smoontjes's recent activity

  1. Comment on "The therapeutic industry is platonic prostitution" in ~health.mental

    smoontjes
    Link Parent
    No, actually, it does mean that they don't get it. And it is truth to me. Which is why I made this post but I deeply regret it on account of a lot of the responses I got. About half of the people...
    • Exemplary

    No, actually, it does mean that they don't get it. And it is truth to me. Which is why I made this post but I deeply regret it on account of a lot of the responses I got. About half of the people replying in this thread did not in any way understand what I said. Instead they went on self-righteous or at least selfish tangents about crap like I somehow derided sex workers (when??? where???) or that well since therapy worked for them I am therefore wrong about it and I didn't put in enough effort - despite having clearly said in my post that I have done hundreds of hours of therapy. I have fucking tried. Instead I am met with now yet another personal attack being called presumptuous. Why??? For sharing my personal journey and decades-in-the-making experiences and opinions therapy? I haven't been able to figure out how the hell to respond to everyone about it but here you go: I have been extremely hurt how either tone-deaf or willfully misunderstanding a lot of commenters are here. Putting everything I said aside to take things out of context, go off being defensive about daring to criticize the thing that worked for them, and therefore pushing back on whatever the hell I somehow upset them with. Meanwhile I am also having conflicting feelings of being grateful that people took the time to read my write-up in the first place, so how should I even dare to feel offended by responses. There's been 3 comments that actually understood what I said. Another handful engaged meaningfully with my writing but also pushed back which you know what that's fair enough. The rest, about half the comment section, only push back and criticize and it in a sense feels like victim blaming me for not being either good enough at English, good enough at getting my points across, but it doesn't even matter because the damage is already done, my app is reset, my clean streak is gone, all I can feel is regret that I ever dared open my mouth about something so central to my experience as a human. But most of what I got was just being misunderstood, a trigger as old as time for me, people just don't get me, I don't fit in, it's completely meaningless to even try. And I fucking try and try and try to no avail. I spent all night writing this post, I put so much time and energy and thought into it, making it grammatically correct, it's genuinely just the story of my life to do my absolute utmost best and STILL it's NEVER good enough. I even had a disclaimer at the very top of my post because I knew it was controversial, I did not mean to ever offend anyone yet it seems people did take offense and didn't care that I was posting in good faith from what I myself thought was a rational point of view about hardship for years and years and nothing works and ffs just fuck this

    16 votes

  2. Comment on "The therapeutic industry is platonic prostitution" in ~health.mental

    smoontjes
    Link Parent
    Being sandbagged is exactly what I'm feeling by all these responses, thank you.

    Being sandbagged is exactly what I'm feeling by all these responses, thank you.

    4 votes

  3. Comment on "The therapeutic industry is platonic prostitution" in ~health.mental

    smoontjes
    Link Parent
    I'm glad it resonated with you, thank you for the kind words.

    I'm glad it resonated with you, thank you for the kind words.

    3 votes

  4. Comment on "The therapeutic industry is platonic prostitution" in ~health.mental

    smoontjes
    Link Parent
    Thanks for reading and hearing me. I thought that I was being fair too so thanks for seeing that. And the dead fish analogy is great, thanks for sharing that as well.

    Thanks for reading and hearing me. I thought that I was being fair too so thanks for seeing that. And the dead fish analogy is great, thanks for sharing that as well.

    7 votes

  5. Comment on "The therapeutic industry is platonic prostitution" in ~health.mental

    smoontjes
    Link Parent
    Thank you for reading and taking the time to respond in a decent fashion. You understand me exactly.

    Thank you for reading and taking the time to respond in a decent fashion. You understand me exactly.

    9 votes

  6. "The therapeutic industry is platonic prostitution"

    ~health.mental Ask
    If any therapists are reading this, feel free to skip this post or at least know that I do not intend to offend you or your profession. I happened upon that phrase while scrolling somewhere. I...

    If any therapists are reading this, feel free to skip this post or at least know that I do not intend to offend you or your profession.

