enough.

    that includes access to medical care and mental care. easiest way to get healthcare and therapy is to be rich so you can pay out of pocket and skip the limits/lines imposed by insurance companies.

    a lot of people's mental and health problems would also simple be alleviated by being able to have better food and a better work-life balance, both which are privileges of the wealthy that the less economically fortunate do not have access to.

    these are straight facts, but i'm sure you'll go into denial mode about how the poor and mentally unwell should just become their own therapists or something.

    No, you pivot to wealth inequality because wealth inequality is a populist left argument popular on populist left platforms like lemmy. Your blanket statement about therapists being women and women not understanding the male perspective are sexist and incorrect and so you move the goal posts by reframing the argument as opposed to address the rightful criticisms of your previous statement. What is with people on the internet trying to speak like politicians? We can read the words you typed.

  • The real problem becomes when bad or non scientific advice gets regurgitated to people over and over.

    So... AI.

  • Also talking to ChatGPT, if done anonymously, won’t ruin your career.

    (Thinking of AD military, where they tell you help is available but in reality it will and maybe should cost you your security clearance.)

    won’t ruin your career

    Granted, but it still will suck a fuck ton of coal produced electricity.

  • how many well trained therapists are there out there who are totally objective, compared to poorly trained ones who will often perpetual their harmful biases?

    does anyone know? how do we even measure that? do we just assume people who have a certain degree from a certain program are inherently 'objective'?

    No, but that's not the argument you were making before. You said therapists are women, women don't understand the male perspective, implying therapy is ineffective. Ironically, those most hostile towards mental health treatment and self-analysis are often those with the least amount of time in counseling/therapy. Often the ones that would benefit the most out of it. The goal of a therapist is not to make you feel understood, a therapist is supposed to help you understand and come to conclusions about yourself, so that you can improve your life. Everything about coming to terms with neuropathy/trauma/coping mechanisms takes work and self-discipline. Hand-waving away people's lived experience categorically stating that mental healthcare is ineffective, based on your own (I would bet) extremely limited experience with the field. That's a lot easier. See how you're asking me

    how many well trained therapists are there out there who are totally objective, compared to poorly trained ones who will often perpetual their harmful biases?

    does anyone know? how do we even measure that? do we just assume people who have a certain degree from a certain program are inherently ‘objective’?

    As if that de-legitimises any point that I have made in response to those statements? That is childish. See how when it's your narrow perspective, you view it as reason enough to make blanket statements about therapy, women and mental healthcare as a whole? But, when I offer mine and critique yours instead of addressing the points I make, you expand the scope? To the point I have to contend with Bias over an entire field study and healthcare? That's because your argument is weak, it's a fallacy and it's based on conjecture. I assure you, everyone has biases but again, therapists are there to help you come to conclusions, not give advice. The most harmful bias anyone can have is there own personal biases, which if left unchecked, allows the ego to feel secure, but stops you from growing as a person. That's why you spaz out and attack therapy as an institution, because my drawing attention to and invalidating your biased opinion makes the ego feel threatened. That's why you turn it from a conversation into a confrontation, because an argument you feel you can win. If you acknowledge your position is incorrect/prejudiced then that feels like a problem within the self. Which we can't stand, because in a world of diffuse human interaction we are all the protagonist and we want people to like us. Which is an insight you would have if you had actually ever gone to therapy.

  • Haha, not every place is in the US. Hopefully, I won't face this kind of treatment as I do not live in that shit hole of a country

    I never said it was the US, do rules and regulations governing doctors behavior not exist in your country?

  • Part of me is ok with this in that any avenue to get mental health resources can be better than nothing. What worries me is that people will use ChatGPT for this sort of thing and these models will not be good help.

    AI will reinforce delusional thinking. This is definitely not good.

  • The real problem becomes when bad or non scientific advice gets regurgitated to people over and over.

  • read the whole comment

    I did, but your main assertion that therapists are women, women don't understand the male perspective therefore mental healthcare for men, (like talk therapy and counseling) are ineffective. Is not just completely wrong, it is dangerous. You start talking about how gendered biases effect the outcome of therapy. Ignoring that psychology is an incredibly complex, extremely well-documented, highly diverse and well regarded field of study, That's like saying you wouldn't trust a female virtuoso guitarist to perform 'Master of Puppets' because her female perspective would bias her against playing a solo written by a man. I am a man, I have had some success in therapy and counseling. I need more work, I'll admit. But, all of the best practitioners I have worked with have been women. If you go to counseling, with a social worker, or a master's student in psychology, yeah that can be a bit dodgy. But the idea that a registered psychotherapist, a doctor, would not be able to provide effective treatment because women can't understand men is absolutely petulant. It is a myth, pervaded by a lot of influential male voices online and pop-psychology. It misunderstands the whole purpose of talk therapy and then it's mis-characterised as "giving advice" and "putting biases in your head." When psychotherapists are literally just there to help you confront and come to terms with things that you identify are affecting your ability to live. This stupid argument is always propped up by the same idea of women not being able to understand the male perspective, goes hand-in-hand with reported instances of mental health disorders. When really, the disparity between the sexes in terms of reported mental issues, is actually because people make arguments like yours. They say "all therapists are women and women don't understand the male perspective" and "women report higher levels of depression and anxiety, therefore mood disorders are women's issues." When, in fact, it is men that dominate the field of psychotherapy, psychology and psychiatry. It is also us men that are killing themselves in record numbers, it is us that drive cars into street markets, it is us that shoot into crowds of people and then turn the gun on ourselves and it is boys that go online and see men like you. Making these harmful, disingenuous, ignorant arguments that makes them believe that their mental health is unimportant and that any pain, or issue they are having difficulty with is their problem and a flaw in themselves. Which just leads to self-victimisation.

