It's our 100th episode! Can you believe it? That's insane. And speaking of INSANE. We're talking about the real reasons people were committed to asylums in the 1800s.
ASYLUM ADMISSION FORM – CIRCA 1872
Name of Patients: REDACTED
Age: Mentally ageless, spiritually chaotic
Date of Admission: Immediately upon viewing
Reason for Commitment:
Hysteria
Moral insanity
Uncontrollable giggling
Delusions involving felt creatures exhibiting romantic behavior
Excessive familiarity with puppetry
Attempted French kissing via sock-based mediums
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
When the worms crawl in, the worms crawl out.
They'll eat your gods and spit them out.
And when your bones begin to rot, the worms remain, but you
do not. So don't ever laugh as the
hearse goes by. There's someday you'll be next
(00:21):
in life. And when death brings his cold
despair, ask yourself, will anyone?
Macabre may not be suitable for all audiences.
Listener discretion is advised. Can we just self commit to an
insane asylum? You know, is that the same
(00:44):
fucking cowbeat? It'd be quiet at least.
Maybe in a padded room it'd be quiet.
Yeah, exactly. Yeah.
I'm just daydreaming about all of the things that would be
solved if I look. You think about it back in the
(01:06):
day, that's how a lot of problems are solved.
Yeah, a lot of them. The fucking range of things that
you could be committed for. It's insane.
The list is very long. Can you Speaking of that, good
segue. Yeah, today we are talking about
(01:28):
ways to be committed to an asylum. 100 ways, in fact.
Because indeed, it is our 100th episode of Macabre, a dark
history podcast. Welcome.
If you're new here, you are coming in at a really funny
time. Welcome.
(01:50):
If you're not new here, you knowexactly how it goes around.
Here. This is the very first time, so
this is perfectly timed to be atthe end of season 2 for our
100th episode. But also this is the first time
(02:10):
out of 100 episodes that we haveever had to re record.
We have prided ourselves on making sure that never fucking
happens. And here we are on our 100th
episode. Sorry, sorry.
(02:31):
Nick and. Jake, yes, I texted you Nick and
said I'm sorry. I told him and he's dude, that's
OK. He's we should come on again
sometime. I was like, yes, we need to get
that figured out because if Nickand Jake sound familiar, it's
because they're the hosts of America's Scary Land and we've
been pinting here and there thisseason that we have been wanting
(02:54):
them to come back. We know that a lot of our fans
were huge fans of them and we were right.
They are coming back. In fact, they should be
launching next month, within thesummer of 2025.
I was told June, perhaps July, So keep an eye on.
(03:16):
People yes, that's interesting because season 3 for us will
basically be back in July 'causewe're taking a little just a
little break I don't know that it'll affect listeners too much
there might be maybe two weeks where there isn't a new episode
coming out but yeah, so interesting timing but it.
(03:36):
Is bear with us, we love you, weare not forgetting about you.
We are just in the process of writing for Season 3.
There's a lot happening this year on Season 3, and so if our
intro didn't hint at anything, life is a time, right?
Say, wish that I owned a straitjacket because.
(03:58):
Oh man, I wish I owned a padded wolf because that I've wanted to
just beat my head against. Yeah, so 100th episode, which is
pretty insane. Yeah.
In itself. And So what a better way to
celebrate than do something insane around insanity and.
(04:23):
It's fitting, very fitting. We'll maybe probably say some
sappy things at the end because that's how we are, but maybe
we'll wait. But OK, we'll give a little bit
of this, but we'll say more at the end.
We just want to thank everybody who has been with us throughout
this journey, whether you started in the beginning or if
(04:47):
you're just starting now. We can't tell you how much we
appreciate you coming to hang with us every week.
It means so fucking much to us and you seriously make our life
so thank you. We hope we can make your day, at
least when we hang with you. So hopefully this will get you
(05:08):
laughing. And we're going to try to go
through these topics in alphabetical order, but we're
going to see how long it takes for you to be committed.
Oh, OK. And I'm not going to fucking lie
fast. I died right away.
OK. Our topic today, 100th episode,
is 100 ways that you personally could have been committed in
(05:34):
literally the 17 and 1800s around the world to an asylum.
So buckle up, get your straight jackets, and tuck in next to
that padded wall because we are about to get into it.
Some of the stuff is really insane, and we might add a
(05:57):
couple bonuses in there, but 100, you know, it's just what
we'll find out. Some of these are a little
similar, but OK #1 where I died was asthma.
You could be committed for asthma.
That's I'm already thought. Was it just because they didn't
have a treatment for it at the time, I think I wonder.
(06:19):
Based on some of the things thatI've read, I mean, look at all
of the things that they haven't been able to cure back in the
day, but because it was just something that would come like
on set, you'd be. It's like a attack that you
didn't know where it spawned from or whatever.
Right. Kind of makes sense.
Yeah, so they're like that's commitment worthy, you know, and
(06:43):
we can't deal with y'all away with y'all #2 is bad company.
Yeah. We all know a lot of people like
that. Sure, you could probably name a
few people in your lifetime who would have been committed for a
bad company. I personally don't think I'm one
(07:04):
of those. Get a good company.
At least I like to think I'm a good company.
Right. But here's the thing.
Are you being committed because you have bad company or you
being committed because you are the bad company?
I think because you are the bad company, they're like, they're
like Uncle Uncle Charlie is boring as fuck at dinner
parties. Oh my gosh.
(07:27):
Can. You imagine if it was your fault
though? Relax.
Uncle Charlie showed up today and the wrong people saw it in
complete snoozefest. My dude, you're getting it.
Because parties were so important back in the day and
like, being social and, you know, having all those social
skills and whatnot. So, yeah, right.
Bye, Uncle Charlie. For real.
(07:49):
A party fall back then was like Major, Yeah, the next one is
they're together, which I don't know.
I don't know if they should be together.
I think they should be their ownseparate ones.
But it's bad habits and political excitement.
(08:09):
OK, Literally everybody would befucking committed right now.
Yeah, at this point, we would beall we're done.
Yeah, we're just done. I'm talking to you at this in
the cell next to me, passing notes under the door.
Yeah, we're meeting up in the lunch room, hanging out.
(08:32):
What meds did they give you today?
Into a trade I'll. Trade you.
Mine was just a little too much yesterday.
Bad whiskey is another reason. I've had some bad whiskey in
this day but like. Now, is it that you're drinking
bad whiskey or you made the bad whiskey?
(08:54):
Or you served the bad whiskey ata party.
Oh. Shit parties are coming to
freaking get you back. Then.
You are just. Done.
Oh, you know what Corpse whiskeywould be considered bad whiskey?
Actually, yes. Throwback to season 1.
Yeah, you would definitely get committed for drinking that
(09:16):
nastiness. Definitely and making it anytime
like ever since then anytime I see a commercial or any
advertisement that was aged in abarrel blow, I'm like thanks.
Still one of the greatest facts of all time.
I think it. Is it is and nobody really knows
(09:38):
what they mean when they say stiff drink like careful what
you wish. So remember, we're not just
talking about a regular hospital.
This is a mental asylum, right? But the next reason is being
bitten by a rattlesnake. I'm pretty sure you should go
(10:00):
straight to the regular hospital.
Yes, like dude, he's insane. And guess what?
His foot is the size of a softball.
That's insane. He made his ankle that big.
He needs to be committed. Sure.
Surely they realized that was like a venom response, right?
(10:25):
Eventually they had to have known.
But why? Also are asylums carrying anti
venom? I feel like anti let me look up
when anti venom was actually invented.
Because I'm going to say asylumsdidn't just have that on hand.
No, I don't think so. And if you get bitten by a
(10:47):
venomous snake, you're going to act crazy because Oh yeah, that
does awful things to your body. It does, and I mean you can go
insane in the time that you it doesn't take very long for you
to start showing symptoms and the severity of course only
grows. So here's a just a side note.
(11:10):
If you get bitten by a rattlesnake, know this.
You don't always have to see twoholes wherever you get bitten
because oftentimes they don't always get both things in when
they launch. Oh, who knew?
Right. MC Cobb, MC Public service
announcement. I didn't know that.
(11:31):
Yeah. Secondly, sucking on the spot
where it was injected does not help.
In fact, you are making it worsebecause the venom and the
enzymes in the venom from a rattlesnake are active, meaning
that as soon as you are impacted, it is already going
(11:53):
through your bloodstream. There is no way you'd be able to
suck it out. The only thing that you're doing
by sucking out your blood is taking out the white blood cells
to help combat it. So you're actually making it go
faster. Shit, yes.
So keep that in mind if you get bitten.
Looking it up, anti venom was actually created by a French
(12:15):
physician named Albert Clement in the late 1890s.
Oh so. Much later, Yeah.
OK. Yeah, they're not.
Yeah. Do you want to know what they
use? Here's another note for people
because I don't want to find outif I'm still allergic to horses.
(12:36):
I was. Wait, what?
I was allergic to horses also. Do you know how they make anti
venom? No, so they take rattlesnakes
and they have them like bite onto a hoof of either a goat or
a horse. Horses are more common and so if
(12:56):
you're allergic to horses you'regoing to have an anaphylactic
shock if you get normal anti venom.
So you can't. You can never be bitten by a
snake. A venomous snake one, yeah.
The rare one meaning the goat one.
But yeah, they some component ofthe hoof keeps that venom
(13:20):
together and it kind of builds and works and it mutates enough
that when it gets translated into the anti venom and it's
injected into a human body, it kind of acts like a
immunotherapy shot or wow. Yeah.
And not always. I know that some people say oh
it's a one and done. Sometimes, depending on the
(13:42):
severity and how long you have been holding on to the snake
bite, you may have to have multiple vials of anti venom.
Yeah, crazy. I don't know why I'm full of all
that knowledge, but I am. It's great for trivia.
Night it is. It's also great if you go on a
hike. Also hiking boots.
(14:02):
Normal ones do not combat bites from animals only if you were to
get like they do make boots justfor that kind of thing, but you
have to basically get knee high really thick stiff leather boots
in order to deflect a snake bite, otherwise they go through
(14:22):
everything. Wow, that's thanks for adding
that to my nightmare fuel. I'm sorry, but I'm just telling
you. I'm just telling you, hiking
boots don't necessarily unless you get special ones, but then
you're only covering however long they go up.
But make sure you keep an eye out.
Yeah, but moving on from that, interesting.
(14:45):
For some reason, you could be infor a rattlesnake bite.
Another reason that you could bein for is brain fever, which
remembering everything we've ever talked about on the show,
and I'm sure other things you'veheard about, brain fever is an
umbrella for. We don't know what in the hell.
Yeah, what? The fuck is wrong with you?
(15:08):
Yeah, some. So that's that could be a lot of
people. Yeah, could be.
Oh yeah. And then think about the things
you eat. You could eat a poorly cooked
something or other and brain fever and you're after next
(15:28):
morning you're completely fine after you've gone through your
little sick episode and then Nope, you are suddenly in an
asylum the rest of your life. Yeah.
Oh, here we go, another reason why I would definitely be
committed. Business nerves.
Business nerves, like when people try to sell you stuff.
Yeah, or they get like anxious and their jobs and they're too
(15:51):
like, you know, anxious and. That was me all week.
Same. Same.
Yeah. So Can you imagine every.
Nobody is safe back then. No one.
Oh, so I'm going to look this upagain because the next one
(16:14):
that's on the list, and I remember us talking about it
before, but it's carbonic acid gas and I think it's some sort
of issue with your tummy, but. I can only imagine.
(16:35):
OK, no, guess what? That's just an old phrase for
carbon dioxide. OK, so if you're too fucking
sleepy because you had too much carbon dioxide, what?
