Thank you, Peter, for your persistence in showing that psychiatry is not a science, not a legitimate branch of medicine, and, to say the least, not beneficial. I will enjoy sending this little gem to all my lists. Kudos, too, to whoever chose the hilarious illustration.
Yay, Peter! Keep up the good work! How I wish the New York Times and every other thing people actually read much had the courage and honesty to publish this sort of article.
I loved finding out about the existence of the âAlleged Lunaticsâ Friend Societyâ! And Iâm so glad you included the link to the United Nations session on âRemedy and Reparation for Institutionalization,â so ably (pardon the expression) hosted by Tina Minkowitz.
Your determination and persistence in advocating for global nonviolent revolution are inspiring. It seems like a no-brainer (whoops!) that crazies should partner with the disability movement as well as those fighting for womenâs rights, racial justice, prison abolition, poverty reduction, queer rights, and so many other necessary remedies to ânormalityâ – since, as you so rightly point out, âWhat is generally called ânormalâ is wrecking the planetâs environment and threatens life on Earth.â
I also love that you refer to psychiatric labels as âgoofyâ; emphasizing the ridiculousness rather than the evil of psychiatry is such a smart way to help ânormalâ people wake up to the incredible levels of disability caused by psychiatry. And how right you are to say that âWhether or not your label is goofy or true, you do not deserve oppression!â
I certainly do not see myself as belonging to âthe consumer/survivor movement,â since this use of the word âconsumerâ (like its much more common use in replacing the word âcitizenâ or âpersonâ everywhere, thanks to our society being all about consumption) kind of makes me want to barf – but of course itâs always good to be reminded that people like me share with âmental health consumersâ a âcommon framework [of] choice and human rights.â
I am also very far from being a fan of the paradigm of Pride, and am sad about its having replaced the concept of liberation (as in gay liberation – the long-forgotten ancestor of 2SLGBTQ[etc]. Pride). And yet I appreciate Ron Ungerâs statement that âsome people are definitely proud of the mental states that are called mad, while others see the madness itself as a tragedy but are proud of their resilience, etc. around it.â Similarly, although âautism spectrumâ ideology does not do anything for me personally, I love Greta Thunbergâs view that being âon the spectrumâ is her âsuperpower.â
Hurray for âseeing through the web of lies that seemingly control ânormal people.ââ Hooray for activism and humour! Hooray for you, David Oaks – thanks for being there, through thick and thin.
*In truth, what people really mean by âone-sidedâ is that theyâre uncomfortable with the âother sideâ getting any space at all*
Yup. This reminds me so much of when I used to edit Phoenix Rising magazine (if you don’t know what that is, please see psychiatrized.org/PhoenixRising/PhoenixRising.htm). Whenever someone started whining about the lack of balance, I’d say, “We *are* the balance! Everything published everywhere else exclusively promotes the other side!”
*In a world where the most progressive research says only around 20% of people will do best staying on psychotropics longer term*
Sad if true. Progressive research should be proving the truth: that precisely 0% of people will do best staying on psychotropics longer term.
*five deaths because of a mental health emergency response⌠and four of those five deaths were Black folks*
wish this were headline news everywhere.
*Psychologist David Jobes … said … if weâre going to forcibly intervene then we need to create alternative places for those people besides hospitals.*
howzabout not forcibly intervening? đ
*â[S]omething this big and draconian, in my opinion, should be meticulously organized and planned for,â *
youch. something this big and draconian should clearly be nixed.
Yes, Ted – people creating and practising “alternatives” all over the world should eventually be able to convince the public that listening, kindness, forbearance, respect, etc., are more helpful than the fraud and force which are all psychiatry has to offer.
Yes, Ted – people creating and practising “alternatives” all over the world should eventually be able to convince the public that listening, kindness, forbearance, respect, etc., are more helpful than the fraud and force which are all psychiatry has to offer.
I know what you mean. Personally, I very much feel that way about, in particular, “Asperger’s autism” and the whole “neurodiversity” thing. And that all forms of madness (other than those caused by tertiary syphilis and other real physical things that actually affect the brain), at bottom, constitute an understandable reaction to an increasingly incomprehensible world.
“… I fear people will continue to demand the right to subdue what they fear rather than embrace it.”
I certainly share that fear. I have no short-term optimism here, but do feel that, if we keep on plugging away, in just a few hundred years or so psychiatry will have become a thing of the past. If humanity lasts that long …
How horrible that you had to endure this shocking cruelty after a shrink had already murdered your brother, Rosalee. I am so sorry about what happened to him and to you.
Thank you for letting us know this, Ted. Have you written elsewhere about the help you got in Canada? Was it the Vancouver Emotional Emergency Centre you were at?
Thank you, Madmom. I applaud those who “want a lasting revolution in the mental health system,” even though my own personal/political interest is in the mental health system (or mental illness industry, as I prefer to call it) withering for lack of customers, as noncommercial alternatives become available. I do recognize, however, that this may never happen, and that in the meanwhile those being tortured need and deserve the best advocacy, reform, etc. that can be had.
Comrade! Thank you for defending Marxism as a worldview; may it be practised somewhere someday. Please check out, if you have not already done so, https://progressive.international (I am a new member and have already found an antipsychiatry colleague!)
Thank you for this much-needed ammunition in the fight to stop psychiatry from poisoning the brains of children and the worldview of those who care for them.
Thank you, Melissa, so powerful and beautiful and true. As for “so-called professionalsâ growing curiosity and awareness of something more,” curiosity and awareness have not been among the characteristics of any “professionals” I’ve ever come across.
Thank you for this article. Although there are a million things wrong with our issues being classified as having to do with health, and although the idea of “services” to me indicates the need for some people to make money off other people’s misery, it’s still great to see a listing of non-coercive entities, not to mention any recognition anywhere that force and coercion do not constitute help.
Thank you for this, Peter. It is wonderful that we can read your work in instalments, for free, rather than buying an expensive book. I am not one of those who believes in psychotherapy, but much more important than that is authoritative voices denouncing psychiatric pseudoscience and the harm it causes, and showing that it is possible to come back from “treatment.”
Another excellent article, which I wish everyone everywhere would read – despite my discomfort with the fact that Open Dialogue uses psychiatric professionals and psychiatric drugs at all; and despite my objection to the use of the word “schizophrenia” without quotation marks; and despite my agreement with those who have said, here and elsewhere, that we should not be surprised by media cover-ups of the truth about psychiatry. Fundamentally, it’s still important to expose, expose, expose, and that’s what Robert is doing here.
thanks for pointing this out, sam. i too find the term âemotional wellnessâ unfortunate. but of course this is all part of “humanising the paradigm” – as opposed to dumping the paradigm, the professionals, and the whole idea that some of us have something wrong with us and others are experts who should be paid to fix the rest.
Thank you so much for keeping after Ronald Pies, Phil. He certainly deserves it. How dare he spout all these hypocritical denials when the whole of psychiatric drugging is based on the “chemical imbalance” lie, which psychiatry and mainstream media have never stopped promulgating – and which an ever-increasing number of “patients” inevitably keep falling for. I wish many more people had access to your views.
I hope that Jim G will agree to post all of the original MNN on his site; we must not allow this wonderful piece of history to continue to be co-opted.
exactly, sam. also, “The next study should be one on how pouring water on your head makes your hair wet” sounds just about right, registeredforthissite
Wow, Rosalee, I had no idea about any of this. Thank you so much for bringing it to my attention. I have signed the petition and will send the link to my contacts.
Thanks for the petition link, Sam. I don’t think psychiatry can afford to recognize human rights, other than the fraudulent “right to treatment” touted by such entities as NAMI and the Schizophrenia Society. If we were recognized as actual human beings with real rights, such as the right to say no, psy and pharma would be in serious danger of losing business.
Superb work, Rob. What an obscene world we live in, where âhelpingâ people is an industry, or rather a conglomeration of industries, and people in distress have to reach out to paid âhelpersâ because they have no one in their lives they can talk to – and then are likely to get incarcerated and forcibly drugged, likely for the rest of their lives, with neurotoxins which, even when they donât directly lead to chemically-induced âsuicidal ideation,â are likely to cause early death, even aside from wrecking peopleâs lives.
Yes. And as for the “chemical imbalance” having been debunked, that seems somehow never to have filtered down to … well … anywhere. As we all know, this lie is still promoted indiscriminately and universally used as a pretext for poisoning an ever-increasing number of “clients” and “patients.” By the way, Sam, I seem never to have responded to your initial comment of June 5. How rude! Sorry, and thank you for your words. Alas, I’m sure everything we’ve sent to Trudeau and other politicians and officials has gone straight into the circular file …
i am happy to send regards, oldhead, but don will not know who they are from. i’m sure he would be glad to be contacted by you directly: [email protected]
Hi, this comment is not from me but from Don Weitz (https://www.madinamerica.com/author/dweitz/), who wanted me to post on his behalf because he does not want a log-in password (note to moderator – is there a way I could get a password on his behalf without going through his email, for future reference?)
