Psychiatry is “….a presumed medical specialty that has no reputable theory about the alleged internal dysfunction that causes mental illness, that has no biomarkers with which to diagnose those illnesses, yet that has a long history of coercing people to act, think, and feel in accordance with an ill-defined and ever-changing set of moral standards.”
Psychiatry is nothing more than a medicalized game of Blind Man’s Bluff. And it’s guilty of Willful Blindness until it changes.
Psychiatry has become the polite term for drug dealing, because instead of advocating for healthier mindsets, behaviors, and lifestyles, they create drug addicts.
So why wouldn’t they want their “patients” addicted to their “treatments” when that’s their business? Very paternalistic, i.e. “Big Daddy Knows Best”.
Generally, I like what Gabor Mate says. However, I always had the strange sense that he’s missing something, which always left me wondering: Does he not appreciate the way most people are forced to live?
I could never decide if he was being cowardly, or if it just never occurred to him how much deferential treatment he receives because he has “Dr.” in front of his name.
I read your essay yesterday and I’m in awe of it and you. Your insights and intelligence are AMAZING. I see it as a blueprint for the future.
And thank you, thank you, thank you Lisa, for being you, above all else.
I just took a look at “The Illusion of Psychotherapy” on Amazon and it sounds well worth reading as Epstein addresses the many social-relational causes of psychic distress.
I look forward to getting a copy once I find one less pricey.
True.
Often people with money and/or advanced education (the so-called “elites”) either don’t know or have forgotten what it’s like to be low man on the totem pole and the consequences that real people can face if they dare call out the powers that be.
“To see what “Science” is made of, we need only observe what happens when it collides with power, pounds, payola, politics or promotional prospects, perhaps?”
“People need to ask about all those patients who as teenagers became patients in the late 1980’s with Prozac and have been compliant and ask simply where are they today? Homeless? Jobless? Severely ill or dead?”
Psychiatry would hide that “data” if they had it—or try to give it a “positive” spin.
Correction: Whether psychiatry does this deliberately or not is of NO CONSEQUENCE, because the results are THE SAME: iatrogenic illness, disability and death, which makes psychiatry’s claims of bearing no responsibility completely invalid.
Aftab can soft-soap about psychiatry all he wants, but it doesn’t change the fact that psychiatry is a dishonest, exploitative organization whose long history of misinforming the public has allowed it to misuse its power against the most vulnerable people with virtually NO consequences and continues to do so TO THIS DAY.
And this has happened because until now the public has lacked access to information that tells them THE TRUTH behind psychiatry’s many FALSE CLAIMS:
1. That psychiatric diagnoses are physically rooted
2. That psychiatric drugs correct “chemical imbalances” or other physical processes
3. That these drugs pose little risk to people’s physical and/or psychological health
And whether not psychiatry does or has done this deliberately is of NO CONSEQUENCE, because the results are THE SAME: iatrogenic illness, disability or even death.
And no amount of charm or savvy on the part of any slickly packaged internet shill can change this AWFUL TRUTH.
Correction: Any non-drug therapies psychiatry lays claim to are already being done by people and organizations that have no connections to the drug world, legal or illegal. And as a result, people are experiencing better outcomes than psychiatry’s depraved world of “medication” side effects and any ensuing drug withdrawal.
Aftab is the face of something that has morphed into a world-wide, legalized drug ring. And no amount of philosophizing can change that.
Any other “therapies” it lays claim to are already being done by other people or organizations with no connections to the drug world which just happen to be showing “better outcomes”. And what are “better outcomes”? No drug-induced side effects or withdrawal effects.
No one is safe from psychiatry’s clutches. It strategically targets the entire globe through its trademark insidious fashion: Direct To Consumer Advertising —
“The DSM mindset is now so thoroughly embedded within the culture it’s massively eroding the ability of people in describe their uniqueness and shifting emotional reactions and states in anything other than psychiatric language.”
It’s become the biggest source of cultural pollution.
“Recently, he [Aftab] has written a curious blog about the Power Threat Meaning Framework, in which he claims that a) no one has ever heard of it b) everyone thinks it is rubbish c) everyone needs to be warned against it….. and attributes the authors’ motivations to ‘active hostility….against diagnosis’. Which doesn’t really stand up as an evidence-based refutation.”
He says that stuff because the PTMF rattles his cage. And don’t be surprised if sooner or later he tries to hijack the idea with his own distorted version. But he’d be much better off if he’d a) own his own ‘active hostility’, b) quit his twitter habit, and c) stop dabbling in philosophy that only makes him sound more ridiculous.
And as for him claiming that no one has ever heard of the Power Threat Meaning Framework: it’s my understanding that people at the World Health Organization have heard of it.
I’ve learned one thing dealing with psychiatry: it’s best not to engage with it at all, because it’s full of people like Aftab who will defend their dubious “diagnoses” till their dying day.
Thank you for the extraordinary work you do. You’ve created a template based on honesty, respect, trust, personal agency and mutual growth, which are the only things that make any sense, and things I found sorely lacking both in psychiatry and psychotherapy. Listening deeply with an open heart and open mind is what’s most important in life.
You’ve given me a lot to think about.
And thank you for your links.
Birdsong
Psychiatry’s current recognition of trauma and neurodiversity just provides more opportunities for psychiatry to invent more meaningless and ultimately stigmatizing labels, and more opportunities for psychiatry to peddle more harmful drugs, which obviously means more money for them.
Psychiatry is Opportunistic Medicine, and labels and drugs are all they’ve got.
Tanya says, “…I think there is such a defensiveness on the part of many psychiatrists. I think that my narrative was perhaps just something that was too challenging and would’ve caused a lot of reflection on their part, and that reflection could probably be very painful, I’m sure.”
Psychiatry is the modern version of the Tower of Babel, and it’s DSM is its Book of Babble.
So expecting serious reflection from people schooled in psychiatry is like waiting for the second coming of Christ.
Psychiatry is immune to meaningful reflection, because it would mean the end of psychiatry.
Another look at Aftab’s twitter tells me he’s much too busy promoting himself to spend any time reading anything that doesn’t flatter his already inflated ego. So here’s something short and sweet from Psychology Today:
“Review: The Book of Woe: Why the DSM is doomed to fail”, by Helene Guldberg, PhD
And for something more visually entertaining, Aftab might watch this: “The Myth of Low-Serotonin & Antidepressants – Dr. David Horowitz”, courtesy After Skool
And if that’s not too taxing, Aftab might pick up a copy of “A Profession Without Reason: The Crisis of Contemporary Psychiatry—Untangled and Solved by Spinoza, Free-Thinking and Radical Enlightenment”, by Bruce Levine, PhD.
Thank you for sharing your poignant story. You’ve been through hell and back, but congratulations on making it out alive. I totally relate to your saying this:
“The only therapy that made sense to me was self-introspection and a lot of reading about trauma from compassionate experts…”
And you’re absolutely right that no one should have to experience and heal from psychiatric gaslighting and abuse. But it’s my belief believe that psychiatry’s current recognition of trauma and neurodiversity is no more than lip service.
Thank you very much, lcjohnstone. And thank you for the wonderful link.
Aftab’s inviting two senior psychiatrists to oppose you proves you set his pants on fire, but I bet he had the old farts lined up long before the interview, as anyone who dares speak the truth poses a threat their identity and Power. And Aftab’s insistence on proving abstractions proves he’s a fool, a fraud, and a fake.
Someone needs to ask Aftab about the philosophy of bait and switch.
Definition for Bait and Switch: Fraudulent or deceptive practice.
The ploy of offering a person something desirable to gain favor (such as political support), then thwarting expectations with something less desirable.
Aftab’s the perfect front man for a “profession” that sees its days are numbered, but his carefully modulated hissy fits are a testament to MIA’s integrity. He sees the writing on the wall and it has him running scared…
You might find some videos and books by Daniel Mackler to be helpful, rasselas.redux. He’s a former therapist who addresses childhood trauma and breaking from one’s parents with a lot of understanding.
Psychiatry claims to be medicine, but it’s actually a socially acceptable form of drug trafficking that lobbied for DTCA at the end last century. It’s not about health, but the bottom line.
I agree that much of what’s labeled “great art” is not relatable, and that women’s perspective is often ignored or silenced. And art definitely attracts a lot of snobs.
To me, art is just another form of expression, to communicate soul to soul, to make the unconscious conscious.
You gotta hand it to psychiatry trying to walk back its biological reductionism. But it’s definitely overcompensating.
Here’s what most people truly need: space and time to grieve unprocessed emotions – – unmolested by psychiatry’s intrusive machinations, pharmaceutical or otherwise.
Because the Federal Government has agreed to pay for psychiatry’s “standard of care”, which is primarily psychiatric drugs, and because the pharmaceutical industry is a huge part of the economy.
Psychiatry’s co-optation and de-radicalization of peer-support and psychedelics does nothing to change the fact that it’s CODIFIED BIGOTRY co-opted by financial interests.
“Forcing agreement on one shared story, which will no doubt be created by those who hold the most power, is oppressive and dangerous for people who have experienced the dominant paradigm labels, diagnoses and “treatments”.”
Psychiatry and psychotherapy exploit people’s need for attachment and attention.
Traditional psychotherapy is a psychological trap based on an unnatural and unnecessary power imbalance imposed by those whose main goal is having power over vulnerable people. It’s self-aggrandizing for the therapist and infantilizing for the client.
A peer-run approach is the only civilized way to conduct “therapy”, if one seeks it at all.
“Illness trajectories depend on developmental processes, learning, and behavioral interactions on multiple spatial and temporal scales, which involve levels of the organization across neurobiological, cognitive-affective, interpersonal, and social systems.”
Translation: LOOK AT THE BIG PICTURE
And while you’re at it, try having a little respect for the people you’re dealing with.
Exposing children and adolescents to notions of “mental health awareness” is totally inappropriate because it makes them think there’s something wrong with them for not feeling their best at all times; they’re too young to have perspective about their feelings. It’s a grossly irresponsible use of the power of suggestion.
Children need to know that feelings are a part of living, and be taught how to respond to their feelings in positive, self-affirming ways. Anything else is confusing and harmful.
Psychiatry is as much a political tool today as it was during the Nazi era, as its goal is essentially the same: power and control by whatever means necessary, which today includes psychedelics.
But has anyone imagined the iatrogenic damage in years to come?
Some people need to pull their heads out of their data-dependent asses and instead consider these novel ideas:
1. Maybe emotional distress isn’t physical illness
2. Maybe psychoactive drugs aren’t a good thing for most people
3. Maybe talk therapy isn’t what it’s cracked up to be
Then finally ask themselves this burning question:
Is turning to a medicalized, data-dependent system for emotional distress good idea?
What do you know! Psychiatry’s finally come full circle with psychedelics. And who knows? Maybe with this latest twist, they’ll finally admit that psychiatry is drug pushing…
There’s nothing more “disalienating” than listening to people (be they men OR women) unconsciously guided by chauvinistic attitudes.
Definition for Chauvinistic: displaying excessive or prejudiced support for one’s own cause or group; the irrational belief in the superiority or dominance of one’s own group or people
And there’s nothing more chauvinistic than psychiatry and its self-satisfied offshoot called “psychotherapy”, as both are based on gratifying the egos of their practitioners.
No one needs anyone’s convoluted, self-serving theories regarding psychosis when the explanation is simple: people retreat from reality when life gets too painful. And if they sense safety, they often come back.
Intellectualism, as opposed to psychosis, is just another way to dissociate from intolerable feelings. And it’s long been a refuge for the intellectually pompous, i.e. “psychiatry” and it’s chronically confused cousin better known as “psychology”.
There is such a thing as thinking too much. People need to get out of their heads and into their hearts.
I agree 100% with Laura’s assessment of the situation regarding psychic distress in today’s world; that it’s one of financial exploitation on top of personal victimization — which explains why so many people high on the abusive end of the narcissistic spectrum hold jobs as “mental health workers”. And it’s definitely spread by the misuse and overuse of psychological language that characterizes emotions as illness. And any effort to reclaim the narrative, i.e. “DI Without The Disorder” is definitely a step in the right direction.
The main problem with psychiatry is that all you need to do is say “boo” to have the fools reach for their stupid DSM. And most psychologists are no different.
Worth a glance: “Splitting: The Psychology Behind Binary Thinking And How It Limits A Diversity Of Opinions,” by Ilana Redstone in Forbes Magazine
My takeaway was this quote from psychologist Andrew Hartz:
“There’s an Islamic mystic who described how harmful it is to divide people into groups, say only good things about some and only bad things about others…” — something that accurately describes the “mental health” industry.
What I find remarkable about the enlightenment era is how adamant some people were about separating the mind and body. And I wonder if this had anything to do with the fact that these were men who never had to contend with the agonizing realities of either menstrual cramps or childbirth. Because if they’d had to, I bet they’d have stopped thinking like a bunch of stubborn two-years olds. And while I don’t believe there’s any such thing as the completely egotistical construct invented by the completely egotistical Freud called “penis envy”, there is definitely such a thing as “penis privilege”.
Cartesian dualism is actually a form of ‘splitting’, the defense mechanism used by people unable to tolerate ambiguity. And ‘splitting’ is what characterizes most of the people who practice psychiatry and psychology—and when challenged, they resort to gaslighting.
So there you have it, the two things that characterize the system of “mental health”: splitting and gaslighting.
“The JHP was the venerable journal of a revolutionary movement begun in the 1950’s to provide a “third force” in the field, to counter the two dominant movements of Freud’s psychoanalysis and B.F. Skinner’s behaviorism.”
Human beings are not just their brain chemistry; they are mind, body and spirit/soul. In my mind, humanistic psychology recognizes what other psychologies and certainly psychiatry do not, which is the overriding reality and beauty of the human soul, without which life loses its purpose and meaning.
Check this out on YouTube: “This Is Priceless – George Harrison On What Lies Beyond…” T&H – Inspiration & Motivation
Psychology needs to shut up and change its name to cognicology. It doesn’t belong in the “feelings” business. And psychiatry needs to shut up entirely.
The field of psychology should be called ‘behaviorism’ because that’s all it is. After all, ‘psyche’ means ‘soul’ and souls can’t be “clinically studied”.
And psychiatry should be called drug pushing, because that’s EXACTLY what it is.
I was delighted to read something about human suffering that actually captures the essence of what it means to be human:
“To have seen those JHP journals on the library shelves full of merciful caring about human suffering, was proof that the human heart and spirit could prevail over the head and the dangerous objectification of the disease model of psychiatry.”
“The contrast was human-hearted compassion and potential for all, verses human-disordered abnormality/pathology and emotion-killing psych drugs for all.”
My thanks are to you, Dr. Coleman. A heart-centered approach should be the gold standard for helping people, and also for living a good life.
People don’t need a disease-centered, agenda-laden system. They need caring human beings without an agenda who know how to listen—something that used to be called a very good friend.
Healing happens in understanding, NOT “diagnoses”.
Thank you for sharing your story. I relate to it because like you I believe much of what is thought to be ‘mental illness’ is actually a spiritual breakthrough brought about by repeated moral injury—injuries usually made worse by a system that speaks a different language.
And I wish you many Happy Returns on your Spiritual Birthday!
And I wouldn’t be surprised if higher rates of addiction to psychiatric drugs correlates with higher levels of income. After all, that’s just what the pharmaceutical cartels are counting on.
I think it depends on what you consider “mental illness”.
Enduring financial hardship and deprivation can cause high levels of stress that can adversely affect people’s state of mind and ability to function. And unfortunately this usually gets categorized as “mental illness”.
“A man who says, ‘I want change, tell me how to’, seems very earnest, very serious, but he is not. He wants an authority whom he hopes will bring about order in himself. But can authority ever bring about inward order? Order imposed from without must always breed disorder.”
– J. Krishnamurti
“All ideologies are idiotic, whether religious or political, for it is conceptual thinking, the conceptual word, which has so unfortunately divided man.” – J. Krishnamurti
And there’s nothing more divisive than psychiatry and psychology.
Definition for Divisive: alienating, estranging, isolating, schismatic, discordant, disharmonious, inharmonious — all of which aptly describes psychiatry and psychology.
Psychologically speaking, the author seems to have all his ducks in order. However, he contradicts himself when first saying:
“From the relational-intersubjective standpoint, both the therapist and the context/system are unavoidably a part of the very experiences that become pathologised as individual disorders.’”
And then saying:
“Though in relational-intersubjective therapy there is an inevitable ‘asymmetry’ — as there necessarily is in any therapeutic relationship — the model [relational-intersubjective] assumes and encourages an epistemological equality with regards to what is occurring and what it means.”
Why can’t he see that an “inevitable asymmetry” directly contradicts any claims of “epistemological equality” — the lack of which is extremely pathologizing?
All he’s done is prove how some people will say anything to maintain a pathologizing power imbalance, which, incidentally, ensures him of being capitalistically compensated.
It’s not that complicated. People’s emotions and frames of mind are most often the result of their interactions with others, while people stuck in Cartesian thinking are usually the result of disconnected control freaks addicted to power.
Who in their right mind would assume there’s no collusion between the FDA and Big Pharma when so much money’s at stake? And don’t forget—when their stint is up at the FDA, you’ll find them on the board at some Big Pharma.
Judi Chamberlin: “People are unlikely to question the underlying premises of their occupations, in which they often have a large financial and emotional stake.”
This is why so few “clinicians” critically evaluate psychiatry’s many unprovable assumptions: the validity of their “diagnoses”, the reliability of their prognosis, and the necessity and safety of their so-called “medications”. And their habitual use of the word “clinical” hides the fact that they themselves are afraid of admitting their whole shebang is full of holes.
If you want to persuade people, just pepper your speech with scientific language, it’s an effective marketing tool for just about anything.
Traumatic injury/memory gets stuck in the body as much if not more than anywhere else. And this is where psychiatry, psychology, and western medicine in general miss the boat. The DSM is an extreme example of how fragmented western approaches are.
Psychiatry and psychology have destroyed people’s faith in their ability to process emotional trauma without drugs or reliance on some fool’s idea of “psychotherapy”.
That’s for damn sure. But it’s gotten even sicker since hitching its wagon to the pharmaceutical industry as anything that’s profitable financially inevitably controls the narrative. But megavitamin therapy sounds interesting though, as it probably helps restore people’s messed up physiology from either psychiatric drugs or other psychoactive substances like alcohol, etc.
And anything’s better than psychiatry’s sanitized drug hustling or psychology’s mindless minds fucks.
Definition for Mind Fuck: the process of raping someone’s intelligence and/or beliefs with lies and manipulation
Definition for Psychiatry and Psychology: the raping of someone’s intelligence and/or beliefs with lies and manipulation
David,
Thank you for your generous offer, but right now I’m not needing it. But I don’t doubt EMDR’s effectiveness as trauma definitely gets stuck in the mind and memory, and people definitely need alternatives to psychiatry’s drug-happy medical model.
It would be great if psychiatry were disbanded altogether. But realistically this won’t happen anytime soon because real change rarely comes from the top down. More likely to happen is psychiatry eventually going the way of cigarette smoking, meaning it will probably take a long time for the majority of the population to learn from bitter experience that psychiatry’s sick assortment of diagnoses and drugs are not the best answer.
However, I think it inevitable that the DSM will be formally discredited, hopefully with an admission that most psychic distress is caused by relational-environmental factors. And who knows? Maybe sooner rather than later an increasing number of general practitioners will be less likely to automatically prescribe psychotic drugs.
I can’t say enough good things about something that fosters reconnecting with oneself rather than symptoms, i.e. psychiatry’s superficial “diagnoses”. Reconnecting With Yourself” needs to be everyone’s motto.
Your kind and considerate perspectives are EXACTLY where the “therapeutic model” (and anyone’s perspective for that matter) needs to be.
Thank you for sharing your personal observations about therapy; they closely mirror my own:
1. The dishonesty of paying for kindness and compassion—which is the opposite of kindness and compassion
2. Using “transference” to protect and maintain what is essentially a destructive power dynamic
3. Money wasted on bad memories “dug up about which nothing can be done”
4. Being told you are incurably ill and hopelessly broken from someone with something to gain
5. Forced to cope with abandonment from boundaries “suddenly put up by a previously accepting therapist”
6. That most therapists are egomaniacs
7. That most therapists like having power over vulnerable people for all the wrong reasons which DEFINITELY “takes a certain level of arrogance to think that way”.
And I forgot to mention how IFS uses curiosity in untangling the complexity of the mind rather than shutting it down with drugs or other narrow-minded “therapeutic” methods.
I just visited your website (healingtheself.net) and am glad I did. It’s thorough without being exhaustive and accessible without being simplistic, something essential in an area as broad as mental health. Your “Perspectives” section is particularly illuminating as it includes the most relevant topics: “The Spectrum of Trauma”, “Breaking the Trauma Cycle”, “Western Medicine”, and “Internal Family Systems (IFS)”. It’s important you placed these topics together as these are all interconnected, and connecting the dots is something too few people are doing. And the quotes you’ve chosen are brilliant.
Thank you for devoting your life to something so important and central to what truly matters. I wish you the best in your new vocation.
Thank you for saying everything that needs to be said about a non-pathologizing approach to psychic distress. You succeed in making the complicated understandable in a beautifully cogent way.
I appreciate your explaining in detail how Internal Family Systems parts-centric approach acknowledges not only the impact of the subconscious, but also “the notion of the Self” and how respecting that Self, one’s “true essence” or innate dignity, is central to the healing process, i.e., “becoming whole”. And I especially appreciate your mentioning how psychiatry is “locked into a paradigm of neurotransmitters and genetics, [that] misses what’s right in front of its face, and turns a blind eye to mountains of evidence supporting the role of environmental distress—i.e., trauma—in mental health.” Your ideas are SPOT ON.
I too believe “a revolution is brewing with respect to mental health treatment in our culture”, but more strongly I hope “the beauty of IFS” will be at the forefront this—and perhaps eventually of life itself.
Imo, psychiatry is nothing more than an absurd gallery of pseudoscientific diagnoses whose DSM represents one gargantuan psychological autoimmune “disorder”.