I mean, look at the gas heated homes back then, your whole
(16:56):
family is. I'm super tired.
What's going on? It's me everyday.
Same. Same.
Oh, can you just imagine? Come get it.
I think they just committed everybody for whatever reason
because it just made their liveseasier.
(17:17):
Oh, yeah. They just don't want to deal
with anything. Yeah.
And then when people were in there, they like to play up that
they helped everybody inside thebuilding.
They didn't. They didn't.
So the next one, I had to look this one up again as well
because I forgot what it meant. But you again, this should be
(17:40):
something that people were brought to an actual hospital
for. It's called Carbuncle.
Do you remember Jackson said that?
That was like, weird, remember? My brain wants to say or like
Barnacle, but it's carbacle. So it's a very painful deep
(18:00):
seated skin infection that develops when there's multiple
boils in a cluster on your person's.
That sounds terrible, right? It normally is caused by like
staph infection, but they. Didn't oh, which is so dangerous
and would have killed you prettyquickly.
(18:23):
Right. And imagine how people, like,
took care of themselves back then after looking at people,
like, people didn't wash their hands.
Yeah. But often times when patients
came in with things like that, there would be these clusters of
boils all over their bodies, red, swollen and tender limbs,
lymph nodes. They may have had multiple areas
(18:45):
of drainages and openings in their skin.
Often the first signs of carbuncle is a fever, chills and
malaise. Yeah, Gross, gross, gross.
It's not something you hear of now.
No. Must have a different name for
it. Right.
(19:06):
Boils. Boils, yeah, 'cause like staph
infection now, I mean, staph infection so severe, but
normally it doesn't get to a level like that because you're
already like, going in and getting an antibiotic for it.
But Aloha, I can't imagine. I can't imagine the next one is
(19:27):
just having a freaking cold. Well, oh, everybody is screwed.
Congestion of the brain and not just a cold can get you in
there. That also is a very LAX term
because that could be anything from a swelling on one side of
(19:49):
your face for some reason if youhad an allergic reaction or
having pains in your brain and just, yeah.
What about like brain fog? Yes, you know that form like
hormone related brain fog and just any kind of brain fog.
(20:09):
Right, in some documents that I found, they called that cerebral
softening. Oh geez.
Yes, which I find very interesting because cerebral
softening was used for differentthings too.
But a lot of the ways that they describe some patients, that was
exactly what it was. It's just brain fog because they
(20:30):
say, Oh yes, it would come and go and no, you could be in for
crime. OK.
Yeah, that kind of makes sense. For what?
Yeah, it does. Yeah, depending on the crime, of
course. Right, another this one is
really sad, but we're going to also talk about some family
(20:54):
dynamic stuff too, of how you could be committed, one of which
was actually if your son were togo to war and he died, you could
actually be committed to an insane asylum for multiple
reasons. They could one whoever was, you
know, next in line for your property could just say, oh, you
(21:19):
know, I'm just going to take youto the home and start living my
life, You know, otherwise some would wait until the funeral,
use that excuse that oh, she wascompletely hysterical during the
funeral. There's no calming her down.
Then that would be another way, easy way for mothers or sisters
(21:39):
even, to get committed. Yeah, another option, Speaking
of Army military, if you were decoyed into the Army, that
would be enough to commit you. Just some really weird stuff.
As we go down the lid, there will be some other weird things
that we run into that's more like familial dysfunction.
(22:01):
But the next one on the list, myfriends, is deranged
masturbation. Oh, OK.
What makes it deranged? That's what I was gonna say.
Who? First of all, who is making this
determination right? Are you out like sitting on a
(22:23):
bench? In public or?
Or is this just like a woman saying her husband partakes in
deranged masturbation? Or.
Right. Yeah, I want.
Do I? I say I want.
Details I don't know. I don't know.
(22:45):
I mean, it'd be kind of funny and maybe interesting to find
out, but. Silence of the Lambs comes to
mind. OK.
Yeah, yes. Oh.
If you know, you know. Yeah, if you know, you know, I
don't want to watch it for that reason, but.
And now you're going to think about it though, when you do.
(23:06):
Exactly, that's going to be the only thing on my mind.
Credits roll. I'm like deranged, deranged.
You could also be committed if your husband deserts you because
maybe he's just derangingly masturbating all over the place.
You don't know desertion for anyreason by that's awful.
(23:26):
That's awful. It's not like your husband
leaving you is bad enough, you know?
Exactly. And then you got to go to the
fucking insane asylum. For nothing.
And most of the time reading up on some of these records, most
of the time the reason why this was happening was because he
found someone else. Yeah.
And he's just. So I'm going to pretend I'm not
(23:47):
married. Just bring you over to the
asylum and I'm going to start a brand new life.
Holy shit. No.
You could also be committed for diphtheria.
That sucks. Yeah.
I mean, having diphtheria sucks to begin with, and you're, yeah,
(24:09):
you're not lasting long, but Oh my gosh, I can't even imagine
being inside one of these facilities because you could
catch how many different things so contagious.
Yeah. Another reason I had to throw
that in there. We're just going in alphabetical
order, you know? The next one on the list is
(24:30):
disappointed affection. OK, so my mind goes a couple
places with that. OK, OK, I wanna hear.
But you're disappointed with theway someone gives you affection.
More like you are affectionate to someone.
(24:53):
And you're disappointing. Act you act towards you in
return. Disappointed affection.
OK, so the person who's getting committed is the one who's
disappointed by someone else. Yes.
OK. I thought you were getting
committed because you were disappointing.
(25:15):
What? You know, like, like you're a
bad kisser or something, right? Bad lover.
I mean, I dated. Somebody that would fall in my.
Category. How do we all?
Yeah, I mean, I'm no fucking Casanova, but oh, some things.
(25:39):
Some things I mean. Muppet.
Muppet kissing? Yes.
Muppet Frenching. Much more.
Sorry I fucked that up. Sorry David.
Muppet Frenching. Muppet Frenching.
And you know, that's one of those things with that, you just
know what it is. If you picture it, you picture
(26:00):
it. Just imagine.
Disappointed affection equals muppet Frenching.
Oh so my gosh my face hurts. I needed this.
Me under the disappointment category, there's multiple, but
(26:26):
that's one of them. Disappointed love is one of
them, which is also just kind ofthe same thing.
And then just straight up disappointment, yeah.
Yeah, like you've disappointed your parents.
You haven't lived up to their expectations.
Yeah. Yeah, your disappointment at
parties. See.
(26:48):
Keep them up at frenching. Oh, my gosh.
Oh, my gosh. All right, now we're back to
animal bites. You could be committed for a dog
bite, too, you know, Sucks. Yeah, it was probably because,
in this case, probably because of the scare of rabies.
(27:09):
Of werewolves. You're going to turn into a
well. And I can trope.
And I can trope, but yeah. Rabies makes more sense and.
Think about that too. Anti venom was invented in the
late 1890s and this was before that and I feel like rabies
shots were invented around the same time but let me.
(27:33):
See, doesn't rabies, like kill you?
There's no cure. You have to get the, you have to
get the shots before like it sets in or whatever.
Yep, yeah, 'cause once it sets to a certain level, you are
done. There is no coming back from it.
Oh, wow. Hey, way to go, France.
(27:55):
So another Frenchman invented this.
His name was Louis Pasteur. Oh.
What's the same? I think Louis Pasteur was the
one who did all of the vaccinations right and stuff.
Yeah, very intelligent man. We should definitely talk about
him sometime in depth, but he actually invented the rabies
(28:17):
injections in 1885. OK, yeah, so right.
Kind of fucked before the 1880s.So France was really Pasteur was
probably the leader in all of that because it seems like a lot
of the things stemmed from France, which makes sense.
Yeah, they were definitely innovating at that time.
(28:38):
There was a very almost like a second renaissance during that
period for science. And it would be really
interesting to cover because there was so much shit that came
out in the late 1800s. That's definitely a noteworthy
topic because you have to think about all the trial and error
and, you know, you hear about the different physicians that
(29:03):
injected themselves as part of their process and understanding
and experimentation. And that in itself is you have
to be really crazy and really passionate about what you're
doing to be willing to risk yourown life, you know?
Right exactly. Now, was it Louis Pasteur or was
(29:23):
it a British scientist in this time or like even a little bit
earlier than this that invented the vaccine for smallpox?
And how he did that? Was he crushed?
And this is so disgusting. Imagine being the person that
first thought of this idea and was crazy enough to try it, but
(29:44):
crushing up scabs from people's smallpox and just crushing the
shit out of them and putting them in this powder and taking
like a straw thing and insertingit into somebody's nose and
blowing it into that person's nose.
(30:04):
So I remember we talked about this at one point, I think it
was during maybe the STD episodeas like a side note or
something. Was it?
But the Chinese were the first ones that attempted to try to
utilize the smallpox scab, and they didn't quite figure it out.
But at least I don't think they did.
(30:27):
No, because it wasn't until 1890when they actually were able to
make the vaccine. And the Chinese were on to that
a long time prior. They just didn't have the
science, you know? No.
And who would have thought that you had to ingest it because
that was a thing that you definitely didn't want to do is,
oh, ingest an infection and. Eating scabs.
(30:51):
Or inhaling them. Or oh.
Just commit me to the asylum. Yeah, Yeah, I'm good.
I'm ready. So you could also kind of
falling into the next one on thealphabetical list, domestic
affliction or domestic troubles could get you committed.
(31:13):
Now, often times, based on what I was seeing, and it wasn't
always this case, but normally the people being attacked in
these domestic situations were the ones that were being
committed because a lot of the blame was put on them by the
person doing the acts of yeah, who's surprised?
(31:36):
Really. Yeah, yeah.
And sometimes, depending on how many people in the area knew
this particular person, if they were doing the attacking in the
home and they're like, oh, no, should be this person, then
everyone smile. You would see the aggressor
being put away, but typically no.
(31:56):
Well, now I think in modern situations where there's
conflict like that, I think theytend to pull people aside
separately and try to sort out like what actually genuinely
happened. And although in the case of what
was her name, the young couple that were driving around the
(32:19):
country in the van, Gabby Petito, that did not happen the
way it should have happened. Yeah.
So I guess I take what I said back.
It doesn't always happen, but itshould.
Right, right. Yeah.
It's still such a, we like to think that we've come a long way
(32:41):
with a lot of things, but we really haven't in some things.
It definitely needs more work inthat area for sure.
This one gets me to like why another reason could be doubt
about a mother's ancestry. Oh shit, so who's the person
that's getting committed? The child and.
(33:03):
Oh that is insane. That's the only word I know to
use for that. Because why in the world would
you commit the child? Right.
Because you didn't know the mother's ancestry, you'd think
it'd be the mother. Right.
Not the child, but I think it's the mother or the child doubting
(33:24):
the mother's ancestry, like accusing her of lying or like,
where do you really come from and that kind of thing.
And which I find very interesting because it's that
feels like something that would have happened more during maybe
war times, depending on who's atwar.
I could see that. But yeah, that's a very weird
one. Dropsy could get you committed.
(33:48):
That's terrible to say this, butyeah, I guess I could sort of
see why if they because at the time they attributed certain
physical characteristics with insanity, right?
And dropsy will cause your, is that the one that where you like
face, one side of your face willkind of droop and it's not
permanent in most cases. I don't think it's permanent.
(34:10):
It will go back. But yeah, the way they
attributed insanity to physical abnormalities, I can see why
that would have been a thing. At that time, right, we talked
about that in the, when we talked about like PT Barnum and
stuff like that, just that therewere people that were sideshows
(34:32):
that really should have gotten some help because it was
literally because of their appearance and it was because
they had a deficiency or a disease.
