Unpopular Opinion

The entire organization is extremely shady, and Vibrant Behavioral Health subcontracts to a bunch of random companies. There is often zero requirement that the “trained counselor” on the other end of the line has any form of clinical experience - the only requirement for hire is often just a psychology BA.

Most of what 988 does is call the police. Calling will end up with essentially a robot reading a script of questions to you, and choosing to hang up or answering the questions in a way the random person on the other end of the line finds unacceptable will have the cops knock on your door. Even if they don’t call the cops, the most they will be able to do is say “I’m sorry, that sounds hard.” They will lie and claim resources are available, when they often are not unless you have the ability to pay/insurance.

They have probably spent more money on advertising than they have researching into effective ways to prevent suicide. They are completely opaque about how many calls end with non consensual intervention - and often these calls are made completely inappropriately. There is no accountability - complaints are handled by Vibrant, not necessarily the subcontractor you spoke to. There’s evidence that they are lying about the number of nonconsensual interventions.

988 primarily exists so that people have something they can say to someone in crisis. It is a pretend solution to a problem - it allows Americans to pretend the mental health crisis is being addressed by someone.

Involuntary inpatient hospital stays increase the risk of suicide for years after. Having the police show up at your door to take you to a filthy facility where you lose all rights, where you can be physically assaulted and verbally abused - this is not “care,” but this is often what happens.

It’s a bandaid on an amputated leg. It lets people pat themselves on the back for “helping.”