Borderline

Borderline (pronounced bawr-der-lahyn)

(1) On or near a border or boundary; a border; dividing line; line of demarcation.

(2) Uncertain; indeterminate; debatable; an indeterminate position between two conditions.

(3) Not quite meeting accepted, expected, or average standards.

(4) In psychiatry, as Borderline Personality Disorder, a descriptor of a personality disorder characterized by instability in many areas, as mood, identity, self-image and behavior and often manifested by impulsive actions, suicide attempts, inappropriate anger, or depression. The abbreviation is BPD.

1847: A compound word (also as border-line), created to describe a "strip of land along a frontier" as distinct from the actual line of a border, the construct being border + line.  Border was inherited from the Middle English bordure, from the Old French bordure & bordeure, from border (to border), from bort & bord (a border), of Germanic origin akin and to the Middle High German borte (border, trim) and the German Borte (ribbon, trimming); doublet of bordure.  Line, influenced in Middle English by the Middle French ligne (line), was from the Latin linea, from līneus (flaxen; a flaxen thing) from līnum (flax).  The Middle French ligne was from the Old Danish likna, derived with the inchoative suffix -ne from lig (similar) and was related to the Swedish likna, the English liken and the Middle Low German līkenen.  It replaced galīkōną, an older verb without -n, hence the Old English ġelīcian, the German gleichen and the Gothic galeikōn.  As an adjective meaning "verging on" it is attested from 1903, originally in medical jargon to describe various conditions but from the 1930s, it became most associated with metal health, the diagnosis of the condition BPD (Borderline Personality Disorder) apparently first mentioned in the medical literature in 1938 and evolving over several decades.  More correctly, that process can be called a "co-evolution" because while in academic and clinical use understanding of the condition was being refined, in the popular imagination BPD became one of the more popular terms used both for self-diagnosis and to apply to others (whether or not known personally).  Because BPD is inherently a spectrum condition, coinings like borderlinelike & borderlineish are superfluous although (of behavior) borderlinesque might be useful; all three remain non-standard.  The adjective nonborderline is used both in political geography (those lines of delineation on maps indicating something other than national or sub-national borders) and mental health (meaning “unaffected by BPD”).  Borderline is a noun, verb, adjective & adverb, borderliner & borderlineness are nouns and borderlined & borderlining are verbs; the noun plural is borderlines.  

Borderline Personality Disorder

On the internet, BPD is one of the more popular of the conditions ascribed to celebrities, politicians and others in the public eye.  As a general principle, places on the web are not recommended as sources of medical advice and that includes mental health although it seems obvious that in many politicians, their personality disorders are well beyond being classified as "borderline", many thresholds long since crossed.

In clinical psychiatry, although the number of borderline conditions has increased, it’s only the concepts of Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD) and the Schizotypal Personality which are claimed to have adequate diagnostic reliability, the parameters of both first codified in the third edition of the American Psychiatric Association's (APA) Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM).  The fourth edition (DSM-IV-TR (2000)), established the most commonly followed criteria for BPD and in DSM-5 (2013), these were extended to a remarkable sixteen headings in seven (A-G) categories in what appeared to be a kind of clinical mopping-up of symptoms suffered by those not able, for whatever reason, to be diagnosed with something more specific.  Indeed, the all-encompassing taxonomy appears rendered superfluous by Criterion E which seems just about to sum it up.

Criterion A: Moderate or greater impairment in personality functioning; two or more of the following criteria: (1) Identity: Markedly impoverished, poorly developed, or unstable self-image, often associated with excessive self-criticism; chronic feelings of emptiness; dissociative states under stress. (2) Self-direction: Instability in goals, aspirations, values, or career plans. (3) Empathy: Compromised ability to recognize the feelings and needs of others associated with interpersonal hypersensitivity (i.e., prone to feel slighted or insulted); perceptions of others selectively biased toward negative attributes or vulnerabilities. (4) Intimacy: Intense, unstable, and conflicted close relationships, marked by mistrust, neediness, and anxious preoccupation with real or imagined abandonment; close relationships often viewed in extremes of idealization and devaluation and alternating between over-involvement and withdrawal.

Criterion B: Four or more of the following seven pathological personality traits must be present: (5) Emotional liability: Unstable emotional experiences and frequent mood changes; emotions that are easily aroused, intense, and/or out of proportion to events and circumstances. (6) Anxiousness: Intense feelings of nervousness, tenseness, or panic, often in reaction to interpersonal stresses; worry about the negative effects of past unpleasant experiences and future negative possibilities; feeling fearful, apprehensive, or threatened by uncertainty; fears of falling apart or losing control. (7) Separation insecurity: Fears of rejection by and/or separation from significant others, associated with fears of excessive dependency and complete loss of autonomy. (8) Depressivity: Frequent feelings of being down, miserable, and/or hopeless; difficulty recovering from such moods; pessimism about the future; pervasive shame; feelings of inferior self-worth; thoughts of suicide and suicidal behavior. (9) Impulsivity: Acting on the spur of the moment in response to immediate stimuli; acting on a momentary basis without a plan or consideration of outcomes; difficulty establishing or following plans; a sense of urgency and self-harming behavior under emotional distress. (10) Risk-taking: Engagement in dangerous, risky, and potentially self-damaging activities, unnecessarily and without regard to consequences; lack of concern for one’s limitations and denial of the reality of the personal danger. (11) Hostility: Persistent or frequent angry feelings; anger or irritability in response to minor slights and insults.

Criterion C: (12) The impairments in personality functioning and the individual’s personality trait expression are relatively inflexible and pervasive across a broad range of personal and social situations.

Criterion D: (13) The impairments in personality functioning and the individual’s personality trait expression are relatively stable across time with onsets that can be traced back at least to adolescence or early adulthood.

Criterion E: (14) The impairments in personality functioning and the individual’s personality trait expression are not better explained by another mental disorder.