Don’s comment:
“Too bad Samantha Lilly never mentions the systemic racism and fraud in psychiatry that has been prevalent since the 19th century, starting with Dr. Benjamin Rush, the racist âfather of American psychiatryâ and founder of the APA. The psychiatric and prison systems are not global movements; theyâre self-serving, fraudulent, exploitative, health-threatening and disabling. In their essence, they are essentially paramilitary police: moral enforcers for neoliberal and fascist regimes. The âmental healthâ movement is dominated by psychiatrists and other professionals; itâs largely funded by self-serving, profiteering, and amoral Big Pharma (transnational drug companies), promoted by the corporate media, and politically supported by neoliberal governments, including those of the United States, the UK, Australia, and Canada. This âmental health movementâ continues to spread and profit from psychiatric myths and lies, including âmental illness,â âmental health,â âsafe and effective medication,â and the widely discredited âchemical imbalanceâ theory. This âmovement,â in partnership with national âjusticeâ departments, has permanently discriminated against, stigmatized, imprisoned, debilitated, electrocuted, poisoned and killed millions; particularly Black, Brown, Latinx, Indigenous, middle-class and poor people, and political dissidents. The global âmental health movement,â like the psychiatric and prison systems, does not heal; it disables, traumatizes, and stigmatizes vulnerable people including children, single parents, the elderly, the unemployed, immigrants and refugees and is a willing partner of neoliberal governments and fascist regimes that are inherently harmful, racist, repressive, inhumane, and deadly.
“In short, the âmental health movementâ promoted by psychiatry and the corporate media is a destructive fraud. It does not deserve our support. It must be abolished. Instead of âmental healthâ and psychiatric institutions, people in crisis need and deserve non-institutional community supports, including 24/7, non-medical walk-in crisis centres, and crisis lines, runaway houses, drug detox houses, and other humane alternatives controlled, not by intrusive âmental health professionalsâ and the police, but by psychiatric survivors and our allies.
“Our health, lives and rights are much too important to be interfered with, controlled or ‘treated.'”
My response is to recommend *The Careless Society: Community And Its Counterfeits,* about which Goodreads says: “John McKnight shows how competent communities have been invaded and colonized by professionalized services — often with devastating results. Overwhelmed by these social services, the spirit of community falters: families collapse, schools fail, violence spreads, and medical systems spiral out of control. Instead of more or better services, the basis for resolving many of America’s social problems is the community capacity of the local citizens.”
(https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/635872.The_Careless_Society)
Thank you, dear David, for this wonderful article. Boy, our gang sure has problems with terminology, don’t we? Iâve long wished the concept of âmad prideâ could be replaced by that of âmad liberationâ (yay, MindFreedom!). Nevertheless, everything youâve written here and elsewhere resonates with me, and I love and admire you so much. I will never forget the time I managed, somehow, to phone you from inside the bin, in 2007, and told you what a failure I was for getting locked up again, and that I just wanted to die. You told me I hadnât failed anyone or anything, but was re-establishing my credentials by doing field work; that I should make sure no staff ever heard me talk about wanting to die; and that I mustnât die, because the movement needed me! Your loving words made all the difference in the world. They gave me the comfort and courage I needed to make it through yet another psychiatric incarceration. The idea of all oppressed peoples uniting to rise up and fight the right is such a beautiful dream, and even if it remains a dream for a very long time it strengthens us to remember it and strive towards it.
Excellent, important article, Rob. Thank you for writing it and for choosing to highlight the work of such smart people. A few specific comments:
âmainstream mental health approaches influence or determine community resilience agendas.â
Or obliterate them, eh? Keeping in mind, too, that “mainstream mental health approaches” include the administration of incapacitating drugs that prevent thinking about, never mind acting on, any sort of agenda other than compliance, trying to get out of bed in the morning, etc. And of course psychiatric drugs commonly cause a huge variety of physical problems that can contribute to the human body’s ability to deal with excessive heat, bad air, etc., etc. Not to mention that it’s harder to get out of a burning house, or town, when your body and brain can’t function properly.
âthe competence of the local community to deal with deviance goes down.â
I wish the word âdifferenceâ were consistently used in place of âdeviance,â which, though harmless in its actual meaning, unfortunately carries connotations of âabnormal psychology,â âdeviantâ as âcriminal sex pervert,â etc.
Finally, in reference to David Oaksâs words about his âwide range of alternatives to support myself ⌠especially [including] nature (going out on 3-day fasts in Oregon wilderness, for example)â certainly needs to be taken in the context of what is happening to the Oregon wilderness right now – I hope youâre okay, David! – and what will happen to all wilderness and nature if climate change goes unchecked.
Personally, I pretty much need to get outside every day, preferably riding my bike to and around a park, in order to feel anything close to okay (one of the consequences of long periods spent locked up in hospitals); and, right now, smoke in the air here in Canada, as elsewhere – smoke that is emanating from U.S. wildfires – makes outdoor activities âinadvisable.â
“.â.. people of colour killed instantlyâ. Are you speaking generally or specifically?â
Both. There have been two reports in the past month (and probably more that Iâve missed) of police arriving at someoneâs house on a âmental health callâ and that person â in one case a black woman and in another case an indigenous man â ending up dead. âMental health callsâ are never good news for the âmentally illâ person, though they do end in the caller getting rid of the inconvenience, sometimes by the inconvenience getting thrown in the loony bin and sometimes by the inconvenience being murdered. It would be nice
âTo be fake and talk “Law and Order” while gassing and shooting rubber bullets just doesn’t realize a path towards justice nor respect for the possibilities and probabilities of collaborating together.â
Thatâs for sure.
âManaging a government’s laws one would think would also reach to our experience, by which we could begin to make sense not just for ourselves, but also others. If not, bodies of law that becomes alive thereby embracing the concept of what is Tikkun Olam?â
Tikun Olam â literally ârepair of the world,â for those who may not know â is a wonderful concept, as is managing a governmentâs laws in a way that would make sense. But it seems to me that people have been trying to reach these goals for a long time without any success.
I hate the term âinterventionsâ too. To me the question of âworkers and patientsâ already accepts that our problems are in the realm of disease and medicine, which I donât buy. I think expediency and economics has everything to do with the impossibility of systemic change, which is why we have to figure out how to help ourselves and each other outside of systems. From what I see many people who get into politics do so to exert power over others, though I imagine most or all are lying to themselves about that, as shrinks and their minions (and a great many police officers, etc.) must surely be doing as well. Humanitarian concerns are only important when they donât challenge the status quo. So, yes, I think weâre on our own. And it can be hard as hell to help each other, but I think thatâs all there is, at least for those who canât afford or hate the idea of therapy. Which is not to say that I am only helped by (or only help, for that matter) other crazies. But mutual aid, independent of pay, is where itâs at for me. And I realize that Iâm incredibly lucky to be able to get by on that. Hope this is halfway coherent. I get very worked up about this stuff!
âDo you think the U.S. Bill of Rights is stronger or weaker than the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms?â
My guess is theyâre both fairly useless in the real world, and 100% useless when it comes to mental patients.
âHow do we begin to get the thinking to enfranchise what many have disenfranchised in silence? I reckon we just might need to go beyond the prevailing belief systems. What do you think?â
I think so too. The problem to me is how do we get everyone else to go beyond prevailing belief systems. Wish I had a clue.
“Do you sense a healthier rhythm, by which we can advocate? And how does our âprofessionalâ, that is the we/us advance a certain awareness that detects before we are injured/hurt further”
I think we can learn a lot about healthier rhythms from the traditions of the Indigenous peoples from whom this country was first stolen, and of other Indigenous peoples and ancient cultures, and from each other, and even from looking into our own hearts. If we could just stop the meaningless, harmful noise coming from the psychiatric and capitalist systems (which are tightly linked), that would be a start. I am not sure what you mean by your question about our “professional” – can you explain?
“I thought all people are supposed to be treated equally, isnât this part of the Canadian Constitution?”
Yup, it’s in the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, which is about as good at actually protecting the rights and freedoms of disenfranchised people as any other country’s constitution, I reckon.
“Please forward this hopefully to our PM, although I am not certain he understands.”
Pretty sure he can’t emotionally afford to understand, as his own mother has been mental-healthed. Not to mention the “need” for social control. It has been disturbing that to calls for dismantling the police are inevitably accompanied by demands for more “mental health” funding. Not to mention reports of “mental health calls” by police (sigh) during which people of colour are killed instantly. Where the desired outcome would have been their being slowly poisoned to death.