    I happened upon that phrase while scrolling somewhere. I thought that it is a harsh thing to say and while it is not something I entirely agree with, I also do not entirely disagree with it. It was real provocative too, so it really got me thinking.

    As someone that has done hundreds of hours of therapy with little to show for it, I feel like it is an understandable thing to say because on a deep fundamental level, I truly get it.

    If you are talking to a friend or loved one (who is not being paid to talk to you) about mental health, if you bring up some personal issue, raise a life problem, anything deeper than surface level interpersonal stuff, there is a high likelihood that the conversation will steer towards a version of this question: have you tried therapy?

    That is - probably unintentionally and unbeknownst to them - the signal to me that the conversation is now over. They do not have the mental capacity to talk about it at the moment, maybe they feel they are out of their depth with such a heavy subject matter, or perhaps they do not have the life experience to relate to it. Maybe all of the above. It is all fair enough. So they bring up their best bet for a solution that in their mind might help. It gets very old but I remind myself to appreciate their good faith and good intentions.

    The answer to that question is that yes I have indeed tried therapy. I have tried so much therapy, in fact, that whole teams of therapists have concluded that therapy cannot help me. I would be remiss if I was not open about that bias, and it is probably the reason I have found the incentive to spend so many hours writing this post in the first place.

    The way we behave and interact with each other is unrecognizable compared to just one or two centuries ago before industrialization. It used to be that whatever troubles you were dealing with, you probably had a community around you. Even if you did not talk about what troubled you directly, the people were there to make you feel safe. You didn't have to talk about diagnostic criteria and therapeutic methods and psychiatric theories and mindfulness and self-help resources... you had people to talk to. The simple fact that people were around you all day every day meant that you got on with it and coped with things. You had a neighborhood or village or whatever in which friends and family lived and worked closely together every day. People to talk to all day. That is therapeutic in itself.

    Nowadays, work-life balance is such an enforced thing that connections seem to be in rigid boxes. Not that people are not friends with their coworkers, but it is my impression that it is kind of rare to truly befriend a coworker. So you have a box that is called work, and you have a box that is called life. And you do not much mix them together - you certainly do not talk about heavy life things at work. Big no-no, even though it is the former that takes up a majority of most people's time awake during the week. Not to go on a tangent about capitalism, but the way our entire system is built up around individualism is not something that can be ignored here either. Through urbanization, we seem to have lost our sense of one another. I of course cannot speak to other societies than my own, but I do see these sentiments from people that live in other countries of the western world too.

    I do not think that it is controversial to conclude that individualism can be extremely harmful. The we-society of the past pretty quickly transformed into our current me-society. So much so that "self-help" is a huge industry. A lot of people are getting by just fine of course, but for those of us who are not fitting into boxes, this societal obsession with individualism only worsens our states of mind. Off to school, off to university, off to work, start a family, get married, build a house, mow the lawn, rinse and repeat for the next generation. That is what the majority is doing and they have little to no problems doing it. Some of them think it is so normal and easy, even, that it becomes repetitive so they find themselves calling it the hamster wheel and start writing articles about how boring it is to be married and have children and own property.

    But if you do not fit into those boxes, are not capable of these things, do not have a supportive environment, well good luck to you, there will be no networking, no meaningful connections, there will be major hardship ahead if you have not somehow managed to figure it all out on your own. Due to being even slightly socially inept, behind your peers in any way, or if you chose a different path in life, chances are that you are sooner or later going to run into this so-called platonic prostitution of the therapeutic industry.

    On your own, family might be there but they are not truly supportive, might have a friend or two but they are not really close friends that can be relied upon for important stuff. Try to talk to them about things and they end up distancing themselves because it is either not that kind of relationship or they do not actually care or you are simply too much to handle for them. Therapy becomes the answer when you bring up the tough subjects and the things that happened as a child, be it bullying or emotional neglect or some kind of violence against you that the adults should have been there to protect you from or at least have seen the signs afterwards but never did. You are far enough outside of what is considered the normal problems, or you are already far enough into a long spiral of mental health issues, or far enough into the depths of psychiatric diagnoses that in order for someone to talk to you, to help you, they have to be paid to do it. How humiliating. But you are told therapy is the only way to help you.