Criterion F: (15) The impairments in personality functioning and the individual’s personality trait expression are not attributable to a substance (eg, a drug of abuse, medication, exposure to a toxin) or a general medical condition (eg, severe head trauma).

Criterion G: (16) The impairments in personality functioning and the individual’s personality trait expression are not better understood as normal for the individual’s developmental stage or the socio-cultural environment.

The wide BPD net cast in DSM-5 pleased the psychiatrists but in recent years, there’s been interest in changing the name of BPD, a movement led not the profession but by those diagnosed with the condition, the creation of pressure-groups now greatly assisted by social media.  The objections seem to be that BPD (1) somehow marginalizes the sufferers in the hierarchy of mental illness, (2) fails to capture the underlying issues and mechanisms involved in producing its symptoms and (3), denigrates and even invalidates the very existence of their condition, the word “borderline” suggesting their symptoms aren’t sufficiently severe to be a “real” condition.  In that sense, the word does have loaded connotations, “borderline” used first by 1930s psychoanalysts to describe patients whose symptoms lay between psychosis and neurosis but to modern lay-persons, a common interpretation is that the condition “borders” on being a “real” illness.  Some even object to “disorder” but most accept it; they’d just prefer to be diagnosed with a more significant, and fashionable, depressive disorder.

Although it seems hardly more respectable, Emotional Intensity Disorder emerged from a survey as the popular choice of patients, beating out Emotional Regulation Disorder, Emotional Dysregulation Disorder, Emotionally Unstable Personality Disorder, Impulsive Personality Disorder & Impulsive-Emotional Dysregulation Disorder.  The clinicians liked Emotional Regulation Disorder but were out-voted.  Unimpressed by either, the committee working on the revision of DSM-5 proposed Borderline Type (which sounds like a sceptical psychiatrist’s casual dismissal of emos), but noted “no decision has yet been made.”  When in 2022 the text-revision (DSM-5-TR) was released, although there were textual and contextual updates, the diagnostic criteria for BPD did not change so the distinction between the two can be thought terminological rather than structural, the language used reflected the editors’ decades-long attempts at once to be more precise and less stigmatizing.  In DSM-5-TR there was also an obvious focus on editing “now suspect” references to gender but none of this altered the construct of BPD.  As had long been the practice, DSM-5-TR included updated epidemiology data (if newer research or analysis was thought to have provided some refinement) but it was very much a project focused on cultural considerations, terminology and “modernization” of language.

Checkpoint Charlie and the Berlin borderline, 1961-1990

Konrad Adenauer (1876–1967; FRG Chancellor 1949-1963) at Checkpoint Charlie in 1962; car is a Mercedes-Benz 300d (W189).

The 300 was produced in four generations (W186: 300, 300b & 300c, 1951-1957 & W189: 300d, 1957-1962) and became known informally as the “300 Adenauer”, the association prompted by the chancellor using six (cabriolets, sedans and a landaulet) 300s during his long term in office.  The 300d is also associated with John XXIII (1881–1963; pope 1958-1963) who was presented with one in 1960 and it served as the official papal vehicle until 1965 when Paul VI (1897-1978; pope 1963-1978) took delivery of a Mercedes-Benz 600; both cars were high-roofed landaulets.  Used only until the mid-1960s, the lower case characters in the model designation appeared only in documents and were never added to the badgework but they are another layer in the intricacy of the factory's model nomenclature which, when first conceived (sort of) made sense but a combination of new technology and range-proliferation (with the same engines appearing in different classes conspired to make the system unmanageable and in the early 1990s there was a structural revision which, as amended (with its own inconsistencies), endures to this day.

Although the most famous, the crossing point in the Berlin Wall (1961-1989) on the borderline between East and West Berlin and named Checkpoint Charlie (Checkpoint C to the military) was one of three, all known by their designation drawn from the NATO phonetic alphabet, the now forgotten pair being Checkpoint Alpha at Helmstedt and Checkpoint Bravo at Wannsee.  The Soviets (officially) didn't use the NATO designation, instead calling Checkpoint Charlie the КПП Фридрихштрассе (KPP Fridrikhshtrasse (Friedrichstraße Crossing Point)) while the government of the GDR (Deutsche Demokratische Republik (German Democratic Republic; the old East Germany, 1949-1990) listed it as the Grenzübergangsstelle (Border Crossing Point) Friedrich-Zimmerstraße.

Checkpoint Charlie, 1963.

In one of the charming coincidences of the Cold War, Checkpoint Charlie was located at the intersection of Friedrichstraße, Zimmerstraße & Mauerstraße (Wall Street).  It became the only well-know crossing point because, for reasons of security and administrative convenience, it was the sole designated crossing point (whether for foot or vehicular traffic) for foreigners and members of the three Allied (previously occupying) forces (France, the UK & the US) stationed in the FRG (Bundesrepublik Deutschland (Federal Republic of Germany; the old West Germany, 1949-1990).  The manned structures associated with Checkpoint Charlie were also in a location which lent itself to photography from a number of angles and replicas were built by film studios for the many productions shot in Berlin during the Cold War.  Often dark, gloomy pieces, the "Cold War spy film" was a genre which over the decades as geopolitical tensions waxed & waned but the divided Berlin of the 1960s was its high-point and what was done then "defined the look".  The Cafe Adler (Eagle Café), adjacent to Checkpoint Charlie was for decades one of West Berlin's tourist hotspots.

Checkpoint Charlie in 1982, showing the larger aluminum building which that year replaced the original wooden hut.

To those accustomed to seeing the gargantuan structures the US military tend to erect wherever they take root, Checkpoint Charlie must have been a surprise, a modest (though enlarged in 1962) and obviously temporary wooden hut was for more than twenty years all that stood on the western side, the little building replaced in 1982 only because it had become so dilapidated it was literally falling down around the guards stationed within and even then, the metal structure which replaced it, while larger, was no more permanent.  That obvious impermanence was part of the political messaging, the Western powers never wishing to hint at an acceptance the division of Germany would forever endure.  However, if people were surprised, it’s doubtful many were disappointed, the compact architecture providing a single point of focus and even in the pre-selfie era, at one glance, what tourists could take in was evocative of the Cold War cinema with which so many were familiar.