    I have read your comment, I have read all of your comments in this thread and your rhetoric is not just wholly emblematic of someone who has never done any meaningful work in therapy, it is dangerous and invalidating to kids who don't have the experience and don't know any better. That's why you expand your argument, from "women therapists" to the entire field, because then it goes from sexist nonsense, to a broader discussion on the existence of human bias in the field. Conveniently, then you don't have to confront the obvious flaws in what you're saying. Personally, I wouldn't trust someone, who has never so much as opened a textbook on abnormal psychology, to be a great judge of the existence of gendered biases in contemporary psychological care. I swear, if more men could be brave enough to admit that we endure psychological strain and experience issues through that strain that manifest in ways that effect our lives, we wouldn't have Trump. Roe V Wade would be codified. So many of today's problems exist because of the stigma round men seeking professional help with their mental health. So, yes I read your whole comment, I recognise your arguments and your perspectives. I say they are categoriaclly prejudiced, unhelpful, disingenuous and dangerous. When young men see this stuff and haven't developed a sense of identity yet, they adopt this. Because this is what they think they're supposed to believe, because boys look to contemporary male ideas and figures to emulate what they perceive to be masculinity. That's how you get idiots on the Internet trying to discredit what is arguably the single most needed field of medicine in the world right now. When those men face crises, in their lives and need help, where do they go? If the main medical avenue of psychotherapy is seen as weak, or feminine or ineffective. Where do they go? That's how you normalise male loneliness and hopelessness. You make young men feel like no one can understand what they're going through, or help them understand themselves and navigate it. That is how you get drug addicts, that is how you get alcoholics. That's how you get radicalisation, incels, domestic terrorists and victims of suicide. So, maybe just stop with the whole injustice over the feeling of being a man whose feelings are not understood. "But therapy doesn't work, because nobody can understand me bro" and actually go to therapy. It might help you empathise with other people's perspectives, perhaps you could analyse why you have these uninformed beliefs about this field of healthcare.

    Which you seem so impassioned about discrediting and maybe it could even help you understand why it feels like no one gets you. Why you feel this is the correct way to approach mental health issues. The effect your words have on the well-being of impressionable members of our sex and what that stigmatisation of mental health problems and empathetic emotional recognition means, for men as a whole. What it means for our feelings about our place in society. It would help all of us, a lot more, than you maligning being told to "man up" whilst also perpetuating the concept of "man up" by spreading actual lies that psychotherapy doesn't work for men. If society's view of male mental health is so troubling to you. Maybe, don't regurgitate misinformation about mental health that specifically invalidates the feelings and experiences of men struggling with addiction, or trauma, or grief, or psychological disturbance? Men, who would otherwise be comfortable enough in their masculinity and strong enough emotionally, to admit they have a problem to seek out professional help. Mental healthcare is healthcare, it is not a moral failing, personal flaw, or emasculating experience. If you actually gave a shit about men's issues you'd understand that. Instead of just, first, trying to sound above it (by being incorrect about what therapy is and largely sexist), then posturing victimhood by co-opting men's issues and trying to make the conversation about how society disregards male feelings and how nobody gets us. Your feelings are your own and you can feel however you'd like about anything. But you don't preface that it's your feelings, or your opinion based on shit you have absorbed from other male figures and spaces. You say this is how it is, before saying that therapists are women who are biased against men. Which is not true and reinforces this idea that men and women are completely diametrically opposed opposites and not just humans with the same breadth of emotions and very similar psychological conditions. Bi-polar depression doesn't care what genitals you have. Trauma effects everyone. Mental health is NOT a gendered issue. Your reasoning throughout this entire thread is deeply flawed, divisive and doesn't even make sense. If you feel like nobody cares about men's feelings and men's psychological and social issues, why is your position to take away one of the only recognised avenues by which men who are suffering can have those issues validated and explore their feelings in a safe, non-judgemental way? That is what you do when you lie like that and misrepresent the purpose and efficacy of psychotherapy.

    You argue for positions directly in opposition to men's issues. It's quite extraordinary. I doubt everything you say about your experiences with therapy, just based on how you talk about it as a gendered issue. Also, the idea that people with biases put ideas in your head. Which is genuinely, just a fallacious red-pill talking point, that completely goes against the process and purpose of talk therapy. It allows men to live in denial about their actions and feelings and also validate those insecurities because nobody understands the male position, society doesn't care and it's not our fault. Which is all well and good, until your misrepresentation leads to someone's death. So, I'll say it again.

    Incel Talk

  • Yeah, but also one of them is helpful and the other is the exact opposite. If the choices are AI therapist or no therapist, you are still better off with no therapist.

    I'm gonna need a source on that.

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