Background: Discussion about language and psychiatry is often limited to discussion about how DSM-classifications are being used. Fundamental and more societal questions about why individual disorders (should) exist are then rarely addressed.
Aim: We introduce the term disorderism to give a name to a poorly visible effect of psychiatric classification: the dominance of an individualized understanding of psychological suffering.
Method: We substantiate the term disorderism by giving a theoretical analysis as well as providing examples of disorderistic ways of thinking.
Results: Our formal definition of disorderism is: the systematic decontextualization of psychological suffering by thinking about it in terms of individual disorders. At its worst disorderism brings us both failing individual treatments and (prolonged) continuation of societal problems.
Conclusion: Only after we recognize disorderism in our language and in our way of thinking, we will be able to fight it. This could make room for alternative solutions to psychological suffering, next to the treatment of individuals. The emphasis in understanding psychological suffering could then partly shift to the societal domain: to societal and political choices.