“The underpinnings of beliefs are that people MUST âdeserveâ this. (itâs not âtreatment, itâs abuse)”
Thank you for your comment, Bippyone. I have never understood how “mental health professionals” see “improvement” in inmates/outmates whom they have turned into zombies; “patients” whose bodies, minds and souls have so obviously been destroyed by “treatment.” I had left “sexual dysfunction” (among other things) off my list of the effects of psy neurotoxins because it seemed less directly relevant to covid-related risks, but I’m glad you brought it up, as it’s important and should not be forgotten.
Thank you, Tina, and everyone involved in the drafting of this statement. Although it is not possible for me to imagine that any of the good things proposed here will be brought into effect, I believe that it is vital to propose them, in part because they will serve as useful evidence in future. And let us not forget other effects of psychiatric drugs that make those who take them (whether voluntarily or by force) more vulnerable to infection, discrimination and/or ill treatment, among them muscle stiffness, pain and spasticity; dizziness; dehydration; constipation; blood vessel hemorrhage; osteoporosis; damage to the brain, heart, kidney, liver, pancreas, intestines, and other internal organs; seizures; obesity; parkinsonism; dystonia; dyskinesia; akathisia; confusion, memory problems and other cognitive difficulties; depression; tremors, hallucinations; anxiety; âparanoiaâ; suicidal and homicidal thoughts and feelings; and of course withdrawal âpsychosis.â
I was fortunate to attend Tending Hearts and Minds, as well as many other excellent events and meetings, courtesy of the Eppersons’ tireless efforts in exposing psychiatric iniquities and promoting better ideas. I have also been personally supported by both Diana and Steven, who have saved me from being locked up on several occasions. This has taught me how very much we diagnosed people need our allies (when I was younger I was militant about meeting and organizing only with my fellow nutbars). I hope others will be inspired by this article to organize and educate, wherever they live.
Thank you, Tina, for this excellent article. As we know (and as I like to keep reminding people) besides akathisia, lethargy, weight gain and diabetes, psychiatric “treatments” also directly cause acute agitation; anxiety; blood vessel hemorrhage; cognitive deterioration (including confusion, memory loss and reduced ability to focus, concentrate, or think at all); constipation; damage to the brain, heart, kidney, liver, pancreas, abdomen, and other internal organs; depression; dehydration; distress; dizziness; dyskinesia; dystonia; fatigue; hallucinations; muscle stiffness, pain and spasticity; osteoporosis; paranoia; parkinsonism; seizures; sexual dysfunction; suicidal and homicidal impulses; tremors; and of course decreased life expectancy (common) and sudden death (rare, but not unknown).
Enormous thanks and kudos to RW for this excellent article, which I had previously only skimmed but read thoroughly today. Would that this had been published in the New York Times or the New Yorker or the Guardian or any large mainstream publication. Which is of course about as likely as Torrey suddenly admitting that he’s been lying all these decades.
They write, âThe DSM is not simply a scientific manual, but a social laboratory where political, sociological, ethical and psychological issues are discussed and confronted.”
imho, this article could have been replaced (and readers’ time thus not wasted), by the sentence “The DSM is not a scientific manual.”
Thank you so much, Bonnie. “Distributed far and wide” would be as wonderful as it is unlikely, but I’m certainly glad to have it available on madinamerica. I wish I were half as prolific and dedicated to the cause as you are, and congratulate you, as always, on all the work you do.
Don Weitz has an ancient computer and was unable to open the link to this article, so I sent him the text, and this is his response:
“WOW. What a horrific nightmare of suicide attempts and shocks (89) Annita Sawyer endured in NY psychoprisons, and helpful psychotherapy from psychiatrists Heller and Searles that helped her heal. Very glad she recovered her memories shock apparently destroyed. Her deciaion to write, go public and find her voice is awesome and inspiring.The shrinks once labeled me ‘schizophrenia reaction, improved.’ If you find her emaii address, please send her the MIA Library link to my book.* Thanks so much for sending me her gripping personal story of survival, professional success, courage.”
Don Weitz [email protected]
Thank you so much, Paula, for bringing this problem up and for provoking such an impassioned discussion. I strongly agree with you that MIA, though I recommend it to just about everyone I meet, would be greatly improved by the flagging of diagnostic labels as fraudulent.
Thank you for the excellent article, Sera. I feel so strongly about language that I often jump down peopleâs throats. (I will do so now, in reference to some of the comments, by saying that uncritical acceptance of the words âproviderâ and ârecipientâ make me kinda sick.) I recently went out for coffee with a young woman who had just been âdischargedâ from a month-long hospitalization and felt very traumatized, but wanted to tell me that the neuroleptic she was now taking was helping. I said I hoped she wouldnât stay on it for long and spoke about some of the dangers. She responded by trying to explain why some people âneedâ long-term neuroleptization: she had a relative who had been born schizophrenic. I had a fit. I didnât yell, but Iâm sure I turned purple. I said that there was no such thing as schizophrenia, etc., etc. I came home and wrote an apologetic email saying that I wished I hadnât been so mean. She replied that sheâd very much enjoyed our visit and wanted to meet again soon. The next day I went to a party, attended mostly by psychiatrized people, and someone spoke about my work in the area of âmental health.â I had a fit about the wrongness of that term, and it resulted in a lot of interest from one of the party-goers, leading to a new friendship; she is thrilled to find a perspective on her own âmental healthâ experience that resonates for her. Sometimes, oddly, my fury about language does not work against me. Just thought Iâd mention.
oy, rosalee, i am so sorry to hear about what you have been put through. (i tried to reply to you specifically but the site wouldn’t let me do other than reply to the replies to your comment.) auntie psychiatry, thank you for your brilliant future-dictionary definition of psychiatry.
Don replies: Julie,
really sorry about your negative publishing experiences, had similar experience with BoiokBaby, since 2012 they sold less than 10 copies of my online book Rise Up/Fight Back.
Don
thanks, julie. i thought i’d better let don reply, as it’s his book, so i passed your email on to him and this is what he wrote in response:
Julie
Thanks for your comments re self-publishing. However, I want a real publisher, a publisher that can give the book the credibility and legitimacy it deserves, a publisher that recognizes its literary value and power. For far too long, most psychiatric survivor writing has been rejected as second-rate, as footnotes, by mainstream and left-wing publishers. I feel that my book and similar works should get the credibility, legitimacy and wide readership they deserve, which self-publishing rarely achieves. Itâs time publishers stopped discriminating and patronizing our literature, especially personal testimony and biography, as second-rate. Most of our writings have been unjustly minimized or flatly denied by self-serving corporate publishers and the media. Itâs time our writings were officially recognized as valuable contributions to anti-oppression and resistance literature. In a more practical sense, I also believe that a real publisher will promote the book, mainly because of its access to financial resources and the media that are generally denied to self-publishing writers. I want my book and other survivor works to walk through and be accepted at the front door of publishing, not the back door of self-publishing.
That’s all I want to say. Thanks for sharing your suggestions.
Don
Wow, Fred, thanks!! Please do not send money, though. I hope that, in the unfortunate event that we can’t find a publisher, we will either self-publish or make the book available electronically.
wonderful, sarah! i do agree with kindredspirit on the right to die (especially for the many whose bodies and lives have been utterly destroyed by psychiatry and who have no support and therefore no way out). but i love all the points that you make here, and it’s so important to talk about this stuff. as someone who has been damaged (and who knows so many others who have been damaged) by “health care providers” and their diagnoses and “treatments,” and by trying to get help from crisis lines, and by 911 calls made by concerned persons, i find it very gratifying to see all this laid out.
for the record: to me, “rethinking psychiatry” means asking “was psychiatry a good idea in the first place?” it was not, and still isn’t, and never will be.
“why is it always more important to detect even tiniest traces of âreformist contentâ among us and make a clever statement on that than to move on with our work”
âIrit â do you remember the Madness e-community set up by Sylvia Caras in the mid-1990s? That was my first taste of anti-psychiatry activism, and it saved my life!!â
I remember it very well, and loved it, but it almost drove me nuts. I was most of the way there already, and new to e-lists, and the flood of daily emails was so overwhelming that I had to quit. i avoided e-groups for the next couple of decades and still feel overwhelmed by the very few i belong to now.
âBut it pains me to realise that over 20 years later, we are still covering the same old ground in the same old way.â
Me too. It’s sickening.
âAs far as I can tell, there is no anti-psychiatry movement for psychiatric survivors â in fact the word âmovementâ is a hollow joke. The very phrase âAnti-psychiatryâ is defined and controlled by the likes of Lieberman, Pies and Wessely â it has been weaponised and is used very effectively to bludgeon anyone who gets in their wayâ
Exactly.
