pro-autonomy

It’s a mental health awareness term for people who encourage others to recover while also giving them space to choose not to — and offering support through it instead of eradicating their human rights. The focus shifts from isolating, stigmatizing and shaming individuals for their self-destructive behavior to harm reduction through acceptance. Someone who uses that label instead of the old “pro-recovery” one recognizes all people deserve to recover, while also admitting that forcing them into it could have massive repercussions on their psyche (specially given the state of the current mental healthcare system, as it doesn’t have that many resources and forced recovery on its own is not only traumatic but also moralizes poor mental health as immoral and reinforces systemic ableism). It’s about allowing people to feel their own feelings without immediately pushing them to do better — because a lot of the times, that’s the best they can do. Getting better is a choice. Not a requirement. TL;DR Movement that defends the idea that people deserve human rights despite wanting to recover or not as well as the autonomy to choose between the two.