And yeah, some really crazy stuff, really crazy stuff.
Egotism could also get you committed.
We could use a little bit of that nowadays.
(34:54):
I'm like what? That's maybe the one that I vote
for. I know some politicians and
different, Oh, my high-ranking CE OS and I know, you know,
things like that. Right.
It's funny that you say these because I thought that's what
you were going for when we started laughing because I was
like the first I thought of a person as soon as I read that.
(35:18):
And yes, I won't name. Who?
That person? I'm not naming names either, so
you know. But yes, that that person.
But you know the type. Yeah, yeah, Epileptic fits,
which we've, we know that was quite common.
We heard about that quite a bit from different sources and
(35:39):
throughout history really. And some of the really horrific
treatment from Bedlam for peoplewho had epileptic fits just
yeah, yeah, excessive sexual abuse.
I believe that's both ways. Unfortunately, it's not always
getting the person doing it off the streets, which is
(36:00):
unfortunate. The other one that we laughed
about the last time was excitement as officer.
That's what it was written as. And I'm like, are you excited
about an officer or as an officer you're getting excited?
Is it like you're power hungry or?
(36:23):
Right. What are we?
Like you're adrenaline junkie because you're an officer, and
then it's just too much because it's your, your personality is
too excitable because you like danger, right?
Maybe. Maybe otherwise, the only thing
I could think of is because I know sometimes excitement was
used for a multiple range of things back then, but it could
(36:47):
also be maybe like you said, power hungry as an officer and
he was like overly aggressive and acted too quickly on things
or overdid it. Yeah.
The next I'm going to list are actually kind of in the same
boat. It's for people that were
involved in war. You could be committed for being
(37:11):
next to an explosion of a nearbyshell, exposure to the elements
or weapons of war, and also justexposure to what you trained for
as a soldier could get you committed.
And of course, this was before atime that people really knew
what PTSD was and all that. So it was kind of a umbrella
(37:36):
term for a lot of different soldiers.
They just kind of treated them, you know, the same and they
didn't really focus on what was truly causing it.
It wasn't till much later, unfortunately.
Speaking of exposure, you could also be committed for exposure
to quackery. We've talked a lot about that.
(37:59):
Yeah, you might want to be committed after that, depending
on your treatments. Right, being awake and feeling
an entire surgery that they had to open you up for?
No thanks. I'd probably go insane.
You would definitely have PTSD after that, yeah.
Wow, falling from a horse. There's a lot of horse talk
(38:21):
today. Yeah, I mean, if you hit your
head, I could see that if you were.
Oh yeah, you know, something more serious like that.
But just falling off of a horse,you just fall and you're fine
right there. I don't know.
We're committed. Committed.
Come. That reminds me of last time.
(38:41):
Bring out the Street Fighter voice.
Come in it. Your memory is so much better
than mine. No, not always.
I feel like it's just that we'regoing through it again that I'm
like. It's triggering stuff, yeah.
Because otherwise I'm like what,1/2 breakfast?
We said the word committed a lotlast time, I do remember that.
Yeah. And I feel like come.
(39:03):
Yeah, committed it. That's probably why I remember
it is 'cause we were laughing about it.
I. Think we were drinking too.
We were. Oh yeah, makes a difference.
'Cause we did this, which was 2 episodes, we did a bonus episode
and I think. I did the one on the tabloids.
(39:24):
Yes, yes. So we did get them for that one
at least we got some content which is.
Good. Which is good.
False confinement could have gotten you committed.
Which? What is false confinement if
somebody. Did you wrong by saying you were
guilty and then you were put in prison or something?
And really? Oh, here we go.
(39:48):
I hear the cat choir. Uh huh.
They need to be committed. The female disease is next on
the list. Oh boy, there's a lot of
different things for that on this list that we'll have to
talk about. But that was often put as a
reason, which is like really, that could be also a big
(40:10):
umbrella term for different things like hedaria and
hormones. That's they felt very strongly
about hormones, apparently. I wonder if.
Listeners, if you can hear my cats going, they're like really
(40:30):
doing the choir justice, that's for sure.
They sound pissed off. Yes, they do.
It's because I literally, I've been at work all day in here,
which are like, OK, it should betime for you to come out, you
know, for a little bit. And I literally grabbed a tiny
bit of food in the fridge and ran back in here and they're
like. Yeah, so now they're really.
(40:52):
Good. You could be committed for fever
of any kind. But fever was different than
brain fever, remember? Which is weird.
Do you see that? What?
My lights. What the heck?
Do you see them? The candle came on by itself
behind. Me.
(41:14):
Oh, negative energy, not a lot. Oh, not allowed.
Negative energy is not allowed. What the hell is happening and
my box lights 11 is flickering and then the other one will
flicker and they're totally separate.
What the? OK, that light was not on, has
not been on. No.
(41:36):
Negative. You have OK, so listeners,
Patreon people, you'll be able to see it.
But that candle, the way it works is it pops out of the
holder and on the bottom there'sa twist knob that you have to
turn all the way tight to make it go on.
It's still doing it. Negative energy is not allowed.
(42:00):
Well, why is it me? What is?
That. OK, I got to see it.
Negative energy is not allowed. Get that shit out of here.
Get that shit out of here. I don't want it in this house.
I don't want it in Halley's house.
It just needs to get the fuck out.
Oh. The candle flickered behind you.
(42:20):
Oh, come on, Blair. I'm sorry.
I'm sorry. Maybe.
Maybe the cats. The cats might have known.
I don't know. Creeped out now?
My hair on my arms and like what?
Shall we continue? I think so, yes.
What were we just talking about?Fevers.
(42:40):
Yeah, I don't know, that's kind of weird.
Fevers in different categories though, too.
Not just regularly if you never Oh my gosh.
OK listeners who can't see the candle light just went out
behind negative energy not invited.
(43:01):
OK, no RSVP D from you. So no.
Where's my sign back there? It's not even in my picture.
But negative energy is not allowed.
OK. Do you have moving on?
OK, firefighting could have got you committed, too.
Yeah. I don't understand why you're
(43:22):
trying to help people, so that'sweird.
Greediness could have also gotten you committed, which I
find very interesting because greed by others was actually
what got some people in the asylum to begin with.
Grief was another big one. I get that.
Yeah, definitely. Obviously, we talk about this
(43:46):
nowadays. Grief hits people differently.
People react differently to grief.
People act differently to grief.And sometimes those levels can
be quite, you know, intense for some and not so much for others.
But back then, it was just labeled as hysteria, you know,
(44:07):
just a category. Which I find that to be really
interesting, that someone would be committed for grief, now that
I'm thinking about it. Because you think about that
time people wore morning gowns and they made like morning, they
made stuff out of people's hair and all those things were pretty
(44:27):
normal. Right.
Yeah, I don't. Like how bad did your grief have
to be for you to be committed? Right.
Was it because, you know, sometimes if people cry really
loudly during like certain timesof this, you know, the funeral
or just in general, was it something like that because it
(44:52):
was outward? Yeah, or just because they
grieved for so long and just were depressed and locked away
and, you know, not eating and. Right.
Because I could see that. Definitely, definitely.
So yeah, super sad, very common on this list.
(45:13):
This would probably in the top 10 for being committed.
Just very sad. And obviously like some of the
big 10 have different semi categories within them.
You know, we talked about like fever and family dysfunction and
stuff like that. Yeah, just crazy.
You could be committed for gunshot wounds, kind of going
(45:37):
back more to soldiers. That was a big record for some
of the soldiers that were committed.
Being a hard study could get youcommitted.
Imagine that hereditary predisposition.
So in cases like this, it's not necessarily just assuming, oh,
(46:01):
like your dad had this, so you're probably going to get it.
You're going to get committed. It's more OK, your dad showed
this, Now you are showing signs of the beginnings of what he
had, which ended up being like this.
So now you're going to get committed.
So it kind of depends on what itis.
Obviously we're talking about a different range of type of
(46:26):
predisposition, but yeah, Speaking of family stuff, being
ill treated by your husband could get you committed.
Not your husband, but you. So that's fun.
Oh my gosh, this one just fucking gets me.
Imaginary female trouble. Really.
(46:48):
Like what? Why?
Living in a moral life imprisonment.
Another one that would have really taken me down was
indigestion. Yeah, but the same like really.
I'm just like going through these.
I'm like shit, I'm really in. Jealousy could have gotten you
(47:09):
in. Jealousy mixed with religion
could have gotten you in. I don't know how they go
together in that case, of why that you would be committed with
a little religion added in, or why jealousy would get you
committed either. But something, although I'm
wondering if it kind of refers to 'cause you know how sometimes
(47:31):
in like period peace literature you hear about how there's
always like a jealous love rivalor something.
And so in order to get your way like the rival goes away kind.
Of yeah, that's what I was thinking exactly for.
Especially the religion type thing, you know?
Oh yeah, yeah, that. Makes because it's very
(47:52):
political structure too, depending on what church you're
talking about and. Right.
Especially if they come from a different one different
religion, if it's like a love thing or if even if it because
Christianity has so many different branches.
If it's let's say good example, because this is a very big
rivalry in history. But if a Catholic person wanted
(48:15):
to marry a Protestant, that would have been pretty.
The family would have both families probably would have
been like, oh back in the day, kicked by a horse, could have
guessed a. Lot of horse related things,
yeah. It's really, I don't want to
laugh, but the way it was written in the records, really
(48:37):
funny because like right next toeach other, it's kick of horse
and then like right underneath it says kicked in the head by a
horse and it's two different people in the.
Oh no, yeah, I mean, horses werea part of every everyday life,
too. And you are not coming away
(48:59):
unscathed in any way, shape or form.
Something's going to be broken if you're getting kicked
anywhere by a horse. Laziness could have gotten you
committed. Yeah, loss of an arm could have
gotten you committed because youweren't deemed reliable enough
in the work field back then. Which is so sad.
(49:21):
It is very sad. Bigger examples that we see, and
I think we've talked about a fewon the show here and there, but
during the Industrial Revolutionspecifically, if you were
injured in a factory that you were working in and you lost
anything, you would be gone. And most of the time, depending
on where you worked, they would commit you so that you couldn't
(49:42):
try to come back to work. And loss of an arm is a big one.
Sometimes it would be hands or feet or yeah, sometimes.
When your son got married, he had the right to put you away
after marriage. Which Wolf?
It's not looking great for the ladies.
(50:05):
OK, we're solidly into the M's now and we're back to
masturbation and the following reasons.
Not only was it deranged, but also if you masturbated and had
syphilis, that was maybe that was why it was deranged.
I don't know. It's a whole other category.
And then they weren't spreading it to anyone else if they were
(50:27):
just busy taking. Care of themselves, right?
That should have been seen as a cure, keeping it away from other
people. And then the other one involving
masturbation is the duration, and the duration in which you
would be committed was 30 years.OK.
So somebody's been documenting you for 30 years.
(50:53):
That in itself is a commitment. Like, why are you?
Yeah, yeah. During certain periods of time,
and in most countries, even the more forward countries of the
time, women could be committed for taking medicines that would
prevent conception. Yeah, there were other things
(51:14):
that women would take for their health, not necessarily
preventing conception, but just things in general to try to help
them with certain things that would also consider them for
commitment. Believe it or not, I believe it
because there's a lot of ridiculous shit on this list.
Speaking of why you'd probably take something for your health.
(51:35):
Menstrual problems, They called it committed.
Committed Menstrual derangement is what it was called, which I'm
like, you know, moral sanity would get you committed.
