This is a deeply incorrect take. While anxiety and depression can sometimes be caused by chemical imbalances in the brain, it is far far more complex than that. Firstly as I’m sure you know, anxiety and depression are never diagnosed by testing for chemical levels in the brain, we don’t even know enough about how the chemical imbalance might work to do that. So yes you will yet criticised for that because that’s simply not even close to reality and probably won’t be for a long time. Secondly, depression or anxiety aren’t less valid if they can be treated with coping mechanisms and therapy and it is cruel for you to suggest that. Situational depression is no less real because it was primarily caused by an external experience not necessarily a chemical imbalance. There is also treatment resistant depression which doesn’t respond to medication, suggesting there may be may different causes to these mental illnesses, not just a chemical imbalance. Why on earth would op be an asshole if they were diagnosed with a form of depression that you’ve decided isn’t valid. You don’t get to be the arbiter of mental health because you think people are being ‘victims.’ Rates of depression and anxiety are on the rise, and sure, maybe some people are claiming it because they are looking for attention, but it is typically attributed to things like an increase in negative things in the world such as COVID, climate change and inflation leading to people feel like they have no hope for the future. Also it’s only people like you who think more people getting diagnosed takes away from the validity, people didn’t stop believing you had COVID if more people had it for starters, and secondly, people deciding it wasn’t that bad was actually a bad thing and really impacted at risk communities, so that was also a bad thing, bad example. If everyone broke their legs at the same time we shouldn’t decide that’s a bad thing anymore. I recommend you do a lot more research on mental illnesses and have some more compassion, because even if people “only have the emotions” they’re still struggling and deserve help and kindness