Elon Musk, Ye, and God were on a desert island…it sounds like the start of a joke, but it is the image I get in my head when I see another news headline about these two “visionaries.”
What makes these stories interesting to me is that I recognize the brilliant and disturbing elements of a bipolar mind. That’s because I could be that mind right now. But, add billions of dollars to that, and you have a recipe for disaster that affects millions of people, for good and bad.
In my case, without the butterfly effect, my bipolar actions would not affect so many, but perhaps with just as much depth in terms of my loved ones. But, there’s this seemingly sheer irresponsibility of these two people letting their mental health seemingly go unchecked.
I’m reluctant to talk about two men’s psychological states that I have no special privy to. However, Ye has talked about being diagnosed with bipolar disorder while also sharing that he has chafed at treatment and/or characterization. Musk has hinted at this disorder, tweeting and discussing it, but never suggesting that it’s been treated, if he is bipolar. But, from an outsider's perspective of someone with managed bipolar disorder, I can’t help but see myself in their behavior.
In my case, that behavior hasn’t occurred for years. But once bipolar, always bipolar, no matter managed it might be.
The erratic and self-aggrandizing discourse of Ye and Musk, on top of rash/contradictory decisions, is hard to interpret as anything but manifestations of mania. The difference though between my mania is that this disordered mood-fueled delusional destruction takes place on a world stage.
Oh, how dangerous you are on social media, you. The elixir of bipolar disorder, the capitalization of the enduring shame on your reputation. There’s no putting the disorder back in the bottle with this digital landscape.
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