Novel reading would get you committed.
Oh, oh shit, don't look behind me.
I know I was already committed. Like I'm #1 nymphomania would
(52:00):
get you committed, an opium habit over action of the brain.
So if you had any sort of imagination, I'll admit it,
yeah. Creatives are screwed.
Yeah, yeah, There's a couple of other ones later than like, huh.
(52:20):
For just like being like an academic or anything like that.
You're like, really, but overheating.
If you were somebody that just ran naturally too warm, you're
committed over studying religion, which I find very
ironic because I think it's every religion.
(52:42):
It's not just one or two. It's all religion, but it's but
you were expected to be religious.
So it's and if you're overly studied, wouldn't that be like
monks and like all that like. Yeah, people in the school for
priesthood, yeah, all that, right.
(53:03):
The next one is overtaxing mental powers.
That's all I'm thinking is you. Know one of those?
Yeah. I don't know why, but that was
where I went. The next one, parents were
cousins. So you would be committed
because your parents were cousins?
Wait, what? Yes.
No. Yeah, you were seen as an
(53:25):
abomination. OK.
Yeah, yeah. Also fun fact about that, I
started reading up on when I'm supposed to apply for my
marriage license cuz it's, it's different every state, you know,
I tried to go through like they're on the knot.
They have, oh, what you do in every state.
And I'm like, how long before doI need to apply for this?
(53:47):
So I started reading up on my very own county clerk of courts
website. And do you know, so a lot of
people do. And my aunt actually scared me.
My older aunt, she's, you know, you used to have to get a blood
test in order to apply. And I'm like, what?
(54:08):
She's. Yeah.
Because back in the day, a lot of cousins were getting married.
And I'm like, no. So I looked it up.
There's a clause when you read through your little brochure
thing. There's a fucking clause in
Wisconsin. What's the clause?
It's literally I thought, oh, ifyour cousins at all, why No, no,
(54:31):
legally you can marry not your first cousin or your second
cousin, but technically you can marry your third cousin.
Yeah, I think that's true here too.
Is it? And then there's another clause
underneath that that if you're over the age of 55, you can
(54:54):
marry your second cousin. Because you're not having kids.
Yeah, wow, that's I literally had to read that one out loud
when I was like what the no way,no way.
OK, anyway, I'm just full of like random shit today.
If he had worms, any type, I won't go into detail.
(55:19):
You let your imagination run wild with that one.
Periodical fits. Whether that would be like
chronic hiccups, chronic sneezing, it didn't matter.
It could get you committed. Political excitement is on this
list again, just by itself this time, But just in general,
politics could actually get you committed.
(55:42):
Yeah. Also religious enthusiasm or
religious excitement could get you committed.
Feeling remorse. I have buyer's remorse a lot.
Yeah, and remorse is a good thing.
Yeah, right. You want someone to feel
(56:02):
remorse, right? For certain things, right?
That's weird to me. Doesn't make sense.
No, because if you didn't feel remorse then you'd be a
sociopath. Yes, exactly.
It's defeating the purpose. I think this system is designed
to keep the good people in in the bad people roaming free.
(56:23):
Yeah. That seems like so even.
OK, we're going back and forth, of course, 'cause we're doing
alphabetical categories, but ladies had it rough back then.
So we talked about being mistreated by your husband,
being deserted by your husband. Even a rumor could get a lady
(56:46):
committed about either a husband's desertion or he's
about to desert you or somethingcould get her committed.
But also, if anybody were to mutter the fact that they
thought that you, like, murderedyour husband, you would be
committed and you basically wouldn't have any time to say
(57:06):
anything to defend yourself in that way.
Yeah, seduction is that. That's funny.
If you're getting committed for seduction, did you really seduce
right, You know, but the one underneath it.
That's why I think of this, because it says seduction and
(57:29):
disappointment. Oh, that's not a good combo.
No, I that's not why I want to be committed.
I don't want that on fucking written record.
That's why I was committed. Oh man, self abuse, which that
makes more sense. There are some things that they
did have. I will give them that.
(57:50):
Like where yes, maybe people should be protected, but they
weren't necessarily being protected when they were inside.
They were just like, OK, you're committed, but they were still
able to do that inside. Effects from severe labor on the
body could get you committed. I think that's just more of a
(58:11):
subcategory from losing a limb or something.
It's just, hey, like I threw my back out in the lumberyard.
Like now I can't do my job as I used to.
That kind of that kind of thing,using stimulants.
We talked about opium before. Sexual derangement again.
I really want to know why. What is derangement to them?
(58:36):
I think that could be a lot of things though.
Right. Oh yeah.
Oh yeah, shooting of daughter could get you committed.
That was literally that was how it was phrased.
Like, OK, maybe jail, you know, smallpox, having snuff on you,
consuming snuff for two years, softening of the brain from
(59:00):
snuff. That was a.
Lot of snuff related things a. Lot of snuff, spinal irritation,
sunstroke, superstition. I I sort of can see that.
But yeah. And also the one you talked
about, what was it, the ones left behind or something like
(59:20):
that? Because remember that woman?
Was she French? Yes, she was committed for
superstition. She was?
Yeah, because she was an academic and she studied
religion and literature and she wanted to teach that.
She wanted to talk to people about those topics.
(59:42):
And people were really unsettledby that 'cause she was just a
lady before her time. Yeah, it's so sad because, and
what was even sadder in her casewas it was her own best friend
that turned her in. Yeah, turned her in.
So sad. Yeah, and then she became insane
because of all the drugs and stuff they gave her over all
those years. Yeah, yeah.
(01:00:03):
And the they showed pictures in the book and it was very
unfortunate. They had two of her.
They had around the time she moved to America.
And then they had a picture of her after how many years being
in an asylum? Oh my gosh, it was
heartbreaking. Like she was so gorgeous.
(01:00:24):
Really had her whole life ahead of her.
A lot of potential as a person, just very smart.
And then at the end of her life,it was more towards the end of
her life as well. So sad.
The facial effects, the drooping.
It's really awful. It's really awful.
(01:00:46):
Yeah. Some of this stuff is just very
tragic. And I mean, it's easy to look at
topics like this and just, you know, some of them are really,
they are kind of funny. You're like, what?
But at the same time, it's like when you look at it from their
perspective, it's wow, why? And also, you know, the
(01:01:09):
treatment they're getting is just awful.
So we're almost done with the list.
I just looked at our timing. We just want to.
Yeah, Phil, rattle some off and then we can talk about it.
Heck yeah. All right, I will cut some of
these out. But the time of your life, think
(01:01:30):
about older generation probably going to be in that category.
Suppressed masturbation was alsoon that list.
We just had to throw in one moreof those.
Being a troublemaker vicious vices in your early life.
OK. If you were a troublemaker, you
(01:01:50):
know, and you're doing things you weren't supposed to.
But then even if you got better as you got older, no, somebody
remembered that you did that onething when you're in grade
school and now you're being committed.
Committed. Women is literally listed as its
own category. Just being a woman is literally
on this list and this. I don't know if I said this in
(01:02:13):
the beginning, I'm probably thinking of last time.
All of these come from a record from a West Virginia insane
asylum that ran in the mid 1800s.
By the way, I'm not pulling the shit out of my ass.
If you would like to learn more listeners just on the side
tangent really quick, it is Weston Hospital which is located
(01:02:34):
in Lewis County, West Virginia. This particular census that I'm
reading from, it's actually 25 topics of commitment.
We just kind of skipped over some that were more repetitive.
But if you would like to learn more, please go ahead and take a
look at Weston Hospital in West Virginia.
(01:02:55):
This particular report comes from 1862 to 1887, if you're
wanting specifics on that. We didn't really go into that.
We're just kind of rambling off the ways you could have been
committed because this was literally everywhere.
It wasn't just this asylum, of course, in some places were more
(01:03:16):
lenient with the reasons why than others, but in general, not
a great time. So literally, yeah, being a
young lady, if a woman were to show that they were any sort of
trouble or afraid of something or had too much anxiety or they
were too shy, like your demeanorcould have gotten you committed
(01:03:40):
as well. And this was more focused on
women because women had more of a strict, especially societal
view than men did. Yeah.
And that's literally where it ends.
Is it just the categories for women?
But I could probably go through this.
(01:04:03):
Listen, I won't be surprised if I could check.
Your number, yeah, I'm like, I think that the number would be
pretty high for things related to, you know, yeah.
Right, right. Like having allergies, having
asthma. Yeah, I'm too tired, being too
stressed, working too much. Yeah, anything that a woman
(01:04:25):
could be committed for on this list?
Probably. Oh yeah, we'll check that box.
Definitely, definitely one of the things that I think is also
a factor, but I don't think it wasn't mentioned in here.
But having having not met certain women's standards, I
(01:04:48):
think also if you never got married, if you never had
children or even if you were married and we're trying for
children but you couldn't have them.
I feel like that was also probably because we've heard
about that before too. And sometimes I think when you
see different lists or you hear different stories, it's kind of
listed under a category like adequacies or inadequacies or
(01:05:13):
whatever they call it. Just like some really crazy
stuff. Listeners, I know there was one
thing on this list that you're like, really?
Oh, I'm screwed. What was it?
I want to hear about it. And please don't say the M word,
OK? We don't need to know.
(01:05:34):
Keep that at home. Keep it in your pants.
Keep it Facebook. What is it?
Community standard approved? Yes, on the Facebook group page
please. Yeah, we like to have fun over
there, but that is a whole otherlevel.
You're still professional a little bit.
OK, OK. Yeah, get a little bit loosey
(01:05:56):
goosey on the Patreon. But Oh yeah, Oh yeah.
And sometimes like we I just want to shout out people right
now from the Facebook group because this last week, Oh my
gosh, it was 1 banger after the other with posts in there that I
was like I am cry laughing. What cracks me up is I will see
(01:06:19):
stuff and I'll save it in my photos, right?
Because I'm like, I'm going to pepper this out later.
Yep, and then I've seen Nat postthings that I was planning to
post and other people post things was planning to post.
Damn it, now we're just all likefighting to get our posts out
before the other people. I know great minds think alike.
That is true. Yeah.
(01:06:43):
Well, 100A. 100 that is insane. I I still can't wrap my head
around that. We do a podcast so and it's been
how long? But now we're at 100 episodes.
Yeah. And this is this basically will
come out, there will be one moreepisode for Season 2 and then
(01:07:05):
we'll take a short break and then we'll be back for Season 3.
We're excited and we hope that you guys really like what we're
going to bring you in Season 3 because we're switching it up a
little bit. We're excited.
We're excited. We are very excited.
But wow, yeah, like we kind of mentioned in the beginning, we
(01:07:29):
couldn't do this without you guys.
And hearing from you guys, hearing your feedback, being
able to banter with you guys, hang out with you guys, it
really makes this for us. And I mean, we like hanging out
with each other and that's how it started.
But then our fam grew and we're like Oh my goodness, this part
(01:07:53):
is just hopping. Love it.
Oh, and don't be disheartened ifyou sent us a story that you
wanted us to cover. If you haven't heard it already,
it doesn't mean it's not going to happen.
It's just timing and scanning and things like that.
So keep sending us stories. We love it and just a big thank
(01:08:13):
you from the bottom of our dark.Macabre hearts, we love you guys
very much and yeah, please keep sending it in We don't say that
we love hearing from you for health, we really do.
And just like how everybody's lives are really crazy right
(01:08:35):
now, we like to give you contentwithout that kind of banter, you
know, because yeah, every, everybody's got a lot going on
right now. And we see you, we hear you.
So hang tight in the in between.OK?
