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I Am Queer and Mentally Ill. Get a Clue, Mark Zuckerberg.

We are not mentally ill because we are queer or trans. Nor are we queer or trans because we are mentally ill.

Rand Bishop
Prism & Pen

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Graphic from The State of Mental Health in America, screen shot by the author

Updated policies at Meta for Facebook, Instagram, and Threads — recently announced by Mark Zuckerberg — now specifically clear the way for posts accusing folks of mental illness simply because they are queer or trans.

We do allow allegations of mental illness or abnormality when based on gender or sexual orientation.

— from Meta’s official announcement.

Why?

One has to wonder what incentive Zuckerberg and Meta had to detail this policy change with such targeted specificity.

After all, gender identity and sexual orientation are not irrational behaviors. In fact, they’re not behaviors at all. These labels represent who a person is, not how a person acts or what they do.

Not that someone has to actually act irrationally to qualify as mentally ill. A person might even be coocoo for Coco Puffs and never reveal or demonstrate their insanity. But that possibility exists for straight people as much as it does for queer and trans folks.

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