It’s too bad psychiatry can’t diagnose its own own pathological tendency to diagnose and label everything under the sun.
In contrast, Internal Family Systems is a path towards true healing, as it’s based on compassion and common sense.
Psychiatry isn’t about listening, it’s about imposing pseudoscientific beliefs on others.
And most of the time people are “diagnosed” before they’ve even uttered a word—and most of the time their goose is cooked if the doctor doesn’t like them.
I also bet Decartes, like most of today’s psychiatrists and psychologists, was secretly one angry dude—and Heaven knows there’s nothing more destructive than unacknowledged anger—which I think is the foundation of all of psychiatry and most of psychology.
And there’s nothing wrong with anger; it’s one of most instructive and protective emotions anyone can have—if dealt with authentically.
It’s heartening to know that Dr. Ophir’s book is receiving such positive scholarly reviews. I hope his bravery encourages others like him to speak out against the institutional gaslighting not only surrounding ADHD, but all the other scientifically baseless “diagnoses” that constitute the fallacious field of psychiatry. And I sincerely believe it’s only a matter of time before it collapses from the weight of its own lies.
ericwsetz says, “The first step is a willingness to be there with the patient and understand what they are saying.”
Which just happens to be the basis of ANY healthy relationship, and most importantly needs to starts with the first: with one’s parents/caregivers in childhood
So-called “mental health awareness” in schools is about as helpful as an infestation of head lice—psychological head lice, that is. They are no longer places to learn and be educated, they are places to be labeled and “medicated”.
And children often live up to a teacher’s worst expectations.
“The motivation to remove the symptom has resulted in what Poole calls a “ever-increasing proliferation of context-less achievements…local scientific successes which precede even the remotest notion of how to deal with them ethically or how to integrate them into the needs of the totality.”
That explains psychiatry’s main flaw: its refusal to see experience in context.
Charlotte says, “The discipline [psychiatry] pretends to be an objective classification of people, borrowing language (“diagnosis”) from physical medicine, which assigns the label of disease following the identification of a pathology, which one hopes can be targeted and cured. But the analogy fails in psychiatry. There are few known biological pathologies. And who is to say what cure is?”
Not only that—who’s to say what pathology is? And THAT’S the problem with psychiatry: it uses medicalized name-calling (“diagnoses”) to sell its designer drugs. And there’s a label for that: FRAUD —
Some wounds never heal completely, and sometimes forgiveness is impossible, but there’s nothing shameful or “sick” about this. It’s just accepting emotional reality—something that leads to emotional maturity—which is the beginning of wisdom, something psychiatry knows little about.
Psychiatry is entirely subjective. Indeed, how objective can it be when it’s based entirely on labeling WHATEVER IT ALONE deems “abnormal” or “unhealthy”?
But the real tragedy is that it fails to see how much it’s shaped by its own biased thinking.
But psychiatry isn’t about thinking; it’s about its practitioners NEEDING to think they’re ALWAYS right: hence they thunk up a COLOSSALLY STUPID DSM.
“Psychiatry persists because of the profession’s strategies to manage its ignorance…”
Translation: psychiatry persists because it believes its own lies.
“In order to make those changes and to promote those reinventions, psychiatrists engage in hype.”
Translation: psychiatry is more public relations than science.
“Now the flipside to hype is hubris. Psychiatrists believe the hype and then undertake these transformations in an incredibly aggressive way.”
Translation: psychiatry’s become big business by teaming up with the pharmaceutical industry and its advertising flunkies while sending its latest edition of the DSM to every doctor in town.
All of which leads to one conclusion: psychiatry is what happens when quackery meets propaganda.
In a word? Emphatically NO. But it might be a step in the right direction if psychiatry realized that stress and trauma are the true culprit, not its idiotic assumptions of biological/genetic whatnot.
Me too. After all, most religions are based on sacred texts that believe in salvation, whereas psychiatry, (a secular religion based on its DSM/bible) says you’re eternally damned —
Beatrice g,
I have to disagree with your saying that “fixing trauma” requires “therapeutic practices” when it’s been clearly demonstrated time and again that children, animals and adults heal best in loving, non-judgmental environments, which often means staying as far away as possible from the so-called “trauma experts”.
Yes! The the social structure of today’s society and modern family dynamics are EXACTLY where “psychiatric problems” start. But psychiatry’s answer is to have the whole world drowning in “diagnoses” and drugs or endlessly spinning their wheels in diagnostic-infested “psychotherapy”.
Very true. It’s sad reality when children aren’t safe in the very places they need it the most: home and school.
And a lot of doctors and “therapists” just continue the pattern of bullying and name-calling through “diagnosing” and labeling and call it “mental health”.
It’s no wonder the kids are upset when there’s nowhere to turn.
“What are the socio-cultural factors of modern society that drive [abuse and bullying]…?”
Let me take a wild guess…how about psychiatry!….you know, that marvelous bully-inspired invention that prescribes chemical dissociation instead of emotional integration…
“….and what can we do to reverse its course?”
First of all, QUIT making excuses by seeing people as “patients” instead of full human beings—be they children OR adults—which means DUMPING psychiatry and its endless list of invented “diagnoses”/“disorders” as soon as possible.
It all starts with seeing people as doing the best they can in a sick society, NOT the other way around.
And I’ve often thought there’s way more to learn from watching “Dog Whisperer with Cesar Millan” than listening to so-called “trauma-informed” therapists or so-called “human” psychiatrists.
Steve,
Freud chickened out alright. He turned out to be an egotistical coward more anything.
And thank you for pointing out the true reason behind blaming people’s brains: the refusal to face reality, both personally and collectively.
Looking at it historically, though, deflection has always been used by the ruling class, one way or another. Just look at the Middle Ages—but instead of blaming the brain, they blamed the devil.
At least Freud had curiosity and imagination. But even these got out of control, not to mention his unhealthy need to always be right, a fixation no doubt shared by none other than the great Emil Kraepelin, the founder of psychiatric eugenics. (Opps! I think I meant ‘genetics’….)
I don’t think ‘experts’ like thinking too much (i.e. “mentalization”, or “reflective functioning”), because questioning their assumptions means questioning their power. So conversations with them too often pointless, I’ve found.
So what’s my answer? Hauling out the old “caveat emptor” approach. After all, doing your own research never hurt, and it just might save your life. Or just trust your own instincts and move on.
I think a lot of problems come from people unconsciously needing to feel more powerful than the next person so they can get away with bossing people around; power means more than truth to them.
And this most likely comes from not having their emotional needs met in childhood, so having power-driven jobs like psychiatry or psychotherapy fills their unmet need to feel powerful.
So life for them becomes one big long “I know more than you” kind of game that they never outgrow, but instead of flexing their muscles, they’re flexing their egos, imho.
“Becoming more resilient means, for me, that I take the fragments of my identity which have become lost in the course of my life so far, and carefully and attentively re-assemble them into an intact ego so that I can perceive myself ever more accurately and clearly.”
“I look back on past times until they feel alive and warm….I believe that is helpful — and an essential part of living….”
“Given these accumulating personal observations, I find it hard to understand why, even today, research on schizophrenia focuses so heavily on genetics; why helping affected persons involves antipsychotics above all; and why the knowledge and experience of affected persons are barely recognized.”
“If we have an increased susceptibility to stress and psychosis, then there are always reasons for this, which are as individual as we ourselves are.”
“Excessive treatment with antipsychotics and psychiatric medication in general can hide the true causes of mental problems and disorders, stand in the way of real healing, and destroy real social interactions.”
“As humans and as inhabitants of the Earth we all depend on each other: physically, intellectually, and emotionally. So all of us need to be willing to learn from and with each other in mutual respect, to live together and establish a resilient community.”
Thank you for sharing your remarkable story and insights, Moyu. It’s a beautiful testament to the resilience of the human spirit. I hope it inspires real change in the mental health system and the world at large.
Moyu says, “…(when I had finally found a psychiatrist and psychotherapist who treated me as an equal…”
Being thought of as an equal and treated as an equal is where healing begins in any relationship.
I felt stigmatized by psychiatry, infantilized by psychotherapy, and demoralized by both—and diagnoses and power imbalance—the foundation of both—are the reasons why, imo.
No one seeking help needs to feel worse than they already do.
KateL says, “People who were abused in the mental health system are experts in how the system abuses people. I guess some people just can handle that objective fact.”
Very true. Your statement reveals how most “mental health experts” are incapable of self-reflection.
Thank you KateL, for pointing out how the “experts” try to defend themselves by discrediting people who don’t share their views with stupid phrases like, “‘be careful not to over generalize’, and flipping from ‘this is objective fact’, to ‘ah well, it’s more art than science.’”
Did it ever occur to the “experts” that psychiatry and psychology ARE BASED on over generalizations???
When it suits the “experts” narrative they call it objective fact, and when THAT fails they haul out the old bromide, “it’s more art than science”, which simply means they don’t know what they are talking about.
“…the gaslighter—like all verbal abusers—operates from what they know to be your fears, insecurities, vulnerabilities, and neediness.”
“Additionally, as in other types of verbal abuse, there has to be an imbalance of power with the gaslighter holding all the cards.”
“This [your inclination to doubt yourself] is something the gaslighter knows about and he or she stands ready to exploit.”
Psychiatrists AND therapists will often use these gaslighting dynamics to gain an unfair advantage over vulnerable people.
And people saying, “That’s just their training, they’re really just trying to help,” IS BULLSHIT because for the most part, people who have no problem using these tactics are more interested in HAVING POWER OVER OTHERS more than EMPOWERING OTHERS; they obviously prefer infantilizing people.
“….sometimes all you need is a genuine person to help you stand up when you are down and reignite not the light at the end of the tunnel, but the light within yourself. Self-love and self-awareness are the key to a healthy life.”
Yes!!! THIS is the way to heal broken hearts, minds, lives and relationships, NOT name-calling (diagnoses) and “psychiatric medications”.
There’s nothing better than help from someone who’s been there and sees you as capable of helping yourself.
Whether or not there’s neurological evidence of emotional trauma, the bigger problem lies in seeing the results (“symptoms”) as medical issues, i.e. “psychiatric diagnoses”; the medical model just continues the trauma of disrespect, blame, and neglect.
3. Not only seriously curtail the use of psychiatric drugs, but stop saying these “treat” a “chemical imbalance” or other “mental illness” that need to be taken “the rest of your life”.
Thanks for the info, LivingPast27, though it looks like Europe has caught up: “How depression treatment differs throughout Europe”, from the Guardian. It shows how important it is that M.I.A. is getting a foothold in more and more countries around the world.
Yes!!! Apologizing and making amends to the patients they’ve harmed is as important as anything. But I was trying to stay within the realm of the possible.
Thank you Krista, for your detailed clarification.
I read Frances’ insulting rebuttal to the late Dr. Caplan, but I wasn’t surprised by his blatantly condescending attitude and remarks. But I do consider it an excellent example of the attitudes psychiatric survivors are up against, which is why self-rescue is too often the only option.
Fraud, medical neglect, exploitation, and lack of patient/public education/information are what makes psychiatry psychiatry, and is why it needs to go the way of the dinosaur asap.
So what does “treating patients better” actually mean? It means any one of the following, but should begin with the first:
1. Throw out the DSM and do not replace it
2. Stop claiming that psychiatric problems are biological or genetically linked
3. Seriously limit the prescribing of psychiatric medications
4. Seriously limit the use of ECT
5. Make it illegal for any physician to force medicate or medically incarcerate
6. Replace psychiatry with the many alternatives currently available
And when these happen, no one will be needing to find an exit.
“Screening for Mental Illness: The Merger of Eugenics and the Drug Industry”, by Vera Hassner Sharav, MLS, from The Alliance for Human Research Protection
As I previously stated, if people want to take psychiatric drugs or undergo ETC, that’s their business. What I object to is psychiatry falsely claiming that people’s problems are lifelong and biologically or genetically based, permitting the overprescribing of psychiatric drugs while downplaying the risks, and last but not least their ability to force treatments or involuntarily hospitalization on people which can be for indefinite periods of time.
Psychiatry’s abuse of medicine, power, and people’s human rights got a HUGE boost when psychiatrists collectively decided in 1980 to adopt the medical model through an admittedly flawed checklist system for their admittedly flawed DSM, which makes psychiatry not only misleading, but downright fraudulent. And the resulting devastation to both individuals and society are becoming increasingly apparent and definitively undeniable.
The body-brain chemical makeup can greatly affect how emotions are felt and thoughts are perceived. And lots of things can screw it up: too much stress (emotional, psychological or physical), prescription medications, environmental or recreational substances, and even bangs on the head. But none of these indicate biologically or genetically caused illnesses.
From the New York Post: “Why more women, like me, are abandoning the pill over emerging health concerns” by Rikki Schlott.
Correction: “If people want to take “psychiatric medication” or subject themselves to ECT, that’s their business, but they need to be CLEARLY informed of significant risks of side effects and/or withdrawal reactions both immediate and future, and that NO “illness” is being “treated”.
And NO ONE should have the legal authority to force any “treatment”, or “hospitalize” someone who hasn’t committed a crime.
Ideally, all medicine should be based in a Functional-Holistic paradigm. But present reality demands no longer seeing emotional distress through a medical/diagnostic lens, beginning with a dissolution of psychiatry and its DSM.
If people want to take “psychiatric medication” that’s their business, but they need to clearly know there’s significant risk of side effects and/or withdrawal reactions, and that no “illness” is being “treated”.
And no one should have the legal authority to hospitalize someone who hasn’t committed a crime.
It’s not hard seeing how disconnected modern society is when you stop to think how insane it is having people pay someone for emotional support—and on top of THAT calling it “mental healthcare”. It’s not a sign of progress; it’s a sign of degradation.
And as corny as it sounds, things won’t change until people get out of their heads and into their hearts.
Richard says, “Unfortunately, you have fallen into Healy’s “oh so charming” trap of pragmatic rationalizations for justifying oppression.”
I agree with Richard.
IMHO, most psychiatrists are driven by an unconscious need to hide from their own hidden vulnerabilities. Why else would they seek to obliterate feelings through drugs and ECT?
And psychiatry’s veneer of science gives the illusion of invulnerability.
It’s all about power, similar to what drives most bullies or those who want to be seen as saviors.
Freud was absolutely right about one thing: the unconscious influences behavior. And scientists are no exception.
Why rely on “experts” who haven’t experienced ECT?
Aren’t people’s personal accounts enough?
Has anyone bothered to ask the dear Dr. Healy (or anyone else who can’t make up their minds about the dangers of ECT) if they’d be willing to subject themselves or their loved ones to ECT?
How much more “proof” does anyone need?
Science has been put on a pedestal that leads people away from their intuition and common sense.
“The experts” would be wise to remember there’s a point at which “nuance” becomes a hindrance to seeing and accepting the cold, hard truth.
No one need rely on “psychotherapists” to process their trauma. People can do a lot on their own, in their own time, in their own way: writing /journaling, reading, listening to people’s experience on podcasts and videos, talking with friends or family members, including animals, engaging in hobbies or creative pursuits, volunteering, and spending as much time as possible in nature.
“I suggest we all become shrinks or lawyers and then we will be safe from slander. It will then come down to who can outslander whom.”
THAT’S what psychiatry boils down to: SLANDER —
“They are a childish, immature, selfish hateful bunch….you better tread careful.”
Indeed. Only childish adults think the way most psychiatrists and psychotherapists do, i .e. having to believe they’re always right, and having temper tantrums when “patients” tell them they’re not.
Wow. Who would’ve guessed that talking to someone could be helpful??? And wouldn’t it be great if people weren’t made to believe they need an “expert”???
I’m very sorry getting off the psych drugs is causing you so much pain and trouble. It can take a long time for your body to readjust. And it’s even harder when the people who should know something don’t.
I don’t know what’s worse, the effects of the so-called “medications” or the stupidity of the so-called “therapists”. The whole thing’s a scam, imho.
Just hang in there as best you can, believing you will get through this.
They it called “psychopathy” to make it sound impressive so they can charge a fee when all it is listening, and most psychotherapists do a lousy job of that.
The term “psychotherapy” implies illness which indicates medical which leads to the can of worms called “psychiatric diagnoses”. It’s as weaponized as psychiatry.
On the other hand, the word “counseling” has a much less negative connotation, i.e. legal counsel, pastoral counsel, guidance counsel, parental counsel, etc. And in these situations, people are share knowledge, experience, wisdom and guidance that (hopefully) isn’t biased on pseudoscientific “diagnostic” beliefs.
I no longer use words like “depression” or “anxiety”. I just say sad or apprehensive.
And the same goes if someone is acting in a way I dislike. So instead of saying something nasty like “sounds like someone has a personality disorder”, I just take the time to describe their behavior.
But it IS consistently based on a “power imbalance” and the exchange of money, something that’s unfair, unnecessary, unhealthy and inappropriate when all it is is talking with someone.
And psychotherapists are trained in psychiatric ideologies, i.e. “mental illness”, “psychiatric diagnoses”; they’re psychiatrists without a prescription pad which can be even more damaging.
Either way, it’s all about power, manipulation and money.
There’s one criticality important thing Ms.Heller doesn’t mention, or perhaps is unable/unwilling to see: that it’s not uncommon for manipulative people to be working as mental health professionals.
Powerful organizations always try to fix things after the fact, and can’t see how perhaps they and society are part of the problem.
Children and adults need emotional support from people who truly care about their wellbeing, but not from prying professionals paid to police their private lives.
Dear Ramesh,
You might look into something at The Withdrawal Project (TWP). It’s part of ICI, the Inner Compass Initiative. These are dedicated to helping people who are looking to reduce or come off psychiatric drugs.
Birdsong made a mistake.
Bill Wells says, “…some organizations can be extraordinarily closed.”
And Birdsong says, “Most of these belong to psychiatrists.”
HERE IT IS!!! In print! Just what I’ve always sensed and been trying to say here all along, which is that psychiatry (and its loyal sycophantic twin known as “psychotherapy”) are BULLSHIT GALORE —
“Goffman [a sociologist] emphasizes the role stigma plays in psychiatric diagnosis and treatment by expounding on its insidious barrier to recovery and the dehumanization and de-personalization which stimulates further damage and marginalizes victims. Essentially stigma breeds contempt and contempt breeds blame.”
Such are the so-called “healing” dynamics of psychiatry and its partner in crime “psycho-therapy.”
To yinyang:
I wasn’t fully aware of that, but I think MIA is as radical as I’m comfortable with. And I also think it’s a good idea to post in a place that has a somewhat more broad appeal, as something more radical might be too radical and therefore reach fewer people.
Bill Wells says, “As Tip O’Neill wound suggest, the politics start at the local level. And some organizations can be extraordinarily closed.”
Psychiatry’s not medical. Never was, never will be. It’s political, which is why it needs to go.
The political (punitive) abuse of psychiatry already exists in some form as evidenced by people’s inaccurate beliefs and attitudes towards people with psychiatric labels and the laws permitting forced psychiatric drugging and detention. And this will continue as long as psychiatry exists in any form. And THAT’S the truth and the horror OF IT ALL.
And psychiatry has people up a creek because being a former or current user can make it difficult to be taken seriously, or even ruin someone’s life personally and professionally. (Did I say psychiatry is political? Yes I did!) So people are left with word of mouth that thankfully is often the most effective (and safest) way for real change to happen.
Violence isn’t always physically brutal; sadism often looks benign.
Psychiatry is a case in point: it offers a way for traumatized people to unconsciously deny their trauma by wearing the mask of “doctor” so to legally traumatize people in the name of “treatment”. It’s sanitized sadism.
Psychiatry’s hauling out their old standby CYA (Cover Your Ass) medicine because they’re afraid of the lawsuits headed their way. So they’re jumping on the bandwagon before it’s too late.
Many thanks to MIA for giving voice to those who have been unfairly criticized, silenced, targeted, imprisoned, tortured, censured and censored by psychiatry and its advocates.
Kate W. writes, “This is the problem with being a consumer — we get consumed.”
Wow. Reading this article confirmed my worst suspicions about people who work in the mental health system. Nonetheless I was deeply saddened as I read Kate W.’s painfully vivid account.
And it’s an eye opener for anyone holding illusions about creating alliances in a mental health system based on stigma and invasions of privacy.
“All this focus on psychiatry is a bit old fashioned.”
Psychiatry’s history of human rights violations has continued unabated to this day and is becoming increasingly widespread due to the undeniable association among psychiatry, Big Pharma, mainstream media, academia, and the legislative/judicial/policy-making branches of government. So promoting alliance between supporters and opponents of the current mental health system reveals not only a serious lack of understanding and concern for those caught in the mental health system, but a disturbing complacency that is best described as irresponsible.
I don’t ever consider the fight for ANYONE’S human rights “old fashioned!”
People holding seriously different views can unite on individual issues; it happens every day and is called democracy.
However, psychiatry is the only branch of medicine that seriously infringes on people’s basic human rights.
I therefore see aligning with people who believe in psychiatry as making a deal with the devil; this, however, does not preclude aligning over specific issues.
I’ve never viewed all “consumers” as the same. Whatever someone decides to do is their business.
What I object to is psychiatry’s violating people’s human rights by feeding them lies.
And building alliances where there’s major conflicts of interests is counterproductive, especially when one side has more power than the other. So in this area I see collaboration and half measures as ultimately harmful for those who need help the most.
“When the oppressed set aside all disagreements with their oppressors, there will be no discussion, no collaboration, no compromise. Just capitulation and silence.”
Protecting and restoring human rights requires addressing and eradicating problems at their source, which in this case is psychiatry. But unfortunately, too many supporters of the current mental health system either cannot see or refuse to acknowledge this.
Fortunately, more and more people are gradually seeing what “psychiatry” actually stands for, which is the denial of human rights.
madmom asks, “….if you do not believe in constructive dialogues between psychiatric survivors, consumers, family members, and mental health professionals, if you do not believe in recruiting allies from within the helping professions, what is your preferred strategy for implementing a global revolution of the mental health system? What activities do you believe will result in a safer, more humane world?”