    Unfortunately all you can get is one session every two weeks. And the therapist does not even have time for all your problems despite being paid a hefty hourly rate by you or by the system. Come back next time and hope they remember their notes because otherwise you will spend half of their precious scheduled time reiterating your issues and reminding your therapist of your history. But you tell yourself that it is fair enough that they forgot some minor details like the death of your loved one. They are paid to be there, but they are only human after all, you tell yourself it is not fair to expect them to perfectly remember everything. Never mind all the other problems that arose in the time since the previous meeting, but there is not enough time to talk about that. But this is therapy, this will help and things will get better now!

    I would usually spend the rest of the day after a therapy session thinking about what I forgot to bring up. The next day I would try to write a few things down, but once the next session comes around, those things are already out-dated and they do not seem to be relevant anymore. It does not matter anyway because there might have been a new cut on my arm because of things brought up in therapy that there was not enough time to process, and I did not care to hide it, and so now the entire new session is spent treating this tiny symptom of illness instead of the years of trauma that is the reason for it. That is how it has to be because the therapist has rules to follow, a system designed in such a way that something like self-harm must immediately be brought front and center. Forget your traumas for now. Forget your life circumstances. Let us do some breathing exercises! Let us do some grounding techniques! We should engage in some mindfulness!

    Anyone would probably become mentally unwell and fulfill diagnostic criteria for something or other if their living situation became bad enough. Top of your class, job interviews, get romantically involved and move in to a great apartment together, get accepted to university, probably not going to be a whole lot of symptoms there when things are going great and breezing by. Lose it all though and you are suddenly a textbook example of multiple mental illnesses. Have you tried therapy?

    But it will not cure loneliness, unemployment, financial ruin, bad environments, abusive homes. Probably not a lot of therapists would claim that it does, but those unfamiliar certainly do tout it as the cure-all, because they simply do not know better, because individualism is taught as the way of life from the moment you exit the womb. And it is so harmful. The things that therapy claims to solve is to stand on your own two feet and be self-sufficient, self-reliant, stable, need minimal help from the outside. It has even gone so far that a concept of co-dependency has been invented to be a criteria for diagnoses because god forbid you are actually a human being who relies on others like the pack animals we are. Even if you do not rely on others, if you truly desire to do it all on your own, it takes months and months and years and years to get there because of the time between each appointment you can get. It is not even in any way a holistic approach. It is one piece in a huge puzzle, the rest of which you probably cannot even find professional help with.

    Let us say that the solutions to all sorts of problems in life are contained in a big toolbox. All those tools will be needed in one way or another, at one point in time or another, throughout life. Therapists are, for some reason, said to know the entire toolbox. Again, they do not claim this themselves. It is society that vaguely thinks so. But the therapist really only knows how to use a small set of the tools needed to repair you. Hopefully the therapist you find is competent, but you might get unlucky and not even know it before it is too late and damage has been done by the wrong treatment being used. They specialize in specific methods but end up applying the wrong one to you. Laymen put them on a pedestal as a mythical force that can solve all manner of serious and complex issues with just a few words of wisdom here and there, or they have hidden gems of mind blowing advice.

    But as I have come to see it, the cure to most things that therapists try to solve is simply the formation of a bond. Yet when they undergo their training, it is specifically instilled in them that they should not ever form a bond with their clients because they should not get emotionally invested in them on account of it would cause burn-out to take on so much suffering from people every day. So they create a wall between themselves and the client, a distance they proclaim to be healthy for themselves but what most people would think was worryingly cold if it were any other meetings between two humans. But because one part is paying the other, it is fine, and it is also not a real bond with another person anyway because money was exchanged and services provided. It is robotic.

