If you argue you may be mentally ill?

If you are a free thinker, or argue and don't respect authority you may be, according to the American Psychiatric Association, mentally ill.

You may in fact be suffering from “oppositional defiant disorder” or ODD.

Oh dear. It would appear that having your own thoughts and views may actually be a sign that you should be drugged by the latest wonder medicine from who knows which company.

These kind of diagnoses worry me, there seems to be so little room for the person who chooses not to confirm to a medically drawn stereotypical model of what a 21st century citizen should be. It is rather like the gulags of Soviet era Russia when to think other than the way you were told to was a sign of mental illness.

Our modern day, western version of the gulag is not some cold prison cell in a remote location, but a chemical concoction that seeks to smooth away all the rough edges of personality and thought until conformance is achieved.

Check the link to read more about DSM IV and this 'disorder'