First of all, I DO believe in constructive dialogue with anyone. But that is not the same as forming alliances, something that is NOT constructive when fundamental beliefs are fundamentally incompatible.
And my strategy for implementing a global revolution of the mental health system is supporting and contributing to MIA which I believe IS resulting in a safer, more humane world, as speaking out in whatever way possible is the MOST concrete action ANYONE can take.
“All this focus on psychiatry is a bit old fashioned.”
Human rights violations committed by psychiatry and its wide assortment of allied professionals has continued unabated to this very day, and are growing increasingly widespread due to the undeniable alliances formed among psychiatry, Big Pharma, mainstream media, academia, and the legislative/judicial/policy-making branches of government. So promoting alliances between supporters and dissenters reveals not only a serious lack of understanding and concern for those caught in today’s mental health system, but a disturbing complacency that can only be described as irresponsible.
My question is this: WHO in their right mind would ever consider the fight for ANYONE’S human rights to be “old fashioned”?
“All this focus on psychiatry is a bit old fashioned.”
Violations committed by psychiatry and its wide assortment of cooperating practitioners not only continues unabated to this day, but are getting increasingly worse with the increasing coordination of psychiatry, big Pharma, academia, government agencies, courts, and the mainstream media. So promoting cooperation between supporters and dissenters reveals a disturbing complacency about the serious issues people face when caught in today’s mental health system, which is not only very disturbing, but most irresponsible.
Janne says, “It really bothers me that the whole belief that science can prove the necessity of something and that educated professionals can make good decisions for others has been going on for so long. When that happens some personal and political goals are pushed in the scientific evidence base and expressed as objective fact. But those that are interested in these kinds of philosophical problems seem few.”
Agreed. Where people used to automatically point to their bible, they’re now saying, “it’s the science” about darn near everything, from dog food to psychiatric drugs. It’s become a meaningless trope.
And it’s society’s collectively uncritical embrace of anything that looks or sounds remotely “scientific” that has led to the neglect of teaching people how to think philosophically and critically question the prevailing narratives about “mental health”. What started as misguided Freudian interpretations gradually merged with “science” and steadily morphed into the public’s unquestioning acceptance of psychiatry’s medical model. It’s become the world’s latest and greatest example of mass indoctrination.
Janne says, “It really bothers me that the whole belief that science can prove the necessity of something and that educated professionals can make good decisions for others has been going on for so long. When that happens some personal or political goals are pushed in the scientific evidence base and expressed as objective fact. But those that are interested in these kinds of philosophical problems seem few.”
Agreed. It used to be people automatically saying things like, “the Bible says so”, to where they’re now automatically saying, “it’s the science” about darn near everything, from psychiatric drugs to dog food.
Sadly, today our societies’ collectively uncritical infatuation with science has led to not teaching people how to think critically and question prevailing theories. The mass indoctrination that began with Freud has morphed into the public’s unquestioning acceptance of “bio-psychiatry”.
Ms. Aybar’s says, “As it is, the clinical psychology field continues to promote and monetize the dehumanization of mentally ill people. When will the dehumanization of people with lived experience in mental illness stop?”
Excellent question. But I doubt things will change anytime soon due to the prevailing satisfaction with the status quo from those in leadership positions. But thanks to stories like Ms. Aybar’s, people’s efforts now have a fighting chance, as her story powerfully and painfully pulls back the curtain on the poisonous mindsets currently being inculcated in the very places one would think there would be none.
But I never held many illusions, as I always had the uncomfortable sense that the psychotherapeutic field too often brings out the worst in very people who work in it.
My using the phrase “sleeping with the enemy” was not intended to be a personal attack on Mr. Oaks or the work he does. I consider the phrase a reasonable choice for anyone who has experienced psychiatry’s abuses and therefore understandably disagrees with Mr. Oak’s efforts to unite people with markedly different perspectives.
I personally find psychiatry’s many documented malfeasances to be much too serious to allow for any common ground with those who harbor more sanguine feelings. And criticizing those who for good reason harbor less sanguine feelings seems counter to the purposes of this webzine, one of which, if I’m not mistaken, is to give voice to those who have been unfairly targeted, criticized, silenced, tortured, censured and censored by psychiatry and its advocates. And I sincerely hope MIA continues refraining from such practices.
Unless they haul out that sorry substitute for “collaboration” they call “shared decision”, their pathetic attempt to maintain control by appearing cooperative.
But when push comes to shove, they know damn well who holds the power, and they’ll not likely to willingly relinquish ANY of it.
Thank you yinyang for shedding some light on the situation.
To me it’s mind-boggling how defensive most psychiatrists and their advocates get whenever people disagree with them, especially when presenting evidence of psychiatry’s many obvious harms and fallacies. They invariably go into attack mode attempting to shred someone’s character, i.e. “shooting the messenger” —
Stopping psychiatry’s obvious abuses, (involuntary commitment, forced drugging, ECT, or “psychosurgery”) won’t be enough, because psychiatry’s harms are rooted in its own false premises; more colloquially, psychiatry is psychological vermin that needs to eradicated, not merely “tweaked”.
Steve,
Thank you for this comment. It reminded me of the term “willful ignorance”. So I looked up the definition and think it perfectly describes most “mental health professionals”, from instructor on down.
Willful ignorance is: “Tactical Stupidity. The practice can entail completely disregarding established facts, evidence, and/or reasonable opinions if they fail to meet someone’s expectations”
It’s uncanny how typical it is for therapists and psychiatrists to turn a deaf ear to people’s real concerns, as they usually demand to be seen as having more knowledge than anyone else, especially when they know they don’t!
“…at some point the best decision is to say, screw all the therapies.”
THAT was the beginning of healing for me.
“At some point, the patient realizes that maybe the “treatment providers” enjoy seeing patients face rejection, suffer, fail. It’s the only thing that makes sense.”
THAT’S what I’ve always thought! I think a lot therapists unconsciously live to experience schadenfreude; why else would they seek power over others?
No one should be expected or pressured to form an alliance with people who refuse to fully accept and stop the harms they cause, even if they stop harming.
Survivors aren’t responsible for appeasing their perpetrators.
Allying with psychiatry is allying with barbarism.
People need to learn better ways of taking care of themselves emotionally, and this doesn’t happen through “diagnoses”. It happens by being with others who openly share their own struggles, not people who hide behind “credentials” in order charge a fee.
“Today, there are few opportunities to get help without also receiving a diagnosis.”
This is the root of the problem caused by the current “mental health system”. As soon as a diagnosis is given, an insidious process of infantilization starts taking place that may not be dislodged until serious damage is done to someone’s self-concept. It’s as damaging as calling a child “bad”.
“You make yourself the master of another through language and the power inherent in language.”
This is exactly what psychiatric language does, FOR psychiatrists, and anyone else who uses it. It gives the illusion of power and knowledge when all it actually does is strip people of their own.
This conference is a huge step in the right direction. But I’m afraid it’s just going to spawn another school of “therapy” that inevitably puts itself ahead the client. In other words, just another ego trip for unhealed, unconsciously insecure therapists.
What helped me get beyond therapy better than anything was learning to heal myself through self-therapy, courtesy Daniel Mackler’s many videos and books. No gimmicks, just truth, through and through.
“Johnstone points out that if you only have a trauma-informed focus, you can fall into a trap of becoming too individual-focused and forgetting the interaction with the power structures in society.”
This point can’t be emphasized enough. Therapist who say they “treat trauma” are doing the same thing as those who use DSM labels, making “trauma” just another label that ignores the surrounding situation, or “story”.
The only thing people need is to be heard by someone who doesn’t hijack their story, “trauma” or not.
– “Words affect both the person who utters the words and those who receive them.”
THAT’S an understatement. Psychiatric language devalues people and allows practitioners to talk down to them. Not very “therapeutic”.
– “But psychiatry has the problem that it does not base itself on what people actually say, but what it thinks they mean.”
Here’s what most psychiatrists (and psychologists) fail to see: that DSM “diagnoses” are no more accurate and even less useful than the Freudian interpretations of yesteryear. In other words, they’ve merely exchanged one bogus idea for another. Not very “insightful”.
It’s paternalistic, alright, and in all the worst ways.
All it proves is that people, both men and women, take for granted someone running their home or having their kids.
They need to remember that people are PAID for doing housework, and that women can now RENT OUT THEIR WOMB—and if THAT isn’t “work”, I don’t know what is.
And that’s a lot more work than any man will ever do.
I’m surprised they haven’t already. They’ve co-opted just about everything else: “art therapy”, “dance therapy”, “music therapy”, and—how could I forget—“talk therapy”.
Genuine acts of kindness and freely chosen social connections do more than improve so-called “negative affect”, they prevent it. And no one needs a study to know that.
Some people are too arrogant to grasp the true nature, meaning and reason for religion: feelings of awe, gratitude and humility—all of which are spiritual—something they’re loath to accept, for who knows what reason.
It’s too bad when people have no sense of the transcendent. But some people have no ability to be humble.
People like E. Fuller Torrey are too arrogant to grasp the true nature and meaning and reason for religion: a sense of awe, humility, and gratitude—which are non-material, which means spiritual—something he seems loath to understand.
Someday psychiatry and its “therapeutic” offshoots will be seen for what they truly represent: complicated defense mechanisms used to hide from emotional reality.
l.e._cox says, “The biggest problem with most academics (not to generalize) is that they can’t confront, and thus see problems as much more complicated than they really are.”
THAT’S the god’s honest truth. But some people get a kick out of complicating things. Or maybe they’re just cowards.
NEWSFLASH: Psychiatry’s not rocket science. And neither is psychology, for that matter. But making people think they are can bring in lots of self-satisfaction, not to mention plenty of dough.
Thank you Dr. Gotzsche for your dedication to truth and integrity. A textbook critical of psychiatry’s current inaccurate narrative is badly needed, and I hope it gains traction in mainstream circles.
“Researchers have debated what it means to recover from mental illness, with “professional” opinions often differing greatly compared to service user opinions.”
I think psychiatrists are extremely arrogant to think they’re the ones to decide what “recovery”means.
And most think you’re “sick” if you’re not punching someone else’s time clock.
Psychiatry’s replaced it with diagnoses and drugs, while other psychs preach “resilience”, “mindfulness” or that granddaddy of them all, “psychotherapy”.
Sheltering in place was a huge relief because it gave me a reason to stay out of places where music is constantly played. And things are a lot quieter with the advent of earphones. A lot less musical bombardment, which helped me gain some mental and emotional equilibrium.
Psychiatry and psychology promote unrealistic standards for people’s thoughts, feelings and behavior. They’re very judgmental. Just like religion often is.
My late aunt was hospitalized only once in her life for the only psychotic episode she ever had. Thank goodness the attending psychiatrist realized she was suffering from a one-time event because she hadn’t been that way before. So when she was discharged she didn’t fill any prescriptions or continue with “therapy”. And she was never psychotic again.
And what was the matter? She was suffering from extreme loneliness.
I think people who don’t realize they’re psychiatric prisoners are unconsciously using defense mechanisms, i.e. “Stockholm syndrome” or “identification with the aggressor”) as a means of survival.
The only reason Allen Frances did an about-face on the DSM was because he saw it was becoming a laughing stock, not because he suddenly grew a conscience.
Thank you very much, justsayno86. I greatly appreciate your generous appreciation.
You are right. Psychiatry IS the greatest enemy. But it’s an invisible enemy, which makes it more dangerous. And people definitely need to be warned.
I also can’t imagine why anyone would ever want to unite psychiatric survivors with psych consumers. And anyone who thinks it’s a good idea shows a serious lack of understanding.
Spirituality essentially means emotional growth, which means the broadening, deepening or “maturing” of a person’s soul, which means gaining an awareness and understanding of oneself and others and how this relates to the world around them.
But this is a deeply personal, complex process that tragically gets hijacked by psychiatric diagnoses, drugs, and even “psycho-therapy”.
sam plover says, “Funny how a shrink will accept that his patient is “sick”, he never questions what you say and even has a bunch of diagnoses on hand.”
Fantastic article. It reveals like no other how one-sided and corrupt the psychiatric industry, Big Pharma, and the legal system have become.
“The very fact that someone has been given any psychiatric label is used in a staggering variety of ways to deprive them of self-respect, dignity, self-confidence, employment, custody of their children, the right to make decisions about their medical and legal affairs, and even their lives….”
“Anyone in danger of losing their human rights — or their life — through a court proceeding should have someone like Gottstein advocating for them, because he is a tireless advocate, knows the law inside and out, and never loses sight of what is true, what is right, and what is humane in its respect for his clients’ dignity.”
A YouTube video worth watching: “OH SH*T, THIS JUST HAPPENED”, by Russell Brand
These neuroscientists could have learned a lot from this YouTube video: “A Critique of Neuroscience—As it Relates to Psychological Healing From Trauma”, by Daniel Mackler
Psychiatry unequivocally deprives people of their humanity with its pseudoscientific diagnoses, iatrogenically harmful drugs, damaging ECT, and forced medication/hospitalization. And none of these build diplomacy or allies, but definitely deny people’s human rights, which is criminal. So expecting meaningful dialogue with people who not only deny their humanity but also their human rights is not only unrealistic, it is illogical.
And while there are no laws demanding anyone face their inner demons, more than enough people have learned more than enough about psychiatry’s demons or “dark side” with its violations of social justice which is the reason for this website.
Nijinsky says, “Something does happen when you step out of investing in using fear, trauma, coercion and physical violence to control people…That’s what snake oil salesmen do, and lately the mental health system.”
Yes, and I would posit that miracles happen when people step out of psychiatry.
Steve says, “I think we should all be in touch with our own inner sense of what is “right” and true, rather than following some outside interpretation of reality.”
I agree completely. And I forgot that Buddhists don’t believe in a deity, and that Quakers refer to God as Light Within, which to me means one’s own intuition.
Nijinsky says, “Religion and psychiatry seem to be in the same boat as indoctrination rather than simply listening, being curious, and SHUTTING UP with their attempts at programming rather than allowing and showing decent curiosity”.
Very true. Religion and psychiatry aren’t about curiosity. They’re about conformity, how to think, talk and act like them.
And psychedelics aren’t the answer anymore than psychiatric drugs.
I consider psychiatry the enemy because that’s how I see it. And it’s not without reasoning OR content that I’ve come to this hard-won conclusion. And you’re assuming I don’t use either reasoning or content is both disparaging and diminishing, and very presumptuous.
Steve says, “….generalizations about “therapists” lead to mistaken ideas. Not all therapists are alike or believe in the same things.”
But they all believe in “therapy”, which creates more problems, in my experience.
I can’t bring myself to defend anything about “therapy” because it’s a bad idea that only gets worse when people call themselves “therapists”, no matter how well-intentioned they may be because they still represent and profit from an exploitive system based on irrational power dynamics and pseudoscientific diagnoses. So defending any part of it is morally inconsistent, imo.
And the saying, “the road to hell is paved with good intentions” plays out again and again and again by people who practice “psychotherapy”.
And the Catholic Church arbitrarily changes its miracles checklist, as it used to demand three “miracles”. I guess they got impatient in today’s digital world.
It’s like psychiatry arbitrarily changing its “DSM” checklists.
And as for “miracles”: for me, these mean good things that can’t be explained. And I see no need for getting entangled in someone else’s religiously tedious explanations, be they religious, or “scientific”.
My question is this: why do some people insist on needing to explain the unexplainable? And my answer is this: some people need to be seen as god, and scientists are no exception.
The Catholic Church has its own arbitrary checklist for declaring new “saints”, which includes at least two incidents they arbitrarily consider “miracles”. This makes about as much sense as a group of psychiatrists arbitrarily declaring new “diagnoses” via arbitrary checklists for their own arbitrary bible, the DSM .
I was referring to the Catholic Church which has its own arbitrary criteria for determining whomever they arbitrarily deem a “genuine saint”, which includes at least two things they arbitrarily deem a “genuine miracle”, which makes about as much sense as psychiatry’s arbitrary checklists for its definitely ingenuine DSM.
Most people who work in the “mental health system” are obsessed with seeing what’s “wrong” in the person, instead of what’s happened to the person. And even if they do happen to consider what’s happened to the person, they still pathologize/label their reaction to what’s happened to them.
How in god’s name does anyone think they know better than anyone else what qualifies a “genuine miracle”?
Oh, the irony…
The miracle is the fact that “educated” people manage to keep a straight face while thinking like this. Which suggests they must be delusional, which makes sense regarding psychiatry, since that DEFINITELY qualifies as delusional.
Why has it taken so long for “the experts” to figure out what lots of ordinary people have already known for a long time? Maybe they’re finally realizing they can no longer ignore the handwriting on the wall.
Looks to me like they’re trying to claim the narrative before getting caught with their pants down.
Everyone needs a sense of agency, control, freedom and privacy, of being heard, included and valued for who they are, not the objectification, isolation, exclusion and brute force used by traditional psychiatry, which is essentially sanitized brutality.
Universities claim to be dedicated to the transmission of knowledge and wisdom. But if this were true, why are so many dedicated to modeling and motivating some of the worst in human nature: bias, intolerance, favoritism.
People who work in areas like “psychiatry” and “psychology” have reached the apex of dissociation, as they have the delusion they’re helping people. But all these do is provide a way for them to intellectually distance themselves (dissociate) from feelings and fears they can’t face in themselves. Another word for this is “othering”, or labeling, it’s “gold standard”, which has always been a means of survival, conscious or not.
And universities are great places to academically dissociate.
Why does it take so long for “educated” people to figure things out? Why can’t they just admit the garbage they’ve been selling doesn’t do anything but numb the brain???
It sounds like the jerks are starting to pay attention to what’s happening on the sidelines and are trying to get ahead of the narrative that’s being created by people who actually know what they’re talking about. But as stupid as the “experts” are showing themselves to be (once again), they at least sense they’re starting to look stupid, which, btw, they actually are.
Darkness and silence invite sleep which quiets the mind and gives the body a chance to regenerate. And hormones can be very sensitive to light-dark cycles.
People have a right to “believe” whatever they want. And I don’t really give a damn one way or the other, as long as they don’t try and shove what they “believe” down my throat.
Traditional trappings of success (college degrees, professional/social distinction, expensive lifestyle) wards off unconscious feelings of dissatisfaction and prevents social rejection. And the university system, like the society that created it, capitalizes on these destructive dynamics to preserve society’s distorted values.
Steve Spiegel says, “…only psychiatry uses redundancy to promote legitimacy.”
Definition for redundancy: not or no longer needed or useful; superfluous
Freud was trained as a neurologist which was why psychiatry was believed to be a “medical science”. But since he hard time establishing his practice, he had plenty of time to wonder about patients whose problems defied physical explanation. And while many of his ideas were very insightful, a lot of them were just plain nutty—products of his own out of control imagination and habitual misogyny. So eventually, a few people got wise to the guy and came up with their own take on things, but not before his ideas took root in the public consciousness.
There’s nothing more prone to fads then the “mental health” system. And psychiatry’s redundancy is reflected time and time again whenever the latest psychiatric drug comes on the market, or some half-cocked “therapist” writes another book to publicize their own brand of “groundbreaking” “psychotherapy”. And neither of these are legitimate.
boans says, “What sort of delusional visions are conjured up when people speak like this?” [“treatment”]
The idea of “treatment” itself is a delusional vision—and a lot of mental health “professionals” en-vision themselves as saviors—which suits very nicely their visions of grandiosity.
And since emotional struggles are generally perceived as weakness, or in today’s jargon “mental illness”, people who struggle (or viewed as “different”) are often met with suspicion and kept at an arm’s length using various means of rejection and sometimes outright hostility.
Dynamics like these flourish in traditional college environments where competition is lauded and worldly success is venerated, so fears of “not succeeding”, or “not fitting in” make a lot of people nervous and therefore want to avoid like a contagion those experiencing difficulties because it reminds them of their own insecurities surrounding failure or not fitting in. And these feelings are often hidden underneath all the hype.
So people who don’t fall in line with societies’ expectations in thought, appearance or actions are often roundly criticized or even dismissed because people don’t want to be associated with anything they perceive as “illness”/weakness i.e. “failure” (which equals rejection, the most primal fear) because vulnerability is antithetical to the whole college spiel of “winning”, something society lives and dies by. It’s a vicious circle covered up by the ballyhoo of college life.
And fears of litigation are behind a lot of what drives the whole scenario these days.
Stigma (fear) against “mental illness” has primal origins.
Emotional struggle on some level means vulnerability, which generates feelings of overwhelm/weakness, which leads to feelings of helplessness, which ultimately triggers fears of rejection, a feeling first felt at some point in infancy. So receiving attention and feeling accepted (having one’s need met) are associated with survival, both physical and emotional.
And most adults continue playing this out as soon as certain levels of prosperity are achieved, by running around seeking validation and grabbing whatever status they perceive as important in their environment, as this wards off feelings of isolation and helplessness felt as infants.
There’s not a chance in hell that psychiatrists will ever willingly “share” their power, because without it, what have they got? Not much more than anyone else, except an ability to write “prescriptions” for chemical junk. And so-called “psycho-therapy” is word junk.
They’re naked as jaybirds and deep down they know it.
Stigma around mental illness has been around for thousands of years. And fear is at the root of it. And contrary to popular belief, things like “psychiatry, “psychology” and the so-called “mental health system” are built on stigma (fear) and do a good job of passing it along.
And universities are products of elitist thinking, no matter their geographical location. And elitism breeds unhealthy competition and discrimination that leads to destructive power dynamics on which most societies (and families) are based.
What passes for “education” about “mental illness” in traditional venues like universities actually promotes and continues spreading misinformation (fears) about what is believed to be “mental illness” while stoking feelings of superiority towards those who have either not had an opportunity for such “education”, or have chosen to bypass it.
