A Threat to the Empire

The British Raj was so paranoid about coming off as weak that they stigmatized mental health issues among their own people.

🛑 Before we get into it, quick note: we made this post in collaboration with @thedesicondition . They have a podcast and post all kinds of cool resources re: mental health in the desi diaspora community. We love them. Ok, back to our scheduled programming 🛑

Many Europeans living in India suffered from mental health issues. After all, colonization was a pretty cruel practice, so it’s hard to imagine any mid-level government official was truly living-their-best-life™️ while seeing Indians around them being treated poorly.

So the British East India Company created asylums specifically for Europeans. These were highly profitable endeavors. They started enticing British doctors to come to India to profit off the “trade in lunacy,” and touted the number of jobs available 🧑🏻‍⚕️👨🏻‍⚕️🧑🏻‍⚕️

But this booming business created another problem. If South Asians (and the world) saw all of these Europeans with mental health issues, it would erode the theory of racial superiority 💪

So one by one, these Europeans were sent back to Britain ⛵⛵Oh, by the way, this didn’t mean that the Company stopped making money off them. They stayed in the mental asylum system over in England (where they were likely charged even more! 🤑🤑🤑)

Eventually, the Company established "Native-only" asylums in South Asia, and they of course found a way to turn a profit from these institutions as well 💰All patients were forced to perform manual labor, producing goods that the British Empire would then export and sell.

🟣🟣Tl;dr mental illness wasn't a threat to just the crown, but the entire empire. Yikes. 🟣🟣