âHow do we break out of this habit of fighting each other and hollering into the void?â
The only way I know is to keep trying to get our work into the publicâs view, which is of course terribly difficult, and to try to work together with those who do not want to fight.
i am so sorry that you lost your son to zyprexa. thank you for your persistence; it’s great that caplan wrote about this horrible drug’s dangers in the times, and that you helped get a warning on it. yes, progress is inevitably glacial. every accomplishment on our side should be publicized and celebrated.
i am perfectly okay with people using pseudonyms! my point was not that everyone has to be or should be or can be “out” as a psych survivor, but rather that those of us who are “out” might sometimes get a little cranky about being trashed for being naive, tautological, etc., on the grounds that our work does not live up to the ideological standards of those still in hiding.
thank you for this comment, Jasna. I, too, believe that every effort each of us makes against psychiatrization is valuable, and I thank you for reminding us of that. Spotlight is not free of reformist content. One of the writers says, e.g., that the “lack of accessible documentation, among other failures of the current system, makes it difficult to study and improve the practice and administration of psychiatry.â Such views, however, are far outweighed by everything else in the publication, as well as potentially making it easier for the not-already-converted to be willing to read what other contributors have to say. In fact, I was going to put the reformist piece first for that reason, but just couldnât make myself do it.
just as a matter of interest, i wonder how many of the people on mia who advocate for the abolition of psychiatry (which i would love to see but do not believe is ever going to happen) and slag those who do not publicly do so are using their real names. anyone happen to know?
so, oldhead, as I have long known from following and appreciating things you have said here and elsewhere on mia, we are in accord with regard to the “mh system,” and all that attends it, being utterly pernicious. however, i will not apologize for spotlight, most of which i quite like. true, the reason spotlight came into being in the first place was a request for a one-time newsletter responding to operating in darkness, from someone i used to work with, who did indeed want to publicize the CLAS report as a tool for âmhâ law reform. now, let me be perfectly clear: i have zero interest in helping psychiatrists and their minions become gentler, kinder murderers, or in âeducatingâ anyone who provides âprofessional help.â i personally regard making money off the misery of others as a morally bankrupt enterprise (and all the more so when itâs âpeersâ making that money). nevertheless, i liked and still like the CLAS reportâs strong, human-rights-oriented-language, and its admission that psych drugs debilitate. obviously, all of that is kindergarten-level stuff for us, but not for many of spotlight’s readers. yes, all of us know all about psychiatric abuses, but most people don’t, and as for their not caring, i think there are many different ways to help them care. in other words, i still agree with myself (ha-ha) that people who are less easily dismissed than us can be useful in saying, yup, there’s something wrong with this picture; and that this might help outsiders give a damn. that said, please let me reiterate that i am fully aware that the only purpose for the “mh” paradigm is to justify the authorization of âpractitionersâ to inflict damage of many kinds (including financial damage) on “patients/clients.â i may be crazy â in fact, there is no doubt â but i still think that, for all its reformist content, there is other material in spotlight which indeed indicates, just as you say, that psychiatry is a bankrupt institution which needs to meet the dustbin of history.
i do not think anything is working. i base this opinion on the fact that psy torture just keeps getting worse and more ubiquitous, as far as i know. that said, the strategy in which i am interested is publishing.
i personally don’t give a fuck about educating “mental health professionals.” i was talking about educating the public. and i think we should be trying not to defeat (whatever that would mean) but to replace the system. i respect and admire you, oldhead, but when you say, “Iâm sure you realize this, at least at some level” it makes me wonder whether you’ve actually read spotlight. i’m actually very well aware of what psychiatry is and why it is so powerful.
it is not so much “just” that i’m feeling discouraged about pace and strategies as that there is no progress, no pace, and a marked absence of strategies. my point here was that all the “education” i and others have been attempting for decades has been accompanied by the steady worsening of the mental death system.
hi, francesca, my dear. my response is just what you would expect: the piece is gloriously well-written and persuasive, and i wish that such a fine mind as yours was on my side regarding the illness paradigm!
e.g.
“the onus seems to be on the patient to prove that she’s not insane, rather than on the psychiatrist to prove that she is.”
if only you’d stick to “sane vs. insane” by way of terminology!
âWhy don’t you do something more respectable for a living like deal crystal meth?â
love this, and it indicates insight and humour, though of course to Them it clearly indicates illness. sigh.
“I exercised much self control (which is really all it takes to disguise mental illness), spoke calmly and slowly, displayed a passable rendition of sanity”
again, to me, that self-control indicates that this has nothing to do with illness. if your brain is diseased self-control should not be an option.
“was taking massive doses of medication as prescribed (three antipsychotics, a mood stabilizer and a sedative)”
that anyone should be subjected to this mishmash of poisons is revolting, and certainly these substances cause true brain problems, even individually, never mind in combination.
“As with all mental illnesses, there is no brain scan, blood test or any other physical test which can confirm or deny the presence of anosognosia.”
indeed. which proves, to me and my ilk, that there’s no illness.
“As somebody who has been diagnosed variously with anxiety, psychotic depression, schizophrenia, panic disorder, schizoaffective disorder, major depressive disorder, borderline personality disorder and, finally, bipolar disorder (my sole accurate diagnosis), I’m skeptical that disagreement with my psychiatrist as to the presence or absence of any particular mental illness necessarily indicates neurological disease.”
again, this hodgepodge indicates to me that there’s no science in any of this…
“most of the mentally ill”
a category in which i assume that you would include me, given that i, too, during certain chaotic periods,
“threw many of my apartment’s contents out the window, destroyed my treasured photographs, screamed incomprehensibly, burned food, embarrassed myself on the internet, disturbed my neighbours, wasted police resources, scared the shit out of my parents and alienated most of my friends.”
yet to me this behaviour, awful as it was, had to do with distress and despair, and not with some unprovable neurological whatever…
“substantially expanded and run properly, psychiatric hospitals would have little need of force. With the current power structure dismantled, hospital procedures would have to be designed to be inviting, humane and mindful of patients’ rights.”
sounds right, except there should be no need of force and this shouldn’t be a matter of hospital, from my perspective (obviously).
“street people who may not identify as mentally ill but who surely know that they are tired, poor, hungry and scared, would also flock to safety. The only real problem with this solution, in my view, is that voluntary psychiatric hospitals would be simply overrun, unable to provide for all those seeking sanctuary.”
ah, sanctuary. exactly. not in any way what hospitals are meant for.
“Extended Leave is a form of social control, not health care, as it’s primarily designed to curb undesirable behaviour.”
i agree 100%, except that this is true of psychiatry and not just of the hideously and militarily named “Extended Leave”
Thank you, Peter, for your persistence in showing that psychiatry is not a science, not a legitimate branch of medicine, and, to say the least, not beneficial. I will enjoy sending this little gem to all my lists. Kudos, too, to whoever chose the hilarious illustration.
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Suberb, Bruce. Thank you for writing this.
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“psych treatments that are effective (and there really are some!)”
for instance?
in my experience, benzos used for a night or two can be helpful to prevent or cut short a “psychotic episode” involving or caused by lack of sleep.
do you agree? are there other examples?
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Thank you for this important article, Peter. I wish everyone duped by this “study” would read it.
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me too!
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Thank you for writing about this. So important.
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Thank you, Bruce – great article!
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Yay, Peter! Keep up the good work! How I wish the New York Times and every other thing people actually read much had the courage and honesty to publish this sort of article.
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Thank you for this article. Beautifully done.
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Thank you so much for this excellent blog, David.
I loved finding out about the existence of the âAlleged Lunaticsâ Friend Societyâ! And Iâm so glad you included the link to the United Nations session on âRemedy and Reparation for Institutionalization,â so ably (pardon the expression) hosted by Tina Minkowitz.
Your determination and persistence in advocating for global nonviolent revolution are inspiring. It seems like a no-brainer (whoops!) that crazies should partner with the disability movement as well as those fighting for womenâs rights, racial justice, prison abolition, poverty reduction, queer rights, and so many other necessary remedies to ânormalityâ – since, as you so rightly point out, âWhat is generally called ânormalâ is wrecking the planetâs environment and threatens life on Earth.â
I also love that you refer to psychiatric labels as âgoofyâ; emphasizing the ridiculousness rather than the evil of psychiatry is such a smart way to help ânormalâ people wake up to the incredible levels of disability caused by psychiatry. And how right you are to say that âWhether or not your label is goofy or true, you do not deserve oppression!â
I certainly do not see myself as belonging to âthe consumer/survivor movement,â since this use of the word âconsumerâ (like its much more common use in replacing the word âcitizenâ or âpersonâ everywhere, thanks to our society being all about consumption) kind of makes me want to barf – but of course itâs always good to be reminded that people like me share with âmental health consumersâ a âcommon framework [of] choice and human rights.â
I am also very far from being a fan of the paradigm of Pride, and am sad about its having replaced the concept of liberation (as in gay liberation – the long-forgotten ancestor of 2SLGBTQ[etc]. Pride). And yet I appreciate Ron Ungerâs statement that âsome people are definitely proud of the mental states that are called mad, while others see the madness itself as a tragedy but are proud of their resilience, etc. around it.â Similarly, although âautism spectrumâ ideology does not do anything for me personally, I love Greta Thunbergâs view that being âon the spectrumâ is her âsuperpower.â
Hurray for âseeing through the web of lies that seemingly control ânormal people.ââ Hooray for activism and humour! Hooray for you, David Oaks – thanks for being there, through thick and thin.
