Comment by ceejayoz
10 hours ago
By that logic, pediatricians and gynecologists shouldn't exist.
> A national hotline that can handle anyone is clearly the right way.
Absolutely. That describes this setup. You call the number. You get help. Sometimes that means a person trained in, say, talking to rape victims. (If you go to the ER, they'll have a nurse trained in it too!)
Per the article: "Also known as the 'Press 3 option,' the program gave 988 callers the option to 'press 3' to connect with a counselor trained to assist lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer youths and young adults (they could also text 988 with the word 'PRIDE'). Nearly 1.5 million contacts were routed to the LGBTQ service since its launch, according to data available on the SAMHSA website."
Same hotline, just a phone tree option in it.
> pediatricians and gynecologists
Those are physical differences. Which isn’t to say that you’re wrong, but we could easily have different things for physical differences and not for mental differences. Should we have different prisons for gays? Same logic, no?
The leading theories for the biological underpinnings of same-sex attraction are also physical—some combination of genes, prenatal environment, and biochemistry—so this argument fails both ways.
It’s moot in any case because the whole point is identifying groups of people who benefit from help tailored at their situation so it’d make sense to specialize even if it was a choice. If we saw tons football fans more likely to contemplate suicide after the Super Bowl we’d want to support them even though that’s unambiguously social. Helping people is what makes civilization worth having.
You're right, maybe we should have the same counselors handling calls from 13 year olds girls and veterans, after all, what's the difference?
> Those are physical differences.
Good; we agree differences in a patient/customer may require special training/handling.
> Should we have different prisons for gays?
Again, this wasn't a different hotline. Just a phone tree option.
I suspect prisons, at times, have to manage things specific to gay inmates. Seems like it could cause roommate situations to be accounted for, as an example.
> I suspect prisons, at times, have to manage things specific to gay inmates.
doubtful. There's no customer service in prison nor the ability to speak with the manager.
4 replies →
Psychologists and therapists have different specialties too, for mental differences. This is generally considered a good thing.
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