For Season 3, it is coming. And if you have anything that
(01:08:57):
you've sent us on any of the platforms, Facebook, e-mail,
anything, it's being seen. We're not ignoring it.
There's a reason why it's not been.
We have our own archive. I do for now.
I'll see you next time. OK, I guess we will love you.
When the worms crawl in, the worms crawl out.
They'll eat your gods and spit them out.
And when your bones begin to rot, the worms remain, but you
do not. So don't ever laugh as the
hearse goes by. There's someday you'll be next
(00:21):
in life. And when death brings his cold
despair, ask yourself, will anyone?
Macabre may not be suitable for all audiences.
Listener discretion is advised. Can we just self commit to an
insane asylum? You know, is that the same
(00:44):
fucking cowbeat? It'd be quiet at least.
Maybe in a padded room it'd be quiet.
Yeah, exactly. Yeah.
I'm just daydreaming about all of the things that would be
solved if I look. You think about it back in the
(01:06):
day, that's how a lot of problems are solved.
Yeah, a lot of them. The fucking range of things that
you could be committed for. It's insane.
The list is very long. Can you Speaking of that, good
segue. Yeah, today we are talking about
(01:28):
ways to be committed to an asylum. 100 ways, in fact.
Because indeed, it is our 100th episode of Macabre, a dark
history podcast. Welcome.
If you're new here, you are coming in at a really funny
time. Welcome.
(01:50):
If you're not new here, you knowexactly how it goes around.
Here. This is the very first time, so
this is perfectly timed to be atthe end of season 2 for our
100th episode. But also this is the first time
(02:10):
out of 100 episodes that we haveever had to re record.
We have prided ourselves on making sure that never fucking
happens. And here we are on our 100th
episode. Sorry, sorry.
(02:31):
Nick and. Jake, yes, I texted you Nick and
said I'm sorry. I told him and he's dude, that's
OK. He's we should come on again
sometime. I was like, yes, we need to get
that figured out because if Nickand Jake sound familiar, it's
because they're the hosts of America's Scary Land and we've
been pinting here and there thisseason that we have been wanting
(02:54):
them to come back. We know that a lot of our fans
were huge fans of them and we were right.
They are coming back. In fact, they should be
launching next month, within thesummer of 2025.
I was told June, perhaps July, So keep an eye on.
(03:16):
People yes, that's interesting because season 3 for us will
basically be back in July 'causewe're taking a little just a
little break I don't know that it'll affect listeners too much
there might be maybe two weeks where there isn't a new episode
coming out but yeah, so interesting timing but it.
(03:36):
Is bear with us, we love you, weare not forgetting about you.
We are just in the process of writing for Season 3.
There's a lot happening this year on Season 3, and so if our
intro didn't hint at anything, life is a time, right?
Say, wish that I owned a straitjacket because.
(03:58):
Oh man, I wish I owned a padded wolf because that I've wanted to
just beat my head against. Yeah, so 100th episode, which is
pretty insane. Yeah.
In itself. And So what a better way to
celebrate than do something insane around insanity and.
(04:23):
It's fitting, very fitting. We'll maybe probably say some
sappy things at the end because that's how we are, but maybe
we'll wait. But OK, we'll give a little bit
of this, but we'll say more at the end.
We just want to thank everybody who has been with us throughout
this journey, whether you started in the beginning or if
(04:47):
you're just starting now. We can't tell you how much we
appreciate you coming to hang with us every week.
It means so fucking much to us and you seriously make our life
so thank you. We hope we can make your day, at
least when we hang with you. So hopefully this will get you
(05:08):
laughing. And we're going to try to go
through these topics in alphabetical order, but we're
going to see how long it takes for you to be committed.
Oh, OK. And I'm not going to fucking lie
fast. I died right away.
OK. Our topic today, 100th episode,
is 100 ways that you personally could have been committed in
(05:34):
literally the 17 and 1800s around the world to an asylum.
So buckle up, get your straight jackets, and tuck in next to
that padded wall because we are about to get into it.
Some of the stuff is really insane, and we might add a
(05:57):
couple bonuses in there, but 100, you know, it's just what
we'll find out. Some of these are a little
similar, but OK #1 where I died was asthma.
You could be committed for asthma.
That's I'm already thought. Was it just because they didn't
have a treatment for it at the time, I think I wonder.
(06:19):
Based on some of the things thatI've read, I mean, look at all
of the things that they haven't been able to cure back in the
day, but because it was just something that would come like
on set, you'd be. It's like a attack that you
didn't know where it spawned from or whatever.
Right. Kind of makes sense.
Yeah, so they're like that's commitment worthy, you know, and
(06:43):
we can't deal with y'all away with y'all #2 is bad company.
Yeah. We all know a lot of people like
that. Sure, you could probably name a
few people in your lifetime who would have been committed for a
bad company. I personally don't think I'm one
(07:04):
of those. Get a good company.
At least I like to think I'm a good company.
Right. But here's the thing.
Are you being committed because you have bad company or you
being committed because you are the bad company?
I think because you are the bad company, they're like, they're
like Uncle Uncle Charlie is boring as fuck at dinner
parties. Oh my gosh.
(07:27):
Can. You imagine if it was your fault
though? Relax.
Uncle Charlie showed up today and the wrong people saw it in
complete snoozefest. My dude, you're getting it.
Because parties were so important back in the day and
like, being social and, you know, having all those social
skills and whatnot. So, yeah, right.
Bye, Uncle Charlie. For real.
(07:49):
A party fall back then was like Major, Yeah, the next one is
they're together, which I don't know.
I don't know if they should be together.
I think they should be their ownseparate ones.
But it's bad habits and political excitement.
(08:09):
OK, Literally everybody would befucking committed right now.
Yeah, at this point, we would beall we're done.
Yeah, we're just done. I'm talking to you at this in
the cell next to me, passing notes under the door.
Yeah, we're meeting up in the lunch room, hanging out.
(08:32):
What meds did they give you today?
Into a trade I'll. Trade you.
Mine was just a little too much yesterday.
Bad whiskey is another reason. I've had some bad whiskey in
this day but like. Now, is it that you're drinking
bad whiskey or you made the bad whiskey?
(08:54):
Or you served the bad whiskey ata party.
Oh. Shit parties are coming to
freaking get you back. Then.
You are just. Done.
Oh, you know what Corpse whiskeywould be considered bad whiskey?
Actually, yes. Throwback to season 1.
Yeah, you would definitely get committed for drinking that
(09:16):
nastiness. Definitely and making it anytime
like ever since then anytime I see a commercial or any
advertisement that was aged in abarrel blow, I'm like thanks.
Still one of the greatest facts of all time.
I think it. Is it is and nobody really knows
(09:38):
what they mean when they say stiff drink like careful what
you wish. So remember, we're not just
talking about a regular hospital.
This is a mental asylum, right? But the next reason is being
bitten by a rattlesnake. I'm pretty sure you should go
(10:00):
straight to the regular hospital.
Yes, like dude, he's insane. And guess what?
His foot is the size of a softball.
That's insane. He made his ankle that big.
He needs to be committed. Sure.
Surely they realized that was like a venom response, right?
(10:25):
Eventually they had to have known.
But why? Also are asylums carrying anti
venom? I feel like anti let me look up
when anti venom was actually invented.
Because I'm going to say asylumsdidn't just have that on hand.
No, I don't think so. And if you get bitten by a
(10:47):
venomous snake, you're going to act crazy because Oh yeah, that
does awful things to your body. It does, and I mean you can go
insane in the time that you it doesn't take very long for you
to start showing symptoms and the severity of course only
grows. So here's a just a side note.
(11:10):
If you get bitten by a rattlesnake, know this.
You don't always have to see twoholes wherever you get bitten
because oftentimes they don't always get both things in when
they launch. Oh, who knew?
Right. MC Cobb, MC Public service
announcement. I didn't know that.
(11:31):
Yeah. Secondly, sucking on the spot
where it was injected does not help.
In fact, you are making it worsebecause the venom and the
enzymes in the venom from a rattlesnake are active, meaning
that as soon as you are impacted, it is already going
(11:53):
through your bloodstream. There is no way you'd be able to
suck it out. The only thing that you're doing
by sucking out your blood is taking out the white blood cells
to help combat it. So you're actually making it go
faster. Shit, yes.
So keep that in mind if you get bitten.
Looking it up, anti venom was actually created by a French
(12:15):
physician named Albert Clement in the late 1890s.
Oh so. Much later, Yeah.
OK. Yeah, they're not.
Yeah. Do you want to know what they
use? Here's another note for people
because I don't want to find outif I'm still allergic to horses.
(12:36):
I was. Wait, what?
I was allergic to horses also. Do you know how they make anti
venom? No, so they take rattlesnakes
and they have them like bite onto a hoof of either a goat or
a horse. Horses are more common and so if
(12:56):
you're allergic to horses you'regoing to have an anaphylactic
shock if you get normal anti venom.
So you can't. You can never be bitten by a
snake. A venomous snake one, yeah.
The rare one meaning the goat one.
But yeah, they some component ofthe hoof keeps that venom
(13:20):
together and it kind of builds and works and it mutates enough
that when it gets translated into the anti venom and it's
injected into a human body, it kind of acts like a
immunotherapy shot or wow. Yeah.
And not always. I know that some people say oh
it's a one and done. Sometimes, depending on the
(13:42):
severity and how long you have been holding on to the snake
bite, you may have to have multiple vials of anti venom.
Yeah, crazy. I don't know why I'm full of all
that knowledge, but I am. It's great for trivia.
Night it is. It's also great if you go on a
hike. Also hiking boots.
(14:02):
Normal ones do not combat bites from animals only if you were to
get like they do make boots justfor that kind of thing, but you
have to basically get knee high really thick stiff leather boots
in order to deflect a snake bite, otherwise they go through
(14:22):
everything. Wow, that's thanks for adding
that to my nightmare fuel. I'm sorry, but I'm just telling
you. I'm just telling you, hiking
boots don't necessarily unless you get special ones, but then
you're only covering however long they go up.
But make sure you keep an eye out.
Yeah, but moving on from that, interesting.
(14:45):
For some reason, you could be infor a rattlesnake bite.
Another reason that you could bein for is brain fever, which
remembering everything we've ever talked about on the show,
and I'm sure other things you'veheard about, brain fever is an
umbrella for. We don't know what in the hell.
Yeah, what? The fuck is wrong with you?
(15:08):
Yeah, some. So that's that could be a lot of
people. Yeah, could be.
Oh yeah. And then think about the things
you eat. You could eat a poorly cooked
something or other and brain fever and you're after next
(15:28):
morning you're completely fine after you've gone through your
little sick episode and then Nope, you are suddenly in an
asylum the rest of your life. Yeah.
Oh, here we go, another reason why I would definitely be
committed. Business nerves.
Business nerves, like when people try to sell you stuff.
Yeah, or they get like anxious and their jobs and they're too
(15:51):
like, you know, anxious and. That was me all week.
Same. Same.
Yeah. So Can you imagine every.
Nobody is safe back then. No one.
Oh, so I'm going to look this upagain because the next one
(16:14):
that's on the list, and I remember us talking about it
before, but it's carbonic acid gas and I think it's some sort
of issue with your tummy, but. I can only imagine.
(16:35):
OK, no, guess what? That's just an old phrase for
carbon dioxide. OK, so if you're too fucking
sleepy because you had too much carbon dioxide, what?
I mean, look at the gas heated homes back then, your whole
(16:56):
family is. I'm super tired.
What's going on? It's me everyday.
Same. Same.
Oh, can you just imagine? Come get it.
