MIA Today

Headlines of Today's Posts

ISEPP to American Psychological Association: Condemn Forced Treatment

0
The International Society for Ethical Psychology and Psychiatry petitions the American Psychological Association to condemn forced treatment as a human rights violation
Photograph of a blue plate shattering

When Treatment Makes You Sick: The Eating Disorder Clinic

6
Eight years after beginning ‘treatment’ for an ‘eating disorder’, I was eating worse than ever. Yet three years after quitting that ‘treatment’, food is a pleasure, not a problem.

The Untold Story of Purdue Pharma’s Cozy Relationship With the AMA

7
From Mother Jones: A look at the AMA’s track record shows that the opioid crisis is the latest development in a long history of dissonance between the organization’s mission and its actions.
Illustration of a head filling up with pills

Psychiatry Is the Cause, Not the Solution

42
I have found that trauma is frequently at the root of many eventual psychological and medical issues. Medications often only worsen the disconnection caused by trauma.

Pathologizing Dissent

1
From CounterPunch: The existence of antiwar veterans’ groups helps defeat the lie that protest is pathological, and announces to all that knowing right from wrong is not a medical condition.

Southcentral Wildfire Study: Wildfires Ignite Mental Health Concerns

0
From The Revelator: The extended period of multiple stressors caused by wildfires show that we need to prepare more than just physically for the effects of climate change.

EVENT: Town Hall on Children and Psychiatric Drugs

3
On August 13, Mad in America and three partner organizations will present four international experts to discuss the problem of the widespread psychiatric drugging of children—and seek solutions.

Man Arrested in Mistaken Identity Case Locked in Hawaii Mental Hospital for Two Years

4
From The Guardian: The more Mr. Spriestersbach asserted that he was not Mr. Castleberry, the more he was declared delusional and psychotic by Hawaii State Hospital staff and doctors and heavily medicated, a court petition said.

Paula Caplan, 74, Dies; Feminist Psychologist Took On Her Profession

1
From The New York Times: Dr. Caplan, the author of 11 books, was perhaps best known for her seven-year battle with the American Psychiatric Association as it planned the fourth edition of its "DSM."

What Happened to Britney Spears Can Happen to You

1
From RxISK: Inaccurate and invalid so-called "expert" psychiatric testimony is used in a number of ways - not just guardianships - to take people's rights away in court.

Mental Health Survival Kit, Chapter 5 (Part 6): Patient Stories and Conclusion

23
In an evidence-based healthcare system, we should not use interventions that do more harm than good, but that's just what psychiatry does.

Surviving Race: Intersection on Injustice, Disability and Human Rights – Dialogues and Retreat 2021

0
From Open Excellence/Surviving Race: Surviving Race will convene advocates, artists, educators, peer supporters, psychiatric survivors, and white allies in response to the increased visibility of structural racism, systemic oppression, and police violence.

An American History of Addiction, Part 8: A Turning Point, But Where Do We...

3
Practitioners and researchers have increasingly started to feel that the maintenance of the status quo has left the addiction field in a state of conflict and fluctuation.
UK street in winter

How I Learned the Social and Environmental Causes of Madness

2
My first encounter with mental illness was when I was 17. My friend was hospitalised in the psychiatric unit of the local general hospital and diagnosed with hypomania.

Do We All Have Alzheimer’s? Drug Makers Might Want You to Think So

5
From The Baltimore Sun: Recent efforts indicate that Biogen is trying to persuade adults who occasionally misplace their keys that they not only have Mild Cognitive Impairment (MCI), but that MCI is an early form of Alzheimer’s disease.

So Long, Pill Mill: A Letter to My Former Patients and Their Families

I love being a psych nurse practitioner, and I never want to feel that my only role is pushing pills. The private practice I started is my effort to move away from this dysfunctional system.

Inner Experience: From James Hillman’s Archetypal Psychology Towards a Liberation Psychology

2
From Acid Horizon: In this podcast, MIA Science News writer Micah Ingle discusses the work of archetypal psychologist James Hillman and its implications for anti-capitalist politics and other forms of activism.

Speak Out! Britney’s Fight Is Our Fight

17
With all eyes on Britney, we must unmask the role of psychiatrists in court hearings like hers, where basically what the shrink says, goes— and the person’s freedom and human rights are stripped away.

Looking Beyond Self-Help to Understand Resilience: An Interview with Michael Ungar

8
Ayurdhi Dhar interviews Michael Ungar about how complex systems make us vulnerable and how resilience emerges in context-specific ways.

It’s Not Just Britney: Those Deemed ‘Mentally Ill’ Can Easily Lose Basic Rights

2
From The Cut: For every Britney Spears, there are an untold number of exceedingly less-famous Britneys trapped in their own private hells, ignored by our legal system, medical system, and the public.
Businesswoman hand trying to stop toppling dominoes on table

Mental Health Survival Kit, Chapter 5: Survival Kit for Young Psychiatrists in a Sick...

4
Peter Gøtzsche describes trying to join the psychiatric establishment to bring attention to critical issues from the inside.
3d illustration of a brain with one end red and shattering

Psychiatric Drugs “Help” By Causing Brain Dysfunction

25
There are currently ten classes of prescription medications that impair brain function, including both psychiatric and non-psychiatric drugs. A number of non-drug “treatments” do the same.

Suicidality: When Your Feelings Are Too Dangerous

9
After finding a cop at my door, I learned it wasn’t safe to talk about my feelings of wanting to die. As a result, I spent the better part of the next decade not telling anyone when I was suicidal.

U.S. Supreme Court Rejects J&J Appeal Over Risperdal Drug

1
From Reuters: The Court rejected a bid to overturn a $70 million jury verdict against the company for its failure to warn of the risk of breast enlargement in children.

In Memoriam: Paula Joan Caplan

16
Paula Caplan, known for her fierce criticism of psychiatry and its diagnostic manual, died Wednesday at age 74.