Imo, having exceptional intellectual ability has nothing to do with emotional intelligence. Unfortunately, the world values and operates on an ability to process large amounts of complex information or an ability to express oneself eloquently more than emotional intelligence. And the same goes for exceptional athletic or so-called artistic/creative ability. So universities, (especially private ones) end up being highly curated, controlling environments that are more concerned with liability because this affects their marketability (image) which ultimately affects their funding. Simply stated, universities are more concerned with their reputation.
Relying on “professionals” to help with personal matters, no matter how trying, provides a field day for opportunists.
No one can claim “expertise” unless they’ve been through it themselves, or have been by the side of someone who has, and definitely NOT in a “clinical” sense.
The “clinical gaze” is what psychiatry is all about. And psychology isn’t much better. But it’s useful for keeping the powers that be and those who follow them comfortably dissociated.
Mr. Ruck is right. Healing is, above all, relational, and this includes the relationship one has with one’s own self. But traditional “psycho-therapy” is not relational in any meaningful sense. It’s a sad and sterile substitute for the real thing.
Imo, the world would be a much better place if people stopped feeding/paying the beasts of psychiatry and psychology and instead started feeding/paying each other in more ways than one. And creating awareness through MIA is how this is already happening.
Relationships that involve emotional intimacy should never be based on money, as money is never the right incentive, especially in relationships based on a power imbalance. And money is a major incentive, no matter what self-deluded do-gooders would have people think.
Could it be that articles like this signify the last gasps of a dying “profession”? One can only hope. More likely it’s more lip service, or fear-induced naval-gazing in yet another feeble attempt to save their lying asses.
The only thing that needs to happen is for psychiatry and its cohorts to be liquidated, terminated, and utterly eradicated like any other failed business venture. And calling themselves “science” or “healing arts” is the biggest load of bullshit ever perpetrated on society.
But psychiatry et al is far worse than a failed business or “healing” venture. They are the termites of modern society.
And what are the “termites of society”? Well, according to academia.edu, it refers to people who exploit others. And I can’t think of a better term for psychiatry and its cohorts.
And if they insist on pointing to “the science”, they need look no further than the increasing numbers of people “diagnosed” with a “disorder” and the steady accumulation of “diagnoses” in DSM. It’s the manifestation of wish fulfillment for psychiatrists.
Research like this is a disgusting waste of resources that would have been better spent on feeding and housing those in need rather than feeding the egos of people more interested in adding to their curriculum vitae.
Religions metaphorically express the meaning and feeling of being alive. They hold intrinsic value individually and culturally.
But psychiatry and psychology have no intrinsic value, scientifically or spiritually, as both are ethically vacant—and take pride in being so. And the harder these pathetically gruesome quagmires try to be socially relevant, the more they fail society, as coldly analyzing the human experience dignifies no one. They are prime examples of intellectual perversity born of intellectual grandiosity, that mimics science while being religiously intolerant—thus wreaking havoc in people’s lives in all kinds of ways.
I believe there’ll come a day in the not-too-distant future when psychiatry disintegrates from its own unbridled confidence—in no small part because MIA keeps spreading the word.
Years ago, I adopted a puppy dog from the local pound. She looked and acted fine, but she shook violently on the way to her new home, although I held her close and spoke to her gently. And when she got there, it became apparent that she’d been badly mistreated. She wouldn’t let anyone affectionately pat her near her rear, as she was afraid people were going to hit her. And for two weeks she wouldn’t go near her bowl of food until no one was looking, and then she’d grab most of it in her mouth and hide it. And she didn’t want to get in the car because she thought she was going to be taken away from a home that loved her. But with unreserved affection, she eventually learned to feel secure and trust people. But up until she left this world, there were times she did things that revealed she never forgot what she’d been through. And people are no different.
Breaking points aren’t just physical, they emotional, psychological, and spiritual as well. And everything collapsing can open the way for reassessing and clarifying one’s life. Some call it spiritual rebirth. “Illness” it is not.
Adding psychiatric “medications” to unprocessed trauma is a recipe for disaster like no other. But no one need depend on so-called “mental health professions” for this either. But that’s something few “therapists” have the brains to realize or balls to mention to anyone, especially their so-called “clients”. Most hide behind a useless alphabet of dubious “qualifications”, while lacking the most important one of all: an ability to listen respectfully.
Religions are ways for people to metaphorically express the beauty (and sometimes horror) of the human experience. It’s what gives religion and experience of living their intrinsic value. It’s the reason religions have existed since the beginning of time.
But psychiatry and psychology are different in all sorts damaging ways, as the purpose of both are perverse, imo. And the harder these try to be relevant (scientifically or religiously) the worse they fail, as coldly analyzing the human experience dignifies no one. They are monstrous examples of intellectual smugness born of hubris and self-absorbed grandiosity that mimics science while being religiously intolerant. And both need to dissolve, as neither are either religion OR science, but nevertheless wreak havoc in both ways.
Psychiatry and psychology habitually ignore the intrinsic value of the human heart, because doing so would weaken their foolishly incessant claim of being “scientific”.
Imo, the only thing the “mental health professions” offer is a polluted stream of ever-increasing “psychopathologies”, ever-increasing toxic substances to “treat” them, or one of its ever-increasing “psychotherapies”, all of which are based on a pay-to-play, power-imbalanced, artificial “relationship”. And with Big Pharma’s steadfast contributions, it’s become a medicalized Ponzi scheme of epic proportions.
And while most religions are guilty at some time in history of inflicting damage in the name of their respective gods, most were originally based in honoring the dignity of each and every human being. And this ultimately brings out the best in people.
But psychiatry and psychology do nothing of the sort. They are fields obsessed with defining, redefining, and ultimately sentencing people to lives of needless limitation and psychological pain in the name of “therapy”, most of which can be avoided if people simply avoid those who work in the system, as most who do are obsessed with finding what’s wrong in the person, instead of what’s wrong in their past or present surroundings. And they’re neglecting to do so, via their ridiculously vast roster of supposed “diagnoses and treatments” brings out the worst in people—and most clearly in the “therapists” themselves.
And we all know who benefits most from such hopelessly dogmatic thinking.…
Other mental health clinicians are just as limited as the psychiatric ones, as most operate from the same one-dimensional, sickness-obsessed perspective.
Psychiatry and psychology are definitely shibboleths. It’s the only thing they can reasonably lay claim to. And deep down they know this, which is why they cling so tightly to their one-dimensional medical model with such religious fervor. And the insane part is they can’t see how ridiculous this is. It shows their own incredible “lack of insight”.
The main difference between psychology/psychiatry and religion is that where most religions offer some kind of redemption, psychiatry and psychology do not. All they offer is an endless stream of “psychopathology”, which renders them incapable of seeing beyond people’s imperfections. And their “treatments” are an extension of their own pathology. It’s all very nihilistic.
Psychiatry and psychology are definitely shibboleths. It’s the only thing they can reasonably lay claim to. And deep down they know this, which is why they cling so tightly to their one-dimensional medical model with an almost religious fervor. And the insane part is they can’t see how ridiculous this is. It’s an incredible lack of insight.
The main difference between psychiatry/psychology and religion is that most religions offer some kind of redemption, whereas psychiatry/psychology can’t see beyond people’s imperfections. All they offer is a stream of endless psychopathology. They’re the definition of nihilism. And whereas most religions seek god, most psychiatrists and psychologists believe (unconsciously) they ARE god.
I’m sorry for what you’ve been through. Mental health professionals’ claims of confidentiality are false because patients’ files are not. And the fact that few if any legislators recognize this as an abuse of confidentiality is unconscionable.
Correction: Psychiatry and psychology reliably, categorically and conveniently deny real science anytime it contradicts their carefully crafted false narrative.
Once upon a time, churches ruled large areas in the western world. These days it’s the mental health industrial complex.
Once upon a time, people who were castigated were called “sinners”. Today they’re called “mentally ill”.
Once upon a time, the only means to absolution were to “confess one’s sins” to church officials. Nowadays people are compelled to confide in people they don’t trust, claim diagnoses they don’t agree with, and take psychiatric “medications” they don’t want.
Whoever said “the more things change, the more they stay the same” was spot on.
Psychiatry and psychology reliability and categorically deny real science anytime it goes against their carefully crafted false narrative. But they pretend to be scientific because they know it makes them sound convincing.
Their peculiar habit of denying real science clearly indicates how indoctrinated most psychiatrists and psychologists actually are, especially when doctors of other specialties happen to believe the patients who tell them of problems they’re having with psychiatric “medications”. But this doesn’t happen very often.
Most psychiatrists and psychologists harbor a religious belief in a medical model that not only distorts reality, but makes a mockery of the scientific method.
And while some define science as the act of interpreting an observation of the environment that is limited by the tools available for observing, most psychiatrists and psychologists fail to recognize the most important tool for observation and interpretation, and that is having an open mind. But thankfully most religions and art welcome imagination, while psychiatry and psychology definitely do not.
Psychiatry and psychology’s inability to perceive value in the human experience is the reason they habitually disease-ify the human experience. It’s how they fend off their own unconscious fears and desires.
Religion and art are symbolic (metaphorical) ways that humans use to create and express the truth, reality and meaning in the human experience. It’s what gives them intrinsic value and is why they exist. Their power comes from acknowledging the dignity of the human experience (spirit), and is the reason both have existed since time immemorial. But religion goes from good to bad when it becomes dictatorial and intolerant, two words that best describe most psychiatry and psychology. And these two fields, unlike religion and art, flourish by medicalizing, categorizing, and coldly analyzing the human experience which dignifies no one. They are monstrous examples intellectual smugness brought on by huge amounts of hubris and self-congratulatory self-absorption that not only mimics religious intolerance, but actually is religious intolerance.
Psychiatry and psychology both claim to have discovered scientifically valid explanations for just about everything under the sun while failing to recognize that matters of the heart and mind are not matters to be approached “scientifically”.
And while psychiatry has proven itself to be scientifically invalid, psychology is equally vacant, as it also fails to offer much more than anyone with a modicum of common sense and insight would come up with on their own. Nor has either come to realize that observing and naming behavior is scientifically meaningless, whether or not it’s done “clinically”, which makes both fields one huge cosmic joke.
And what is a cosmic joke? Believing the false projections of the limited mind.
Rasx asks, “Wouldn’t image-making then be closer to the truth about existence, or at least as close to it in some way, as analytic reasoning?”
Interesting question. I think things get confusing when essentially mushy stuff like psychology and psychiatry claim to be science while acting like religion. They try to be all things to all people, but end up having no claim to anything worthwhile. But they do manage to squeeze the meaning out of just about everything.
Rasx then asks, “Wouldn’t poetry and literature and religion and metaphor generally be valid means of expressing truth then?”
Poetry, literature, religion and metaphor are not just valid ways of expressing truth and experience, they’re essential to sharing truth and experience. And analytical reasoning is another valid way of finding and expressing truth and experience. But this is where psychiatry and psychology fall off a cliff, so to speak, as neither deal meaningfully with either truth or experience, and definitely not analytical reasoning.
Image-making is the unique way humans find meaning. Poetry and literature and religion are all metaphors to find and express meaning. Which is essentially the meaning, purpose, or reason for art. It’s something uniquely human.
Psychiatry and psychology are hopelessly materialistic, imo, as they stupidly think mouthing “scientific” terms and engaging in “scientific” research gives them credibility, which is stupider still, because there’s nothing more meaningless than endless reams of “scientific” data, most of which is meaningless either materially or spiritually. It’s an expensive waste of time, a lose-lose situation that’s all form and no substance. It’s medicine’s junk food.
There is no “meaning making” in psychiatry and psychology. That’s the first illusion. Unless you consider propping up some professional’s ego and bank account meaningful.
Psychiatrists and psychologists are the worst people to turn to for things like that, imo. And I bet they make “meaning making” a “disorder” if they haven’t already.
Most psychiatrists and psychologists seek to reduce, control and define the indefinable because they’re unconsciously terrified of life’s paradoxical vagueness and complexities. They childishly cling to science while stubbornly denying life’s ultimate uncertainty. But their stubborn belief in the reliability and appropriateness of a “scientific” approach makes them a religion all their own as it seeks to perform the function of traditional religions, which is mainly to quell anxieties. But it’s a far more dangerous one, as their aping of scientific language and protocols give them an illusion of objective reality.
And how does this economic practice think it’s helping the human citizen?
By thinking too much of themselves and not enough of others, while enjoying too much the spoils of their profession, which primarily involve exerting power over others while living large.
I especially agree with your question regarding where the art and artistry has gone in the practice of learning how and why to be, and how to become, a better human. It’s certainly not a question that science can answer, and it’s definitely not one it should even try answer. These questions are an anathema to the so-called “science of psychiatry” for obvious reasons, and also to its self-congratulatory cousin known as the “science of psychology” for somewhat less obvious reasons, but the reasons for both are the same: big egos and even bigger hubris, as both are in areas they don’t belong.
Definition for Blind Man’s Bluff:
TAKING A CHANCE ON A SOMETHING WITHOUT RHYME OR REASON TO YOUR POSITION
Definition for Willful Blindness: intentionally keeping unaware of facts that would render liability or implication
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Psychiatry is “….a presumed medical specialty that has no reputable theory about the alleged internal dysfunction that causes mental illness, that has no biomarkers with which to diagnose those illnesses, yet that has a long history of coercing people to act, think, and feel in accordance with an ill-defined and ever-changing set of moral standards.”
Psychiatry is nothing more than a medicalized game of Blind Man’s Bluff. And it’s guilty of Willful Blindness until it changes.
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And here’s where the “cure” lies:
“Digging In the Dirt”, by Peter Gabriel
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Psychiatry has become the polite term for drug dealing, because instead of advocating for healthier mindsets, behaviors, and lifestyles, they create drug addicts.
So why wouldn’t they want their “patients” addicted to their “treatments” when that’s their business? Very paternalistic, i.e. “Big Daddy Knows Best”.
It’s the new white collar crime.
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And here’s a song that should be on everyone’s playlist:
“Twisted”, sung by Joni Mitchell
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I’m dizzy with cognitive dissonance at the insanity of it all…
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Definitely one of Class and privilege.
Generally, I like what Gabor Mate says. However, I always had the strange sense that he’s missing something, which always left me wondering: Does he not appreciate the way most people are forced to live?
I could never decide if he was being cowardly, or if it just never occurred to him how much deferential treatment he receives because he has “Dr.” in front of his name.
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Your most welcome, Lisa.
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I read your essay yesterday and I’m in awe of it and you. Your insights and intelligence are AMAZING. I see it as a blueprint for the future.
And thank you, thank you, thank you Lisa, for being you, above all else.
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Fascinating.
Brought to mind this classic music video from once upon a time….
“Shock The Monkey”, by Peter Gabriel
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What speaks to people is entirely personal, and often can’t be anticipated. And I’ve no idea what “right-brain maleness” means.
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Absolutely. But I’m more committed to honoring the human being from which all art springs.
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Topher,
I just took a look at “The Illusion of Psychotherapy” on Amazon and it sounds well worth reading as Epstein addresses the many social-relational causes of psychic distress.
I look forward to getting a copy once I find one less pricey.
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And here’s something NO ONE should miss:
“May Cause Side Effects”, by Brooke Siem
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COMPLETELY INVALID!!!
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True.
Often people with money and/or advanced education (the so-called “elites”) either don’t know or have forgotten what it’s like to be low man on the totem pole and the consequences that real people can face if they dare call out the powers that be.
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“To see what “Science” is made of, we need only observe what happens when it collides with power, pounds, payola, politics or promotional prospects, perhaps?”
Welcome to the 21st century.
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“My Story Is Full of Lies”, by Pata Suyemoto
Moving. Haunting. AND FULL OF TRUTH.
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I feel the need to hurl every time I hear the term “character defect”.
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Big Pharma and Big Psychiatry are always planning ahead. It’s what Big Business does.
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“People need to ask about all those patients who as teenagers became patients in the late 1980’s with Prozac and have been compliant and ask simply where are they today? Homeless? Jobless? Severely ill or dead?”
Psychiatry would hide that “data” if they had it—or try to give it a “positive” spin.
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Agree 100%. All talk, no substance.
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And psychiatry DOESN’T GIVE A DAMN about the people it harms; it only sees “patients” as COLLATERAL DAMAGE —
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“…ideology over reality..”
That’s the perfect definition for psychiatry.
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Correction: Whether psychiatry does this deliberately or not is of NO CONSEQUENCE, because the results are THE SAME: iatrogenic illness, disability and death, which makes psychiatry’s claims of bearing no responsibility completely invalid.
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Aftab can soft-soap about psychiatry all he wants, but it doesn’t change the fact that psychiatry is a dishonest, exploitative organization whose long history of misinforming the public has allowed it to misuse its power against the most vulnerable people with virtually NO consequences and continues to do so TO THIS DAY.
And this has happened because until now the public has lacked access to information that tells them THE TRUTH behind psychiatry’s many FALSE CLAIMS:
1. That psychiatric diagnoses are physically rooted
2. That psychiatric drugs correct “chemical imbalances” or other physical processes
3. That these drugs pose little risk to people’s physical and/or psychological health
And whether not psychiatry does or has done this deliberately is of NO CONSEQUENCE, because the results are THE SAME: iatrogenic illness, disability or even death.
And no amount of charm or savvy on the part of any slickly packaged internet shill can change this AWFUL TRUTH.
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Correction: Any non-drug therapies psychiatry lays claim to are already being done by people and organizations that have no connections to the drug world, legal or illegal. And as a result, people are experiencing better outcomes than psychiatry’s depraved world of “medication” side effects and any ensuing drug withdrawal.
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Aftab is the face of something that has morphed into a world-wide, legalized drug ring. And no amount of philosophizing can change that.
Any other “therapies” it lays claim to are already being done by other people or organizations with no connections to the drug world which just happen to be showing “better outcomes”. And what are “better outcomes”? No drug-induced side effects or withdrawal effects.
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But maybe he’d be able to catch the beat by cranking up the hurdy gurdy to this snappy tune: “One Thing Leads To Another”, by The Fixx
But I doubt he could handle the lyrics.
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No one is safe from psychiatry’s clutches. It strategically targets the entire globe through its trademark insidious fashion: Direct To Consumer Advertising —
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Correction: Psychiatry’s a profession of Power, HUGE egos, and deliberate MISREPRESENTATION.
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Or maybe it’s groupthink. Or even gaslighting….
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And dispensing an endless supply of cognitive dissonance.
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And VERY thirsty for validation.
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He’s tripping over himself trying to dance the Ad Hominem Shuffle.
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Here’s Aftab’s idea of progress:
1. More diagnoses
2. More drugs
3. Less dissenting opinion
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“The DSM mindset is now so thoroughly embedded within the culture it’s massively eroding the ability of people in describe their uniqueness and shifting emotional reactions and states in anything other than psychiatric language.”
It’s become the biggest source of cultural pollution.
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Aftab’s keeping busy, alright. He just posted a response to Mr. Whitaker’s essay, which, unsurprisingly, is quite condescending.
All I can say is Aftab seems like one touchy guy.
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lcjohnstone says:
“Recently, he [Aftab] has written a curious blog about the Power Threat Meaning Framework, in which he claims that a) no one has ever heard of it b) everyone thinks it is rubbish c) everyone needs to be warned against it….. and attributes the authors’ motivations to ‘active hostility….against diagnosis’. Which doesn’t really stand up as an evidence-based refutation.”
He says that stuff because the PTMF rattles his cage. And don’t be surprised if sooner or later he tries to hijack the idea with his own distorted version. But he’d be much better off if he’d a) own his own ‘active hostility’, b) quit his twitter habit, and c) stop dabbling in philosophy that only makes him sound more ridiculous.
And as for him claiming that no one has ever heard of the Power Threat Meaning Framework: it’s my understanding that people at the World Health Organization have heard of it.
I’ve learned one thing dealing with psychiatry: it’s best not to engage with it at all, because it’s full of people like Aftab who will defend their dubious “diagnoses” till their dying day.
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Dear Lauren,
Thank you for the extraordinary work you do. You’ve created a template based on honesty, respect, trust, personal agency and mutual growth, which are the only things that make any sense, and things I found sorely lacking both in psychiatry and psychotherapy. Listening deeply with an open heart and open mind is what’s most important in life.
You’ve given me a lot to think about.
And thank you for your links.
Birdsong
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“BPD” is a wastebasket diagnosis…”.
So is every other “psychiatric diagnosis”.
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Correction: BPD is the medicalized TERM for “bitch”.
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Psychiatry’s current recognition of trauma and neurodiversity just provides more opportunities for psychiatry to invent more meaningless and ultimately stigmatizing labels, and more opportunities for psychiatry to peddle more harmful drugs, which obviously means more money for them.
Psychiatry is Opportunistic Medicine, and labels and drugs are all they’ve got.
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Tanya says, “…I think there is such a defensiveness on the part of many psychiatrists. I think that my narrative was perhaps just something that was too challenging and would’ve caused a lot of reflection on their part, and that reflection could probably be very painful, I’m sure.”
Psychiatry is the modern version of the Tower of Babel, and it’s DSM is its Book of Babble.
So expecting serious reflection from people schooled in psychiatry is like waiting for the second coming of Christ.
Psychiatry is immune to meaningful reflection, because it would mean the end of psychiatry.
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“This story is all too typical of psychiatric oppression.”
Absolutely. And it’s a story that needs to be told, desperately.
Thank you Tanya.
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But Aftab obviously has Schizoid disorder. Must be from trying to mix psychiatry with philosophy.
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More on Bait and Switch:
1. Psychiatry promises relief from pain through drugs that cause iatrogenic harm, which it then denies
2. Psychotherapy promises psychological freedom by creating emotional dependence on “therapy”, which it then denies
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Rasx says, “….ad hominem is psychiatry’s stock in trade…”.
You forgot drug pushing.
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Another look at Aftab’s twitter tells me he’s much too busy promoting himself to spend any time reading anything that doesn’t flatter his already inflated ego. So here’s something short and sweet from Psychology Today:
“Review: The Book of Woe: Why the DSM is doomed to fail”, by Helene Guldberg, PhD
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Correction: Aftab’s inviting two psychiatrists to oppose you proves his pants are on fire.