I think they just committed everybody for whatever reason
because it just made their liveseasier.
(17:17):
Oh, yeah. They just don't want to deal
with anything. Yeah.
And then when people were in there, they like to play up that
they helped everybody inside thebuilding.
They didn't. They didn't.
So the next one, I had to look this one up again as well
because I forgot what it meant. But you again, this should be
(17:40):
something that people were brought to an actual hospital
for. It's called Carbuncle.
Do you remember Jackson said that?
That was like, weird, remember? My brain wants to say or like
Barnacle, but it's carbacle. So it's a very painful deep
(18:00):
seated skin infection that develops when there's multiple
boils in a cluster on your person's.
That sounds terrible, right? It normally is caused by like
staph infection, but they. Didn't oh, which is so dangerous
and would have killed you prettyquickly.
(18:23):
Right. And imagine how people, like,
took care of themselves back then after looking at people,
like, people didn't wash their hands.
Yeah. But often times when patients
came in with things like that, there would be these clusters of
boils all over their bodies, red, swollen and tender limbs,
lymph nodes. They may have had multiple areas
(18:45):
of drainages and openings in their skin.
Often the first signs of carbuncle is a fever, chills and
malaise. Yeah, Gross, gross, gross.
It's not something you hear of now.
No. Must have a different name for
it. Right.
(19:06):
Boils. Boils, yeah, 'cause like staph
infection now, I mean, staph infection so severe, but
normally it doesn't get to a level like that because you're
already like, going in and getting an antibiotic for it.
But Aloha, I can't imagine. I can't imagine the next one is
(19:27):
just having a freaking cold. Well, oh, everybody is screwed.
Congestion of the brain and not just a cold can get you in
there. That also is a very LAX term
because that could be anything from a swelling on one side of
(19:49):
your face for some reason if youhad an allergic reaction or
having pains in your brain and just, yeah.
What about like brain fog? Yes, you know that form like
hormone related brain fog and just any kind of brain fog.
(20:09):
Right, in some documents that I found, they called that cerebral
softening. Oh geez.
Yes, which I find very interesting because cerebral
softening was used for differentthings too.
But a lot of the ways that they describe some patients, that was
exactly what it was. It's just brain fog because they
(20:30):
say, Oh yes, it would come and go and no, you could be in for
crime. OK.
Yeah, that kind of makes sense. For what?
Yeah, it does. Yeah, depending on the crime, of
course. Right, another this one is
really sad, but we're going to also talk about some family
(20:54):
dynamic stuff too, of how you could be committed, one of which
was actually if your son were togo to war and he died, you could
actually be committed to an insane asylum for multiple
reasons. They could one whoever was, you
know, next in line for your property could just say, oh, you
(21:19):
know, I'm just going to take youto the home and start living my
life, You know, otherwise some would wait until the funeral,
use that excuse that oh, she wascompletely hysterical during the
funeral. There's no calming her down.
Then that would be another way, easy way for mothers or sisters
(21:39):
even, to get committed. Yeah, another option, Speaking
of Army military, if you were decoyed into the Army, that
would be enough to commit you. Just some really weird stuff.
As we go down the lid, there will be some other weird things
that we run into that's more like familial dysfunction.
(22:01):
But the next one on the list, myfriends, is deranged
masturbation. Oh, OK.
What makes it deranged? That's what I was gonna say.
Who? First of all, who is making this
determination right? Are you out like sitting on a
(22:23):
bench? In public or?
Or is this just like a woman saying her husband partakes in
deranged masturbation? Or.
Right. Yeah, I want.
Do I? I say I want.
Details I don't know. I don't know.
(22:45):
I mean, it'd be kind of funny and maybe interesting to find
out, but. Silence of the Lambs comes to
mind. OK.
Yeah, yes. Oh.
If you know, you know. Yeah, if you know, you know, I
don't want to watch it for that reason, but.
And now you're going to think about it though, when you do.
(23:06):
Exactly, that's going to be the only thing on my mind.
Credits roll. I'm like deranged, deranged.
You could also be committed if your husband deserts you because
maybe he's just derangingly masturbating all over the place.
You don't know desertion for anyreason by that's awful.
(23:26):
That's awful. It's not like your husband
leaving you is bad enough, you know?
Exactly. And then you got to go to the
fucking insane asylum. For nothing.
And most of the time reading up on some of these records, most
of the time the reason why this was happening was because he
found someone else. Yeah.
And he's just. So I'm going to pretend I'm not
(23:47):
married. Just bring you over to the
asylum and I'm going to start a brand new life.
Holy shit. No.
You could also be committed for diphtheria.
That sucks. Yeah.
I mean, having diphtheria sucks to begin with, and you're, yeah,
(24:09):
you're not lasting long, but Oh my gosh, I can't even imagine
being inside one of these facilities because you could
catch how many different things so contagious.
Yeah. Another reason I had to throw
that in there. We're just going in alphabetical
order, you know? The next one on the list is
(24:30):
disappointed affection. OK, so my mind goes a couple
places with that. OK, OK, I wanna hear.
But you're disappointed with theway someone gives you affection.
More like you are affectionate to someone.
(24:53):
And you're disappointing. Act you act towards you in
return. Disappointed affection.
OK, so the person who's getting committed is the one who's
disappointed by someone else. Yes.
OK. I thought you were getting
committed because you were disappointing.
(25:15):
What? You know, like, like you're a
bad kisser or something, right? Bad lover.
I mean, I dated. Somebody that would fall in my.
Category. How do we all?
Yeah, I mean, I'm no fucking Casanova, but oh, some things.
(25:39):
Some things I mean. Muppet.
Muppet kissing? Yes.
Muppet Frenching. Much more.
Sorry I fucked that up. Sorry David.
Muppet Frenching. Muppet Frenching.
And you know, that's one of those things with that, you just
know what it is. If you picture it, you picture
(26:00):
it. Just imagine.
Disappointed affection equals muppet Frenching.
Oh so my gosh my face hurts. I needed this.
Me under the disappointment category, there's multiple, but
(26:26):
that's one of them. Disappointed love is one of
them, which is also just kind ofthe same thing.
And then just straight up disappointment, yeah.
Yeah, like you've disappointed your parents.
You haven't lived up to their expectations.
Yeah. Yeah, your disappointment at
parties. See.
(26:48):
Keep them up at frenching. Oh, my gosh.
Oh, my gosh. All right, now we're back to
animal bites. You could be committed for a dog
bite, too, you know, Sucks. Yeah, it was probably because,
in this case, probably because of the scare of rabies.
(27:09):
Of werewolves. You're going to turn into a
well. And I can trope.
And I can trope, but yeah. Rabies makes more sense and.
Think about that too. Anti venom was invented in the
late 1890s and this was before that and I feel like rabies
shots were invented around the same time but let me.
(27:33):
See, doesn't rabies, like kill you?
There's no cure. You have to get the, you have to
get the shots before like it sets in or whatever.
Yep, yeah, 'cause once it sets to a certain level, you are
done. There is no coming back from it.
Oh, wow. Hey, way to go, France.
(27:55):
So another Frenchman invented this.
His name was Louis Pasteur. Oh.
What's the same? I think Louis Pasteur was the
one who did all of the vaccinations right and stuff.
Yeah, very intelligent man. We should definitely talk about
him sometime in depth, but he actually invented the rabies
(28:17):
injections in 1885. OK, yeah, so right.
Kind of fucked before the 1880s.So France was really Pasteur was
probably the leader in all of that because it seems like a lot
of the things stemmed from France, which makes sense.
Yeah, they were definitely innovating at that time.
(28:38):
There was a very almost like a second renaissance during that
period for science. And it would be really
interesting to cover because there was so much shit that came
out in the late 1800s. That's definitely a noteworthy
topic because you have to think about all the trial and error
and, you know, you hear about the different physicians that
(29:03):
injected themselves as part of their process and understanding
and experimentation. And that in itself is you have
to be really crazy and really passionate about what you're
doing to be willing to risk yourown life, you know?
Right exactly. Now, was it Louis Pasteur or was
(29:23):
it a British scientist in this time or like even a little bit
earlier than this that invented the vaccine for smallpox?
And how he did that? Was he crushed?
And this is so disgusting. Imagine being the person that
first thought of this idea and was crazy enough to try it, but
(29:44):
crushing up scabs from people's smallpox and just crushing the
shit out of them and putting them in this powder and taking
like a straw thing and insertingit into somebody's nose and
blowing it into that person's nose.
(30:04):
So I remember we talked about this at one point, I think it
was during maybe the STD episodeas like a side note or
something. Was it?
But the Chinese were the first ones that attempted to try to
utilize the smallpox scab, and they didn't quite figure it out.
But at least I don't think they did.
(30:27):
No, because it wasn't until 1890when they actually were able to
make the vaccine. And the Chinese were on to that
a long time prior. They just didn't have the
science, you know? No.
And who would have thought that you had to ingest it because
that was a thing that you definitely didn't want to do is,
oh, ingest an infection and. Eating scabs.
(30:51):
Or inhaling them. Or oh.
Just commit me to the asylum. Yeah, Yeah, I'm good.
I'm ready. So you could also kind of
falling into the next one on thealphabetical list, domestic
affliction or domestic troubles could get you committed.
(31:13):
Now, often times, based on what I was seeing, and it wasn't
always this case, but normally the people being attacked in
these domestic situations were the ones that were being
committed because a lot of the blame was put on them by the
person doing the acts of yeah, who's surprised?
(31:36):
Really. Yeah, yeah.
And sometimes, depending on how many people in the area knew
this particular person, if they were doing the attacking in the
home and they're like, oh, no, should be this person, then
everyone smile. You would see the aggressor
being put away, but typically no.
(31:56):
Well, now I think in modern situations where there's
conflict like that, I think theytend to pull people aside
separately and try to sort out like what actually genuinely
happened. And although in the case of what
was her name, the young couple that were driving around the
(32:19):
country in the van, Gabby Petito, that did not happen the
way it should have happened. Yeah.
So I guess I take what I said back.
It doesn't always happen, but itshould.
Right, right. Yeah.
It's still such a, we like to think that we've come a long way
(32:41):
with a lot of things, but we really haven't in some things.
It definitely needs more work inthat area for sure.
This one gets me to like why another reason could be doubt
about a mother's ancestry. Oh shit, so who's the person
that's getting committed? The child and.
(33:03):
Oh that is insane. That's the only word I know to
use for that. Because why in the world would
you commit the child? Right.
Because you didn't know the mother's ancestry, you'd think
it'd be the mother. Right.
Not the child, but I think it's the mother or the child doubting
(33:24):
the mother's ancestry, like accusing her of lying or like,
where do you really come from and that kind of thing.
And which I find very interesting because it's that
feels like something that would have happened more during maybe
war times, depending on who's atwar.
I could see that. But yeah, that's a very weird
one. Dropsy could get you committed.
(33:48):
That's terrible to say this, butyeah, I guess I could sort of
see why if they because at the time they attributed certain
physical characteristics with insanity, right?
And dropsy will cause your, is that the one that where you like
face, one side of your face willkind of droop and it's not
permanent in most cases. I don't think it's permanent.
(34:10):
It will go back. But yeah, the way they
attributed insanity to physical abnormalities, I can see why
that would have been a thing. At that time, right, we talked
about that in the, when we talked about like PT Barnum and
stuff like that, just that therewere people that were sideshows
(34:32):
that really should have gotten some help because it was
literally because of their appearance and it was because
they had a deficiency or a disease.
And yeah, some really crazy stuff, really crazy stuff.
Egotism could also get you committed.
We could use a little bit of that nowadays.