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Fantastic work, Sera.
*In truth, what people really mean by âone-sidedâ is that theyâre uncomfortable with the âother sideâ getting any space at all*
Yup. This reminds me so much of when I used to edit Phoenix Rising magazine (if you don’t know what that is, please see psychiatrized.org/PhoenixRising/PhoenixRising.htm). Whenever someone started whining about the lack of balance, I’d say, “We *are* the balance! Everything published everywhere else exclusively promotes the other side!”
*In a world where the most progressive research says only around 20% of people will do best staying on psychotropics longer term*
Sad if true. Progressive research should be proving the truth: that precisely 0% of people will do best staying on psychotropics longer term.
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Superb work, Rob.
*five deaths because of a mental health emergency response⌠and four of those five deaths were Black folks*
wish this were headline news everywhere.
*Psychologist David Jobes … said … if weâre going to forcibly intervene then we need to create alternative places for those people besides hospitals.*
howzabout not forcibly intervening? đ
*â[S]omething this big and draconian, in my opinion, should be meticulously organized and planned for,â *
youch. something this big and draconian should clearly be nixed.
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yes, frank, thanks!!!
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Yes, Ted – people creating and practising “alternatives” all over the world should eventually be able to convince the public that listening, kindness, forbearance, respect, etc., are more helpful than the fraud and force which are all psychiatry has to offer.
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Yes, Ted – people creating and practising “alternatives” all over the world should eventually be able to convince the public that listening, kindness, forbearance, respect, etc., are more helpful than the fraud and force which are all psychiatry has to offer.
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Thank you so much for this incisive article – zowie! Well done!
“… one could have hoped that Insel, writing as the former director of the NIMH, would have dared to cross this bridge of no return.”
One could indeed have hoped!
Okay, now it’s time to forward the link to everyone I know đ
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This may be of interest to those interested in peer stuff:
The Power of Peer Respites Webinar
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1zFl2O4BOPPzPeEre3M220220unkm_al6/view
(sorry if it turns out not to be viewable – i don’t know anything about google drive)
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“Iâm a peer specialist . My goal is to help others. Is there a forum anywhere for this type of thing? Sharing stories for healing etc⌔
I don’t know if there is a forum for peer specialists to share stories. Anyone else know?
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I know what you mean. Personally, I very much feel that way about, in particular, “Asperger’s autism” and the whole “neurodiversity” thing. And that all forms of madness (other than those caused by tertiary syphilis and other real physical things that actually affect the brain), at bottom, constitute an understandable reaction to an increasingly incomprehensible world.
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(Duplicate Comment)
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“… I fear people will continue to demand the right to subdue what they fear rather than embrace it.”
I certainly share that fear. I have no short-term optimism here, but do feel that, if we keep on plugging away, in just a few hundred years or so psychiatry will have become a thing of the past. If humanity lasts that long …
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How horrible that you had to endure this shocking cruelty after a shrink had already murdered your brother, Rosalee. I am so sorry about what happened to him and to you.
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Thank you for letting us know this, Ted. Have you written elsewhere about the help you got in Canada? Was it the Vancouver Emotional Emergency Centre you were at?
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Have you written elsewhere about the help you got in Canada? Was it the Vancouver Emotional Emergency Centre you were at?
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ummm … isn’t “blunting emotions” exactly what “antidepressants” (and all psychiatric “treatments”) are *for*?
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Ha! My dad (who was born in 1919) used to tell a penis joke whose punchline was “It’s a handy thing to have on a picnic.”
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I am so sorry you had to go through those horrible experiences. It is always good to know that some “mental health” workers mean well …
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Thanks, Sam.
“It is simply diversity where power is the ultimate winner until the tides change.”
Well put!!!
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I think it’s actually Tina doing the truth-telling here, Someone Else, and me just telling about the telling, but thanks! đ
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Thank you, Madmom. I applaud those who “want a lasting revolution in the mental health system,” even though my own personal/political interest is in the mental health system (or mental illness industry, as I prefer to call it) withering for lack of customers, as noncommercial alternatives become available. I do recognize, however, that this may never happen, and that in the meanwhile those being tortured need and deserve the best advocacy, reform, etc. that can be had.
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Comrade! Thank you for defending Marxism as a worldview; may it be practised somewhere someday. Please check out, if you have not already done so, https://progressive.international (I am a new member and have already found an antipsychiatry colleague!)
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Thank you for this much-needed ammunition in the fight to stop psychiatry from poisoning the brains of children and the worldview of those who care for them.
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Excellent work, Rob. Wish this were required reading for the whole world.
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Thank you so much for this absolutely brilliant article. I hope you appreciate yourself for the important work you’ve done here. Kudos!!!
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If only psychiatry could be held accountable for the ever-increasing damage it does.
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I have delayed too long in saying thank you for this excellent article. And hooray for the “OCD” that produces detail!
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Thank you, Melissa, so powerful and beautiful and true. As for “so-called professionalsâ growing curiosity and awareness of something more,” curiosity and awareness have not been among the characteristics of any “professionals” I’ve ever come across.
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Thank you for this article. Although there are a million things wrong with our issues being classified as having to do with health, and although the idea of “services” to me indicates the need for some people to make money off other people’s misery, it’s still great to see a listing of non-coercive entities, not to mention any recognition anywhere that force and coercion do not constitute help.
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hear, hear!!!
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Thank you, Phil, great work as always. I wonder how many times we all need to be saying these same things before psychiatry withers away …
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Thank you for this, Peter. It is wonderful that we can read your work in instalments, for free, rather than buying an expensive book. I am not one of those who believes in psychotherapy, but much more important than that is authoritative voices denouncing psychiatric pseudoscience and the harm it causes, and showing that it is possible to come back from “treatment.”
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Another excellent article, which I wish everyone everywhere would read – despite my discomfort with the fact that Open Dialogue uses psychiatric professionals and psychiatric drugs at all; and despite my objection to the use of the word “schizophrenia” without quotation marks; and despite my agreement with those who have said, here and elsewhere, that we should not be surprised by media cover-ups of the truth about psychiatry. Fundamentally, it’s still important to expose, expose, expose, and that’s what Robert is doing here.
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thanks for pointing this out, sam. i too find the term âemotional wellnessâ unfortunate. but of course this is all part of “humanising the paradigm” – as opposed to dumping the paradigm, the professionals, and the whole idea that some of us have something wrong with us and others are experts who should be paid to fix the rest.
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At last!
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This is extraordinary, Tina. Kudos. I feel like we can’t lose, and I have certainly never felt anything like that before. Thank you.
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Thank you so much for keeping after Ronald Pies, Phil. He certainly deserves it. How dare he spout all these hypocritical denials when the whole of psychiatric drugging is based on the “chemical imbalance” lie, which psychiatry and mainstream media have never stopped promulgating – and which an ever-increasing number of “patients” inevitably keep falling for. I wish many more people had access to your views.
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I hope that Jim G will agree to post all of the original MNN on his site; we must not allow this wonderful piece of history to continue to be co-opted.
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Thank you, Jenny, it was wonderful to read this!
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exactly, sam. also, “The next study should be one on how pouring water on your head makes your hair wet” sounds just about right, registeredforthissite
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Wow, Rosalee, I had no idea about any of this. Thank you so much for bringing it to my attention. I have signed the petition and will send the link to my contacts.
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Thanks for the petition link, Sam. I don’t think psychiatry can afford to recognize human rights, other than the fraudulent “right to treatment” touted by such entities as NAMI and the Schizophrenia Society. If we were recognized as actual human beings with real rights, such as the right to say no, psy and pharma would be in serious danger of losing business.
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Superb work, Rob. What an obscene world we live in, where âhelpingâ people is an industry, or rather a conglomeration of industries, and people in distress have to reach out to paid âhelpersâ because they have no one in their lives they can talk to – and then are likely to get incarcerated and forcibly drugged, likely for the rest of their lives, with neurotoxins which, even when they donât directly lead to chemically-induced âsuicidal ideation,â are likely to cause early death, even aside from wrecking peopleâs lives.
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thanks, sam!! it was still rude, but never mind.
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Yes. And as for the “chemical imbalance” having been debunked, that seems somehow never to have filtered down to … well … anywhere. As we all know, this lie is still promoted indiscriminately and universally used as a pretext for poisoning an ever-increasing number of “clients” and “patients.” By the way, Sam, I seem never to have responded to your initial comment of June 5. How rude! Sorry, and thank you for your words. Alas, I’m sure everything we’ve sent to Trudeau and other politicians and officials has gone straight into the circular file …
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Thank you for this comment, Sam. I will pass it on to Don, who will be moved by it, as I am.