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But like all politicians, Aftab’s greatest strength lies in talking out of both sides of his mouth.
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And for something more visually entertaining, Aftab might watch this: “The Myth of Low-Serotonin & Antidepressants – Dr. David Horowitz”, courtesy After Skool
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Correction: psychiatry is a profession of insults (DSM) practiced by insulting people.
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And if that’s not too taxing, Aftab might pick up a copy of “A Profession Without Reason: The Crisis of Contemporary Psychiatry—Untangled and Solved by Spinoza, Free-Thinking and Radical Enlightenment”, by Bruce Levine, PhD.
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BPD is medical misogyny.
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Dear Lisa,
Thank you for sharing your poignant story. You’ve been through hell and back, but congratulations on making it out alive. I totally relate to your saying this:
“The only therapy that made sense to me was self-introspection and a lot of reading about trauma from compassionate experts…”
And you’re absolutely right that no one should have to experience and heal from psychiatric gaslighting and abuse. But it’s my belief believe that psychiatry’s current recognition of trauma and neurodiversity is no more than lip service.
Thank you again for your remarkable testimony.
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I believe it’s called collective insanity.
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Or their half-cocked “genetics” theory.
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Definition for Magical Thinking: believing that genetics explains psychic suffering
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Psychiatry is a profession of Power, big egos, and deliberate misperception.
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It’s obvious that getting under Aftab’s skin is easy.
He’d be well advised to fix the carefully concealed chip on his shoulder.
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Correction: psychiatry is a religion more than anything else, because it believes in magical thinking.
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And psychiatry has no answers to explain that either.
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Psychiatry’s poisoned chalice is a jug of Kool-Aid. And Aftab’s the perfect Kool-Aid Man.
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He clearly loves being psychiatry’s latest Golden Boy.
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Thank you very much, lcjohnstone. And thank you for the wonderful link.
Aftab’s inviting two senior psychiatrists to oppose you proves you set his pants on fire, but I bet he had the old farts lined up long before the interview, as anyone who dares speak the truth poses a threat their identity and Power. And Aftab’s insistence on proving abstractions proves he’s a fool, a fraud, and a fake.
And thank you for lighting the match.
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Aftab’s a politician, more than anything else, because psychiatry is politics, more than anything else.
And if that were not the case, there’d be no cause for argument.
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Correction: Aftab needs to realize he can’t out-philosophize the truth.
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BPD is the medicalized form for “bitch”.
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I’m so glad you finally you finally heard a voice. It must have been your own.
Daniel was that voice for me.
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An even better question: What makes Aftab want to be a publicity hound?
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Here’s the “science” behind Aftab’s psychiatry: “It IS so because we SAY so!”
Yet for all his disorganized rhetoric, he fails to answer the most basic philosophical question: WHAT THE FUCK IS PSYCHIATRY TRYING TO DO?
Here’s more food for thought: “On the Heels of Ignorance: Psychiatry and the Politics of Not Knowing” by Owen Whooley
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Is psychiatry mostly hard or soft power?
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How is Brand a hypocrite?
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I think Aftab wears two hats at the same time: drug-pushing theologian AND drug-pushing propagandist.
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You gotta hand it to Aftab. After all, it must be tough being an apologist for psychiatry in this day and age.
But as the saying goes, “It’s a dirty job, but somebody’s gotta do it.”
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Maybe Aftab should spend a little less time twittering and a little more time listening.
And here’s something that just might expand his awareness a wee bit:
“Psychiatry’s Cycle of Ignorance and Reinvention: An Interview with Owen Whooley”, a conversation with Ayurdhi Dahl, PhD, courtesy MIA
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Someone needs to ask Aftab about the philosophy of bait and switch.
Definition for Bait and Switch: Fraudulent or deceptive practice.
The ploy of offering a person something desirable to gain favor (such as political support), then thwarting expectations with something less desirable.
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Psychiatry needs to go the way of the girdle.
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Believe this:
Psychiatry has no facts to back up its claims, by god.
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Doctors in general give me the creeps.
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It seems the more things change, the more they stay the same:
“Mother’s Little Helper: The History of Valium”, historyhit.com
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If Aftab felt secure in his convictions, he wouldn’t bother with MIA —
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Psychiatry doesn’t “treat disease”, it creates iatrogenic illness.
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Correction: Aftab needs to realize he can’t outtalk the truth.
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What Aftab fails to see is this:
Psychiatry will eventually collapse under the weight of its own lies—with or without MIA.
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Aftab needs to check his calendar: it’s 2023, not 1983, so controlling the narrative’s a thing of the past, thanks to the internet.
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It used to be barefoot and pregnant. Now it’s drugged and compliant.
“Mother’s little helper”: Vintage Drug Ads Aimed at Women, goretro.com
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Aftab needs to realize he can’t outrun the truth.
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Aftab’s the perfect front man for a “profession” that sees its days are numbered, but his carefully modulated hissy fits are a testament to MIA’s integrity. He sees the writing on the wall and it has him running scared…
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No, but the robots who prescribe sure do.
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You might find some videos and books by Daniel Mackler to be helpful, rasselas.redux. He’s a former therapist who addresses childhood trauma and breaking from one’s parents with a lot of understanding.
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Psychiatry claims to be medicine, but it’s actually a socially acceptable form of drug trafficking that lobbied for DTCA at the end last century. It’s not about health, but the bottom line.
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What world do these researchers live in?
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Sad how much things have changed….
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Doctors will remain ignorant and afraid of lawsuits until they’re offered more guidelines.
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I agree. Psychedelics have the potential to make opiates look like child’s play.
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I agree 100%. The professionalization of emotional support is a terrible invention.
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I agree that much of what’s labeled “great art” is not relatable, and that women’s perspective is often ignored or silenced. And art definitely attracts a lot of snobs.
To me, art is just another form of expression, to communicate soul to soul, to make the unconscious conscious.
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You gotta hand it to psychiatry trying to walk back its biological reductionism. But it’s definitely overcompensating.
Here’s what most people truly need: space and time to grieve unprocessed emotions – – unmolested by psychiatry’s intrusive machinations, pharmaceutical or otherwise.
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Psychiatry isn’t medicine. It’s a criminal enterprise of drugging and jailing.
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Here’s a novel idea: Don’t start antidepressants in the first place.
A YouTube video to watch BEFORE starting antidepressants:
“The Myth of Low-Serotonin & Antidepressants – Dr. Mark Horowitz”, courtesy After Skool
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Living in a state of numbness is not living.
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Perhaps it shouldn’t be.
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Reductionism is not the answer. But neither is brain clutter.
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A drug-dependent society is a terrible legacy to pass onto the young.
A related video on YouTube: “HOLY SH*T! Big Food Is Profiting Off Sick Kids”, courtesy Russell Brand
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I wish you good luck, as you certainly have your work cut out for you!
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It’s long been an open secret: “psychotherapy” is a potential playhouse for predators.
And why doesn’t it matter to these people that the psychiatric drugs already prescribed produce similarly negative outcomes?
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I don’t think increasing disability rates spell victory, especially when accompanied by a rise in psychiatric drug prescribing.
The side effects of psychiatric drugs are destroying people’s ability to support themselves in increasingly large numbers.
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Exactly. Psychiatry is all about “diseases and disorders”, and imaginary ones at that.
And “psychotherapy” is no better in that it creates an unhealthy dependence on “therapy”.
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Maintaining the status quo through drug sedation (psychiatry) is a form of oppression.
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Not quite the same. Psychiatry claims to be medicine.
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Psychiatry and its drugs ruins the quality of life for many.
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Art, humanities and psychiatry do have something thing in common: all are unwisely placed on pedestals.
Living should be revered, not someone’s rendition of it.
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Indeed. The arts give meaning and expression to the human experience, whereas psychiatry destroys what it means to be human.
And “psychotherapy” caricatures human relationships.
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Because the Federal Government has agreed to pay for psychiatry’s “standard of care”, which is primarily psychiatric drugs, and because the pharmaceutical industry is a huge part of the economy.
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YES!!! Psychiatry doesn’t “treat” drug dependence, it PRESCRIBES drug dependence, INDEFINITELY —
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Psychiatry’s co-optation and de-radicalization of peer-support and psychedelics does nothing to change the fact that it’s CODIFIED BIGOTRY co-opted by financial interests.
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Your welcome, Lauren, and thank you for your warmly insightful article.
I agree. Open minds and hearts works wonders. And BELIEVING in ourselves is key.
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Psychiatry is the only profession where a practitioner’s self-actualization depends on destroying the self-actualization of others.
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“Forcing agreement on one shared story, which will no doubt be created by those who hold the most power, is oppressive and dangerous for people who have experienced the dominant paradigm labels, diagnoses and “treatments”.”
Psychiatry and psychotherapy exploit people’s need for attachment and attention.
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There’s nothing more co-dependent than the therapist-client “relationship”.
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Good article.
The arts and humanities embrace and express the reality of human suffering in ways that are incredibly healing.
Neuropsychiatry is a haven for the heartless, and for those unable to accept the vagaries of life.
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Traditional psychotherapy is a psychological trap based on an unnatural and unnecessary power imbalance imposed by those whose main goal is having power over vulnerable people. It’s self-aggrandizing for the therapist and infantilizing for the client.
A peer-run approach is the only civilized way to conduct “therapy”, if one seeks it at all.
People heal best on their own.
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Get a load of this:
“Illness trajectories depend on developmental processes, learning, and behavioral interactions on multiple spatial and temporal scales, which involve levels of the organization across neurobiological, cognitive-affective, interpersonal, and social systems.”
Translation: LOOK AT THE BIG PICTURE
And while you’re at it, try having a little respect for the people you’re dealing with.
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People who abuse psychiatric patients need to be held accountable.
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Psychiatry dominates and disempowers through diagnoses and drugs.
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Who needs psychiatry—reductionist or otherwise—when a little Jung is all you need?
On YouTube: “Carl Jung – How to Find Your Soul”, courtesy After Skool
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Psychiatrists, and medical doctors in general, are now the “middle men” of the pharmaceutical industry.
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Psychiatry needs to learn one thing: wordiness only goes so far.
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“Psychiatric disorders” are autoimmune “diseases” of the soul.
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By choosing to disregard the data compiled by Robert Whitaker and Joanna Moncreiff, psychiatry is guilty of criminal negligence.
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Psychiatry is the elephant’s turd.
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Exposing children and adolescents to notions of “mental health awareness” is totally inappropriate because it makes them think there’s something wrong with them for not feeling their best at all times; they’re too young to have perspective about their feelings. It’s a grossly irresponsible use of the power of suggestion.
Children need to know that feelings are a part of living, and be taught how to respond to their feelings in positive, self-affirming ways. Anything else is confusing and harmful.
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Psychiatry has all the data it needs, thanks to Robert Whitaker and Joanna Moncreiff.
And by ignoring this data, it remains a profession of negligence by its own choice.
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Conventional psychiatry isn’t medicine, it’s the nuclear option.
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Healing comes from collaboration, not domination.
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Psychiatry is as much a political tool today as it was during the Nazi era, as its goal is essentially the same: power and control by whatever means necessary, which today includes psychedelics.
But has anyone imagined the iatrogenic damage in years to come?
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Trauma has turned the world into a gathering of re-traumatizing psychiatrists and psychotherapists.
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What’s a “successful outcome” in psychiatry? People chronically dependent on its “medications”.
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Psychiatry will never admit to being a total crock of shit.
But thanks to the internet, fewer and fewer people look to the likes of “JAMA”.
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maradel says, “They [doctors] are very insecure and enjoy their massive power trips.”
100% TRUTH.
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Doctors who rely on the DSM are completely irrational.
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Maybe people should stop being data-dependent and instead ask themselves this burning question:
WHY rely on “data” more than your own intuition?
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Some people need to pull their heads out of their data-dependent asses and instead consider these novel ideas:
1. Maybe emotional distress isn’t physical illness
2. Maybe psychoactive drugs aren’t a good thing for most people
3. Maybe talk therapy isn’t what it’s cracked up to be
Then finally ask themselves this burning question:
Is turning to a medicalized, data-dependent system for emotional distress good idea?
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Psychiatry is colonialism at its most extreme.
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What do you know! Psychiatry’s finally come full circle with psychedelics. And who knows? Maybe with this latest twist, they’ll finally admit that psychiatry is drug pushing…
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The people at JAMA need to pull their heads out of their data-dependent asses and instead consider these novel ideas:
1. Maybe emotional distress isn’t illness
2. Maybe psychiatric drugs are a bad thing
3. Maybe talk therapy isn’t what it’s cracked up to be
Then finally ask each other this burning question:
Why turn to the medical community for emotional distress in the first place?
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There’s nothing more “disalienating” than listening to people (be they men OR women) unconsciously guided by chauvinistic attitudes.
Definition for Chauvinistic: displaying excessive or prejudiced support for one’s own cause or group; the irrational belief in the superiority or dominance of one’s own group or people
And there’s nothing more chauvinistic than psychiatry and its self-satisfied offshoot called “psychotherapy”, as both are based on gratifying the egos of their practitioners.
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No one needs anyone’s convoluted, self-serving theories regarding psychosis when the explanation is simple: people retreat from reality when life gets too painful. And if they sense safety, they often come back.
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Definition for Intellectualism: the exercise of the intellect at the expense of the emotions.
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No one learns to empathize by living in an intellectual bubble.
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Who would have thought that treating people with dignity could actually be a good thing?
But I guess that’s not enough for people more interested in making a name for themselves, i.e. Freud, Lacan, etc.
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Intellectualism, as opposed to psychosis, is just another way to dissociate from intolerable feelings. And it’s long been a refuge for the intellectually pompous, i.e. “psychiatry” and it’s chronically confused cousin better known as “psychology”.
There is such a thing as thinking too much. People need to get out of their heads and into their hearts.
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I agree 100% with Laura’s assessment of the situation regarding psychic distress in today’s world; that it’s one of financial exploitation on top of personal victimization — which explains why so many people high on the abusive end of the narcissistic spectrum hold jobs as “mental health workers”. And it’s definitely spread by the misuse and overuse of psychological language that characterizes emotions as illness. And any effort to reclaim the narrative, i.e. “DI Without The Disorder” is definitely a step in the right direction.
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The mental illness industry is exactly that, as it’s misuse of language has infected an entire generation.
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Never underestimate the power of words.
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It’s all a matter of subjective interpretation, imo. And why define it at all?
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Well, I have to admit I’ve never thought that much about it, so I’ll leave the answer to that question up to you…
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You can add Charlie Chaplin to the mix: “A Message For All Of Humanity – Charlie Chaplin” courtesy T&H – Inspiration & Motivation on YouTube
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And that’s about as far as it goes—y’all can keep your stupid floppy-sack!
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The main problem with psychiatry is that all you need to do is say “boo” to have the fools reach for their stupid DSM. And most psychologists are no different.
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Worth a glance: “Splitting: The Psychology Behind Binary Thinking And How It Limits A Diversity Of Opinions,” by Ilana Redstone in Forbes Magazine
My takeaway was this quote from psychologist Andrew Hartz:
“There’s an Islamic mystic who described how harmful it is to divide people into groups, say only good things about some and only bad things about others…” — something that accurately describes the “mental health” industry.
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What I find remarkable about the enlightenment era is how adamant some people were about separating the mind and body. And I wonder if this had anything to do with the fact that these were men who never had to contend with the agonizing realities of either menstrual cramps or childbirth. Because if they’d had to, I bet they’d have stopped thinking like a bunch of stubborn two-years olds. And while I don’t believe there’s any such thing as the completely egotistical construct invented by the completely egotistical Freud called “penis envy”, there is definitely such a thing as “penis privilege”.
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Cartesian dualism is actually a form of ‘splitting’, the defense mechanism used by people unable to tolerate ambiguity. And ‘splitting’ is what characterizes most of the people who practice psychiatry and psychology—and when challenged, they resort to gaslighting.
So there you have it, the two things that characterize the system of “mental health”: splitting and gaslighting.
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I agree, feeling and thinking are intricately intertwined. But as you say, “Feelings do not lie…”
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However, I do consider ‘mental illness industry’ an appropriate metaphor.
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James Hillman is brilliant:
“….medical jargon refers to nothing.”
“It is an extreme materialism and pro technocratic thinking based on labels, procedures and it will be worse.”
“Thinking based on procedures and labels is a programming of the enlightenment era leading to technocracy.”
“And there is no sign of psychiatric victims in this corrupted evil society.”
This is an evil society and things probably will get worse in some ways. But I hold out hope for radical change in how people see “mental illness”.
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Your most welcome, Penni.
And I agree, the metaphors used by the mental illness industry are a huge disservice to humankind.
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Correction: Dr. Cornwall, not “Coleman”. I do apologize for my oversight.
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Listen and enjoy: “Awaiting on You All” by George Harrison, courtesy Soft lyric on YouTube
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“The JHP was the venerable journal of a revolutionary movement begun in the 1950’s to provide a “third force” in the field, to counter the two dominant movements of Freud’s psychoanalysis and B.F. Skinner’s behaviorism.”
Human beings are not just their brain chemistry; they are mind, body and spirit/soul. In my mind, humanistic psychology recognizes what other psychologies and certainly psychiatry do not, which is the overriding reality and beauty of the human soul, without which life loses its purpose and meaning.
Check this out on YouTube: “This Is Priceless – George Harrison On What Lies Beyond…” T&H – Inspiration & Motivation
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Uncomfortable feelings labeled as “mental illness” are messages from within that something is wrong in our life, not in our “brain chemistry”.
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What happens in a world without mercy? You get things like psychiatry and psychology.
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By the time some chooses to train as a psychiatrist, it’s usually too late to make any headway.
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For the most part, NAMI is a support group for the families of “The Identified Patient”.
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Psychology needs to shut up and change its name to cognicology. It doesn’t belong in the “feelings” business. And psychiatry needs to shut up entirely.
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I used to think having a medical degree indicated an ability to think critically. Needless to say I no longer think this way.
But Dr. Gotzsche is that rare exception.
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And sometimes extremes states are caused by living under too much stress.
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The field of psychology should be called ‘behaviorism’ because that’s all it is. After all, ‘psyche’ means ‘soul’ and souls can’t be “clinically studied”.
And psychiatry should be called drug pushing, because that’s EXACTLY what it is.
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I was delighted to read something about human suffering that actually captures the essence of what it means to be human:
“To have seen those JHP journals on the library shelves full of merciful caring about human suffering, was proof that the human heart and spirit could prevail over the head and the dangerous objectification of the disease model of psychiatry.”
“The contrast was human-hearted compassion and potential for all, verses human-disordered abnormality/pathology and emotion-killing psych drugs for all.”
My thanks are to you, Dr. Coleman. A heart-centered approach should be the gold standard for helping people, and also for living a good life.
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Correction: SHARING kindness and REALLY meaning it —
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Wonderful article and wonderful quote:
“Merciful love can help relieve the emotional suffering of extreme states.”
Not receiving merciful love is usually the reason people find themselves in an extreme state. And showing kindness can bring them back.
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The “mental health system” mutilates human relationships.
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All part of the new colonialism.
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A scarily accurate depiction of modern medicine—and psychiatry in particular.
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Psychiatry calls it psychosis.
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People don’t need a disease-centered, agenda-laden system. They need caring human beings without an agenda who know how to listen—something that used to be called a very good friend.
Healing happens in understanding, NOT “diagnoses”.
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Someone should ask these characters if they’d feel comfortable having a robot look after their kids.
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Dear Penni,
Thank you for sharing your story. I relate to it because like you I believe much of what is thought to be ‘mental illness’ is actually a spiritual breakthrough brought about by repeated moral injury—injuries usually made worse by a system that speaks a different language.
And I wish you many Happy Returns on your Spiritual Birthday!
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”Ego collapse” is a great term. When the ego dies the spirit survives.
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And I wouldn’t be surprised if higher rates of addiction to psychiatric drugs correlates with higher levels of income. After all, that’s just what the pharmaceutical cartels are counting on.
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I agree, physics can’t replace the psyche. And for the most part, distressed people are suffering from soul sickness, not “mental illness”.
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I think it depends on what you consider “mental illness”.
Enduring financial hardship and deprivation can cause high levels of stress that can adversely affect people’s state of mind and ability to function. And unfortunately this usually gets categorized as “mental illness”.
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Who needs “brain imaging” to prove that poverty and maltreatment damages children in lasting ways?
Only idiots needs brain scans to realize that emotional scars are as real as physical ones.
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The researchers’ stupidity is rooted in assuming that “depression” is an illness in the physical sense.
It’s time these people put away their electronic toys and signed up for some courses in semantics and logic.
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“….the moment we want to be something we are no longer free.” – J. Krishnamurti
“Freedom from the desire for answer is essential for the understanding of a problem.” – J. Krishnamurti
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“Do not pursue what should be, but understand what is.” – J. Krishnamurti
Thought is never free because it is based on knowledge, and knowledge is always limited.” – J. Krishnamurti
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“A man who says, ‘I want change, tell me how to’, seems very earnest, very serious, but he is not. He wants an authority whom he hopes will bring about order in himself. But can authority ever bring about inward order? Order imposed from without must always breed disorder.”
– J. Krishnamurti
“All ideologies are idiotic, whether religious or political, for it is conceptual thinking, the conceptual word, which has so unfortunately divided man.” – J. Krishnamurti
And there’s nothing more divisive than psychiatry and psychology.
Definition for Divisive: alienating, estranging, isolating, schismatic, discordant, disharmonious, inharmonious — all of which aptly describes psychiatry and psychology.
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Correction: Ramesh is the author, not Rasx.
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“They talk about the psyche without the psyche itself, it is as if they were talking about theology without God. It is insanity.”
Psychiatry and psychology are the products of an insane society.
Psychiatry and psychology fail society because they ignore the reality and transcendence of the human soul.
