Whether it’s Donald Trump or our children, mental health diagnosis involves more than a ‘yes or no’ checklist

Bertie Wai says focusing on whether Donald Trump is mentally fit for office or not is simplistic, but such binary thinking persists even when parents seek mental help for their children

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President Donald Trump greets children at the White House on April 2. Speculation is rife about Trump’s mental fitness for office. Photo: Washington Post

Published: 10:17am, 5 May 2018Updated: 7:23pm, 5 May 2018

Since being elected US president, Donald Trump’s mental health has been under an unprecedented level of scrutiny. What seems to legitimise this flurry of media attention is the question, “Is he fit for office?” When it is within the reach of Trump’s erratic hands to press the button that fires nuclear missiles, we feel both the weight and urgency of that question.

However, to frame the ramifications of someone’s mental functioning strictly in either-or terms (“Is he mentally fit to serve as president or not”) distracts us from the wider social and cultural damage that Trump has inflicted on the global community.

As former FBI director James Comey said in his interview with ABC anchor George Stephanopoulos, the danger of Trump lies in his erosion of fundamental American principles and values and his unabashed attacks on truths and norms. What is all the more alarming, Comey added, is that “[Trump’s antics] should wake all of us up with a start, but there’s been so much of it that we’re a little bit numb and that’s dangerous”.

By widening the scope of scrutiny from the simplistic question of whether Trump is mentally fit enough for office or not, Comey introduces more depth to the discussion by addressing the president’s moral fitness and what that portends for the future and welfare of his country, and, I would argue, to our increasingly globalised community.

A diagnosis is not simply a matter of matching the diagnostic criteria against a cluster of observable behaviours

Similarities can be drawn in understanding the mental health of our children, especially when it comes to how parents approach mental health assessments in Hong Kong. When presenting their child for assessment, parents tend to focus on what they consider the million-dollar question: “Does my child have ADHD/autism/what-have-you, or not?”

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