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i am happy to send regards, oldhead, but don will not know who they are from. i’m sure he would be glad to be contacted by you directly:
[email protected]
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i would sure like to listen to (or read) it, sam!
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Hi, this comment is not from me but from Don Weitz (https://www.madinamerica.com/author/dweitz/), who wanted me to post on his behalf because he does not want a log-in password (note to moderator – is there a way I could get a password on his behalf without going through his email, for future reference?)
Don’s comment:
“Too bad Samantha Lilly never mentions the systemic racism and fraud in psychiatry that has been prevalent since the 19th century, starting with Dr. Benjamin Rush, the racist âfather of American psychiatryâ and founder of the APA. The psychiatric and prison systems are not global movements; theyâre self-serving, fraudulent, exploitative, health-threatening and disabling. In their essence, they are essentially paramilitary police: moral enforcers for neoliberal and fascist regimes. The âmental healthâ movement is dominated by psychiatrists and other professionals; itâs largely funded by self-serving, profiteering, and amoral Big Pharma (transnational drug companies), promoted by the corporate media, and politically supported by neoliberal governments, including those of the United States, the UK, Australia, and Canada. This âmental health movementâ continues to spread and profit from psychiatric myths and lies, including âmental illness,â âmental health,â âsafe and effective medication,â and the widely discredited âchemical imbalanceâ theory. This âmovement,â in partnership with national âjusticeâ departments, has permanently discriminated against, stigmatized, imprisoned, debilitated, electrocuted, poisoned and killed millions; particularly Black, Brown, Latinx, Indigenous, middle-class and poor people, and political dissidents. The global âmental health movement,â like the psychiatric and prison systems, does not heal; it disables, traumatizes, and stigmatizes vulnerable people including children, single parents, the elderly, the unemployed, immigrants and refugees and is a willing partner of neoliberal governments and fascist regimes that are inherently harmful, racist, repressive, inhumane, and deadly.
“In short, the âmental health movementâ promoted by psychiatry and the corporate media is a destructive fraud. It does not deserve our support. It must be abolished. Instead of âmental healthâ and psychiatric institutions, people in crisis need and deserve non-institutional community supports, including 24/7, non-medical walk-in crisis centres, and crisis lines, runaway houses, drug detox houses, and other humane alternatives controlled, not by intrusive âmental health professionalsâ and the police, but by psychiatric survivors and our allies.
“Our health, lives and rights are much too important to be interfered with, controlled or ‘treated.'”
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My response is to recommend *The Careless Society: Community And Its Counterfeits,* about which Goodreads says: “John McKnight shows how competent communities have been invaded and colonized by professionalized services — often with devastating results. Overwhelmed by these social services, the spirit of community falters: families collapse, schools fail, violence spreads, and medical systems spiral out of control. Instead of more or better services, the basis for resolving many of America’s social problems is the community capacity of the local citizens.”
(https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/635872.The_Careless_Society)
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Thank you, dear David, for this wonderful article. Boy, our gang sure has problems with terminology, don’t we? Iâve long wished the concept of âmad prideâ could be replaced by that of âmad liberationâ (yay, MindFreedom!). Nevertheless, everything youâve written here and elsewhere resonates with me, and I love and admire you so much. I will never forget the time I managed, somehow, to phone you from inside the bin, in 2007, and told you what a failure I was for getting locked up again, and that I just wanted to die. You told me I hadnât failed anyone or anything, but was re-establishing my credentials by doing field work; that I should make sure no staff ever heard me talk about wanting to die; and that I mustnât die, because the movement needed me! Your loving words made all the difference in the world. They gave me the comfort and courage I needed to make it through yet another psychiatric incarceration. The idea of all oppressed peoples uniting to rise up and fight the right is such a beautiful dream, and even if it remains a dream for a very long time it strengthens us to remember it and strive towards it.
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Excellent, important article, Rob. Thank you for writing it and for choosing to highlight the work of such smart people. A few specific comments:
âmainstream mental health approaches influence or determine community resilience agendas.â
Or obliterate them, eh? Keeping in mind, too, that “mainstream mental health approaches” include the administration of incapacitating drugs that prevent thinking about, never mind acting on, any sort of agenda other than compliance, trying to get out of bed in the morning, etc. And of course psychiatric drugs commonly cause a huge variety of physical problems that can contribute to the human body’s ability to deal with excessive heat, bad air, etc., etc. Not to mention that it’s harder to get out of a burning house, or town, when your body and brain can’t function properly.
âthe competence of the local community to deal with deviance goes down.â
I wish the word âdifferenceâ were consistently used in place of âdeviance,â which, though harmless in its actual meaning, unfortunately carries connotations of âabnormal psychology,â âdeviantâ as âcriminal sex pervert,â etc.
Finally, in reference to David Oaksâs words about his âwide range of alternatives to support myself ⌠especially [including] nature (going out on 3-day fasts in Oregon wilderness, for example)â certainly needs to be taken in the context of what is happening to the Oregon wilderness right now – I hope youâre okay, David! – and what will happen to all wilderness and nature if climate change goes unchecked.
Personally, I pretty much need to get outside every day, preferably riding my bike to and around a park, in order to feel anything close to okay (one of the consequences of long periods spent locked up in hospitals); and, right now, smoke in the air here in Canada, as elsewhere – smoke that is emanating from U.S. wildfires – makes outdoor activities âinadvisable.â
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Excellent point about âtrainingâ!
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Thank you, Rosalee. Weâre trying to get officials in Canada interested, but not holding our breath.
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“.â.. people of colour killed instantlyâ. Are you speaking generally or specifically?â
Both. There have been two reports in the past month (and probably more that Iâve missed) of police arriving at someoneâs house on a âmental health callâ and that person â in one case a black woman and in another case an indigenous man â ending up dead. âMental health callsâ are never good news for the âmentally illâ person, though they do end in the caller getting rid of the inconvenience, sometimes by the inconvenience getting thrown in the loony bin and sometimes by the inconvenience being murdered. It would be nice
âTo be fake and talk “Law and Order” while gassing and shooting rubber bullets just doesn’t realize a path towards justice nor respect for the possibilities and probabilities of collaborating together.â
Thatâs for sure.
âManaging a government’s laws one would think would also reach to our experience, by which we could begin to make sense not just for ourselves, but also others. If not, bodies of law that becomes alive thereby embracing the concept of what is Tikkun Olam?â
Tikun Olam â literally ârepair of the world,â for those who may not know â is a wonderful concept, as is managing a governmentâs laws in a way that would make sense. But it seems to me that people have been trying to reach these goals for a long time without any success.
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I hate the term âinterventionsâ too. To me the question of âworkers and patientsâ already accepts that our problems are in the realm of disease and medicine, which I donât buy. I think expediency and economics has everything to do with the impossibility of systemic change, which is why we have to figure out how to help ourselves and each other outside of systems. From what I see many people who get into politics do so to exert power over others, though I imagine most or all are lying to themselves about that, as shrinks and their minions (and a great many police officers, etc.) must surely be doing as well. Humanitarian concerns are only important when they donât challenge the status quo. So, yes, I think weâre on our own. And it can be hard as hell to help each other, but I think thatâs all there is, at least for those who canât afford or hate the idea of therapy. Which is not to say that I am only helped by (or only help, for that matter) other crazies. But mutual aid, independent of pay, is where itâs at for me. And I realize that Iâm incredibly lucky to be able to get by on that. Hope this is halfway coherent. I get very worked up about this stuff!
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âDo you think the U.S. Bill of Rights is stronger or weaker than the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms?â
My guess is theyâre both fairly useless in the real world, and 100% useless when it comes to mental patients.
âHow do we begin to get the thinking to enfranchise what many have disenfranchised in silence? I reckon we just might need to go beyond the prevailing belief systems. What do you think?â
I think so too. The problem to me is how do we get everyone else to go beyond prevailing belief systems. Wish I had a clue.
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Good points!
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“Do you sense a healthier rhythm, by which we can advocate? And how does our âprofessionalâ, that is the we/us advance a certain awareness that detects before we are injured/hurt further”
I think we can learn a lot about healthier rhythms from the traditions of the Indigenous peoples from whom this country was first stolen, and of other Indigenous peoples and ancient cultures, and from each other, and even from looking into our own hearts. If we could just stop the meaningless, harmful noise coming from the psychiatric and capitalist systems (which are tightly linked), that would be a start. I am not sure what you mean by your question about our “professional” – can you explain?
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“I thought all people are supposed to be treated equally, isnât this part of the Canadian Constitution?”
Yup, it’s in the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, which is about as good at actually protecting the rights and freedoms of disenfranchised people as any other country’s constitution, I reckon.
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Thanks, Someone Else.