    A bond and a community is what would solve the problems a lot of people who are in therapy have. But we are on average way too individualistic for that. Therapy would not exist to the extent it does if it wasn't so difficult to find solid friends and relationships in modern society. If we all had a tight knit circle that we could lean on, there would not be anywhere near the current demand for therapists and psychologists and psychiatrists and social workers and mentors and advisors and teachers and whatever other mental health professionals I could list.

    The key is that the client-therapist relationship is inherently transactional. And so it can never be the nurturing environment that it needs to be to get better and to improve and to become a functioning individual. Even terms like emotional labour have been invented only to become a commodity through which an entire industry is built. People selling their time to help the less fortunate because they sure as hell will not do it to such an extent for free. Maybe some of them also volunteer their services, but I have a hunch that they are few and far between. They are good people for trying to help, but at the same time, they really are only even talking to me because they are getting paid to. That simple fact ruins any and all feeling of sincerity right away.

    Why is a therapy-like session not something the average person simply just does for their next of kin? A favour to be returned when the time comes. Some people require more, some people require less, and that ought to be fine. But instead we have this whole industry of people that can sell themselves as the solution to oftentimes unsolvable problems. And those that never even tried it will also help sell it because their social media regurgitates fancy terms that sound smart on their feed, making it sound like a miracle.

    But because of our individualistic way of life, or because what we struggle with is outside the norm, or because we did not grow up in a supportive environment, or we experienced things when we were very young, or we do not fit into exact boxes... Whatever it is. It is now entirely socially acceptable for everyone and anyone to say that they cannot deal with this, it is too much, you should get professional help. You do not need a friend, you need therapy.

    50 votes

  7. Comment on What do you think is the best sandwich? in ~food

    smoontjes
    Link
    Danish flæskestegssandwich!!

    Danish flæskestegssandwich!!

    5 votes

  8. Comment on What's a game you're dying to play that doesn't exist? in ~games

    smoontjes
    Link Parent
    Yes I have no trust in Blizzard to make it. I'm sure they will try at some point in the future, possibly after the next expansion which will wrap up this World Soul Saga unless they just keep...

    Yes I have no trust in Blizzard to make it. I'm sure they will try at some point in the future, possibly after the next expansion which will wrap up this World Soul Saga unless they just keep making endless amounts of WoW expansions, successful or not. Either way there's a reason it doesn't exist.

    WoW2 would push boundaries, be a refresher to a stale genre, break new ground, etc. I really enjoyed something like New World in the first few days or weeks of playing it. It was a modern take on the MMORPG but as we all know it failed miserably once its lack of content became obvious. So WoW2 would have modern combat, it would have modern graphics, thoroughly designed environments, je ne sais quoi! I don't really have any concrete answers as to what it should be I guess. Just a sort of vague wish for a continuously fulfilling gaming experience in a world I've loved and liked and at times disliked across 20 years of gaming.

    2 votes

  9. Comment on Midweek Movie Free Talk in ~movies

    smoontjes
    Link Parent
    Yes! Definitely agreed on the modern masculinity look that she has. First Cow was incredible for the way it dealt with that platonic male relationship. It's probably the best display of male...

    Yes! Definitely agreed on the modern masculinity look that she has. First Cow was incredible for the way it dealt with that platonic male relationship. It's probably the best display of male friendship I've seen in a film, even including female friendships on screen, it would still be a top contender. Male directors or scriptwriters maybe are not in touch with that side of themselves? Because yeah good observation, it's funny/odd that male directors don't or can't do that.

    1 vote

  10. Comment on Midweek Movie Free Talk in ~movies

    smoontjes
    Link Parent
    To quote the father in The Mastermind, this is outside my expertise haha. I can say though that these slow movies require being in a certain state of mind and mood. Showing Up particularly was...

    To quote the father in The Mastermind, this is outside my expertise haha. I can say though that these slow movies require being in a certain state of mind and mood. Showing Up particularly was good for me mostly because unfortunately relating a lot to Michelle Williams' character in it. Not much happening is a difficult thing to tackle in film, because it has to be the right kind of not much happening, and Reichardt gets it right most of the time, which is what makes her a great filmmaker.