Checkpoint Charlie, 1970.

The attitude of the allied powers reflected their political position that while obviously a line of control, the Berlin Wall was not a legitimate international borderline and thus only small, temporary buildings were required.  To the authorities in the Kremlin and the GDR, whatever some might suggest was the position in international law, the Berlin Wall was a borderline and thus on their side the infrastructure quickly grew to include watchtowers, a military barracks and a multi-lane, enclosed clearing zone in which those wishing to cross could be interrogated and searched.

Checkpoint Charlie in 2020, now a replica “1961” hut with new sandbags.

The Berlin Wall “fell” in November 1989 and the checkpoint booth was removed some six months later although, because East and West Germany remained legally separate countries, the checkpoint at the point of the borderline was retained as the designated official crossing-point for foreigners and diplomats, an arrangement which ended in October 1990 when German reunification was formalized in law.  Checkpoint Charlie has since remained one of Berlin's tourist attractions and, just as some parts of the once demolished wall have been re-created because supply of the real thing wasn’t enough to meet demand, the municipal government soon erected an almost exact replica of the checkpoint as it stood in 1961 although the quality of the construction is said to be rather more robust than the original and it’s expected to enjoy a longer life.  Better to capture the flavor, even the sandbags which gradually were removed during the 1970s are back in place, carefully stacked.  During every week of the tourist season, selfies are taken by the thousand.

Palinode

Palinode (pronounced pal-uh-nohd)

(1) A poem in which the poet retracts something said in an earlier poem.

(2) A recantation (used loosely and now rare).

(3) In Scots law, a recantation of a defamatory statement.

1590–1600: From the sixteenth century French palinode (poetical recantation, poem in which the poet retracts invective contained in a former satire), from the Middle French palinode, from the Late Latin palinōdia (palinode, recantation), from the Ancient Greek παλινῳδία (palinōidía) (poetic retraction), the construct being πάλιν (pálin) (again, back) + ᾠδή (ōidḗ) (ode, song) + -ia (from the Latin -ia and the Ancient Greek -ία (-ía) & -εια (-eia), which form abstract nouns of feminine gender.  It was used when names of countries, diseases, species etc and occasionally collections of stuff).  The alternative form palinody is obsolete.  Palinode & palinodist are nouns, palinodial, palinodical & palinodic are adjectives and palinodically is a (non-standard) adverb; the noun plural is palinodes).

Although the palinode is now usually defined as meaning “a poem in which the palinodist (ie the poet) retracts something said in an earlier poem”, the French in the sixteenth century seem mostly to have use the word of works in which the writer “retracts invective contained in a former satire”.  It thus had an obviously political slant and it seems likely at least some palinodes were penned to stave of threats of legal action (or something worse).  Although it endures in literary use (and among political scientists with a feeling for classical forms), the word has long been obscure and the OED (Oxford English Dictionary) lists the adjective palinodical as obsolete with its only known instance of use dating from 1602 when it appeared in a work by the English poet, playwright and pamphleteer Thomas Dekker (circa 1572-1632).  The “other” species of palinode was the “ode to Sarah Palin” (b 1964; Republican nominee for VPOTUS 2008) of which there were several including some set to music.

The palinode became associated with poetry because verse (in one form or another) was once a more common form of written expression.  It has however been applied to any retraction or recantation (formal or otherwise), especially one that publicly withdraws an earlier statement, belief or work.  For reasons of ecclesiastical practice, theological palinodes tended to be in verse but there were exceptions including by John Milton (1608–1674) who in The Reason of Church-Government (1642) retracted his earlier advocacy of episcopacy (the bishops and their role), acknowledging his views had changed; for years it remained a rare example of its type.  Beyond poetry proper, use has been quite loose and memorable palinodes have been political, scientific and literary, some especially of the latter described variously as “insincere”, “back-handed” or “bitchy”.  Much of their charm lies in some retractions becoming famous while the original text doubtlessly would have been forgotten were it not for the palinode.

The Death of Socrates (1787), oil on canvas by Jacques-Louis David (1748–1825), Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City.  Had Socrates just dashed off a palinode, maybe he'd never have had to take his dish of hemlock.

The archetypal palinode dates from the sixth century BC and it set the template.  According to legend, the Greek lyric poet Stesichorus (Στησίχορος, circa 630–555 BC) blamed Helen of Troy for the Trojan War and almost at once was struck blind.  He then composed a (“it was not true…”) palinode absolving Helen of guilt, the words of the encomium (praise, eulogy) said to have come to him in a dream.  His sight was restored, thus the understanding the use of the device as a means of undoing moral or divine offense.  The texts from Antiquity have of course survived only in fragmentary form but clearly there were palinodes, Plato (circa 427-348 BC) in his Phaedrus (a dialogue between Socrates (circa 470–399 BC) and Phaedrus (circa 444–393 BC)) he recounted how Socrates first delivers a speech condemning love, then explicitly retracts it with a second passage praising divine madness and erotic love.  Plato explicitly called the second speech “a palinode”, making it one of philosophy’s earliest known self-conscious retractions and, it has to be admitted, only those for whom martyrdom is a calling would think it not preferable to taking hemlock.