(34:54):
I'm like what? That's maybe the one that I vote
for. I know some politicians and
different, Oh, my high-ranking CE OS and I know, you know,
things like that. Right.
It's funny that you say these because I thought that's what
you were going for when we started laughing because I was
like the first I thought of a person as soon as I read that.
(35:18):
And yes, I won't name. Who?
That person? I'm not naming names either, so
you know. But yes, that that person.
But you know the type. Yeah, yeah, Epileptic fits,
which we've, we know that was quite common.
We heard about that quite a bit from different sources and
(35:39):
throughout history really. And some of the really horrific
treatment from Bedlam for peoplewho had epileptic fits just
yeah, yeah, excessive sexual abuse.
I believe that's both ways. Unfortunately, it's not always
getting the person doing it off the streets, which is
(36:00):
unfortunate. The other one that we laughed
about the last time was excitement as officer.
That's what it was written as. And I'm like, are you excited
about an officer or as an officer you're getting excited?
Is it like you're power hungry or?
(36:23):
Right. What are we?
Like you're adrenaline junkie because you're an officer, and
then it's just too much because it's your, your personality is
too excitable because you like danger, right?
Maybe. Maybe otherwise, the only thing
I could think of is because I know sometimes excitement was
used for a multiple range of things back then, but it could
(36:47):
also be maybe like you said, power hungry as an officer and
he was like overly aggressive and acted too quickly on things
or overdid it. Yeah.
The next I'm going to list are actually kind of in the same
boat. It's for people that were
involved in war. You could be committed for being
(37:11):
next to an explosion of a nearbyshell, exposure to the elements
or weapons of war, and also justexposure to what you trained for
as a soldier could get you committed.
And of course, this was before atime that people really knew
what PTSD was and all that. So it was kind of a umbrella
(37:36):
term for a lot of different soldiers.
They just kind of treated them, you know, the same and they
didn't really focus on what was truly causing it.
It wasn't till much later, unfortunately.
Speaking of exposure, you could also be committed for exposure
to quackery. We've talked a lot about that.
(37:59):
Yeah, you might want to be committed after that, depending
on your treatments. Right, being awake and feeling
an entire surgery that they had to open you up for?
No thanks. I'd probably go insane.
You would definitely have PTSD after that, yeah.
Wow, falling from a horse. There's a lot of horse talk
(38:21):
today. Yeah, I mean, if you hit your
head, I could see that if you were.
Oh yeah, you know, something more serious like that.
But just falling off of a horse,you just fall and you're fine
right there. I don't know.
We're committed. Committed.
Come. That reminds me of last time.
(38:41):
Bring out the Street Fighter voice.
Come in it. Your memory is so much better
than mine. No, not always.
I feel like it's just that we'regoing through it again that I'm
like. It's triggering stuff, yeah.
Because otherwise I'm like what,1/2 breakfast?
We said the word committed a lotlast time, I do remember that.
Yeah. And I feel like come.
(39:03):
Yeah, committed it. That's probably why I remember
it is 'cause we were laughing about it.
I. Think we were drinking too.
We were. Oh yeah, makes a difference.
'Cause we did this, which was 2 episodes, we did a bonus episode
and I think. I did the one on the tabloids.
(39:24):
Yes, yes. So we did get them for that one
at least we got some content which is.
Good. Which is good.
False confinement could have gotten you committed.
Which? What is false confinement if
somebody. Did you wrong by saying you were
guilty and then you were put in prison or something?
And really? Oh, here we go.
(39:48):
I hear the cat choir. Uh huh.
They need to be committed. The female disease is next on
the list. Oh boy, there's a lot of
different things for that on this list that we'll have to
talk about. But that was often put as a
reason, which is like really, that could be also a big
(40:10):
umbrella term for different things like hedaria and
hormones. That's they felt very strongly
about hormones, apparently. I wonder if.
Listeners, if you can hear my cats going, they're like really
(40:30):
doing the choir justice, that's for sure.
They sound pissed off. Yes, they do.
It's because I literally, I've been at work all day in here,
which are like, OK, it should betime for you to come out, you
know, for a little bit. And I literally grabbed a tiny
bit of food in the fridge and ran back in here and they're
like. Yeah, so now they're really.
(40:52):
Good. You could be committed for fever
of any kind. But fever was different than
brain fever, remember? Which is weird.
Do you see that? What?
My lights. What the heck?
Do you see them? The candle came on by itself
behind. Me.
(41:14):
Oh, negative energy, not a lot. Oh, not allowed.
Negative energy is not allowed. What the hell is happening and
my box lights 11 is flickering and then the other one will
flicker and they're totally separate.
What the? OK, that light was not on, has
not been on. No.
(41:36):
Negative. You have OK, so listeners,
Patreon people, you'll be able to see it.
But that candle, the way it works is it pops out of the
holder and on the bottom there'sa twist knob that you have to
turn all the way tight to make it go on.
It's still doing it. Negative energy is not allowed.
(42:00):
Well, why is it me? What is?
That. OK, I got to see it.
Negative energy is not allowed. Get that shit out of here.
Get that shit out of here. I don't want it in this house.
I don't want it in Halley's house.
It just needs to get the fuck out.
Oh. The candle flickered behind you.
(42:20):
Oh, come on, Blair. I'm sorry.
I'm sorry. Maybe.
Maybe the cats. The cats might have known.
I don't know. Creeped out now?
My hair on my arms and like what?
Shall we continue? I think so, yes.
What were we just talking about?Fevers.
(42:40):
Yeah, I don't know, that's kind of weird.
Fevers in different categories though, too.
Not just regularly if you never Oh my gosh.
OK listeners who can't see the candle light just went out
behind negative energy not invited.
(43:01):
OK, no RSVP D from you. So no.
Where's my sign back there? It's not even in my picture.
But negative energy is not allowed.
OK. Do you have moving on?
OK, firefighting could have got you committed, too.
Yeah. I don't understand why you're
(43:22):
trying to help people, so that'sweird.
Greediness could have also gotten you committed, which I
find very interesting because greed by others was actually
what got some people in the asylum to begin with.
Grief was another big one. I get that.
Yeah, definitely. Obviously, we talk about this
(43:46):
nowadays. Grief hits people differently.
People react differently to grief.
People act differently to grief.And sometimes those levels can
be quite, you know, intense for some and not so much for others.
But back then, it was just labeled as hysteria, you know,
(44:07):
just a category. Which I find that to be really
interesting, that someone would be committed for grief, now that
I'm thinking about it. Because you think about that
time people wore morning gowns and they made like morning, they
made stuff out of people's hair and all those things were pretty
(44:27):
normal. Right.
Yeah, I don't. Like how bad did your grief have
to be for you to be committed? Right.
Was it because, you know, sometimes if people cry really
loudly during like certain timesof this, you know, the funeral
or just in general, was it something like that because it
(44:52):
was outward? Yeah, or just because they
grieved for so long and just were depressed and locked away
and, you know, not eating and. Right.
Because I could see that. Definitely, definitely.
So yeah, super sad, very common on this list.
(45:13):
This would probably in the top 10 for being committed.
Just very sad. And obviously like some of the
big 10 have different semi categories within them.
You know, we talked about like fever and family dysfunction and
stuff like that. Yeah, just crazy.
You could be committed for gunshot wounds, kind of going
(45:37):
back more to soldiers. That was a big record for some
of the soldiers that were committed.
Being a hard study could get youcommitted.
Imagine that hereditary predisposition.
So in cases like this, it's not necessarily just assuming, oh,
(46:01):
like your dad had this, so you're probably going to get it.
You're going to get committed. It's more OK, your dad showed
this, Now you are showing signs of the beginnings of what he
had, which ended up being like this.
So now you're going to get committed.
So it kind of depends on what itis.
Obviously we're talking about a different range of type of
(46:26):
predisposition, but yeah, Speaking of family stuff, being
ill treated by your husband could get you committed.
Not your husband, but you. So that's fun.
Oh my gosh, this one just fucking gets me.
Imaginary female trouble. Really.
(46:48):
Like what? Why?
Living in a moral life imprisonment.
Another one that would have really taken me down was
indigestion. Yeah, but the same like really.
I'm just like going through these.
I'm like shit, I'm really in. Jealousy could have gotten you
(47:09):
in. Jealousy mixed with religion
could have gotten you in. I don't know how they go
together in that case, of why that you would be committed with
a little religion added in, or why jealousy would get you
committed either. But something, although I'm
wondering if it kind of refers to 'cause you know how sometimes
(47:31):
in like period peace literature you hear about how there's
always like a jealous love rivalor something.
And so in order to get your way like the rival goes away kind.
Of yeah, that's what I was thinking exactly for.
Especially the religion type thing, you know?
Oh yeah, yeah, that. Makes because it's very
(47:52):
political structure too, depending on what church you're
talking about and. Right.
Especially if they come from a different one different
religion, if it's like a love thing or if even if it because
Christianity has so many different branches.
If it's let's say good example, because this is a very big
rivalry in history. But if a Catholic person wanted
(48:15):
to marry a Protestant, that would have been pretty.
The family would have both families probably would have
been like, oh back in the day, kicked by a horse, could have
guessed a. Lot of horse related things,
yeah. It's really, I don't want to
laugh, but the way it was written in the records, really
(48:37):
funny because like right next toeach other, it's kick of horse
and then like right underneath it says kicked in the head by a
horse and it's two different people in the.
Oh no, yeah, I mean, horses werea part of every everyday life,
too. And you are not coming away
(48:59):
unscathed in any way, shape or form.
Something's going to be broken if you're getting kicked
anywhere by a horse. Laziness could have gotten you
committed. Yeah, loss of an arm could have
gotten you committed because youweren't deemed reliable enough
in the work field back then. Which is so sad.
(49:21):
It is very sad. Bigger examples that we see, and
I think we've talked about a fewon the show here and there, but
during the Industrial Revolutionspecifically, if you were
injured in a factory that you were working in and you lost
anything, you would be gone. And most of the time, depending
on where you worked, they would commit you so that you couldn't
(49:42):
try to come back to work. And loss of an arm is a big one.
Sometimes it would be hands or feet or yeah, sometimes.
When your son got married, he had the right to put you away
after marriage. Which Wolf?
It's not looking great for the ladies.
(50:05):
OK, we're solidly into the M's now and we're back to
masturbation and the following reasons.
Not only was it deranged, but also if you masturbated and had
syphilis, that was maybe that was why it was deranged.
I don't know. It's a whole other category.
And then they weren't spreading it to anyone else if they were
(50:27):
just busy taking. Care of themselves, right?
That should have been seen as a cure, keeping it away from other
people. And then the other one involving
masturbation is the duration, and the duration in which you
would be committed was 30 years.OK.
So somebody's been documenting you for 30 years.
(50:53):
That in itself is a commitment. Like, why are you?
Yeah, yeah. During certain periods of time,
and in most countries, even the more forward countries of the
time, women could be committed for taking medicines that would
prevent conception. Yeah, there were other things
(51:14):
that women would take for their health, not necessarily
preventing conception, but just things in general to try to help
them with certain things that would also consider them for
commitment. Believe it or not, I believe it
because there's a lot of ridiculous shit on this list.
Speaking of why you'd probably take something for your health.
(51:35):
Menstrual problems, They called it committed.
Committed Menstrual derangement is what it was called, which I'm
like, you know, moral sanity would get you committed.
Novel reading would get you committed.
Oh, oh shit, don't look behind me.
I know I was already committed. Like I'm #1 nymphomania would
(52:00):
get you committed, an opium habit over action of the brain.
So if you had any sort of imagination, I'll admit it,
yeah. Creatives are screwed.