    1 vote

  11. Comment on Midweek Movie Free Talk in ~movies

    smoontjes
    (edited )
    Link
    I've been watching Kelly Reichardt movies and she is overall doing something really special I find. It's definitely an acquired taste and the only one I didn't like was her latest one, The...

    I've been watching Kelly Reichardt movies and she is overall doing something really special I find. It's definitely an acquired taste and the only one I didn't like was her latest one, The Mastermind, which on the other hand made me understand what people probably feel about all her other movies, so I can thank it for that perspective at least. Like the barn scene, why!? It also reconfirmed my extreme utter intense seething total hatred for jazz scores. Ruins its movies every time, good fucking grief.

    So anyway what she does is just very slow pace, atmosphere, vibes, slice of life, down to earth, human to human, character studies. Here's my ratings of her films.

    Wendy and Lucy (2008) - 7/10

    Meek's Cutoff (2010) - 7/10

    Night Moves (2013) - 7/10

    Certain Women (2016) - 6/10

    First Cow (2019) - 8/10

    Showing Up (2022) - 7/10

    The Mastermind (2025) - 4/10

    3 votes

  12. Comment on What's a game you're dying to play that doesn't exist? in ~games

    smoontjes
    Link
    World of Warcraft 2

    World of Warcraft 2

    2 votes

  13. Comment on Final Fantasy Resonance | Trailer in ~games

    smoontjes
    Link Parent
    Oh wow it's €50 lol, it looks like the type of game that should be at most €20.

    Oh wow it's €50 lol, it looks like the type of game that should be at most €20.

    5 votes

  14. Comment on People who want less AI are breaking up with Google Search in ~tech

    smoontjes
    Link Parent
    I switched to DDG just yesterday after becoming fed up with hallucinated or useless Google results. Was also a bit strange that there was AI on it but yeah, at least it was incredibly easy to...

    I switched to DDG just yesterday after becoming fed up with hallucinated or useless Google results. Was also a bit strange that there was AI on it but yeah, at least it was incredibly easy to switch it off - not a setting hidden somewhere, not some weirdness about adjusting the browser's settings, etc.

    Having an on/off button is deserving of compliments. The bar is so low nowadays..

    13 votes

  15. Comment on Alternatives to a straw hat in ~life.style

  16. Comment on Games journalist Jason Schreier has started a YouTube channel in ~games

    smoontjes
    Link
    Since nobody explained who is he: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jason_Schreier

    Since nobody explained who is he: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jason_Schreier

    American journalist and author who primarily covers the video game industry. He worked as a news reporter for Kotaku from 2011 to 2020 and was recognized for several investigative stories, particularly on the crunch culture within the industry. In April 2020, Schreier joined the technology focus team at Bloomberg News.

    13 votes

  17. Comment on TV Tuesdays Free Talk in ~tv

    smoontjes
    Link
    Been watching a ton of stuff, small reviews. Daredevil: Born Again (season 2) - 5/10. Not much special but still passable, some things getting repetitive, awful ending, overall entertaining...

    Been watching a ton of stuff, small reviews.

    Daredevil: Born Again (season 2) - 5/10. Not much special but still passable, some things getting repetitive, awful ending, overall entertaining enough.

    The Punisher: One Last Kill - 3/10. A nonsensical turd.

    Jack Ryan: Ghost War - 5/10. Had some pretty neat scenes but it was an unfortunate end to a series that started really well yet ultimately suffered from not living up to its potential.

    The Studio - 6/10. Really fun show, fun characters, a bit too goofy though. The "oners" are also just always distracting to me, I find it almost only ever detracts from the viewing experience. But yeah clever show and tons of laugh out loud moments.

    The Pitt (season 2) - 8/10. Dialed back a bit from season 1 but what a great show. Binged the whole season in a day.