Geoffrey Chaucer (circa 1344-1400), right at the end of The Canterbury Tales (1387-1400), as a formal retraction, disowned those earlier passages he had come to think sinful or frivolous and begged forgiveness for having written them.  It's considered one of Medieval literature’s most explicit and sincere palinodes and presumably he also asked God and at least one priest for absolution for those unworthy thoughts, this likely the course of action taken also by the English journalist Malcolm Muggeridge (1903–1990) who wrote long pieces disavowing earlier having welcomed communism and opposed censorship.  One long-established tradition (transgress with enthusiasm in youth; reform with piety as one contemplates mortality) is a movement owing much to Saint Augustine of Hippo (354–430) who in Confessiones (Confessions, 397-400) wrote: Da mihi castitatem et continentiam, sed noli modo (Lord, give me chastity and continence, but not yet), an exemplar of that school of the palinodic being George W Bush (George XLIII, b 1946; POTUS 2001-2009) who abandoned whiskey and much else.  As he might have put it in a “Bushism”: “I spent my youth misunfortunatistically”.  The whole “born-again” movement in Christianity seems often something of a life lived palinodically.

Galileo before the Holy Office (1847), oil on canvas by Joseph-Nicolas Robert-Fleury (1797-1890).

The element “Holy Office” was first applied to the official designation for the Inquisition during the thirteenth century and after that there were a number of variant constructions before in 1965, it was renamed the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF), the most famous of the latter-day inquisitors being Benedict XVI (1927–2022; pope 2005-2013, pope emeritus 2013-2022) who, with some relish, discharged the role between 1981-2005.  Since 2022, the Inquisition has been styled the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith (DDF).  Coincidentally, DDF is also the acronym for “drug & disease free” and (in gaming) “Doom definition file” while there’s also the DDF Network which is an aggregator of pornography content.  The Holy See may be aware of these uses but probably takes the view the target markets are different and, given the DDF Network appears not to offer any “gay male” content, if one author’s conclusions are accepted, the site is unlikely often to be accessed by priests, bishops, cardinals and such.

Some palinodes have become among the more famous statements made by an accused before a court.  Under courts run by the Nazis and the Soviet Union they were of course legion (the scripts often written by the prosecutors) but the most famous was probably the retraction the Roman Inquisition in 1633 extracted from the Italian physicist and pioneering astronomer Galileo Galilei (1564–1642); under threat of torture (words to be taken seriously if from the lips of an inquisitor), he abjured his support for heliocentrism; the defendant's legendary mutter: “Eppur si muove” (although it does move) almost certainly apocryphal.  After that, palinodes came thick and fast, the Swiss philosopher Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712–1778) in Les Confessions (Confessions of Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1770, published 1782)) not only his retracted many of his earlier stances (especially in matters of religion and education) but did so repeatedly, sometimes in the same chapter.  More than a decade in the writing, Les Confessions functions as something of a “rolling palinode”, his intellectual past constantly revised.  More nuanced in this approach was the English naturalist Charles Darwin (1809-1882) who, in later editions of On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life (1859), toned down or even withdrew some claims regarding human evolution and teleology.  These revisions can be considered “partial palinodes” but they were really merely a reflection of the modern scientific method which updates theories as new evidence emerges; a matter of correct intellectual caution.

Agitprop poster of comrade Stalin (1878-1953; Soviet leader 1924-1953, left) greeting comrade Trofim Lysenko (1898-1976, right).  The Russian slogan (РАБОТАТЬ ТАК, ЧТОБЫ ТОВАРИЩ СТАЛИН СПАСИБО СКАЗАЛ!) translates best as “Work in such a way that comrade Stalin will say ‘thank you.’”  In comrade Stalin’s Soviet Union, wise comrades followed this sound advice.  For students of the techniques used in the propaganda of personality cults, it should be noted comrade Stalin stood around 1.65 metres (5 foot, 5 inches) tall.

In the matter of scientific and intellectual palinodes, others can do the retractions which can be thought of as palinodes by proxy or (more flippantly) Munchausen palinodes by proxy.  To avoid damage to his reputation, Sir Isaac Newton’s (1642–1727) executors and later editors suppressed and implicitly retracted his alchemical writings and similar judicious editing has excised from the records of some their embrace of the once intellectually respectable field of astrology.  Actually, Newton wasn’t wholly wrong on the science; at the molecular level there is little difference between lead and gold and although traditional chemical alchemy seems impossible, recent experiments have, atom-by-atom, transformed lead into gold, the problem being that to transform a few atoms (and even these often short-lived radioactive isotopes rather than stable Au-197) demanded the use of a huge and expensive particle accelerator; unless there’s some unanticipated breakthrough, the process cannot be scaled up so gold must continue to be dug up.  Communism systems too belatedly made something of an art of the palinode.

In the Soviet Union, after the death of comrade Stalin, a number of “scientific orthodoxies” supported by the late leader abruptly were cancelled, notably the dotty, pseudoscientific “theories” of agronomist Trofim Lysenko whose doctrine of Lysenkoism set back Soviet agriculture by decades.  The evidence suggests comrade Stalin was well aware comrade Lysenko was likely a comrade charlatan but, uniquely among the many Soviet apparatchiks, the dodgy agronomist achieved a great rapport with the peasants who were being most tiresome.  It was Lysenko’s remarkable success in convincing peasants to accept the Kremlin’s imposition of collectivized farming that make him Stalin’s invaluable asset.  In China, when comrade Chairman Mao (Mao Zedong 1893–1976; chairman of the CCP, 1949-1976) instituted many of Lysenko’s “agricultural reforms” (which included applying Karl Marx's (1818-1883) theories of class consciousness to the thought processes of seeds), in the great famine which followed, it's believed between 40-45 million may have starved to death.  The Kremlin was at least precise in who or what got cancelled whereas the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) were a little vague although the Chinese people understood their language.  Long skilled at “reading between the Central Committee’s lines”, when they heard it admitted comrade Chairman Mao’s legacy was “70% good and 30% bad”, the meaning was clear.  As a judgment it may have been generous but if applied to some leaders in the West, would the numbers be any more favorable?

Lindsay Lohan on the cover of Vogue Czechoslovakia, May 2025.

