In a capitalist, patriarchal, and white supremacist society, mental illness is routinely weaponized as a means of control, humiliation, and exclusion. Those in power, whether state agents, employers, abusers, or political rivals, use diagnoses, real or fabricated, to discredit voices, delegitimize dissent, and strip people of autonomy.
This weaponization does not emerge from a genuine concern for mental health; it is a calculated tactic to maintain hierarchies and silence the inconvenient.
Mental illness itself is often a socially constructed label shaped by the needs of oppressive systems.Exposing someone’s mental health issues, whether in personal, political, or workplace settings, is an act of violence in a society that already criminalizes and stigmatizes neurodivergence.
It plays into the state’s logic: that those with mental health challenges are unreliable, dangerous, or less human. Historically, this logic has justified forced institutionalization, police violence, and the erasure of marginalized voices, especially among women, queer people, Black and Indigenous people, and disabled communities.
Fighting this weaponization means rejecting the ableist belief that worth is tied to “mental fitness” or productivity. It means building cultures of care where mental health struggles are met with solidarity, not exposure and shaming. It means calling out weaponization even when it’s convenient to our own political aims,because liberation cannot be built on the same tactics used by our oppressors.
Weaponizing mental illness is not just a personal attack, it is an extension of the capitalist state’s ongoing project to control, discard, and dehumanize. Our struggle is to dismantle the systems that produce both the harm and the stigma, replacing them with communities that treat every person’s dignity as non-negotiable.