What happens when people demand that mental health stay “apolitical”?

In this solo episode I unpack a real time online confrontation that exposed something deeper than an argument: the belief that comfort should come before truth, and that some people don’t deserve a political voice at all.

Drawing on psychology, lived experience, and what it means to live in a city where violence isn’t abstract, I explore why trauma can’t be separated from systems, why silence is often mistaken for neutrality, and why mental health spaces become dangerous when they don't name harm.

This isn’t about being divisive.

It’s about being honest.

Because healing that refuses to speak when people are being erased isn’t healing. It’s compliance.

Sources:

World Health Organization (WHO).
Mental Health: Strengthening Our Response.

American Psychological Association (APA).
Stress in America (annual reports).

Bonanno, G. A., et al. (2011).“Weighing the Costs of Avoidant Coping.”
Psychological Science.

Jost, J. T., & Banaji, M. R. (1994).“The Role of Stereotyping in System-Justification and the Production of False Consciousness.”
Psychological Review.

Bennett, W. L., & Segerberg, A. (2012).
The Logic of Connective Action.
Information, Communication & Society.

Fricker, M. (2007).
Epistemic Injustice: Power and the Ethics of Knowing.Oxford University Press.

Decety, J., & Cowell, J. M. (2014).“The Complex Relation Between Morality and Empathy.”
Frontiers in Psychology.