Purely out of curiosity, have you ever been into a lunatic asylum before? If so, did any of them seem to be much happier than the average person?

"lunatic asylum"

Hmmmmmm, if you mean the average hospital mental wards then they are not happy. Their rights and actions are strictly limited. They usually arrive at the acute moment of their illness, after some intense incident.

There are very few asylums any more. Most long term mental illness is treatable in community settings, group homes or similar. Those people's lives are pretty much as mediocre as yours.

I visited a small mental hospital in southern France once to see a patient, a friend of a friend, and didn't witness any childlike wonder or anything like that. Most people went quietly about their business, some probably drugged into a semi-stupor.

On the other hand the state mental hospital in Provo, Utah used to put on a haunted house every year in a stone castle that was on the institution's grounds. I was told that it was built by the wealthy family that originally owned the property, before they donated it to the state.

There were many patients who were allowed to participate in the haunted house every October, but only non-violent ones who were on their best behavior during the preceding months were selected. It added a little extra frisson to the proceedings, knowing that the guy charging at you with an ax or a chainsaw might be one of the patients.

They all looked like they were having the time of their lives, but to be honest they weren't actually in the hospital at the time, though they were still on the grounds, and under supervision. Sadly the hospital hasn't put on the haunted house for quite awhile now. I heard reports that some patients were being physically and sexually abused by the visitors - dickheads who were punching the male patients in the darkened corridors and passageways and groping the female patients.

It's a shame, they put on a helluva haunted house.

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Link 1 - Link 2

I've visited someone on a psych ward a few times, and seriously, no. They do a mean institutional-shuffle though.

Been to mental hospital, people there are typically drug/booze addicts, paranoid schizophrenics or depressed. None of them seemed very cheerful.

absolutely nothing good about them. stay away at all costs.

Worked at the hospital locally for a while and visited the mental ward many times. Nobody's cheerful in there, and I mean nobody. Most of the people know why they're there, even the schizophrenics. They're all heavily medicated to keep them under control, many are recovering from sedation used from electro-shock therapy, and some just walk around saying they're Jesus. I spoke to Jesus #5 and Jesus #8 at the same time in conference, and they were both depressed that the world was going to end and that they couldn't save humanity with their powers. The two of them apparently agreed that they were the same person which made them even more depressed that they weren't unique.

Mental wards are the most depressing places on earth. They're not all like flying over a cuckoo's nest.

Worked on an inpatient psych ward. The only happy people were either bipolar and in the manic phase, or people that had been profoundly depressed and had been helped by ECT (shock therapy). I was skeptical about the latter and it causes some nasty memory loss, but I saw it do some amazing things for a couple of people.

I Visited the largest unfenced Lunatic Asylum in the world = America 16 years ago. And no they all seemed crazy and sad..