So palinody has a long tradition but while figures like Rousseau, Darwin and Muggeridge had years or even decades “agonizingly to reappraise” their position, in the social media age, it can within the hour be necessary to recant.  In 2006, Lindsay Lohan granted an interview to Vanity Fair in which she acknowledged: “I knew I had a problem and I couldn't admit it.  “I was making myself sick.  I was sick and I had people sit me down and say: 'You're going to die if you don't take care of yourself'”, adding she used drugs: “a little”.  On reflection, and possibly after seeking advice, he publicist the next day contacted the magazine in an attempt to get the “drug confession” retracted.  Later, she would also recant her claims her earlier (and by some much-admired) weight-loss had been achieved by D&E (diet & exercise), admitting it was the consequence of an eating disorder.  Ms Lohan has issued a few palinodes (but although also a song-writer, none have been in poetic verse) and as well as drug use, the correctives have covered topics such as the MeToo movement, Harvey Weinstein (b 1952), Donald Trump (b 1946; US president 2017-2021 and since 2025) and her attitudes to motherhood.

Ye (b 1977, the artist formerly known as Kanye West).

The first notable palinode of 2026 was interesting for a number of reasons, the first of which was structural.  Although the once vibrant industry of print journalism has in the West been hollowed out by successive strikes from the internet, social media and AI (artificial intelligence), in a tactic guaranteed to ensure maximum cross-platform coverage, the multi-media personality, rap singer and apparel designer Ye chose as the host for his latest announcement not Instagram or X (formerly known as Twitter) but a full-page advertisement in Rupert Murdoch’s WSJ (Wall Street Journal).  As a “commercial, in confidence” arrangement, it’s not certain how much the WSJ would have invoiced to run the copy but advertising in the paper remains at “premium level” because of its national circulation and readership with a high proportion in the still much-prized “A”, “B1” & “B2” demographics.  Industry sources suggest that, depending on the day of the week and other variables, a full-page advertisement (black & white) placement in the WSJ’s national edition typically would cost between US$160,000–$220,000 for a “one-off” (ie no re-runs or ongoing contract).

That’s obviously rather more than a post on Instagram or X but what a still “prestigious” legacy title like the WSJ confers is a certain “authority” because, as Marshall McLuhan (1911-1980) explained in Understanding Media: The Extensions of Man (1964): “The medium is the message”.  If one conveys one’s message through a whole page of the WSJ, regardless of the text’s content, the message is different compared with the same words appearing on a social media platform: anyone can post a palinode on Instagram but only a few can pay Rupert Murdoch US$200,000-odd to print it in the WSJ.  The point about Mr Ye using the WSJ was the message was aimed not only at his usual audience but those in finance and industry who interact with the music and apparel businesses.  While some consumers of rap music or his other “projects” may be WSJ readers or even subscribers, the publication’s base has a very different profile and it will be a certain few of those Mr Ye wishes his message to reach.

Marigold Counseling's Bipolar Disorder chart.

Headed “To those I’ve hurt”, his palinode was more than a simple retraction and was an apology for his previous “reckless” anti-Semitism; whether “reckless” carefully was chosen from the spectrum (careless; reckless; intentional) used by disciplinary bodies in sporting competitions wasn’t discussed.  By way of explanation, Mr Ye revealed that some 25 years earlier, he’d suffered an injury to the “right frontal lobe” of his brain and, because the medical focus at the time was on the “immediate physical trauma”, “comprehensive scans were not done” meaning “the deeper injury, the one inside my skull, went unnoticed.”  It seems that not until 2023 was his condition correctly assessed, the injury linked to his diagnosis with Bipolar Disorder type-1 (the old “manic depressive disorder”).  Clinicians distinguish between type 1 and type 2 Bipolar thus: (1) In Bipolar I disorder there must be at least one manic episode that may come before or after hypomanic or major depressive episodes (in some cases, mania may cause a dissociation from reality (psychosis)) and (2) In Bipolar II disorder there must be at least one depressive episode and at least one hypomanic episode but never any psychosis.  (Cyclothymic Disorder involves periods of hypomania and depression not sufficiently severe to be classified as full episodes).  As Mr Ye explained: “Bipolar disorder comes with its own defense system. Denial.  When you’re manic, you don’t think you’re sick. You think everyone else is overreacting.  You feel like you’re seeing the world more clearly than ever, when in reality you’re losing your grip entirely.  Once people label you as ‘crazy’ you feel as if you cannot contribute anything meaningful to the world.  It’s easy for people to joke and laugh it off when in fact this is a very serious debilitating disease you can die from.”

As he further noted: “The scariest thing about this disorder is how persuasive it is when it tells you:  You don’t need help. It makes you blind, but convinced you have insight. You feel powerful, certain, unstoppable.  I lost touch with reality. Things got worse the longer I ignored the problem.  I said and did things I deeply regret.  Some of the people I love the most, I treated the worst. You endured fear, confusion, humiliation, and the exhaustion of trying to have someone who was, at times, unrecognizable. Looking back, I became detached from my true self.  In that fractured state, I gravitated toward the most destructive symbol I could find, the swastika, and even sold T-shirts bearing it. One of the difficult aspects of having bipolar type-1 are the disconnected moments - many of which I still cannot recall - that led to poor judgment and reckless behavior that oftentimes feels like an out-of-body-experience.  I regret and am deeply mortified by my actions in that state, and am committed to accountability, treatment, and meaningful change. It does not excuse what I did though. I am not a Nazi or an antisemite. I love Jewish people.”  He also included remarks intended explicitly for the black community, which he acknowledged “held [him] down through all of the highs and lows and the darkest of times.  The black community is, unquestionably, the foundation of who I am. I am so sorry to have let you down. I love us.  My words as a leader in my community have global impact and influence.  In my mania, I lost complete sight of that.”

