Why a Mental hospitals were called lunatic asylum?

People used to associate the full moon as a time when people were most likely to go crazy, therefore the phrase "lunatic" was coined. A lunatic asylum was literally that, a place were lunatics could take asylum.. refuge/shelter/etc... there the rest of the population were safe from the lunatic's crazy and often destructive behavior, and the lunatics were safe from being stoned to death by angry people tired of putting up with their crazy bullsh**. These asylums were holding places, more like prisons and the people their were treated like animals, beaten and chained, left to wallow in their own filth, no compassion, no visitors, no hygiene, they were scum. Lunatic Asylums were meant to keep the crazies locked up and out of sight, and would remain there until death.

A mental hospital is a hospital. It's goal is to help treat people- to cure them you would say, to help them find the cause of their problems, and how to conquer their issues and control their behavior so that they can leave the hospital and lead normal, healthy, productive lives with the rest of the world. And all the while, preserving their dignity as human beings. Patients are not seen as freaks or animals, but people who need patience and understanding.

Insanity can be caused by a multitude of reasons from a chemical imbalance in the brain to a violent or traumatic event. To lump them all together in a negative, one-size fits all label like Lunatic is insulting and degrading. Asylum has too many negative associations with the barbaric and inhumane prisons of the past.

Back in the day there were no Mental Hospitals. A Lunatic Asylum is not the same thing. They did not help, they did not understand, they did not learn, nor did they want to. They were prisons. Prisons for creatures who were seen as less than human. Pitiable creatures that don't belong in civil society- some even believed that an insane person was possessed by the devil or some other evil entity. Asylums were dark and cold places filled with suffering.

Mental Hospitals are places of healing. Where people are treated with dignity and compassion. The goal is not to lock and hide people away forever, but rather to heal them and get them back out into society. They are places filled with hope for a better future.

It was noticed that some people behaved more oddly around the full moon. They became called lunatics. A lunatic asylum was where the most serious cases were shut away.

Well, Lunatics are people who are usually crazy, and crazy people tend to end up in mental hospitals, so therefore, Lunatic Asylum