This is one reason I find the concept of moral injury so compelling. It offers language that may help explain certain forms of suffering without immediately medicalizing them. Rather than asking, “What is wrong with this person?” it invites us to ask, “What happened to this person?” and “What values or moral expectations were violated?” Those questions often lead the conversation in a very different direction.

Language Shapes Understanding

The words we choose influence how we understand human experience. If someone loses a loved one, survives corruption in the workplace, experiences institutional betrayal, or feels forced into actions that violate deeply held values, emotional distress is often an understandable response. Calling every form of suffering a medical disorder risks overlooking the social, ethical, and personal realities that contributed to it.

Moral injury offers another framework. The term has often been discussed in relation to military service, where individuals may experience lasting distress after witnessing or participating in events that conflict with their moral beliefs. Yet the underlying idea may apply much more broadly. Moral injury may arise whenever a person’s sense of justice, dignity, trust, or conscience has been seriously violated.

Not Every Problem Is Medical

Modern societies have become increasingly comfortable using medical language to describe many problems in living. That does not mean medicine has no role. Medical science has produced remarkable advances, and many people benefit greatly from medical care, including psychiatric care. However, there is also value in recognizing that not every difficult human experience is best understood through a medical lens.

If someone is distressed because they were deceived, exploited, discriminated against, or pressured into actions they believed were wrong, labeling the distress itself as a disorder may shift attention away from the circumstances that deserve examination. Sometimes the environment, rather than the individual, deserves greater scrutiny.

The Importance of Naming Injustice

Human beings naturally seek explanations for suffering. Sometimes the explanation lies within the individual. Other times it lies within families, institutions, workplaces, governments, or broader cultural systems. Moral injury reminds us that external circumstances can profoundly shape emotional well being.

Naming injustice matters because it can restore clarity. If betrayal occurred, calling it betrayal may be more helpful than immediately searching for diagnostic labels. If coercion occurred, acknowledging coercion may provide greater understanding than focusing exclusively on symptoms. Clear language often leads to clearer thinking.

There are many situations that could contribute to moral injury, including:

• Institutional betrayal.
• Workplace abuse or corruption.
• Exposure to violence or cruelty.
• Coercive systems that undermine autonomy.
• Being pressured to violate deeply held moral beliefs.
• Witnessing serious injustice without the ability to intervene.

None of these situations automatically produce the same emotional response in every person. Individual resilience, personality, relationships, and life experience all matter. Even so, these kinds of experiences deserve thoughtful attention before concluding that emotional suffering is primarily medical in nature.

De-medicalizing Problems in Living

I believe society would benefit from becoming more comfortable distinguishing between medical conditions and problems in living. Philosopher and psychiatrist Thomas Szasz argued for decades that many experiences classified as mental illnesses were better understood as problems in living. Whether one agrees with all of his conclusions or not, his broader challenge remains worth considering.

The concept of moral injury fits naturally within that discussion. It acknowledges genuine suffering while avoiding the assumption that every difficult emotional state should automatically be viewed as pathology. That distinction may help preserve both personal dignity and personal responsibility while encouraging honest conversations about social conditions.

A More Human Conversation

Perhaps one of the greatest strengths of the concept is that it keeps ethical questions at the center of the discussion. Instead of asking only how to reduce symptoms, we can also ask whether injustice occurred, whether trust was broken, and whether meaningful repair is possible. Those questions recognize people as moral beings rather than simply biological organisms.

This does not reject science. It simply recognizes that science alone cannot answer every question about meaning, conscience, fairness, or human values. Emotional distress sometimes reflects biology, but it may also reflect the ordinary human response to extraordinary circumstances.

Moving Toward Better Understanding

The language of moral injury will not explain every form of emotional suffering, nor should it replace every existing framework. Human experience is too complex for any single explanation. Even so, expanding our vocabulary may improve both compassion and precision.

If we become more willing to recognize injustice, betrayal, coercion, and problems in living for what they are, we may become less likely to mistake understandable human suffering for medical pathology. Moral injury reminds us that sometimes emotional distress is not evidence that something is wrong with the person. Sometimes it is evidence that something deeply wrong happened to them, or around them. That distinction deserves careful thought, and perhaps much more public discussion than it currently receives.

In a certain way, A Course In Miracles allows one to do whatever one wants. However, it does implicitly direct one to not do things that increases fear and/or misery for oneself and/or others. This would seem to prohibit, violence and unethical behavior, because quite often, violence and unethical behavior can lead to consequences contrary to the joy and peace that ACIM directs one experience.

So, ACIM directs one to be kind to oneself and others. It does not particular threaten someone with punishment if they are not, although, it does seem to indicate that results of not treating oneself and others with kindness is generally going to naturally be unpleasant for oneself, which would also seem to conform with logic. So one should be kind to oneself and others and behaviorally do and strive for what will bring them and others the most joy and happiness possible.

The book does state the one does really not have to do anything, so in theory, according to ACIM one could really just do nothing and still experience the bliss and joy that is promised. However, it also states that one should follow the guidance of The Holy Spirit. So perhaps The Holy Spirit would direct one to do nothing, or perhaps The Holy Spirit would direct one to do something.

It is probably safe to say that The HS would not direct someone to do something illegal, because practically speaking, there is often a fairly good chance that illegal activities could result in negative unpleasant consequences in the long term, and naturally negative unpleasant consequences of doing illegal acts are contrary to the will of God. So to conclude, A Course In Miracles seems to direct everyone to bring joy to ourselves and others and live our lives in such a way that this happens.

I learned about SENS from the book Ending Aging: The Rejuvenation Breakthroughs That Could Reverse Human Aging in Our Lifetime. Regarding libertarian principles as they can be applied to psychology, the writings of psychiatrist Thomas Szasz have influenced me significantly.

In theory, SENS may be able to defeat aging. There are other efforts like Human Longevity Inc. that may lead to the same or similar outcome. SENS Research Foundation which was founded or co-founded by one of the authors of Ending Aging, Aubrey de Grey is the primary force behind SENS.

I am writing this here to express the idea that rather than what currently exists, I would rather live on an Earth where adult humans do not die of old age, but also, they are free to leave Earth at the time of their choosing. This is the alternative to the current situation in which humans do die of old age if something else does not take them out first, and also where currently adults can be locked up in psychiatric wards who decide that they do want to die and will engage in suicide and are found out. The current situation is one in which adult humans die of old age and are potentially subject to psychiatric oppression.

Earth can be a wonderful place to live. For many though, living on Earth is filled with traumas and is not a wonderful place to live. To use anything other than kindness, persuasion and reason on adults who wish to check out and leave Earth is ethically wrong and morally deficient. Currently, psychiatric powers have the legal authorization to use force, coercion and confinement on adults who plan to die. I do support defeating aging. I also support outlawing psychiatric oppression. I think that if those who champion the cause of defeating aging also advocate for outlawing psychiatric oppression, then the mere notion of defeating aging may be more palatable for some who are still stuck in a pro aging mindset.