What does our modern society perceive as normal?

As you say ' a world with no points of reference'. I won't get started with my lecture but humans do need boundaries set out by the society in which they live. Potted version of my soap box lecture!

Don’t worry, give it a few years and they’ll work it out and swing the other way. ‘‘Twas always thus.

Alice in Wonderland has always been subjective hasn’t it? Especially surrounding madness (it was to do with the use of mercury in millinery wasn’t it?) It’s inspired fashion and all sorts of other things. I can’t see how this interpretation will hurt.

I would not be unduly concerned about this latest interpretation of Alice in Wonderland. The original story deals with the mental health issues of most of the characters and the uncertainty of childhood in Victorian times.

Not sure why this would seem problematic.
As a society we need to normalise things, is human nature, but this can exclude some groups, especially those with mental health problems, so accepting that they may feel marginalised and so seeking to be more inclusive isn’t a bad thing. Society will still insist upon norms otherwise this debate wouldn’t be taking place but we can accept some latitude.

My opinion is
I dont see anything wrong with the play itself. It may help some people.
I wouldnt mind seeing it myself maybe, so long as it did not go too far for me.

But, yes I agree, there have to be boundaries. Twas always thus.

From your op
I think I would feel challenged at all the changes if I were you.
Are you able to escape your area for a while?

Get out into nature? Personally I find nature very soothing.
When things get on top of me, I get out of the house. It gives me a different, much needed perspective.

I read the article and found the concept interesting.

I think a lot of mental illness is around not being able to be 'normal' in other people's eyes. There is so much more to learn about what is 'illness' ie a short or chronic condition that happens as a result of trauma or misalignment which can be treated or 'cured.' Or, a condition such as BPD mentioned here which isn't really an illness but just how people are, which cannot be treated but can be managed with the right approaches.
Psychiatry is the youngest of all medical sciences and massively under-appreciated and under-funded. There is so much mystique and mis-information around it's a wonder anyone gets helped.
However as you say this doesn't help these young people caught up in this.
My work before I retired was working with these young people; self-harm, depression, anxiety, anorexia, I came across them all.
One thing I learned was that what they needed was recognition and understanding, but not necessarily in the ways the other services were offering. They needed to know most of all that they were valued and indeed had something to offer others.
This was sometimes in direct contradiction to some agencies promoting that endless and fruitless search for 'identity,' the ego-based belief that they had a right to be how they were and the problem lay with others and not themselves.
So many young people are caught up in this maelstrom of confusion and anti-social thinking. It caused a lot of destructive and wrong thinking, often resulting in the opposite impact, causing deep seated anxiety and a lack of awareness of how they fitted into the world, and not the world fitting into them.
I don't know if this drama is good or bad, anything that raises awareness and promotes discussion like this can only be a positive thing?
I once had a student who really loved Alice in Wonderland and I decided to read the novel with her. She became quite bored with it because it wasn't what she thought it was. I think she had only seen the screen versions and thought the novel would just be a re-interpreation of those. We live in a cultural desert.
My impression is this drama may be so removed from Lewis Carroll it will be unrecognisable- the novel is very much about how Alice learns how to gain confidence in her emerging place in the world, and not expecting the world to put her in the centre of it.

We only have to look back at how people with mental health difficulties have been treated in the past and the pressure that has been put on them to hide their difficulties to think that making it more acceptable and normalized to destigmatize these difficulties. I don't know if the play is a good way to do it
I know locally a year or so ago the local museum has some young people set up a gallery in the museum, they chose lots of nature pictures and soothing sounds, it was really good.
Sometimes of course the issue is that some young people (well people) are in a situation that is causing the issues, being bullied perhaps, and they can't escape from it, or no one is listening to them

Awareness of the 'mental health' of young people has led to more mental health issues, with everyone thinking they must have some problem. Lack of boundaries, role models and views of 'normal' are themselves harmful, and the 'transgender' explosion is very worrying on lots of levels. I say this as a counsellor. It isn't views of 'normal' that hurt and confine people but the attitudes of others to those that do not conform.

keepingquiet

I read the article and found the concept interesting.

I think a lot of mental illness is around not being able to be 'normal' in other people's eyes. There is so much more to learn about what is 'illness' ie a short or chronic condition that happens as a result of trauma or misalignment which can be treated or 'cured.' Or, a condition such as BPD mentioned here which isn't really an illness but just how people are, which cannot be treated but can be managed with the right approaches.
Psychiatry is the youngest of all medical sciences and massively under-appreciated and under-funded. There is so much mystique and mis-information around it's a wonder anyone gets helped.
However as you say this doesn't help these young people caught up in this.
My work before I retired was working with these young people; self-harm, depression, anxiety, anorexia, I came across them all.
One thing I learned was that what they needed was recognition and understanding, but not necessarily in the ways the other services were offering. They needed to know most of all that they were valued and indeed had something to offer others.
This was sometimes in direct contradiction to some agencies promoting that endless and fruitless search for 'identity,' the ego-based belief that they had a right to be how they were and the problem lay with others and not themselves.
So many young people are caught up in this maelstrom of confusion and anti-social thinking. It caused a lot of destructive and wrong thinking, often resulting in the opposite impact, causing deep seated anxiety and a lack of awareness of how they fitted into the world, and not the world fitting into them.
I don't know if this drama is good or bad, anything that raises awareness and promotes discussion like this can only be a positive thing?
I once had a student who really loved Alice in Wonderland and I decided to read the novel with her. She became quite bored with it because it wasn't what she thought it was. I think she had only seen the screen versions and thought the novel would just be a re-interpreation of those. We live in a cultural desert.
My impression is this drama may be so removed from Lewis Carroll it will be unrecognisable- the novel is very much about how Alice learns how to gain confidence in her emerging place in the world, and not expecting the world to put her in the centre of it.

Well put and agree

I lave read the Bible for years and always wondered about a passage in Revelation that talked about a time when the world would, "trade truth for lies and lies for truth, bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter." I thought how could that possibly be, truth is truth. Well I know how it can be now, it is all around us. The pendulam does swing back and forth but maybe the weight has fallen off the end of it now.

Just because we do something one way doesn’t make us right and others wrong - it is just different.

We not talking about moral choices but about mental health issues, part of the problem is that morality has become about personal choices and it screws people up when they are told, 'you have the right to be yourself and others have to deal with it,' rather than,' how do you see how your uniqueness can contibute to society and improve the lives of others who may not be like you?'