Coercion

As you read this, people with lived experience all around the country are mobilizing to educate our federal legislators about why the Helping Families in Mental Health Crisis Act (H.R. 2646) should be defeated. Education is the key. As executive director of the National Coalition for Mental Health Recovery, I am issuing a call to action. We need to ramp up our efforts before this backward piece of legislation becomes law. We need to get in touch with our legislators and their staffs, contact the media, make some noise! We need to exercise the proverbial strength in numbers. And we need all of this now!

From Aeon: Throughout history, psychiatry has pathologized defiance and continues to label individuals who resist authority and stand up for their rights as mentally ill....

E. Fuller Torrey, M.D, shares his experiences and views on AOT with Behavioral Healthcare. “The whole issue of involuntary treatment is one that’s difficult...

While plans to involuntary commit drug users have “received virtual across-the-board support,” Susan Sered from TruthOut reports that “there is little to no evidence showing that coerced drug treatment is effective,” and that “having abstained from opiates for several days may set them up to overdose when they return to their former level of drug use, with a reduced tolerance for the drugs.”

In a new study, Baylor College of Medicine researchers have raised ethical questions about clinical trials of deep brain stimulation (DBS) and other brain implants. "'Generally,...

A new film, "Cause of Death: Unknown" investigates the pharmaceutical industry and the deaths that have been caused by psychiatric drugs. The film will...

From The Age: According to a new report, sexual assault claims by mental health patients are not being reported to the police or even the...

From BuzzFeed News: A six-year-old boy in Jacksonville, Florida was recently committed to a psychiatric institution for throwing a temper tantrum in school. There, he...

From Vox Gibraltar: Many people confuse psychology with psychiatry. Too often, general practitioners recommend psychiatric treatment when psychological treatment or therapy could be just as effective without resulting...

From ABC: The self-help and self-improvement industry are more popular and widely accepted than ever. However, the moral imperative to constantly think positive and always...

In this piece for Non.copyriot.com, Andrew Ryder discusses the life and ideas of the psychotherapist, philosopher, and activist Félix Guattari, whose work united many of...

From Ravishly: The American Psychological Association has released a draft of their "Clinical Practice Guideline for the Behavioral Treatment of Obesity and Overweight in Children...

From Aeon: While psychiatric drugs are often ineffective and can have serious side effects, there are many psychedelics and other illicit substances that have proven...

From Pacific Standard: In an effort to protect homeless individuals from the effects of Hurricane Irma, officials from the Miami-Dade County Homeless Trust used the...

From Aeon: We tend to believe that giving people more choices is inherently positive. However, forcing people to choose between two morally wrong options can be...

From The Huffington Post: Corruption is insidiously pervasive in our healthcare system and dramatically increases our health expenditures. Patients are increasingly being given unnecessary treatments...

In this piece for Mind Hacks, Vaughan Bell, a long-term critic of psychiatric diagnosis, points out the major flaws and logical fallacies in some of...

In The Opinion Pages of the New York Times, Matthew Epperson discusses the devastating results of police acting as the primary responders to mental health crises. “If we are to prevent future tragedies, then we should be ready to invest in a more responsive mental-health system and relieve the police of the burden of being the primary, and often sole, responders.”

For The Boston Globe, Michael Rezendes writes about the dehumanizing conditions for mental health patients and the Bridgewater State Hospital. While previous exposés have...

In this piece, Keris Myrick critiques the usage of the word "anosognosia" and reflects on its power to harm the people it is directed...

Over at CounterPunch, Carl Boggs takes on the knee-jerk mental illness response that pervades the airwaves after every mass shooting. He writes: “What the mental-health fixation lacks is any semblance of historical or social context. Given the persistence of U.S. imperialism and militarism — and mounting fascination with combat and guns in a society transfigured by its warfare state — Washington remains a thriving center of global violence: repeated armed interventions abroad have found their domestic parallel in the world’s largest prison system, a deepening gun culture, home-bred terrorism, police atrocities, and a media culture filled with spectacles of warfare and bloodshed.”

From the Lown Institute: For pharmaceutical companies who use scare tactics to sell drugs, every day is like Halloween. This list of egregious advertisements shows...

From The Body Is Not An Apology: For many people, calling the police during a mental health emergency can result in brutality. Here are five...

In this piece for Pacific Standard, David Dobbs recounts the story of Nev Jones, a psychologist with lived experience who is working to change the...

From Discursive of Tunbridge Wells: Psychologist Rufus May speaks about the often overlooked role of racism in the mental health system. People of color are...