
Developers and Depression - saurabh
https://vimeo.com/72690223
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jetti
I find it great the acceptance of talks like this as it shows progress.
However, I feel like depression (and to an extent bi-polar) is the "easiest"
of the mental illnesses to understand when one is in a position of never
having the illness. Most people have been sad at one point in their life so
they could relate to the depressed part and most people have been full of
energy so they could possibly relate to mania. It is relate-able.

The problem is with the other mental illnesses, that aren't so relate-able.
For instance, there I have schizoaffective disorder. I have talked with people
in real life about the depression aspect and even my self mutilation, but very
few people know about my "schizo" part of my illness. I think maybe 3 people
in my life know and 2 of those 3 don't know the extent. I can explain sadness,
but how does one explain homicidal ideation without alarming somebody? How
does one explain the type of delusions that somebody with my illness can have?
Now imagine that there is a talk of me saying that I quite frequently have
homicidal ideation. Do you think a hiring manager who saw that video after
giving a quick google would want to hire me? My guess is that they would be
scared that I would commit workplace violence, despite me having no intention
to actually act on my thoughts (the thoughts are just there).

Unfortunately, even this community isn't immune from the shaming. There is a
certain developer who has created incredible software, software that many
people only could dream of creating, and he did it all by himself but he gets
no praise. Instead, his illness is the target of ridicule. The threads (here
and reddit) that contain his work are just littered with comments making fun
of him.

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agumonkey
Website made by the speaker to address this topic
[http://www.devpressed.com/latest/more](http://www.devpressed.com/latest/more)

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hltbra
Amazing talk. I need to forward it to a lot of friends...

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agumonkey
The reddit thread about this talk says the same. It seems it's describing many
many of us.