“Absolutely we need a real return to the rule of law.”
It seems to me we need to revisit the whole concept of the rule of law as well as the concept of professional help.
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Thanks, Sam.
“Please forward this hopefully to our PM, although I am not certain he understands.”
Pretty sure he can’t emotionally afford to understand, as his own mother has been mental-healthed. Not to mention the “need” for social control. It has been disturbing that to calls for dismantling the police are inevitably accompanied by demands for more “mental health” funding. Not to mention reports of “mental health calls” by police (sigh) during which people of colour are killed instantly. Where the desired outcome would have been their being slowly poisoned to death.
“The underpinnings of beliefs are that people MUST âdeserveâ this. (itâs not âtreatment, itâs abuse)”
And punishment.
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Thank you for your comment, Bippyone. I have never understood how “mental health professionals” see “improvement” in inmates/outmates whom they have turned into zombies; “patients” whose bodies, minds and souls have so obviously been destroyed by “treatment.” I had left “sexual dysfunction” (among other things) off my list of the effects of psy neurotoxins because it seemed less directly relevant to covid-related risks, but I’m glad you brought it up, as it’s important and should not be forgotten.
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Yes! Very useful substitution. Thank you.
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Thank you, Tina, and everyone involved in the drafting of this statement. Although it is not possible for me to imagine that any of the good things proposed here will be brought into effect, I believe that it is vital to propose them, in part because they will serve as useful evidence in future. And let us not forget other effects of psychiatric drugs that make those who take them (whether voluntarily or by force) more vulnerable to infection, discrimination and/or ill treatment, among them muscle stiffness, pain and spasticity; dizziness; dehydration; constipation; blood vessel hemorrhage; osteoporosis; damage to the brain, heart, kidney, liver, pancreas, intestines, and other internal organs; seizures; obesity; parkinsonism; dystonia; dyskinesia; akathisia; confusion, memory problems and other cognitive difficulties; depression; tremors, hallucinations; anxiety; âparanoiaâ; suicidal and homicidal thoughts and feelings; and of course withdrawal âpsychosis.â
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excellent work, miranda. thank you.
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Removed for moderation.
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Wow, Leah – kudos to you and to everyone involved in these projects. Wow.
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I was fortunate to attend Tending Hearts and Minds, as well as many other excellent events and meetings, courtesy of the Eppersons’ tireless efforts in exposing psychiatric iniquities and promoting better ideas. I have also been personally supported by both Diana and Steven, who have saved me from being locked up on several occasions. This has taught me how very much we diagnosed people need our allies (when I was younger I was militant about meeting and organizing only with my fellow nutbars). I hope others will be inspired by this article to organize and educate, wherever they live.
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Thank you, Tina, for this excellent article. As we know (and as I like to keep reminding people) besides akathisia, lethargy, weight gain and diabetes, psychiatric “treatments” also directly cause acute agitation; anxiety; blood vessel hemorrhage; cognitive deterioration (including confusion, memory loss and reduced ability to focus, concentrate, or think at all); constipation; damage to the brain, heart, kidney, liver, pancreas, abdomen, and other internal organs; depression; dehydration; distress; dizziness; dyskinesia; dystonia; fatigue; hallucinations; muscle stiffness, pain and spasticity; osteoporosis; paranoia; parkinsonism; seizures; sexual dysfunction; suicidal and homicidal impulses; tremors; and of course decreased life expectancy (common) and sudden death (rare, but not unknown).
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wow! extremely powerful and important article. gigantic kudos and thanks for writing this.
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Superb review, Paula. Thank you for writing it.
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Thank you so much, Bob, for this excellent defence of Bonnie’s work and life. Shame on the New York Times.
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Enormous thanks and kudos to RW for this excellent article, which I had previously only skimmed but read thoroughly today. Would that this had been published in the New York Times or the New Yorker or the Guardian or any large mainstream publication. Which is of course about as likely as Torrey suddenly admitting that he’s been lying all these decades.
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They write, âThe DSM is not simply a scientific manual, but a social laboratory where political, sociological, ethical and psychological issues are discussed and confronted.”
imho, this article could have been replaced (and readers’ time thus not wasted), by the sentence “The DSM is not a scientific manual.”
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Excellent work. Thank you for writing this.
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Thank you so much, Bonnie. “Distributed far and wide” would be as wonderful as it is unlikely, but I’m certainly glad to have it available on madinamerica. I wish I were half as prolific and dedicated to the cause as you are, and congratulate you, as always, on all the work you do.
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Thank you, Lauren and Peter, for this excellent article.
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Don Weitz has an ancient computer and was unable to open the link to this article, so I sent him the text, and this is his response:
“WOW. What a horrific nightmare of suicide attempts and shocks (89) Annita Sawyer endured in NY psychoprisons, and helpful psychotherapy from psychiatrists Heller and Searles that helped her heal. Very glad she recovered her memories shock apparently destroyed. Her deciaion to write, go public and find her voice is awesome and inspiring.The shrinks once labeled me ‘schizophrenia reaction, improved.’ If you find her emaii address, please send her the MIA Library link to my book.* Thanks so much for sending me her gripping personal story of survival, professional success, courage.”
Don Weitz
[email protected]
* https://www.madinamerica.com/mad-america-library/
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Thank you so much, Paula, for bringing this problem up and for provoking such an impassioned discussion. I strongly agree with you that MIA, though I recommend it to just about everyone I meet, would be greatly improved by the flagging of diagnostic labels as fraudulent.
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I favour “neurotoxin” myself but don’t expect anyone to actually use it.
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Thank you for the excellent article, Sera. I feel so strongly about language that I often jump down peopleâs throats. (I will do so now, in reference to some of the comments, by saying that uncritical acceptance of the words âproviderâ and ârecipientâ make me kinda sick.) I recently went out for coffee with a young woman who had just been âdischargedâ from a month-long hospitalization and felt very traumatized, but wanted to tell me that the neuroleptic she was now taking was helping. I said I hoped she wouldnât stay on it for long and spoke about some of the dangers. She responded by trying to explain why some people âneedâ long-term neuroleptization: she had a relative who had been born schizophrenic. I had a fit. I didnât yell, but Iâm sure I turned purple. I said that there was no such thing as schizophrenia, etc., etc. I came home and wrote an apologetic email saying that I wished I hadnât been so mean. She replied that sheâd very much enjoyed our visit and wanted to meet again soon. The next day I went to a party, attended mostly by psychiatrized people, and someone spoke about my work in the area of âmental health.â I had a fit about the wrongness of that term, and it resulted in a lot of interest from one of the party-goers, leading to a new friendship; she is thrilled to find a perspective on her own âmental healthâ experience that resonates for her. Sometimes, oddly, my fury about language does not work against me. Just thought Iâd mention.
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oy, rosalee, i am so sorry to hear about what you have been put through. (i tried to reply to you specifically but the site wouldn’t let me do other than reply to the replies to your comment.) auntie psychiatry, thank you for your brilliant future-dictionary definition of psychiatry.
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Don replies: Julie,
really sorry about your negative publishing experiences, had similar experience with BoiokBaby, since 2012 they sold less than 10 copies of my online book Rise Up/Fight Back.
Don
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thanks, julie. i thought i’d better let don reply, as it’s his book, so i passed your email on to him and this is what he wrote in response:
Julie
Thanks for your comments re self-publishing. However, I want a real publisher, a publisher that can give the book the credibility and legitimacy it deserves, a publisher that recognizes its literary value and power. For far too long, most psychiatric survivor writing has been rejected as second-rate, as footnotes, by mainstream and left-wing publishers. I feel that my book and similar works should get the credibility, legitimacy and wide readership they deserve, which self-publishing rarely achieves. Itâs time publishers stopped discriminating and patronizing our literature, especially personal testimony and biography, as second-rate. Most of our writings have been unjustly minimized or flatly denied by self-serving corporate publishers and the media. Itâs time our writings were officially recognized as valuable contributions to anti-oppression and resistance literature. In a more practical sense, I also believe that a real publisher will promote the book, mainly because of its access to financial resources and the media that are generally denied to self-publishing writers. I want my book and other survivor works to walk through and be accepted at the front door of publishing, not the back door of self-publishing.
That’s all I want to say. Thanks for sharing your suggestions.
Don
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Thank you very much, GGGreen. Big congrats on getting oft antidepressants. Solidarity indeed!
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Wow, Fred, thanks!! Please do not send money, though. I hope that, in the unfortunate event that we can’t find a publisher, we will either self-publish or make the book available electronically.
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thank you, ron. don was born in 1930!
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Thank you, Richard. I’ll pass this on as well. As I will all other comments. Or at least the positive ones!
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Wow, Ron, thanks! I will of course send this on to Don.
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thank you. i’m glad you survived and found your voice.
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thank you, paula. i’m grateful for your work, too. fingers crossed re publication…
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thanks, oldhead.