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“The primary cause of disorder in ourselves is the seeking of reality promised by another.” – J. Krishnamurti
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“If you begin to understand what you are without trying to change it, then what you are undergoes a transformation.” – J. Krishnamurti
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If more people found peace in themselves, fewer would end up taking psychiatric drugs or paying some mannequin to listen to them.
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Rasx says, “…not to project the image of what you want to be as against paying attention to what you are…”
Psychiatry and psychology exploit people’s confusion.
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The author asks, “What alternatives do you have to simply coping with it? Simply adjusting to it?”
I think finding some kind of peace within yourself is what needs to happen before anything else.
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Imo, “therapy” itself is a pathololgized relationship.
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Psychologically speaking, the author seems to have all his ducks in order. However, he contradicts himself when first saying:
“From the relational-intersubjective standpoint, both the therapist and the context/system are unavoidably a part of the very experiences that become pathologised as individual disorders.’”
And then saying:
“Though in relational-intersubjective therapy there is an inevitable ‘asymmetry’ — as there necessarily is in any therapeutic relationship — the model [relational-intersubjective] assumes and encourages an epistemological equality with regards to what is occurring and what it means.”
Why can’t he see that an “inevitable asymmetry” directly contradicts any claims of “epistemological equality” — the lack of which is extremely pathologizing?
All he’s done is prove how some people will say anything to maintain a pathologizing power imbalance, which, incidentally, ensures him of being capitalistically compensated.
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There’s no point in having a discussion with people already convinced the moon is made of green cheese.
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It’s not that complicated. People’s emotions and frames of mind are most often the result of their interactions with others, while people stuck in Cartesian thinking are usually the result of disconnected control freaks addicted to power.
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This article does a good job of explaining how Freud and Descartes’ dissociative ideas became a gaslighting technique that exists to this day
“Relational-intersubjective” is just a fancy term for seeing the person in front of you.
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Dr. Gotzsche says, “ADHD is the product of vested commercial, political, and institutional interests.”
Psychiatry itself is a product of vested commercial, political, and institutional interests.
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Who in their right mind would assume there’s no collusion between the FDA and Big Pharma when so much money’s at stake? And don’t forget—when their stint is up at the FDA, you’ll find them on the board at some Big Pharma.
Financial interests always win out.
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Psychiatry is propaganda disguised as science.
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Judi Chamberlin: “People are unlikely to question the underlying premises of their occupations, in which they often have a large financial and emotional stake.”
This is why so few “clinicians” critically evaluate psychiatry’s many unprovable assumptions: the validity of their “diagnoses”, the reliability of their prognosis, and the necessity and safety of their so-called “medications”. And their habitual use of the word “clinical” hides the fact that they themselves are afraid of admitting their whole shebang is full of holes.
If you want to persuade people, just pepper your speech with scientific language, it’s an effective marketing tool for just about anything.
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Correction: “doubt my reality” means doubt my intuition
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And I don’t think anyone can successfully argue that psychiatry is anything more than a glorified drug racket and medicalized con game.
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The complexity of the mind first and foremost includes the emotions, as these are ultimately what guides people’s thoughts and actions.
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Traumatic injury/memory gets stuck in the body as much if not more than anywhere else. And this is where psychiatry, psychology, and western medicine in general miss the boat. The DSM is an extreme example of how fragmented western approaches are.
Psychiatry and psychology have destroyed people’s faith in their ability to process emotional trauma without drugs or reliance on some fool’s idea of “psychotherapy”.
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That’s for damn sure. But it’s gotten even sicker since hitching its wagon to the pharmaceutical industry as anything that’s profitable financially inevitably controls the narrative. But megavitamin therapy sounds interesting though, as it probably helps restore people’s messed up physiology from either psychiatric drugs or other psychoactive substances like alcohol, etc.
And anything’s better than psychiatry’s sanitized drug hustling or psychology’s mindless minds fucks.
Definition for Mind Fuck: the process of raping someone’s intelligence and/or beliefs with lies and manipulation
Definition for Psychiatry and Psychology: the raping of someone’s intelligence and/or beliefs with lies and manipulation
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David,
Thank you for your generous offer, but right now I’m not needing it. But I don’t doubt EMDR’s effectiveness as trauma definitely gets stuck in the mind and memory, and people definitely need alternatives to psychiatry’s drug-happy medical model.
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Correction: psycho-TROPIC drugs, not “psychotic” drugs, although in my experience there’s not much difference —
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Scwnorway,
Thank you for the fantastic link.
It would be great if psychiatry were disbanded altogether. But realistically this won’t happen anytime soon because real change rarely comes from the top down. More likely to happen is psychiatry eventually going the way of cigarette smoking, meaning it will probably take a long time for the majority of the population to learn from bitter experience that psychiatry’s sick assortment of diagnoses and drugs are not the best answer.
However, I think it inevitable that the DSM will be formally discredited, hopefully with an admission that most psychic distress is caused by relational-environmental factors. And who knows? Maybe sooner rather than later an increasing number of general practitioners will be less likely to automatically prescribe psychotic drugs.
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I can’t say enough good things about something that fosters reconnecting with oneself rather than symptoms, i.e. psychiatry’s superficial “diagnoses”. Reconnecting With Yourself” needs to be everyone’s motto.
Your kind and considerate perspectives are EXACTLY where the “therapeutic model” (and anyone’s perspective for that matter) needs to be.
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And “talk therapy” is not only the epitome of capitalism, it’s capitalism at its worst —
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maedhbh,
Thank you for sharing your personal observations about therapy; they closely mirror my own:
1. The dishonesty of paying for kindness and compassion—which is the opposite of kindness and compassion
2. Using “transference” to protect and maintain what is essentially a destructive power dynamic
3. Money wasted on bad memories “dug up about which nothing can be done”
4. Being told you are incurably ill and hopelessly broken from someone with something to gain
5. Forced to cope with abandonment from boundaries “suddenly put up by a previously accepting therapist”
6. That most therapists are egomaniacs
7. That most therapists like having power over vulnerable people for all the wrong reasons which DEFINITELY “takes a certain level of arrogance to think that way”.
Thank you maedhbh for saying it all.
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And I forgot to mention how IFS uses curiosity in untangling the complexity of the mind rather than shutting it down with drugs or other narrow-minded “therapeutic” methods.
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Yes! Psychiatry’s continuous diagnostic rambling is enough to drive anyone batty.
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And because pharmaceutical companies are greedy —
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So what’s the point of “talk therapy”?
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Pictures speak louder than words.
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Thank you for agreeing with me, Someone Else. I just hope the world is finally ready to listen to something that’s long overdue.
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Terry,
I just visited your website (healingtheself.net) and am glad I did. It’s thorough without being exhaustive and accessible without being simplistic, something essential in an area as broad as mental health. Your “Perspectives” section is particularly illuminating as it includes the most relevant topics: “The Spectrum of Trauma”, “Breaking the Trauma Cycle”, “Western Medicine”, and “Internal Family Systems (IFS)”. It’s important you placed these topics together as these are all interconnected, and connecting the dots is something too few people are doing. And the quotes you’ve chosen are brilliant.
Thank you for devoting your life to something so important and central to what truly matters. I wish you the best in your new vocation.
Birdsong
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My anger at psychiatry ultimately lead to my leaving psychiatry—and in that way anger proved valuable.
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Dear Terry,
Thank you for saying everything that needs to be said about a non-pathologizing approach to psychic distress. You succeed in making the complicated understandable in a beautifully cogent way.
I appreciate your explaining in detail how Internal Family Systems parts-centric approach acknowledges not only the impact of the subconscious, but also “the notion of the Self” and how respecting that Self, one’s “true essence” or innate dignity, is central to the healing process, i.e., “becoming whole”. And I especially appreciate your mentioning how psychiatry is “locked into a paradigm of neurotransmitters and genetics, [that] misses what’s right in front of its face, and turns a blind eye to mountains of evidence supporting the role of environmental distress—i.e., trauma—in mental health.” Your ideas are SPOT ON.
I too believe “a revolution is brewing with respect to mental health treatment in our culture”, but more strongly I hope “the beauty of IFS” will be at the forefront this—and perhaps eventually of life itself.
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Psychiatry isn’t about humility, it’s about disconnection and judgment; it’s a psychological cancer that affects all of society.
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Imo, psychiatry is nothing more than an absurd gallery of pseudoscientific diagnoses whose DSM represents one gargantuan psychological autoimmune “disorder”.
It’s too bad psychiatry can’t diagnose its own own pathological tendency to diagnose and label everything under the sun.
In contrast, Internal Family Systems is a path towards true healing, as it’s based on compassion and common sense.
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Psychiatry isn’t about listening, it’s about imposing pseudoscientific beliefs on others.
And most of the time people are “diagnosed” before they’ve even uttered a word—and most of the time their goose is cooked if the doctor doesn’t like them.
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Never underestimate the power of the internet, and M.IA. is a good place to start.
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Correction: DIDDLY-SQUAT
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You can’t talk yourself into forgiving—it has to be felt—something I suspect Decartes knew diddly about.
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And psychiatry is neither intuitive NOR thoughtful—but it IS emotional nitpicking – –
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CORRECTION: Healthy forgiveness isn’t about inducing shame through emotional power plays.
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Imho, healthy forgiveness isn’t about inflicting guilt through emotional power plays.
And I think it’s more important to forgive oneself for not wanting to forgive those who have hurt us.
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I also bet Decartes, like most of today’s psychiatrists and psychologists, was secretly one angry dude—and Heaven knows there’s nothing more destructive than unacknowledged anger—which I think is the foundation of all of psychiatry and most of psychology.
And there’s nothing wrong with anger; it’s one of most instructive and protective emotions anyone can have—if dealt with authentically.
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There’s nothing objective about psychiatry; it sees people through a psychologically distorted lens.
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Dear Dr. Ophir,
There’s now a fighting chance—thanks to people like you—for which I’m eternally grateful.
And as word of your book gets out among the general public, I seriously believe you’ll find way more allies than foes.
Thank you for fighting the good fight, Dr. Ophir. I wish you all the best from now on in your truth-telling quest.
Birdsong
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Rasx,
Thank you for the wonderful quote from Heidegger:
“…there are thoughtless emotions but no emotionless thoughts…”
I think CBT is an exceptionally thoughtless approach. And how do I know this? Ummm…I’m not sure…I just had a feeling.…
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Thank you for thoroughly explaining the true nature of healthy forgiveness and questioning its value when it’s used to control people.
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Yet another attempt by the “mental health industry” to psychiatrize every culture with its tone-deaf heavy-handedness.
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Thank you for an outstanding article.
It’s heartening to know that Dr. Ophir’s book is receiving such positive scholarly reviews. I hope his bravery encourages others like him to speak out against the institutional gaslighting not only surrounding ADHD, but all the other scientifically baseless “diagnoses” that constitute the fallacious field of psychiatry. And I sincerely believe it’s only a matter of time before it collapses from the weight of its own lies.
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ericwsetz says, “The first step is a willingness to be there with the patient and understand what they are saying.”
Which just happens to be the basis of ANY healthy relationship, and most importantly needs to starts with the first: with one’s parents/caregivers in childhood
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ericwsetz says, “Patients are not out of their minds they are too deep in it.”
Yes! And it’s not just psychiatry — “psychotherapy” often sets up its own convoluted “clinical” traps for people needing to get OUT of their heads —
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CORRECTION: Decartes’ way of thinking always struck me as pretty ONE-SIDED — which has turned out to be a detriment to humanity, imho.
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So-called “mental health awareness” in schools is about as helpful as an infestation of head lice—psychological head lice, that is. They are no longer places to learn and be educated, they are places to be labeled and “medicated”.
And children often live up to a teacher’s worst expectations.
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And for what it’s worth, Descartes’ way of thinking always struck me as pretty narrow-minded—and I bet he was an egomaniac to boot!
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Psychological issues don’t belong in a medical textbook.
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Making value judgments based on forgiveness is not conducive to the healing process; it’s an entirely personal matter that can’t be dictated.
People forgive in their own time and in their own way, if at all—and whether or not that’s good or bad is for them alone to decide.
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Rebel,
Please note: nowhere did I claim that “forgiveness is impossible” — I said forgiveness is SOMETIMES impossible.
And I respectfully find your attitude towards a lack of forgiveness to be—for lack of a better word—unforgiving.
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CORRECTION: “That explains psychiatry’s main flaw: it refuses to see “SYMPTOMS” in context.
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Psychiatric labeling isn’t medical progress; it’s pejorative language/thinking caught in a time warp.
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“The motivation to remove the symptom has resulted in what Poole calls a “ever-increasing proliferation of context-less achievements…local scientific successes which precede even the remotest notion of how to deal with them ethically or how to integrate them into the needs of the totality.”
That explains psychiatry’s main flaw: its refusal to see experience in context.
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Charlotte says, “The discipline [psychiatry] pretends to be an objective classification of people, borrowing language (“diagnosis”) from physical medicine, which assigns the label of disease following the identification of a pathology, which one hopes can be targeted and cured. But the analogy fails in psychiatry. There are few known biological pathologies. And who is to say what cure is?”
Not only that—who’s to say what pathology is? And THAT’S the problem with psychiatry: it uses medicalized name-calling (“diagnoses”) to sell its designer drugs. And there’s a label for that: FRAUD —
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Some wounds never heal completely, and sometimes forgiveness is impossible, but there’s nothing shameful or “sick” about this. It’s just accepting emotional reality—something that leads to emotional maturity—which is the beginning of wisdom, something psychiatry knows little about.
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Fear of emotion is why some people see intellect as separate from the somatic.
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And the irony is psychiatry lacks the insight it accuses “patients” of lacking—which is WHY it’s ethically and scientifically vacant.
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The DSM isn’t objective; it’s evidence of psychiatry’s warped subjectivity.
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Psychiatry is entirely subjective. Indeed, how objective can it be when it’s based entirely on labeling WHATEVER IT ALONE deems “abnormal” or “unhealthy”?
But the real tragedy is that it fails to see how much it’s shaped by its own biased thinking.
But psychiatry isn’t about thinking; it’s about its practitioners NEEDING to think they’re ALWAYS right: hence they thunk up a COLOSSALLY STUPID DSM.
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CORRECTION:
Psychiatry INVENTS “illness” to defend its ignorance.
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Psychiatry creates “illness” to DEFEND its ignorance —
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Psychiatry’s “cycle of ignorance” is a revolving door that creates “illness” to maintain its ignorance.
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Psychiatry taught me to hate myself.
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Psychiatry isn’t medicine; it’s a medicalized Hall of Mirrors.
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And just WHAT did psychiatry’s carnival of catastrophe do for me besides create havoc with its debilitating drugs?
1. It made me doubt my reality
2. It hijacked my healthy sense of self
3. It convinced me I couldn’t function without its patronizing “interventions”
ALL of which proved untrue once I FINALLY got off its merry-go-round of so-called “mental illness” and smorgasbord of so-called “medications”.
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Professor Whooley says:
“Psychiatry persists because of the profession’s strategies to manage its ignorance…”
Translation: psychiatry persists because it believes its own lies.
“In order to make those changes and to promote those reinventions, psychiatrists engage in hype.”
Translation: psychiatry is more public relations than science.
“Now the flipside to hype is hubris. Psychiatrists believe the hype and then undertake these transformations in an incredibly aggressive way.”
Translation: psychiatry’s become big business by teaming up with the pharmaceutical industry and its advertising flunkies while sending its latest edition of the DSM to every doctor in town.
All of which leads to one conclusion: psychiatry is what happens when quackery meets propaganda.
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In a word? Emphatically NO. But it might be a step in the right direction if psychiatry realized that stress and trauma are the true culprit, not its idiotic assumptions of biological/genetic whatnot.
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And the same goes for psychology, too.
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Me too. After all, most religions are based on sacred texts that believe in salvation, whereas psychiatry, (a secular religion based on its DSM/bible) says you’re eternally damned —
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And what’s the BIGGEST source of neuroticism be it animal or human? The “mental health” industry, imho; it’s one big neuroticism factory
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Beatrice g,
I have to disagree with your saying that “fixing trauma” requires “therapeutic practices” when it’s been clearly demonstrated time and again that children, animals and adults heal best in loving, non-judgmental environments, which often means staying as far away as possible from the so-called “trauma experts”.
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Yes! The the social structure of today’s society and modern family dynamics are EXACTLY where “psychiatric problems” start. But psychiatry’s answer is to have the whole world drowning in “diagnoses” and drugs or endlessly spinning their wheels in diagnostic-infested “psychotherapy”.
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Very true. It’s sad reality when children aren’t safe in the very places they need it the most: home and school.
And a lot of doctors and “therapists” just continue the pattern of bullying and name-calling through “diagnosing” and labeling and call it “mental health”.
It’s no wonder the kids are upset when there’s nowhere to turn.
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I see psychiatry as medicalized bullying, and it’s important to stop bullying at its source.
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“What are the socio-cultural factors of modern society that drive [abuse and bullying]…?”
Let me take a wild guess…how about psychiatry!….you know, that marvelous bully-inspired invention that prescribes chemical dissociation instead of emotional integration…
“….and what can we do to reverse its course?”
First of all, QUIT making excuses by seeing people as “patients” instead of full human beings—be they children OR adults—which means DUMPING psychiatry and its endless list of invented “diagnoses”/“disorders” as soon as possible.
It all starts with seeing people as doing the best they can in a sick society, NOT the other way around.
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And I’ve often thought there’s way more to learn from watching “Dog Whisperer with Cesar Millan” than listening to so-called “trauma-informed” therapists or so-called “human” psychiatrists.
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Is there a difference between genetics and eugenics in psychiatry? Not much, imho.
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Psychiatry is just another way for egotistical people to deny reality in any way possible at other’s expense in more ways than one.
Alice Miller places blame where it belongs.
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Steve,
Freud chickened out alright. He turned out to be an egotistical coward more anything.
And thank you for pointing out the true reason behind blaming people’s brains: the refusal to face reality, both personally and collectively.
Looking at it historically, though, deflection has always been used by the ruling class, one way or another. Just look at the Middle Ages—but instead of blaming the brain, they blamed the devil.
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At least Freud had curiosity and imagination. But even these got out of control, not to mention his unhealthy need to always be right, a fixation no doubt shared by none other than the great Emil Kraepelin, the founder of psychiatric eugenics. (Opps! I think I meant ‘genetics’….)
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Imo, psychiatry keeps going around in circles because it’s main goal is power, not truth.
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I don’t think ‘experts’ like thinking too much (i.e. “mentalization”, or “reflective functioning”), because questioning their assumptions means questioning their power. So conversations with them too often pointless, I’ve found.
So what’s my answer? Hauling out the old “caveat emptor” approach. After all, doing your own research never hurt, and it just might save your life. Or just trust your own instincts and move on.
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I think a lot of problems come from people unconsciously needing to feel more powerful than the next person so they can get away with bossing people around; power means more than truth to them.
And this most likely comes from not having their emotional needs met in childhood, so having power-driven jobs like psychiatry or psychotherapy fills their unmet need to feel powerful.
So life for them becomes one big long “I know more than you” kind of game that they never outgrow, but instead of flexing their muscles, they’re flexing their egos, imho.
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The honor and pleasure is mine, Moyu. The world needs more people like you
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Dear Moyu,
Your art is amazing, just like you.
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Krista says, “The lack of apparent insight by the self-appointed ‘experts’ in human behavior is perfect bitter irony.”
Not only perfect bitter irony, but an uniquely cruel one that places misery upon misery, imho.
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Moyu says:
“Becoming more resilient means, for me, that I take the fragments of my identity which have become lost in the course of my life so far, and carefully and attentively re-assemble them into an intact ego so that I can perceive myself ever more accurately and clearly.”
“I look back on past times until they feel alive and warm….I believe that is helpful — and an essential part of living….”
“Given these accumulating personal observations, I find it hard to understand why, even today, research on schizophrenia focuses so heavily on genetics; why helping affected persons involves antipsychotics above all; and why the knowledge and experience of affected persons are barely recognized.”
“If we have an increased susceptibility to stress and psychosis, then there are always reasons for this, which are as individual as we ourselves are.”
“Excessive treatment with antipsychotics and psychiatric medication in general can hide the true causes of mental problems and disorders, stand in the way of real healing, and destroy real social interactions.”
“As humans and as inhabitants of the Earth we all depend on each other: physically, intellectually, and emotionally. So all of us need to be willing to learn from and with each other in mutual respect, to live together and establish a resilient community.”
Thank you for sharing your remarkable story and insights, Moyu. It’s a beautiful testament to the resilience of the human spirit. I hope it inspires real change in the mental health system and the world at large.
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Excellent comment.
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Moyu says, “…(when I had finally found a psychiatrist and psychotherapist who treated me as an equal…”
Being thought of as an equal and treated as an equal is where healing begins in any relationship.
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There’s a world of difference between trying to help people and trying to “fix” them. And imo, psychiatry doesn’t see the difference.
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I felt stigmatized by psychiatry, infantilized by psychotherapy, and demoralized by both—and diagnoses and power imbalance—the foundation of both—are the reasons why, imo.
No one seeking help needs to feel worse than they already do.
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Why not just leave “the experts” out of it?
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Here’s another word for shape-shifter: VAMPIRE.
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“…a shape-shifter who knows how to market himself.”
THAT says it all.
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Psychology has always had an inferiority complex when it comes to other sciences, but adding neurology to the mix just adds to the confusion.
Come to think of it, both psychology and psychiatry have an identity crisis because both believe they’re sciences.
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Professor Whooley says:
“Psychiatry persists because of the profession’s strategies to manage its ignorance…”
“In order to make those changes and to promote those reinventions, psychiatrists engage in hype.”
“Now the flipside to hype is hubris. Psychiatrists believe the hype and then undertake these transformations in an incredibly aggressive way.”
Excellent interview, but imho it’s just a long way of saying psychiatry is quackery.
And the definition for quackery is: dishonest practices and claims to have special knowledge and skill in some field, typically medicine.
Sounds like psychiatry to me.
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KateL says, “People who were abused in the mental health system are experts in how the system abuses people. I guess some people just can handle that objective fact.”
