One of the most irresponsible and tone-deaf takes made by living-room activists and TikTok philosophers involves the use of antidepressants. Amateur social critics often use the large number of people taking these medications as evidence of a widespread effort (whether individually or by societal forces) to create an artificial sense of delight and euphoria in an otherwise bleak and meaningless world. In the screen grab above, a rodent, long suffering under the pressure of conformity and mindless consumerism, dives into a bottle of 200mg “Happiness” and emerges as a Disney-esque cartoon, transformed through the magic provided by Big Pharma. For a few blissful moments, the mouse forgets all the horrors and pain of his post-industrial existence. Of course, the magic is short lived and soon wears off, leaving the mouse falling back into his urban nightmare of consumption, vice and exploitation. This is only one sequence, one scene in a larger production, but the creator seems to suggest that people use antidepressants as a way to escape the despairing reality of the modern world and revel in a drug induced dreamworld that mutes the conscience and blinds the user to the evils surrounding them.

Perhaps it is anecdotal, but I personally have taken antidepressants for many years and can say with absolute certainty they have never erased my ability to discern injustice or recognize society’s nihilistic trajectory. I do not take sertraline (Zoloft) and bupropion (Wellbutrin) to avoid the stress and anxiety I encounter every day. If anything, taking these medications makes me more attuned to civilization’s myriad failures and helps me maintain a degree of cognitive stability that allows me to function in a world unlikely to change any time soon. They allow me to keep focused on living and looking for ways to improve Life for myself and other. Falling into a bottle of Happiness capsules is not a character flaw, a personal failure or surrendering to the Machine — it is a way to resist surrendering to the Machine. It has not defeated you if you are alive and antidepressants, to many people, are key to staying undefeated and I take exception to anyone insinuating their use makes one a brain-dead instrument of the System.