He made a comment also about what is a sometimes misunderstood aspect of Bipolar Disorder: “Having bipolar disorder is notable state of constant mental illness.  When you go into a manic episode, you are ill at that point. When you are not in an episode, you are completely ‘normal’.  And that’s when the wreckage from the illness hits the hardest.  Hitting rock bottom a few months ago, my wife encouraged me to finally get help.  My words as a leader in my community have global impact and influence. In my mania, I lost complete sight of that.  As I find my new baseline and new center through an effective regime of medication, therapy, exercise and clean living, I have newfound, much-needed clarity. I am pouring my energy into positive, meaningful art: music, clothing, design and other new ideas to help the world.”  He concluded by saying: “I’m not asking for sympathy, or a free pass, though I aspire to earn your forgiveness.  I write today simply to ask for your patience and understanding as I find my way home.”  The message was signed “With love, Ye.”

Mr Ye with his wife, Australian architect & model Bianca Censori (b 1995) in “WET” themed top (which she wears well), Huacai Intercontinental Hotel, Beijing, China, September 2024.  Ms Censori works for Yeezy as an Architectural Designer.

What Mr Ye placed in the WSJ was a certain type of palinode, one in which there’s a retraction and definitely an apology but also an explanation.  Although, commendably, he included the words “…It does not excuse what I did…”, documenting the long-undiagnosed traumatic brain injury does provide an explanation for his conduct so, the piece is not a true mea culpa (from the Latin meā culpā (through my fault) and taken from the Confiteor, a traditional penitential prayer in Western Christianity; it’s best translated as “I am to blame”.  Mr Ye’s point was that what he did was wrong but “he” was not to blame in the sense that what he did was the result of the Bipolar Disorder induced by his injury.  What that means is that there was no mens rea (a construct from the Latin mēns + reus (literally “guilty mind”), the phrase a clipping of the precept in English common law: Actus non facit reum nisi mens rea sit (The act does not make a person guilty unless the mind is also guilty).  In other words: “I didn’t do it, the Bipolar Disorder did it”.  As a defence the approach is well-known but what Mr Ye is suggesting is supported in the medical literature, there being a number of documented cases of individuals whose behavior suddenly and radically changed for the worse as a result of a condition affecting the brain (either traumatic injury or an illness such as a tumor).  Despite his caveat, his diagnosed Bipolar Disorder, as well as explaining things, may well “excuse what I did”.

However, as an exercise in “reputational recovery” (one of the forks of “crisis management”), Mr Ye does have “a bit of previous” for which to atone including donning a “White Lives Matter” T-shirt which was controversial because there is no political or moral equivalence between that and the implications of “Black Lives Matter”.  In isolation, such a thing might have been thought just a publicity device and, in another time, the dark irony may have caught on in sections of the black community but in the atmosphere of 2022 it was the wrong item at the wrong time.  Worse was to come because later that year Mr Ye tweeted he was going “death con 3” on the Jews, the play on words assumed an adaptation of the DEFCON (Defense Readiness Condition) status levels used by the US military:

DEFCON 5: Normal peacetime readiness (lowest level).

DEFCON 4: Increased intelligence gathering and strengthened security.

DEFCON 3: Heightened readiness; forces ready for increased alert.

DEFCON 2: One step from nuclear war; forces ready to deploy at six hours notice.

DEFCON 1: Maximum readiness; imminent nuclear war or attack underway.

Fashion statement: Mr Ye in black capirote.

So it could have been worse, assuming his “death con 3” implied only “heightened readiness; forces ready for increased alert”.  The Pentagon invoked DEFCON 2 during the Cuban Missile Crisis (16-28 October 1962) and has never (as far as is known) triggered DEFCON 1.  However, “death con 3” was thought bad enough and a number of corporations sundered their contractual arrangements with Mr Ye, the loss of the agreement with Adidas believed financially the most damaging.  The next year, to his “Vultures album (re-titled Vultures 1 for the packaged release in 2024) listening party” Mr Ye wore a black Ku Klux Klan hood.  The use of black rather the while of the KKK in popular imagination attracted some comment from those who seek meaning in such things but it was historically authentic, the original, Reconstruction-era Klan (1865-1871) not having a standardized or even defined garb.  In the 1860s, members used whatever fabric was available, bed-sheets, blankets, sackcloth, and women’s dresses all re-purposed with no apparent interest in patterns or color co-ordination and animal hides or even face paint were used if no fabric was to hand.  The choices were pragmatic, the purposes concealment and intimidation, not visual uniformity.  The now familiar capirote (pointed hood) atop a white robe didn’t become emblematic of the KKK until the heyday of the so-called “Second Klan” between 1915 and the 1940s and although white deliberately was chosen as a symbol of “purity” and white supremacy, there’s nothing to suggest Mr Ye was seeking to vest his garment with similar denotations.

Fashion statement: Mr Ye in the now deleted “Swastika T-shirt” (the Yeezy part-number was HH01). 

Most provocative however was doubtlessly his adoption of the swastika for various purposes and his effuse praise for Hitler and Nazism.  In humanity’s long and depressing roll-call of evil and depravity, there is Adolf Hitler (1889-1945; Führer (leader) and German head of government 1933-1945 & head of state 1934-1945) and there is “everybody else” so selling “swastika T-shirts” at US$20 (promoted in an advertisement at the 2025 Super Bowl) and “dropping a tune” titled Heil Hitler was never likely to be a good career move.  The product code for the T-shirts was “HH01” and those who recalled his comment: “There’s a lot of things that I love about Hitler" in a December 2022 podcast with the since bankrupted host Alex Jones (b 1974) probably deconstructed that to mean “Heil Hitler” although to remove any doubt he also tweeted: “I love Hitler” and “I'm a Nazi”.  Swastika T-shirts were just too much for Shopify which took down the page, issuing a statement saying Mr Ye had “violated” the company's T&Cs (terms & conditions).  It was an example of the dangers inherent in having a site administered by AI with humans checking the content only in reaction to complaints.