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thanks, red squirrel. i hope the book will in fact come out someday; i have a feeling that finding a publisher is going to be challenging.
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wonderful, sarah! i do agree with kindredspirit on the right to die (especially for the many whose bodies and lives have been utterly destroyed by psychiatry and who have no support and therefore no way out). but i love all the points that you make here, and it’s so important to talk about this stuff. as someone who has been damaged (and who knows so many others who have been damaged) by “health care providers” and their diagnoses and “treatments,” and by trying to get help from crisis lines, and by 911 calls made by concerned persons, i find it very gratifying to see all this laid out.
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thank you, diana. i know that you will continue doing your own good work.
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thank you, dragon slayer. i’ve asked don if it would be okay to add your site to the bibliography. kudos for putting it up.
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thank you!
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thank you, frank – me too! ah, for the days before “pride” replaced “liberation”!!!
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for the record: to me, “rethinking psychiatry” means asking “was psychiatry a good idea in the first place?” it was not, and still isn’t, and never will be.
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“why is it always more important to detect even tiniest traces of âreformist contentâ among us and make a clever statement on that than to move on with our work”
ego, i’m guessing.
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âIrit â do you remember the Madness e-community set up by Sylvia Caras in the mid-1990s? That was my first taste of anti-psychiatry activism, and it saved my life!!â
I remember it very well, and loved it, but it almost drove me nuts. I was most of the way there already, and new to e-lists, and the flood of daily emails was so overwhelming that I had to quit. i avoided e-groups for the next couple of decades and still feel overwhelmed by the very few i belong to now.
âBut it pains me to realise that over 20 years later, we are still covering the same old ground in the same old way.â
Me too. It’s sickening.
âAs far as I can tell, there is no anti-psychiatry movement for psychiatric survivors â in fact the word âmovementâ is a hollow joke. The very phrase âAnti-psychiatryâ is defined and controlled by the likes of Lieberman, Pies and Wessely â it has been weaponised and is used very effectively to bludgeon anyone who gets in their wayâ
Exactly.
âHow do we break out of this habit of fighting each other and hollering into the void?â
The only way I know is to keep trying to get our work into the publicâs view, which is of course terribly difficult, and to try to work together with those who do not want to fight.
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i am so sorry that you lost your son to zyprexa. thank you for your persistence; it’s great that caplan wrote about this horrible drug’s dangers in the times, and that you helped get a warning on it. yes, progress is inevitably glacial. every accomplishment on our side should be publicized and celebrated.
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i am perfectly okay with people using pseudonyms! my point was not that everyone has to be or should be or can be “out” as a psych survivor, but rather that those of us who are “out” might sometimes get a little cranky about being trashed for being naive, tautological, etc., on the grounds that our work does not live up to the ideological standards of those still in hiding.
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thank you for this comment, Jasna. I, too, believe that every effort each of us makes against psychiatrization is valuable, and I thank you for reminding us of that. Spotlight is not free of reformist content. One of the writers says, e.g., that the “lack of accessible documentation, among other failures of the current system, makes it difficult to study and improve the practice and administration of psychiatry.â Such views, however, are far outweighed by everything else in the publication, as well as potentially making it easier for the not-already-converted to be willing to read what other contributors have to say. In fact, I was going to put the reformist piece first for that reason, but just couldnât make myself do it.
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just as a matter of interest, i wonder how many of the people on mia who advocate for the abolition of psychiatry (which i would love to see but do not believe is ever going to happen) and slag those who do not publicly do so are using their real names. anyone happen to know?
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so, oldhead, as I have long known from following and appreciating things you have said here and elsewhere on mia, we are in accord with regard to the “mh system,” and all that attends it, being utterly pernicious. however, i will not apologize for spotlight, most of which i quite like. true, the reason spotlight came into being in the first place was a request for a one-time newsletter responding to operating in darkness, from someone i used to work with, who did indeed want to publicize the CLAS report as a tool for âmhâ law reform. now, let me be perfectly clear: i have zero interest in helping psychiatrists and their minions become gentler, kinder murderers, or in âeducatingâ anyone who provides âprofessional help.â i personally regard making money off the misery of others as a morally bankrupt enterprise (and all the more so when itâs âpeersâ making that money). nevertheless, i liked and still like the CLAS reportâs strong, human-rights-oriented-language, and its admission that psych drugs debilitate. obviously, all of that is kindergarten-level stuff for us, but not for many of spotlight’s readers. yes, all of us know all about psychiatric abuses, but most people don’t, and as for their not caring, i think there are many different ways to help them care. in other words, i still agree with myself (ha-ha) that people who are less easily dismissed than us can be useful in saying, yup, there’s something wrong with this picture; and that this might help outsiders give a damn. that said, please let me reiterate that i am fully aware that the only purpose for the “mh” paradigm is to justify the authorization of âpractitionersâ to inflict damage of many kinds (including financial damage) on “patients/clients.â i may be crazy â in fact, there is no doubt â but i still think that, for all its reformist content, there is other material in spotlight which indeed indicates, just as you say, that psychiatry is a bankrupt institution which needs to meet the dustbin of history.
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i do not think anything is working. i base this opinion on the fact that psy torture just keeps getting worse and more ubiquitous, as far as i know. that said, the strategy in which i am interested is publishing.
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i personally don’t give a fuck about educating “mental health professionals.” i was talking about educating the public. and i think we should be trying not to defeat (whatever that would mean) but to replace the system. i respect and admire you, oldhead, but when you say, “Iâm sure you realize this, at least at some level” it makes me wonder whether you’ve actually read spotlight. i’m actually very well aware of what psychiatry is and why it is so powerful.
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“but we are fully capable of speaking for ourselves, not âone dayâ but right now!”
yes, of course, my point was that no one is listening outside our cozy little circle, so we can complain forever without changing anything.
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it is not so much “just” that i’m feeling discouraged about pace and strategies as that there is no progress, no pace, and a marked absence of strategies. my point here was that all the “education” i and others have been attempting for decades has been accompanied by the steady worsening of the mental death system.
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Agreed.
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hi, francesca, my dear. my response is just what you would expect: the piece is gloriously well-written and persuasive, and i wish that such a fine mind as yours was on my side regarding the illness paradigm!
e.g.
“the onus seems to be on the patient to prove that she’s not insane, rather than on the psychiatrist to prove that she is.”
if only you’d stick to “sane vs. insane” by way of terminology!
âWhy don’t you do something more respectable for a living like deal crystal meth?â
love this, and it indicates insight and humour, though of course to Them it clearly indicates illness. sigh.
“I exercised much self control (which is really all it takes to disguise mental illness), spoke calmly and slowly, displayed a passable rendition of sanity”
again, to me, that self-control indicates that this has nothing to do with illness. if your brain is diseased self-control should not be an option.
“was taking massive doses of medication as prescribed (three antipsychotics, a mood stabilizer and a sedative)”
that anyone should be subjected to this mishmash of poisons is revolting, and certainly these substances cause true brain problems, even individually, never mind in combination.
“As with all mental illnesses, there is no brain scan, blood test or any other physical test which can confirm or deny the presence of anosognosia.”
indeed. which proves, to me and my ilk, that there’s no illness.
“As somebody who has been diagnosed variously with anxiety, psychotic depression, schizophrenia, panic disorder, schizoaffective disorder, major depressive disorder, borderline personality disorder and, finally, bipolar disorder (my sole accurate diagnosis), I’m skeptical that disagreement with my psychiatrist as to the presence or absence of any particular mental illness necessarily indicates neurological disease.”
again, this hodgepodge indicates to me that there’s no science in any of this…
“most of the mentally ill”
a category in which i assume that you would include me, given that i, too, during certain chaotic periods,
“threw many of my apartment’s contents out the window, destroyed my treasured photographs, screamed incomprehensibly, burned food, embarrassed myself on the internet, disturbed my neighbours, wasted police resources, scared the shit out of my parents and alienated most of my friends.”
yet to me this behaviour, awful as it was, had to do with distress and despair, and not with some unprovable neurological whatever…
“substantially expanded and run properly, psychiatric hospitals would have little need of force. With the current power structure dismantled, hospital procedures would have to be designed to be inviting, humane and mindful of patients’ rights.”
sounds right, except there should be no need of force and this shouldn’t be a matter of hospital, from my perspective (obviously).
“street people who may not identify as mentally ill but who surely know that they are tired, poor, hungry and scared, would also flock to safety. The only real problem with this solution, in my view, is that voluntary psychiatric hospitals would be simply overrun, unable to provide for all those seeking sanctuary.”
ah, sanctuary. exactly. not in any way what hospitals are meant for.
“Extended Leave is a form of social control, not health care, as it’s primarily designed to curb undesirable behaviour.”
i agree 100%, except that this is true of psychiatry and not just of the hideously and militarily named “Extended Leave”
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