Very true. Your statement reveals how most “mental health experts” are incapable of self-reflection.
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Thank you KateL, for pointing out how the “experts” try to defend themselves by discrediting people who don’t share their views with stupid phrases like, “‘be careful not to over generalize’, and flipping from ‘this is objective fact’, to ‘ah well, it’s more art than science.’”
Did it ever occur to the “experts” that psychiatry and psychology ARE BASED on over generalizations???
When it suits the “experts” narrative they call it objective fact, and when THAT fails they haul out the old bromide, “it’s more art than science”, which simply means they don’t know what they are talking about.
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“…the gaslighter—like all verbal abusers—operates from what they know to be your fears, insecurities, vulnerabilities, and neediness.”
“Additionally, as in other types of verbal abuse, there has to be an imbalance of power with the gaslighter holding all the cards.”
“This [your inclination to doubt yourself] is something the gaslighter knows about and he or she stands ready to exploit.”
Psychiatrists AND therapists will often use these gaslighting dynamics to gain an unfair advantage over vulnerable people.
And people saying, “That’s just their training, they’re really just trying to help,” IS BULLSHIT because for the most part, people who have no problem using these tactics are more interested in HAVING POWER OVER OTHERS more than EMPOWERING OTHERS; they obviously prefer infantilizing people.
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“….sometimes all you need is a genuine person to help you stand up when you are down and reignite not the light at the end of the tunnel, but the light within yourself. Self-love and self-awareness are the key to a healthy life.”
Yes!!! THIS is the way to heal broken hearts, minds, lives and relationships, NOT name-calling (diagnoses) and “psychiatric medications”.
There’s nothing better than help from someone who’s been there and sees you as capable of helping yourself.
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Whether or not there’s neurological evidence of emotional trauma, the bigger problem lies in seeing the results (“symptoms”) as medical issues, i.e. “psychiatric diagnoses”; the medical model just continues the trauma of disrespect, blame, and neglect.
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Addition to number 3:
3. Not only seriously curtail the use of psychiatric drugs, but stop saying these “treat” a “chemical imbalance” or other “mental illness” that need to be taken “the rest of your life”.
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Thanks for the info, LivingPast27, though it looks like Europe has caught up: “How depression treatment differs throughout Europe”, from the Guardian. It shows how important it is that M.I.A. is getting a foothold in more and more countries around the world.
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Yes!!! Apologizing and making amends to the patients they’ve harmed is as important as anything. But I was trying to stay within the realm of the possible.
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True. But I think things will eventually change; it’s just going to take a lot more time and lot more needless suffering.
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Thank you Krista, for your detailed clarification.
I read Frances’ insulting rebuttal to the late Dr. Caplan, but I wasn’t surprised by his blatantly condescending attitude and remarks. But I do consider it an excellent example of the attitudes psychiatric survivors are up against, which is why self-rescue is too often the only option.
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Fraud, medical neglect, exploitation, and lack of patient/public education/information are what makes psychiatry psychiatry, and is why it needs to go the way of the dinosaur asap.
So what does “treating patients better” actually mean? It means any one of the following, but should begin with the first:
1. Throw out the DSM and do not replace it
2. Stop claiming that psychiatric problems are biological or genetically linked
3. Seriously limit the prescribing of psychiatric medications
4. Seriously limit the use of ECT
5. Make it illegal for any physician to force medicate or medically incarcerate
6. Replace psychiatry with the many alternatives currently available
And when these happen, no one will be needing to find an exit.
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Psychiatry is eugenics in action:
“Screening for Mental Illness: The Merger of Eugenics and the Drug Industry”, by Vera Hassner Sharav, MLS, from The Alliance for Human Research Protection
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As I previously stated, if people want to take psychiatric drugs or undergo ETC, that’s their business. What I object to is psychiatry falsely claiming that people’s problems are lifelong and biologically or genetically based, permitting the overprescribing of psychiatric drugs while downplaying the risks, and last but not least their ability to force treatments or involuntarily hospitalization on people which can be for indefinite periods of time.
Psychiatry’s abuse of medicine, power, and people’s human rights got a HUGE boost when psychiatrists collectively decided in 1980 to adopt the medical model through an admittedly flawed checklist system for their admittedly flawed DSM, which makes psychiatry not only misleading, but downright fraudulent. And the resulting devastation to both individuals and society are becoming increasingly apparent and definitively undeniable.
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The body-brain chemical makeup can greatly affect how emotions are felt and thoughts are perceived. And lots of things can screw it up: too much stress (emotional, psychological or physical), prescription medications, environmental or recreational substances, and even bangs on the head. But none of these indicate biologically or genetically caused illnesses.
From the New York Post: “Why more women, like me, are abandoning the pill over emerging health concerns” by Rikki Schlott.
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Correction: “If people want to take “psychiatric medication” or subject themselves to ECT, that’s their business, but they need to be CLEARLY informed of significant risks of side effects and/or withdrawal reactions both immediate and future, and that NO “illness” is being “treated”.
And NO ONE should have the legal authority to force any “treatment”, or “hospitalize” someone who hasn’t committed a crime.
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Ideally, all medicine should be based in a Functional-Holistic paradigm. But present reality demands no longer seeing emotional distress through a medical/diagnostic lens, beginning with a dissolution of psychiatry and its DSM.
If people want to take “psychiatric medication” that’s their business, but they need to clearly know there’s significant risk of side effects and/or withdrawal reactions, and that no “illness” is being “treated”.
And no one should have the legal authority to hospitalize someone who hasn’t committed a crime.
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It’s not hard seeing how disconnected modern society is when you stop to think how insane it is having people pay someone for emotional support—and on top of THAT calling it “mental healthcare”. It’s not a sign of progress; it’s a sign of degradation.
And as corny as it sounds, things won’t change until people get out of their heads and into their hearts.
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Worth a listen: “Release Trapped Emotions in 2023”, a video by Eckhart Tolle
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Daisy Valley is right. Psychiatry and Big Pharma have become a huge, financially driven bureaucracy.
If only more people knew just how petty psychiatry really is, then maybe things would start to change.
And all they need to do is look in the DSM.
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dogworld says, “…the power structure of psychiatry is the root of the issue…”
That’s where the problem begins and why psychiatry needs to end.
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Richard says, “Unfortunately, you have fallen into Healy’s “oh so charming” trap of pragmatic rationalizations for justifying oppression.”
I agree with Richard.
IMHO, most psychiatrists are driven by an unconscious need to hide from their own hidden vulnerabilities. Why else would they seek to obliterate feelings through drugs and ECT?
And psychiatry’s veneer of science gives the illusion of invulnerability.
It’s all about power, similar to what drives most bullies or those who want to be seen as saviors.
Freud was absolutely right about one thing: the unconscious influences behavior. And scientists are no exception.
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Psychiatry uses science as a smokescreen for its evil.
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Most psychiatrists unconsciously expect people to kowtow to their supposed “expertise”.
And those who won’t can expect to be punished, i.e. diagnoses, drugs, and ECT.
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There’s one way people can cut their losses: simply call a spade a spade.
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There’s surgical lobotomy, chemical lobotomy, and electrical lobotomy.
What more does anyone need to know???
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“….an impoverished sense of self….”
THAT’S the defining feature of “psychiatry” and “psychology”.
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Thank you for pointing this out. Your example sounds much better. My sentence wasn’t grammatically correct, but I do try my best.
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Steve,
Expecting people to kowtow reveals the kind of people working in the “mental health” system.
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Freud was by no means the first to divine the meaning of dreams. Any study of ancient cultures would show you that.
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KateL says, “We have a basic right to human dignity…I was robbed of that right…”
This is why psychiatry should be abolished.
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Why rely on “experts” who haven’t experienced ECT?
Aren’t people’s personal accounts enough?
Has anyone bothered to ask the dear Dr. Healy (or anyone else who can’t make up their minds about the dangers of ECT) if they’d be willing to subject themselves or their loved ones to ECT?
How much more “proof” does anyone need?
Science has been put on a pedestal that leads people away from their intuition and common sense.
“The experts” would be wise to remember there’s a point at which “nuance” becomes a hindrance to seeing and accepting the cold, hard truth.
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No one need rely on “psychotherapists” to process their trauma. People can do a lot on their own, in their own time, in their own way: writing /journaling, reading, listening to people’s experience on podcasts and videos, talking with friends or family members, including animals, engaging in hobbies or creative pursuits, volunteering, and spending as much time as possible in nature.
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Sam Plover says:
“I suggest we all become shrinks or lawyers and then we will be safe from slander. It will then come down to who can outslander whom.”
THAT’S what psychiatry boils down to: SLANDER —
“They are a childish, immature, selfish hateful bunch….you better tread careful.”
Indeed. Only childish adults think the way most psychiatrists and psychotherapists do, i .e. having to believe they’re always right, and having temper tantrums when “patients” tell them they’re not.
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Wow. Who would’ve guessed that talking to someone could be helpful??? And wouldn’t it be great if people weren’t made to believe they need an “expert”???
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Psychiatry and psychology are the inevitable result when the denigration and exploitation of human beings becomes second nature.
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Thank you, Lori.
I’m very sorry getting off the psych drugs is causing you so much pain and trouble. It can take a long time for your body to readjust. And it’s even harder when the people who should know something don’t.
I don’t know what’s worse, the effects of the so-called “medications” or the stupidity of the so-called “therapists”. The whole thing’s a scam, imho.
Just hang in there as best you can, believing you will get through this.
Birdsong
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Yes!!! Everything in psychiatry and psychology is morally wrong and NOTHING they believe is beneficial and therefore IS NOT JUSTIFIED.
And spending time in nature is magical.
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Psychiatry’s political abuse ALWAYS exists in some form, beginning with its so-called “diagnoses”.
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They it called “psychopathy” to make it sound impressive so they can charge a fee when all it is listening, and most psychotherapists do a lousy job of that.
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Somehow, the destructive idea that psychological problems are medical has to be discredited and dismantled.
Universities no longer educate; they complicate and discriminate.
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Most psychotherapists see people as “disordered”, just like most psychiatrists do
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The term “psychotherapy” implies illness which indicates medical which leads to the can of worms called “psychiatric diagnoses”. It’s as weaponized as psychiatry.
On the other hand, the word “counseling” has a much less negative connotation, i.e. legal counsel, pastoral counsel, guidance counsel, parental counsel, etc. And in these situations, people are share knowledge, experience, wisdom and guidance that (hopefully) isn’t biased on pseudoscientific “diagnostic” beliefs.
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And THAT goes for “professionals” as much as ANYONE ELSE —
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I no longer use words like “depression” or “anxiety”. I just say sad or apprehensive.
And the same goes if someone is acting in a way I dislike. So instead of saying something nasty like “sounds like someone has a personality disorder”, I just take the time to describe their behavior.
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But it IS consistently based on a “power imbalance” and the exchange of money, something that’s unfair, unnecessary, unhealthy and inappropriate when all it is is talking with someone.
And psychotherapists are trained in psychiatric ideologies, i.e. “mental illness”, “psychiatric diagnoses”; they’re psychiatrists without a prescription pad which can be even more damaging.
Either way, it’s all about power, manipulation and money.
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There’s one criticality important thing Ms.Heller doesn’t mention, or perhaps is unable/unwilling to see: that it’s not uncommon for manipulative people to be working as mental health professionals.
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Sounds like just more Big Brother.
Powerful organizations always try to fix things after the fact, and can’t see how perhaps they and society are part of the problem.
Children and adults need emotional support from people who truly care about their wellbeing, but not from prying professionals paid to police their private lives.
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This is true, but I think most are too dissociated to comprehend what’s really going on. The ones at the top of the heap are another matter entirely.
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Dear Ramesh,
You might look into something at The Withdrawal Project (TWP). It’s part of ICI, the Inner Compass Initiative. These are dedicated to helping people who are looking to reduce or come off psychiatric drugs.
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Birdsong made a mistake.
Bill Wells says, “…some organizations can be extraordinarily closed.”
And Birdsong says, “Most of these belong to psychiatrists.”
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And btw, Freud wasn’t the first to notice the importance of dreams. Just look in bible.
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Beatrice g asks, “What lie are you referring to?
I can think of two, right off the bat: little girls have “penis envy”, and little boys want to sleep with their mother.
Worth a glance: “Was Freud right about anything? Spoiler: not really., By Benjamin Plackett, from LIVESCIENCE
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It’s been said many times before: it’s important live with both eyes WIDE OPEN —
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Brilliantly written and powerfully cogent article.
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HERE IT IS!!! In print! Just what I’ve always sensed and been trying to say here all along, which is that psychiatry (and its loyal sycophantic twin known as “psychotherapy”) are BULLSHIT GALORE —
“Goffman [a sociologist] emphasizes the role stigma plays in psychiatric diagnosis and treatment by expounding on its insidious barrier to recovery and the dehumanization and de-personalization which stimulates further damage and marginalizes victims. Essentially stigma breeds contempt and contempt breeds blame.”
Such are the so-called “healing” dynamics of psychiatry and its partner in crime “psycho-therapy.”
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Dear Beata,
You’re not alone in your efforts in truth telling. These videos might be of interest to you, at least in spirit:
“This Changes Everything|Graham Hancock Interview” with Russell Brand
“Free Julian Assange: Noam Chomsky, Dan Ellsberg, & Jeremy Corbyn Lead Call at Belmarsh Tribunal” from Democracy Now!
Take care,
Birdsong
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To yinyang:
I wasn’t fully aware of that, but I think MIA is as radical as I’m comfortable with. And I also think it’s a good idea to post in a place that has a somewhat more broad appeal, as something more radical might be too radical and therefore reach fewer people.
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And worth watching:
“Bill Gates Said WHAT About Vaccines?!” By Russell Brand
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Worth reading:
“Political Abuse of Psychiatry—An Historical Overview”, by Robert van Voren
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“Today, the vast majority of psychiatric drugs are prescribed by general practitioners.”
Psychiatric drugs are harmful—no matter how you get them.
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Another good question.
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Bill Wells says, “As Tip O’Neill wound suggest, the politics start at the local level. And some organizations can be extraordinarily closed.”
Psychiatry’s not medical. Never was, never will be. It’s political, which is why it needs to go.
The political (punitive) abuse of psychiatry already exists in some form as evidenced by people’s inaccurate beliefs and attitudes towards people with psychiatric labels and the laws permitting forced psychiatric drugging and detention. And this will continue as long as psychiatry exists in any form. And THAT’S the truth and the horror OF IT ALL.
And psychiatry has people up a creek because being a former or current user can make it difficult to be taken seriously, or even ruin someone’s life personally and professionally. (Did I say psychiatry is political? Yes I did!) So people are left with word of mouth that thankfully is often the most effective (and safest) way for real change to happen.
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I refuse to become someone’s puppet, psychiatry’s or M.I.A.’s —
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It’s collective denial.
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Violence isn’t always physically brutal; sadism often looks benign.
Psychiatry is a case in point: it offers a way for traumatized people to unconsciously deny their trauma by wearing the mask of “doctor” so to legally traumatize people in the name of “treatment”. It’s sanitized sadism.
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Psychiatry is inverted psychopathy: I see it as sadism disguised.
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You learn everything except what’s most important. And what’s most important? How to steer clear of the “mental health system”.
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I believe it. And it’s why I keep saying psychiatry is drug pushing.
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Neoliberalist gives advice:
b. Individuals experiencing misery are strongly urged to “get into therapy”.
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All that garbage to get into college so you can become a “psychiatrist”. Explains a lot.
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This is how I see it:
Psychiatry’s hauling out their old standby CYA (Cover Your Ass) medicine because they’re afraid of the lawsuits headed their way. So they’re jumping on the bandwagon before it’s too late.
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Many thanks to MIA for giving voice to those who have been unfairly criticized, silenced, targeted, imprisoned, tortured, censured and censored by psychiatry and its advocates.
I hope someday there will be no need for it.
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JamesHillmamdownwiththereligionofscientism says:
“This a killing game from the beginning. This is not even a human relationship. It is artificial relation based on false assumptions…”
Exactly! The standard “I’m fine, you’re not,” paradigm works great for “mental health professionals”. Now how can that be?….
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And if THAT ever happens, I’m getting the HELL outta here!
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yinyang :
“Psychiatry works to preserve the unjust corporate-dominated system under which we live.”
That’s the truth. They simply go along to get along.
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And all you need to do is follow the money.
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It’s wonderful when people support each other.
But most psychiatric prisoners have no support.
Has anyone thought if there were no “psychiatry” there’d be no Jim Flannerys???
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yinyang says, “These people can NEVER speak for us.”
Absofuckinlutely.
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Bradford,
How very sweet of YOU!!!
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Amen, Bradford! I’ve no doubt it will eventually happen…
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To yinyang,
I don’t have a public email, but I’m honored by your suggestion.
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I think legally banning the DSM should be FIRST on the list.
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Kate W.’s story painfully illustrates how nothing messes with your identity more cruelly and unjustly than a psychiatric diagnosis.
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Kate W. writes, “This is the problem with being a consumer — we get consumed.”
Wow. Reading this article confirmed my worst suspicions about people who work in the mental health system. Nonetheless I was deeply saddened as I read Kate W.’s painfully vivid account.
And it’s an eye opener for anyone holding illusions about creating alliances in a mental health system based on stigma and invasions of privacy.
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David Oaks says:
“All this focus on psychiatry is a bit old fashioned.”
Psychiatry’s history of human rights violations has continued unabated to this day and is becoming increasingly widespread due to the undeniable association among psychiatry, Big Pharma, mainstream media, academia, and the legislative/judicial/policy-making branches of government. So promoting alliance between supporters and opponents of the current mental health system reveals not only a serious lack of understanding and concern for those caught in the mental health system, but a disturbing complacency that is best described as irresponsible.
I don’t ever consider the fight for ANYONE’S human rights “old fashioned!”
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People holding seriously different views can unite on individual issues; it happens every day and is called democracy.
However, psychiatry is the only branch of medicine that seriously infringes on people’s basic human rights.
I therefore see aligning with people who believe in psychiatry as making a deal with the devil; this, however, does not preclude aligning over specific issues.
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Thank you, Bradford for CLEARLY stating:
“A psychiatric “diagnosis” is the medical equivalent of a six-pointed yellow star pinned on your clothing….”
Truer words were never spoken.
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I second those measures.
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Thank you, yinyang, for pointing out this important distinction.
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I’ve never viewed all “consumers” as the same. Whatever someone decides to do is their business.
What I object to is psychiatry’s violating people’s human rights by feeding them lies.
And building alliances where there’s major conflicts of interests is counterproductive, especially when one side has more power than the other. So in this area I see collaboration and half measures as ultimately harmful for those who need help the most.
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Yes, and psychiatry uses fear (on some level) to “win” every argument, or “discussion”, which makes things airtight for them, but suffocates others.
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Exactly. And that’s just the way psychiatry wants it!
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SoSaysAbilene says:
“When the oppressed set aside all disagreements with their oppressors, there will be no discussion, no collaboration, no compromise. Just capitulation and silence.”
Welcome to the world of “psychiatry”.
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Protecting and restoring human rights requires addressing and eradicating problems at their source, which in this case is psychiatry. But unfortunately, too many supporters of the current mental health system either cannot see or refuse to acknowledge this.
Fortunately, more and more people are gradually seeing what “psychiatry” actually stands for, which is the denial of human rights.
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madmom asks, “….if you do not believe in constructive dialogues between psychiatric survivors, consumers, family members, and mental health professionals, if you do not believe in recruiting allies from within the helping professions, what is your preferred strategy for implementing a global revolution of the mental health system? What activities do you believe will result in a safer, more humane world?”
First of all, I DO believe in constructive dialogue with anyone. But that is not the same as forming alliances, something that is NOT constructive when fundamental beliefs are fundamentally incompatible.
And my strategy for implementing a global revolution of the mental health system is supporting and contributing to MIA which I believe IS resulting in a safer, more humane world, as speaking out in whatever way possible is the MOST concrete action ANYONE can take.
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David Oaks says:
“All this focus on psychiatry is a bit old fashioned.”
Human rights violations committed by psychiatry and its wide assortment of allied professionals has continued unabated to this very day, and are growing increasingly widespread due to the undeniable alliances formed among psychiatry, Big Pharma, mainstream media, academia, and the legislative/judicial/policy-making branches of government. So promoting alliances between supporters and dissenters reveals not only a serious lack of understanding and concern for those caught in today’s mental health system, but a disturbing complacency that can only be described as irresponsible.
My question is this: WHO in their right mind would ever consider the fight for ANYONE’S human rights to be “old fashioned”?
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David Oaks says:
“All this focus on psychiatry is a bit old fashioned.”
Violations committed by psychiatry and its wide assortment of cooperating practitioners not only continues unabated to this day, but are getting increasingly worse with the increasing coordination of psychiatry, big Pharma, academia, government agencies, courts, and the mainstream media. So promoting cooperation between supporters and dissenters reveals a disturbing complacency about the serious issues people face when caught in today’s mental health system, which is not only very disturbing, but most irresponsible.
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Janne says, “It really bothers me that the whole belief that science can prove the necessity of something and that educated professionals can make good decisions for others has been going on for so long. When that happens some personal and political goals are pushed in the scientific evidence base and expressed as objective fact. But those that are interested in these kinds of philosophical problems seem few.”
Agreed. Where people used to automatically point to their bible, they’re now saying, “it’s the science” about darn near everything, from dog food to psychiatric drugs. It’s become a meaningless trope.
And it’s society’s collectively uncritical embrace of anything that looks or sounds remotely “scientific” that has led to the neglect of teaching people how to think philosophically and critically question the prevailing narratives about “mental health”. What started as misguided Freudian interpretations gradually merged with “science” and steadily morphed into the public’s unquestioning acceptance of psychiatry’s medical model. It’s become the world’s latest and greatest example of mass indoctrination.
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Kudos to you, Beata, for bravely standing up for the truth. Your courage is truly inspiring.
