Perspectives on the Standards

All of us can give examples of what the opposite of this Standard means! Many of us have been segregated and have lost opportunities merely out of fear of our diagnosis. Thick files follow us everywhere. Hospitals, treatment centers, group homes, transitional housing, independent housing, and employers have justified segregating us and limiting our opportunities as "efficient" and "safe."

But the clubhouse movement believes that having a mental illness does not mean we ARE a certain diagnosis or "level of functioning." We are all persons who have skills, experiences, interests and challenges, just like everyone else. When we are challenged, we can grow. When we have real choices, we can set our own goals. Every member can try any task—if we do not know how to do something, we should feel free to ask another colleague (not necessarily a staff person!) how to do that task. We have seen in our clubhouses that staff members do not know how to do everything.

We get calls in our membership unit from prospective members who are reluctant to join because they are frightened of being around people who are "sick" or "at a lower level of functioning." These people have bought into society’s prejudice against the mentally ill, and they distrust themselves as well as others who also have a diagnosis. When they participate in our clubhouses, they not only overcome their fear of others, they also overcome their lack of confidence in themselves. We learn to appreciate the fact that our clubhouses are welcoming communities where each person is needed and wanted.

We make no judgments about a person’s interests or capacities or what they can bring to our community based on their diagnosis or "level of functioning." We delight in the fact that in most instances we don’t even know each other’s diagnoses. We know what each person enjoys and does well. This Standard enables us to create a new identity, one based on reality, not on the presumed limitations of certain psychiatric diagnoses.