Yeah, yeah, There's a couple of other ones later than like, huh.
(52:20):
For just like being like an academic or anything like that.
You're like, really, but overheating.
If you were somebody that just ran naturally too warm, you're
committed over studying religion, which I find very
ironic because I think it's every religion.
(52:42):
It's not just one or two. It's all religion, but it's but
you were expected to be religious.
So it's and if you're overly studied, wouldn't that be like
monks and like all that like. Yeah, people in the school for
priesthood, yeah, all that, right.
(53:03):
The next one is overtaxing mental powers.
That's all I'm thinking is you. Know one of those?
Yeah. I don't know why, but that was
where I went. The next one, parents were
cousins. So you would be committed
because your parents were cousins?
Wait, what? Yes.
No. Yeah, you were seen as an
(53:25):
abomination. OK.
Yeah, yeah. Also fun fact about that, I
started reading up on when I'm supposed to apply for my
marriage license cuz it's, it's different every state, you know,
I tried to go through like they're on the knot.
They have, oh, what you do in every state.
And I'm like, how long before doI need to apply for this?
(53:47):
So I started reading up on my very own county clerk of courts
website. And do you know, so a lot of
people do. And my aunt actually scared me.
My older aunt, she's, you know, you used to have to get a blood
test in order to apply. And I'm like, what?
(54:08):
She's. Yeah.
Because back in the day, a lot of cousins were getting married.
And I'm like, no. So I looked it up.
There's a clause when you read through your little brochure
thing. There's a fucking clause in
Wisconsin. What's the clause?
It's literally I thought, oh, ifyour cousins at all, why No, no,
(54:31):
legally you can marry not your first cousin or your second
cousin, but technically you can marry your third cousin.
Yeah, I think that's true here too.
Is it? And then there's another clause
underneath that that if you're over the age of 55, you can
(54:54):
marry your second cousin. Because you're not having kids.
Yeah, wow, that's I literally had to read that one out loud
when I was like what the no way,no way.
OK, anyway, I'm just full of like random shit today.
If he had worms, any type, I won't go into detail.
(55:19):
You let your imagination run wild with that one.
Periodical fits. Whether that would be like
chronic hiccups, chronic sneezing, it didn't matter.
It could get you committed. Political excitement is on this
list again, just by itself this time, But just in general,
politics could actually get you committed.
(55:42):
Yeah. Also religious enthusiasm or
religious excitement could get you committed.
Feeling remorse. I have buyer's remorse a lot.
Yeah, and remorse is a good thing.
Yeah, right. You want someone to feel
(56:02):
remorse, right? For certain things, right?
That's weird to me. Doesn't make sense.
No, because if you didn't feel remorse then you'd be a
sociopath. Yes, exactly.
It's defeating the purpose. I think this system is designed
to keep the good people in in the bad people roaming free.
(56:23):
Yeah. That seems like so even.
OK, we're going back and forth, of course, 'cause we're doing
alphabetical categories, but ladies had it rough back then.
So we talked about being mistreated by your husband,
being deserted by your husband. Even a rumor could get a lady
(56:46):
committed about either a husband's desertion or he's
about to desert you or somethingcould get her committed.
But also, if anybody were to mutter the fact that they
thought that you, like, murderedyour husband, you would be
committed and you basically wouldn't have any time to say
(57:06):
anything to defend yourself in that way.
Yeah, seduction is that. That's funny.
If you're getting committed for seduction, did you really seduce
right, You know, but the one underneath it.
That's why I think of this, because it says seduction and
(57:29):
disappointment. Oh, that's not a good combo.
No, I that's not why I want to be committed.
I don't want that on fucking written record.
That's why I was committed. Oh man, self abuse, which that
makes more sense. There are some things that they
did have. I will give them that.
(57:50):
Like where yes, maybe people should be protected, but they
weren't necessarily being protected when they were inside.
They were just like, OK, you're committed, but they were still
able to do that inside. Effects from severe labor on the
body could get you committed. I think that's just more of a
(58:11):
subcategory from losing a limb or something.
It's just, hey, like I threw my back out in the lumberyard.
Like now I can't do my job as I used to.
That kind of that kind of thing,using stimulants.
We talked about opium before. Sexual derangement again.
I really want to know why. What is derangement to them?
(58:36):
I think that could be a lot of things though.
Right. Oh yeah.
Oh yeah, shooting of daughter could get you committed.
That was literally that was how it was phrased.
Like, OK, maybe jail, you know, smallpox, having snuff on you,
consuming snuff for two years, softening of the brain from
(59:00):
snuff. That was a.
Lot of snuff related things a. Lot of snuff, spinal irritation,
sunstroke, superstition. I I sort of can see that.
But yeah. And also the one you talked
about, what was it, the ones left behind or something like
(59:20):
that? Because remember that woman?
Was she French? Yes, she was committed for
superstition. She was?
Yeah, because she was an academic and she studied
religion and literature and she wanted to teach that.
She wanted to talk to people about those topics.
(59:42):
And people were really unsettledby that 'cause she was just a
lady before her time. Yeah, it's so sad because, and
what was even sadder in her casewas it was her own best friend
that turned her in. Yeah, turned her in.
So sad. Yeah, and then she became insane
because of all the drugs and stuff they gave her over all
those years. Yeah, yeah.
(01:00:03):
And the they showed pictures in the book and it was very
unfortunate. They had two of her.
They had around the time she moved to America.
And then they had a picture of her after how many years being
in an asylum? Oh my gosh, it was
heartbreaking. Like she was so gorgeous.
(01:00:24):
Really had her whole life ahead of her.
A lot of potential as a person, just very smart.
And then at the end of her life,it was more towards the end of
her life as well. So sad.
The facial effects, the drooping.
It's really awful. It's really awful.
(01:00:46):
Yeah. Some of this stuff is just very
tragic. And I mean, it's easy to look at
topics like this and just, you know, some of them are really,
they are kind of funny. You're like, what?
But at the same time, it's like when you look at it from their
perspective, it's wow, why? And also, you know, the
(01:01:09):
treatment they're getting is just awful.
So we're almost done with the list.
I just looked at our timing. We just want to.
Yeah, Phil, rattle some off and then we can talk about it.
Heck yeah. All right, I will cut some of
these out. But the time of your life, think
(01:01:30):
about older generation probably going to be in that category.
Suppressed masturbation was alsoon that list.
We just had to throw in one moreof those.
Being a troublemaker vicious vices in your early life.
OK. If you were a troublemaker, you
(01:01:50):
know, and you're doing things you weren't supposed to.
But then even if you got better as you got older, no, somebody
remembered that you did that onething when you're in grade
school and now you're being committed.
Committed. Women is literally listed as its
own category. Just being a woman is literally
on this list and this. I don't know if I said this in
(01:02:13):
the beginning, I'm probably thinking of last time.
All of these come from a record from a West Virginia insane
asylum that ran in the mid 1800s.
By the way, I'm not pulling the shit out of my ass.
If you would like to learn more listeners just on the side
tangent really quick, it is Weston Hospital which is located
(01:02:34):
in Lewis County, West Virginia. This particular census that I'm
reading from, it's actually 25 topics of commitment.
We just kind of skipped over some that were more repetitive.
But if you would like to learn more, please go ahead and take a
look at Weston Hospital in West Virginia.
(01:02:55):
This particular report comes from 1862 to 1887, if you're
wanting specifics on that. We didn't really go into that.
We're just kind of rambling off the ways you could have been
committed because this was literally everywhere.
It wasn't just this asylum, of course, in some places were more
(01:03:16):
lenient with the reasons why than others, but in general, not
a great time. So literally, yeah, being a
young lady, if a woman were to show that they were any sort of
trouble or afraid of something or had too much anxiety or they
were too shy, like your demeanorcould have gotten you committed
(01:03:40):
as well. And this was more focused on
women because women had more of a strict, especially societal
view than men did. Yeah.
And that's literally where it ends.
Is it just the categories for women?
But I could probably go through this.
(01:04:03):
Listen, I won't be surprised if I could check.
Your number, yeah, I'm like, I think that the number would be
pretty high for things related to, you know, yeah.
Right, right. Like having allergies, having
asthma. Yeah, I'm too tired, being too
stressed, working too much. Yeah, anything that a woman
(01:04:25):
could be committed for on this list?
Probably. Oh yeah, we'll check that box.
Definitely, definitely one of the things that I think is also
a factor, but I don't think it wasn't mentioned in here.
But having having not met certain women's standards, I
(01:04:48):
think also if you never got married, if you never had
children or even if you were married and we're trying for
children but you couldn't have them.
I feel like that was also probably because we've heard
about that before too. And sometimes I think when you
see different lists or you hear different stories, it's kind of
listed under a category like adequacies or inadequacies or
(01:05:13):
whatever they call it. Just like some really crazy
stuff. Listeners, I know there was one
thing on this list that you're like, really?
Oh, I'm screwed. What was it?
I want to hear about it. And please don't say the M word,
OK? We don't need to know.
(01:05:34):
Keep that at home. Keep it in your pants.
Keep it Facebook. What is it?
Community standard approved? Yes, on the Facebook group page
please. Yeah, we like to have fun over
there, but that is a whole otherlevel.
You're still professional a little bit.
OK, OK. Yeah, get a little bit loosey
(01:05:56):
goosey on the Patreon. But Oh yeah, Oh yeah.
And sometimes like we I just want to shout out people right
now from the Facebook group because this last week, Oh my
gosh, it was 1 banger after the other with posts in there that I
was like I am cry laughing. What cracks me up is I will see
(01:06:19):
stuff and I'll save it in my photos, right?
Because I'm like, I'm going to pepper this out later.
Yep, and then I've seen Nat postthings that I was planning to
post and other people post things was planning to post.
Damn it, now we're just all likefighting to get our posts out
before the other people. I know great minds think alike.
That is true. Yeah.
(01:06:43):
Well, 100A. 100 that is insane. I I still can't wrap my head
around that. We do a podcast so and it's been
how long? But now we're at 100 episodes.
Yeah. And this is this basically will
come out, there will be one moreepisode for Season 2 and then
(01:07:05):
we'll take a short break and then we'll be back for Season 3.
We're excited and we hope that you guys really like what we're
going to bring you in Season 3 because we're switching it up a
little bit. We're excited.
We're excited. We are very excited.
But wow, yeah, like we kind of mentioned in the beginning, we
(01:07:29):
couldn't do this without you guys.
And hearing from you guys, hearing your feedback, being
able to banter with you guys, hang out with you guys, it
really makes this for us. And I mean, we like hanging out
with each other and that's how it started.
But then our fam grew and we're like Oh my goodness, this part
(01:07:53):
is just hopping. Love it.
Oh, and don't be disheartened ifyou sent us a story that you
wanted us to cover. If you haven't heard it already,
it doesn't mean it's not going to happen.
It's just timing and scanning and things like that.
So keep sending us stories. We love it and just a big thank
(01:08:13):
you from the bottom of our dark.Macabre hearts, we love you guys
very much and yeah, please keep sending it in We don't say that
we love hearing from you for health, we really do.
And just like how everybody's lives are really crazy right
(01:08:35):
now, we like to give you contentwithout that kind of banter, you
know, because yeah, every, everybody's got a lot going on
right now. And we see you, we hear you.
So hang tight in the in between.OK?
For Season 3, it is coming. And if you have anything that
(01:08:57):
you've sent us on any of the platforms, Facebook, e-mail,
anything, it's being seen. We're not ignoring it.
There's a reason why it's not been.
We have our own archive. I do for now.
I'll see you next time. OK, I guess we will love you.
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