Forbes magazine, 31 August 2019.  Forbes had just anointed Mr Ye a “billionaire”.

Those with some generosity of spirit will attribute honorable motives to Mr Ye’s palinode while cynics will note the financial hit suffered as a consequence of his recent conduct.  In 2020, he complained to Forbes magazine it had neglected to include him on their much-anticipated “Billionaires List” (he may have been peeved his then wife (the estimable Kim Kardashian (b 1980)) had made the cut) and duly the publication re-crunched its numbers, including him in a revised edition.  In the wake of his troubles, Forbes “wrote down” the value of his brand and after the “Adidas fallout”, he didn’t appear on the 2023 list.  As he said in the WSJ advertisement, he is “pouring my energy into positive, meaningful art: music, clothing, design and other new ideas to help the world” and all these products, appropriately branded, need to be sold at a profit but having a brand tainted by an association with Nazism and anti-Semitism makes things a “harder sell”.  Hopefully, all will be forgiven and Yeezy-branded hoodies, running shoes and such will again ship in volume; Rupert Murdoch can be proud of the WSJ’s latest contribution to American commerce.

Psychosis

Psychosis (pronounced sahy-koh-sis)

In psychiatry, a severe mental disorder (sometimes with physical damage to the brain), more serious than neurosis, characterized by disorganized thought processes, disorientation in time and space, hallucinations, delusions and a disconnection from reality.  Paranoia, manic depression, megalomania, and schizophrenia are all psychoses.

1847: From the New Latin & Late Greek psȳ́chōsis, the construct being psycho- + -osis, the source being the Ancient Greek ψύχωσις (psúkhōsis) (animation, principle of life), psych from the Ancient Greek ψυχή (psukhḗ or psykhē) (mind, life, soul).  The suffix –osis is from the Ancient Greek -ωσις (-ōsis) (state, abnormal condition or action), from -όω (-óō) (stem verbs) + -σις (-sis); -oses was the plural form and corresponding adjectives are formed using –otic, thus respectively producing psychoses and psychotic.  The Ancient Greek psykhosis meant "a giving of life; animation; principle of life".  In English, the original 1847 construction meant "mental affection or derangement" while the adjective psychotic (of or pertaining to psychosis) dates from 1889, coined from psychosis, on the model of neurotic/neurosis and ultimately from the Ancient Greek psykhē (understanding, the mind (as the seat of thought), faculty of reason).

In clinical use there are many derived forms (with meanings more precise than is often the case when such words migrate to general use) including antipsychotic, micropsychotic, neuropsychotic, nonpsychotic, postpsychotic, prepsychotic, propsychotic, protopsychotic, quasipsychotic, semipsychotic & unpsychotic.  The useful portmanteau word sarchotic (the construct a blend of sarcastic +‎ psychotic) is used to describe a statement so distrubingly sarcastic it can't be certain if the remark is intended to be humerous or the person making it genuinely is psychotic and even then there are graduations for which the adverb is used, the comparative being "more psychotically" and the superlative "most psychotically".  Psychosis & psychoticism are nouns, psychotic is a noun & adjective and psychotically is an adverb; the noun plural is psychoses.

Psychosis and the DSM

The word psychosis was a mid-nineteenth century creation necessitated by early psychiatry’s separation of psychiatric conditions from neurological disorders.  Originally a generalized concept to refer to psychiatric disorders, gradually it became one of the major classes of mental illness, assumed to be the result of a disease process, and, more recently, to a symptom present in many psychiatric disorders.  During this evolution, the diagnostic criteria shifted from the severity of the clinical manifestations and the degree of impairment in social functioning to the presence of one or more symptoms in a set of psychopathological symptoms.  By the early twentieth century, the concept of neurosis (which once embraced both the psychiatric and the neurological disorders), became restricted to one major class of psychiatric disease whereas psychosis (which once embraced all psychiatric disorders) became restricted to the other.

The first consensus-based classification with a description of diagnostic terms was in the first edition (DSM-I (1952)) of the American Psychiatric Association's (APA) Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM) in which mental disorders were divided into two classes of illness: (1) organic disorders, caused by or associated with impairment of brain tissue function; and (2) disorders of psychogenic origin without clearly defined physical cause or structural changes in the brain.  When DSM-II (1968) was released, the classifications were revised with mental disorders now classed as (1) psychoses and (2) neuroses, personality disorders, and other non-psychotic mental disorders.  Psychosis was defined as a mental disorder in which mental functioning is impaired to the degree that it interferes with the patient's ability to meet the ordinary demands of life and recognize reality.

Advances in both neurology and psychiatry led to an extensive revision in DSM-III (1980).  Radically, all traditional dichotomies (organic versus functional, psychotic versus neurotic etc) were discarded with psychiatric syndromes assigned to one of fifteen categories of disease.  At the labelling level, the term psychotic was used to describe a patient at a given time, or a mental disorder in which at some time during its course, all patients evaluate incorrectly the accuracy of their perceptions and thoughts but the editors emphasized it should not be applied to patients suffering only minor distortions of reality, regardless of how exactly they might fulfil the clinical criteria.  The revisions in DSM-III-R (1987) extended only to slight changes in terminology.

Mirroring the changes in diagnostic criteria published by the WHO, DSM-IV (1994) noted the diagnosis of psychosis should no longer be based on the severity of the functional impairment but rather on the presence of certain symptoms which included delusions, hallucinations, disorganized speech and grossly disorganized or catatonic behavior.  This emphasis on psychoses being spectrum conditions was continued in DSM-5 (2013) with schizoid (personality) disorder and schizophrenia defining its mild and severe ends.  Additionally, a more precise diagnostic framework was defined in which patients were assessed in terms both of symptoms and duration of suffering.

Two examples of "schizophrenia art".

My Eyes in the Time of Apparition (1913) by August Natterer (1868-1938).