    Euphoria (season 3) - 4/10. Season 1 was a 9.5/10 for me and season 2 was a 8/10. No clue what they were thinking with this last season. I do not know enough swear words in the English language to describe how fucking weird a turn it took. It went from a great stylized high octane drama about teenage life to some kind of attempt to copy Tarantino movies.

    2 votes

  18. Comment on Hi, how are you? Mental health support and discussion thread (June 2026) in ~health.mental

    smoontjes
    Link
    Still hanging in there. I got denied permanent welfare not too long ago and was told it would take years, nothing concrete, just a vague "we'll see" type of message. The system sucks. Mind you I...

    Still hanging in there.

    I got denied permanent welfare not too long ago and was told it would take years, nothing concrete, just a vague "we'll see" type of message. The system sucks. Mind you I do still have welfare but it's not enough to lead a dignified life and it's been this way for years already - I'm not even allowed to make savings beyond about €2000 in the bank account. I could do about €100-200 per month which isn't much, but being forced to spend what I do manage to save (invested in a new PC that should last me the better part of a decade) is a shitty feeling. At least I'm housed and not going hungry. But I can't afford to move back near family. So on the hierarchy of needs I think I'm only on the first step of the five.

    Mental health is awful. Most days are a struggle and loneliness is crushing - I'm grateful for my online friends but it's just not the same as doing stuff in real life. I have developed bad agoraphobia the last few years and don't leave my (tiny studio) apartment most days. I barely even open the curtains because then it feels like having to allow the world in, which is also a struggle. There's a lot of noisy people in my building too so sometimes it feels unsafe - feels, not is.

    At least I'm holding off on doing silly things to myself, almost 3 months this time around. Frankly it's mostly because it's summer and there's a couple of big events in the family where I can't/won't sit around overheating from being forced to cover up. Self harm is of course merely a symptom of my superduper great big fun cocktail of disorders, which are still largely untreated because I can't afford privatized care. We have socialized health care in my country but it's lacking so despite some intense treatments 2-3 years ago, they can no longer help me. I am getting some help from social workers from the municipality but it's not exactly a cure to anything. It's the best the system can do though.

    So yeah days are spent mostly trying to pass the time and distract myself from whatever negative shit happens to be on my mind that day. It's usually the same things pressing though: financials, dysphoria, self-worth, loneliness, dark thoughts, no future, and so on. So I'll entire seasons of tv shows in a day, or 2-3 movies, or video games for hours. Because the only way that I can keep going is to stay distracted. If I'm not constantly distracting my mind, I just spiral and start having to fight especially self harm urges.

    I don't really feel alive - the welfare system allows people to survive, not live - so I'm surviving I guess. A bland existence that I think would make anyone kind of a nihilist. But I'm still here, mostly because a few people would be sad if I wasn't, I guess.

    8 votes

  19. Comment on What change would make you quit Tildes? in ~tildes

    smoontjes
    Link Parent
    I never use Tildes on my phone but I did try it once and even sent the dev some donations for the effort! Would you mind posting a screenshot or two of how it looks?

    I never use Tildes on my phone but I did try it once and even sent the dev some donations for the effort!

    Would you mind posting a screenshot or two of how it looks?

    3 votes

  20. Comment on Denmark gets four-party centre-left government after months of negotiations in ~society

    smoontjes
    Link

    Denmark's Frederiksen secures third term as prime minister

    "A government was able to be formed, after long negotiations," she told reporters after meeting with the country's king, Frederik X.

    The 48-year-old previously stood up to US President Donald Trump in response to his threats to take over Greenland, an autonomous Danish territory.

    Neither Denmark's right- nor left-wing bloc secured a majority in the March 24 election, resulting in a hung parliament. Frederiksen's Social Democrats emerged at their weakest since 1903 with 38 seats but remained the largest party. Frederiksen's new coalition holds 82 of the 179 seats in parliament. While that is short of the 90 seats needed for a majority, minority governments are common in Denmark and usually rely on support from other parties.

    1 vote