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About this quote

What does it mean?
Debs blames the oppressive economic system for driving people to madness rather than mental illness itself.
In plain terms
He hates the system that makes people crazy more than the hospitals for them.
What can you take from it?
Address root causes of suffering rather than just treating symptoms.

Where it applies

  • public health policy
  • social reform discussions
  • mental health advocacy

Putting it to work

  • study social causes of illness
  • advocate for economic reform
  • reform healthcare systems

Questions to consider

  • What causes mental health crises?
  • How much is society to blame?

Another view

It simplifies complex mental health issues to purely economic causes.

More from Eugene V. Debs

  1. Chicago is the product of modern capitalism, and, like all other great commercial centers, is unfit for human habitation.

    Permalink to quote #9
  2. The Elgin writer says that we shall 'jeopardize the best interests of the Socialist Party' if we insist upon the political equality of the Negro. I say that th…

    Permalink to quote #11
  3. What the workingmen of the country are profoundly interested in is the private ownership of the means of production and distribution, the enslaving and degradi…

    Permalink to quote #8

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