The life of German artist August Natterer began innocuously enough, studying engineering, travelling extensively, marrying and building a successful career as an electrician.  However, in his thirties, he began to experience anxiety attacks and delusions and in 1907 suffered a hallucination in which thousands of images flashed before his eyes in little more than thirty minutes.  So affected by the experience that he attempted suicide, he was admitted to an asylum and would spend the remaining quarter-century of his life in and out of institutes for the insane.  In the literature, Natterer is referred to as Neter, a pseudonym used by his psychiatrist to protect patient and family from the social stigma then associated with mental illness.  He described the 1907 hallucination as a vision of the Last Judgment which he described as:

"...10,000 images flashed by in half an hour.  I saw a white spot in the clouds absolutely close – all the clouds paused – then the white spot departed and stood all the time like a board in the sky. On the same board or the screen or stage now images as quick as a flash followed each other, about 10,000 in half an hour… God himself occurred, the witch, who created the world – in between worldly visions: images of war, continents, memorials, castles, beautiful castles, just the glory of the world – but all of this to see in supernal images. They were at least twenty meters big, clear to observe, almost without color like photographs… The images were epiphanies of the Last Judgment. Christ couldn't fulfil the salvation because he was crucified early... God revealed them to me to accomplish the salvation."

After his suicide attempt and committal to the first of what would be several mental asylums, Natterer thereafter maintained that he was the illegitimate child of Emperor Napoleon I (Napoleon Bonaparte (1769–1821; leader of the French Republic 1799-1804 & Emperor of the French from 1804-1814 & 1815)) and "Redeemer of the World".  The vision inspired Natterer to a prolific production of drawings, all documenting images and ideas seen in the vision, one especially interesting to those studying psychosis and schizophrenia being My Eyes in the Time of Apparition (1913), two eyes bloodshot and wide-open eyes staring from the page.  The irises of the eyes do not match.

The Scream (1893), oil, tempera & paste on cardboard, by Edvard Munch (1863-1944), National Gallery of Norway.

Norwegian Edvard Munch was one of a number of artists modern psychiatrists have written of as having both genetic and environmental predispositions to mental illness, schizophrenia in particular; one of Munch’s sisters had schizophrenia, his father suffered from depression, his mother and another sister dying from tuberculosis when he was young.  Munch though was a realist, once telling an interviewer, “I cannot get rid of my illnesses, for there is a lot in my art that exists only because of them.”  The idea of affliction as a source or artistic inspiration appears often in the literature of art, music and such and in that it's something of a parallel with those who produce their finest work while living under political oppression; unpleasant as that can be, reform can see careers suffer, famous dissidents abruptly left as "rebels without a cause" after the fall of the Soviet Union (1922-1991) and a generation of the UK's activists found grist for their mills less prolific after the Tory Party had Margaret Thatcher (1925–2013; UK prime-minister 1979-1990) walk the political plank.  Where one door closes however, another sometimes opens and in John Major (b 1943; UK prime-minister 1990-1997) the comedians found a rich vein of material.    

His was a troubled life and in 1908, following a psychotic break exacerbated by alcoholism, Munch was admitted to a mental health clinic, later diagnosed with neurasthenia, a clinical condition now known to be closely associated with hypochondria and hysteria.  Adding to his problems, the Nazis labelled Munch’s style “degenerate art” and in 1937 confiscated many of his works but their disapprobation had less of an influence on his painting than his schizophrenia, his output continuing to feature figures obviously tortured by anguish and despair.  The apparently frantic strokes of the brush and his seemingly chaotic pallet of colors have long intrigued both critics and clinicians seeing insight into his state of mind, the idea being his paintings provide something of a visual representation of how schizophrenia might lead individuals to see the world.

Lindsay Lohan, following Edvard Munch, rendered by Vovsoft in comicbook style.

Endlessly reproduced, the subject of numerous memes and the inspiration for many re-interpretations, The Scream is Munch’s most famous work and the most emblematic of what now casually is called “schizophrenic art” (unfortunately often conflated with “art by schizophrenics”).  For decades it has been the chosen artistic representation for the angst-ridden modern human condition, the artist in 1890 noting in his diary a still vivid memory: “I was walking along the road with two friends—the sun went down—I felt a gust of melancholy—suddenly the sky turned a bloody red... I felt this big, infinite scream through nature.”  That entry was written some years after the sight and before painting The Scream in 1893 but the moment stayed with him because his vision of the sky caused him to “tremble with pain and angst” and he felt he heard his “…scream passing endlessly through the world.”  For historians those fragment of memory proved of interest and in his book Krakatoa:The Day the World Exploded (2003), detailing the 1883 eruption of the Indonesian volcano Krakatoa, Simon Winchester (b 1944) connected the “blood red” Norwegian sky with the fiery sunsets created by the ash from the explosion circulating the planet, high in the atmosphere.

Krakatoa: The Day the world exploded.

The idea of a link between the catastrophic geological event and the painting had long intrigued art historians who understood such a sight would have appeared “surreal”, decades before the surrealism movement became established and that it was a natural phenomenon is well-supported by theoretical modelling.  Between 20 May-21 October 1883, Krakatau, a volcanic island in the Sunda Strait, erupted, the “main event” happening on 27 August, during which over two-thirds of the island and its surrounding archipelago was destroyed, the remnants subsequently collapsing into a caldera (in volcanology, a large crater formed by collapse of the cone or edifice of a volcano).  The event created a large tsunami which, much diminished, reached the Atlantic and it’s believed that day’s third explosion was history’s loudest known sound.  What Edvard Munch is thought to have seen is the evening light of the sun being colored by the millions of tons of sulfur dioxide and volcanic dust blasted high into the atmosphere, circulating there for years including over Oslo when the artist was taking his walk.  Nor was he wholly wrong in suggesting “a scream passing” because such was energy generated by the explosion, the acoustic pressure wave circled the globe at least three times.