Please know I’m sending you my heartfelt thanks and support, and am wishing you the best of luck.
Birdsong
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Many thanks and kudos to you, Beata, for your bravery in standing up for the truth. Your courage is truly inspirational.
Please know I’m sending you my heartfelt support, and am wishing you the best of luck,
Birdsong
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And I’ll keep hoping I’m not mistaken in thinking that allowing dissenting opinions is what MIA is all about.
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Many thanks and kudos to you, Beata, for standing up for what you believe in.
Bravery has tragically become a scarce commodity in the world these days.
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Janne says, “It really bothers me that the whole belief that science can prove the necessity of something and that educated professionals can make good decisions for others has been going on for so long. When that happens some personal or political goals are pushed in the scientific evidence base and expressed as objective fact. But those that are interested in these kinds of philosophical problems seem few.”
Agreed. It used to be people automatically saying things like, “the Bible says so”, to where they’re now automatically saying, “it’s the science” about darn near everything, from psychiatric drugs to dog food.
Sadly, today our societies’ collectively uncritical infatuation with science has led to not teaching people how to think critically and question prevailing theories. The mass indoctrination that began with Freud has morphed into the public’s unquestioning acceptance of “bio-psychiatry”.
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Shaming and excluding people for not sharing one’s sanguine sentiments is intolerant, and collectively breeds authoritarianism.
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Ms. Aybar’s says, “As it is, the clinical psychology field continues to promote and monetize the dehumanization of mentally ill people. When will the dehumanization of people with lived experience in mental illness stop?”
Excellent question. But I doubt things will change anytime soon due to the prevailing satisfaction with the status quo from those in leadership positions. But thanks to stories like Ms. Aybar’s, people’s efforts now have a fighting chance, as her story powerfully and painfully pulls back the curtain on the poisonous mindsets currently being inculcated in the very places one would think there would be none.
But I never held many illusions, as I always had the uncomfortable sense that the psychotherapeutic field too often brings out the worst in very people who work in it.
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To Robert Whitaker and Anyone Else,
My using the phrase “sleeping with the enemy” was not intended to be a personal attack on Mr. Oaks or the work he does. I consider the phrase a reasonable choice for anyone who has experienced psychiatry’s abuses and therefore understandably disagrees with Mr. Oak’s efforts to unite people with markedly different perspectives.
I personally find psychiatry’s many documented malfeasances to be much too serious to allow for any common ground with those who harbor more sanguine feelings. And criticizing those who for good reason harbor less sanguine feelings seems counter to the purposes of this webzine, one of which, if I’m not mistaken, is to give voice to those who have been unfairly targeted, criticized, silenced, tortured, censured and censored by psychiatry and its advocates. And I sincerely hope MIA continues refraining from such practices.
Respectfully,
Birdsong
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“Psychiatric diagnosing” is a euphemism for shooting the messenger or blaming the victim. More plainly, it’s medicalized hate speech.
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Unless they haul out that sorry substitute for “collaboration” they call “shared decision”, their pathetic attempt to maintain control by appearing cooperative.
But when push comes to shove, they know damn well who holds the power, and they’ll not likely to willingly relinquish ANY of it.
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And how do most psychiatrists “shoot the messenger”?
By doling out “diagnoses”.
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Yup! It’s “my way or the highway” for most psychiatrists, that’s for sure —
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Thank you yinyang for shedding some light on the situation.
To me it’s mind-boggling how defensive most psychiatrists and their advocates get whenever people disagree with them, especially when presenting evidence of psychiatry’s many obvious harms and fallacies. They invariably go into attack mode attempting to shred someone’s character, i.e. “shooting the messenger” —
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Stopping psychiatry’s obvious abuses, (involuntary commitment, forced drugging, ECT, or “psychosurgery”) won’t be enough, because psychiatry’s harms are rooted in its own false premises; more colloquially, psychiatry is psychological vermin that needs to eradicated, not merely “tweaked”.
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Yes!!! Subjugation rules the day in psychiatry.
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You’re probably right, yinyang. However, most psychiatrists have no concern for the hatred, confusion and pain their profession creates.
And no one ever attained meaningful change using euphemisms.
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Steve,
Thank you for this comment. It reminded me of the term “willful ignorance”. So I looked up the definition and think it perfectly describes most “mental health professionals”, from instructor on down.
Willful ignorance is: “Tactical Stupidity. The practice can entail completely disregarding established facts, evidence, and/or reasonable opinions if they fail to meet someone’s expectations”
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It’s uncanny how typical it is for therapists and psychiatrists to turn a deaf ear to people’s real concerns, as they usually demand to be seen as having more knowledge than anyone else, especially when they know they don’t!
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The hypocrisy begins with saying that “experts know best”. The fraud begins when they’re paid for it.
Learning to live comes from actually living, not from those paid to read from a script.
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Problems begin in assuming that “professionals know best”. And hypocrisy begins when they’re paid for it.
You learn to live from actually living, not from people who read from a script.
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Bradford ,
I’m not blaming Woanjun Lee. I’m stating my opinion on the study he’s reporting on. And I think important to keep tabs on what passes for “science.”.
And I fully agree with you that psychiatry is definitely unkind, and prescribes powerful neurotoxins.
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KateL,
Your DBT therapist was gaslighting you. It’s the typical therapist’s modus operandi.
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KateL says:
“…at some point the best decision is to say, screw all the therapies.”
THAT was the beginning of healing for me.
“At some point, the patient realizes that maybe the “treatment providers” enjoy seeing patients face rejection, suffer, fail. It’s the only thing that makes sense.”
THAT’S what I’ve always thought! I think a lot therapists unconsciously live to experience schadenfreude; why else would they seek power over others?
And some are definitely full-blown sadists.
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Psychiatric survivors don’t need any more burdens placed upon them.
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To my dear friend Bradford,
Are you asking me? If so, here’s my answer:
No one should be expected or pressured to form an alliance with people who refuse to fully accept and stop the harms they cause, even if they stop harming.
Survivors aren’t responsible for appeasing their perpetrators.
Allying with psychiatry is allying with barbarism.
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Thank you, Someone Else. THAT’S what psychology is: “The Study of the Blatantly Obvious”.
And so is psychiatry.
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You learn how to live life THROUGH LIVING IT — not from “professionals” who don’t have enough sense to know that psychiatric labels are BULLSHIT.
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Someone Else is right. The whole “mental health system” is “intrusive, insane, and devoid of common sense.”
And most people who work in it get drunk on power, sooner or later.
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Thank you, anotherone. That’s very kind of you.
And it actually means something because no one made you say it.
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People need to learn better ways of taking care of themselves emotionally, and this doesn’t happen through “diagnoses”. It happens by being with others who openly share their own struggles, not people who hide behind “credentials” in order charge a fee.
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“The Power Imbalance”
“Today, there are few opportunities to get help without also receiving a diagnosis.”
This is the root of the problem caused by the current “mental health system”. As soon as a diagnosis is given, an insidious process of infantilization starts taking place that may not be dislodged until serious damage is done to someone’s self-concept. It’s as damaging as calling a child “bad”.
“You make yourself the master of another through language and the power inherent in language.”
This is exactly what psychiatric language does, FOR psychiatrists, and anyone else who uses it. It gives the illusion of power and knowledge when all it actually does is strip people of their own.
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This conference is a huge step in the right direction. But I’m afraid it’s just going to spawn another school of “therapy” that inevitably puts itself ahead the client. In other words, just another ego trip for unhealed, unconsciously insecure therapists.
What helped me get beyond therapy better than anything was learning to heal myself through self-therapy, courtesy Daniel Mackler’s many videos and books. No gimmicks, just truth, through and through.
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Just goes to show what some people are made of.
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And most therapists “treat trauma” like it’s the flu.
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Art can threaten those in power because it reflects the unconscious, something they instinctively know they can’t control.
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“Johnstone points out that if you only have a trauma-informed focus, you can fall into a trap of becoming too individual-focused and forgetting the interaction with the power structures in society.”
This point can’t be emphasized enough. Therapist who say they “treat trauma” are doing the same thing as those who use DSM labels, making “trauma” just another label that ignores the surrounding situation, or “story”.
The only thing people need is to be heard by someone who doesn’t hijack their story, “trauma” or not.
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Psychiatrists and psychologists don’t “diagnose” anything, but they frequently do misinterpret EVERYTHING —
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– “Words affect both the person who utters the words and those who receive them.”
THAT’S an understatement. Psychiatric language devalues people and allows practitioners to talk down to them. Not very “therapeutic”.
– “But psychiatry has the problem that it does not base itself on what people actually say, but what it thinks they mean.”
Here’s what most psychiatrists (and psychologists) fail to see: that DSM “diagnoses” are no more accurate and even less useful than the Freudian interpretations of yesteryear. In other words, they’ve merely exchanged one bogus idea for another. Not very “insightful”.
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Artistic ability is one of the greatest gifts to give the world. But unfortunately, most of it isn’t respected unless it’s profitable.
But I think it goes deeper than that, as art sometimes reflects things people aren’t willing to see. And a lot of the hostility comes from jealousy.
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It’s paternalistic, alright, and in all the worst ways.
All it proves is that people, both men and women, take for granted someone running their home or having their kids.
They need to remember that people are PAID for doing housework, and that women can now RENT OUT THEIR WOMB—and if THAT isn’t “work”, I don’t know what is.
And that’s a lot more work than any man will ever do.
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Sure sounds like it.
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I’m surprised they haven’t already. They’ve co-opted just about everything else: “art therapy”, “dance therapy”, “music therapy”, and—how could I forget—“talk therapy”.
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Genuine acts of kindness and freely chosen social connections do more than improve so-called “negative affect”, they prevent it. And no one needs a study to know that.
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Some people are too arrogant to grasp the true nature, meaning and reason for religion: feelings of awe, gratitude and humility—all of which are spiritual—something they’re loath to accept, for who knows what reason.
It’s too bad when people have no sense of the transcendent. But some people have no ability to be humble.
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People like E. Fuller Torrey are too arrogant to grasp the true nature and meaning and reason for religion: a sense of awe, humility, and gratitude—which are non-material, which means spiritual—something he seems loath to understand.
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Why would anyone want to unite with people who promote themselves to persecute others?
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Emotional distress and psychological collapse doesn’t come from out of the blue. It comes from one of two things:
1. Bad things happening that no one can be blamed for, or
2. Getting treated like shit from people who should know better
Kindness and social connection are the foundation of any healthy relationship, NOT “chemical imbalances”
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Someday psychiatry and its “therapeutic” offshoots will be seen for what they truly represent: complicated defense mechanisms used to hide from emotional reality.
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l.e._cox says, “The biggest problem with most academics (not to generalize) is that they can’t confront, and thus see problems as much more complicated than they really are.”
THAT’S the god’s honest truth. But some people get a kick out of complicating things. Or maybe they’re just cowards.
NEWSFLASH: Psychiatry’s not rocket science. And neither is psychology, for that matter. But making people think they are can bring in lots of self-satisfaction, not to mention plenty of dough.
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And what is “spontaneous social connection”? Friendship. And no one should have to pay for that, i.e. “psycho-therapy”.
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Spirituality is innate. Religions are arbitrary inventions.
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Someone Else says, “….declaring all “woman’s work” volunteer work…is a staggeringly paternalistic attitude.”
Some do “woman’s work” for a living. They’re called nannies, housekeepers and cooks.
Some unfairly judge and denigrate for a living. A lot of them are psychiatrists and therapists.
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There’s no love in psychiatry.
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Psychiatric drugs numb the emotions and thus prevent the processing of trauma.
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Thank you Dr. Gotzsche for your dedication to truth and integrity. A textbook critical of psychiatry’s current inaccurate narrative is badly needed, and I hope it gains traction in mainstream circles.
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“Researchers have debated what it means to recover from mental illness, with “professional” opinions often differing greatly compared to service user opinions.”
I think psychiatrists are extremely arrogant to think they’re the ones to decide what “recovery”means.
And most think you’re “sick” if you’re not punching someone else’s time clock.
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Doctors are the ones who are addicted to drugs. Patients are just being “compliant”.
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Psychiatric drugs prevent the processing of grief from trauma.
Feeling the feelings is how healing happens.
And no one “needs a therapist” to do it.
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“Meth but for children”.
Scary but true.
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Psychiatry’s replaced it with diagnoses and drugs, while other psychs preach “resilience”, “mindfulness” or that granddaddy of them all, “psychotherapy”.
The un-psyched call it “proactive”.
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It’s spiritual gaslighting.
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Beautiful. Only love. No labels, drugs, or “psycho-therapy”.
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That’s the gist of it all.
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Breakdowns could be breakthroughs, if psychiatry left people alone.
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Psychiatric diagnosing is codified abuse. It’s medicalized gaslighting.
And psychiatry’s only concern is protecting its own turf.
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These researchers need to grow up, get real, and to quit trying to win the science fair.
It’s way past time to feed someone’s empty stomach instead of their own bloated ego.
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How’s this for an alternative: find something to do other than ruining people’s lives.
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Telling children there’s something wrong with their brain damages their budding sense of self.
It’s a sanitized form of psychological abuse.
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Sheltering in place was a huge relief because it gave me a reason to stay out of places where music is constantly played. And things are a lot quieter with the advent of earphones. A lot less musical bombardment, which helped me gain some mental and emotional equilibrium.
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Psychiatry and psychology promote unrealistic standards for people’s thoughts, feelings and behavior. They’re very judgmental. Just like religion often is.
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My late aunt was hospitalized only once in her life for the only psychotic episode she ever had. Thank goodness the attending psychiatrist realized she was suffering from a one-time event because she hadn’t been that way before. So when she was discharged she didn’t fill any prescriptions or continue with “therapy”. And she was never psychotic again.
And what was the matter? She was suffering from extreme loneliness.
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Thank you again, Bradford, for your steadfast support.
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justsayno86,
I think people who don’t realize they’re psychiatric prisoners are unconsciously using defense mechanisms, i.e. “Stockholm syndrome” or “identification with the aggressor”) as a means of survival.
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The only reason Allen Frances did an about-face on the DSM was because he saw it was becoming a laughing stock, not because he suddenly grew a conscience.
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“One thing psychiatrists will never invent is Ethics Deficit Disorder and put themselves or their own brethren through some brain scan studies.”
“Ethics Deficit Disorder is no more or less real than Borderline Personality Disorder, Oppositional Defiant Disorder or Internet Gaming Disorder.”
Terrific comments, registeredforthissite.
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I would never tell someone to drink from a poisoned well, nor to walk over quicksand.
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Good question.
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There’s nothing ethical about the mental health system.
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Thank you very much, justsayno86. I greatly appreciate your generous appreciation.
You are right. Psychiatry IS the greatest enemy. But it’s an invisible enemy, which makes it more dangerous. And people definitely need to be warned.
I also can’t imagine why anyone would ever want to unite psychiatric survivors with psych consumers. And anyone who thinks it’s a good idea shows a serious lack of understanding.
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Thank you, Bradford. Your kind words and support mean a lot to me.
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Lawsuits and snobbery are the name of of the game.
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Constantly hearing music stresses me out, and I never knew how much until the pandemic.
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I doubt Ghandi or Dr. King would criticize or censor someone speaking what is true for them, as this is inhumane.
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One definition of science is “interpreting an observation of the environment that is limited by the tools available for observing”.
But most psychiatrists and psychologists lack the most important tool: an open mind.
Psychiatry and psychology see people through a diagnostic lens, which is the epitome of evil in anyone’s language.
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And what is “soul growth”? It’s the “evolution of a person’s spirit on the journey from fear to love”.
And what’s the purpose of “spiritual growth”? “To help you embody your soul or Higher Self, to shift from ego to Soul”.
But psychiatry and psychology call people “sick”, which makes these both the Devil Incarnate.
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Spirituality essentially means emotional growth, which means the broadening, deepening or “maturing” of a person’s soul, which means gaining an awareness and understanding of oneself and others and how this relates to the world around them.
But this is a deeply personal, complex process that tragically gets hijacked by psychiatric diagnoses, drugs, and even “psycho-therapy”.
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It’s all about emotional growth.
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Sam says, “An authentic attempt at ‘help’ looks nothing like what is occurring.”
Medicine has no business involving itself in people’s emotional/psychological matters.
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sam plover says, “Funny how a shrink will accept that his patient is “sick”, he never questions what you say and even has a bunch of diagnoses on hand.”
Yeah, and they call it “medicine”.
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Fiachra quotes, “…. I was told I would have to take Mind-numbing Thorazine-like drugs for the rest of the life…”
So was I, which was THE BIGGEST BULLSHIT GOING.
“Mental Health Diagnosis is mostly a play on words, and the idea that psychiatric drugs are medicine is rubbish.”
Psychiatry is nothing more than a play on words, and this makes (most) psychiatrists THE BIGGEST liars out there.
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Fiachra says, “I think some of these ‘psychiatric controllers’ must be psychopaths…”
I’d bet my life on that.
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Fantastic article. It reveals like no other how one-sided and corrupt the psychiatric industry, Big Pharma, and the legal system have become.
“The very fact that someone has been given any psychiatric label is used in a staggering variety of ways to deprive them of self-respect, dignity, self-confidence, employment, custody of their children, the right to make decisions about their medical and legal affairs, and even their lives….”
“Anyone in danger of losing their human rights — or their life — through a court proceeding should have someone like Gottstein advocating for them, because he is a tireless advocate, knows the law inside and out, and never loses sight of what is true, what is right, and what is humane in its respect for his clients’ dignity.”
A YouTube video worth watching: “OH SH*T, THIS JUST HAPPENED”, by Russell Brand
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These neuroscientists could have learned a lot from this YouTube video: “A Critique of Neuroscience—As it Relates to Psychological Healing From Trauma”, by Daniel Mackler
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Psychiatry unequivocally deprives people of their humanity with its pseudoscientific diagnoses, iatrogenically harmful drugs, damaging ECT, and forced medication/hospitalization. And none of these build diplomacy or allies, but definitely deny people’s human rights, which is criminal. So expecting meaningful dialogue with people who not only deny their humanity but also their human rights is not only unrealistic, it is illogical.
And while there are no laws demanding anyone face their inner demons, more than enough people have learned more than enough about psychiatry’s demons or “dark side” with its violations of social justice which is the reason for this website.
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I was replying to David.
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Miracles happen when you treat people with dignity.
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Steve,
Here’s an article from the New York Times about how Quakers deal with “mental illness”:
“For 175 Years: Treating the Mentally Ill With Dignity” by Debbie M. Price
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What’s the definition for enemy? A thing that harms or weakens something else.
This describes psychiatry and those who practice it and is the reason I have no respect for either.
And if you want to talk about “sweeping generalizations” I suggest you start with the DSM.
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Nijinsky says, “Something does happen when you step out of investing in using fear, trauma, coercion and physical violence to control people…That’s what snake oil salesmen do, and lately the mental health system.”
Yes, and I would posit that miracles happen when people step out of psychiatry.
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Steve says, “I think we should all be in touch with our own inner sense of what is “right” and true, rather than following some outside interpretation of reality.”
I agree completely. And I forgot that Buddhists don’t believe in a deity, and that Quakers refer to God as Light Within, which to me means one’s own intuition.
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Anonymity on MIA provides safety for people to express themselves authentically, which is no laughing matter, “allies” or not.
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Have it your way.
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Spirituality is not conformity; it’s reality. Religion is not spirituality or reality; it’s conformity.
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What do you mean “Not ALL religions are about conformity”
when all religions require believing the supernatural?
Being in a religion means conforming to some notion of spirituality. How is this generalization untrue?
Trying to “believe” in anything more than my own intuition made me feel more disconnected, almost psychotic.
Reality’s enough to deal with.
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oldhead says, “Strategizing” towards what end?”
THAT’S the real question.
As long as there’s money in it, it’ll come to no good.
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I’m not dismissing anyone’s claims of whatever they think is a miracle. I just don’t think one group has the authority to decide what’s a miracle.
And psychiatry and religion are about exerting authority more than anything else.
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Nijinsky says, “Religion and psychiatry seem to be in the same boat as indoctrination rather than simply listening, being curious, and SHUTTING UP with their attempts at programming rather than allowing and showing decent curiosity”.
Very true. Religion and psychiatry aren’t about curiosity. They’re about conformity, how to think, talk and act like them.
And psychedelics aren’t the answer anymore than psychiatric drugs.
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I see no value in watering down or sugarcoating my opinions in order to make others more comfortable.
There’s no point in living if you can’t be authentic.
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Someone Else says, “The scientific fraud based “mental health” industries are corrupted to the bone.”
I couldn’t agree more.
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I consider psychiatry the enemy because that’s how I see it. And it’s not without reasoning OR content that I’ve come to this hard-won conclusion. And you’re assuming I don’t use either reasoning or content is both disparaging and diminishing, and very presumptuous.
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I thought religion and science are both driven by fear of the unknown.
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Sleeping with the enemy is still too dangerous, especially when the enemy has more power than you.
And it’s hard having to sleep with one eye open.
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The saying, “The road to hell is paved with good intentions” gets played out again and again and again by “therapists” with good intentions.
And this is not a mistaken idea.
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Steve says, “….generalizations about “therapists” lead to mistaken ideas. Not all therapists are alike or believe in the same things.”
But they all believe in “therapy”, which creates more problems, in my experience.
I can’t bring myself to defend anything about “therapy” because it’s a bad idea that only gets worse when people call themselves “therapists”, no matter how well-intentioned they may be because they still represent and profit from an exploitive system based on irrational power dynamics and pseudoscientific diagnoses. So defending any part of it is morally inconsistent, imo.
And the saying, “the road to hell is paved with good intentions” plays out again and again and again by people who practice “psychotherapy”.
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I think religion and science are both driven from fears of the unknown.
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Few can distinguish ego from instinct, which leads to all kinds of problems, western medicine being one.
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And the Catholic Church arbitrarily changes its miracles checklist, as it used to demand three “miracles”. I guess they got impatient in today’s digital world.
It’s like psychiatry arbitrarily changing its “DSM” checklists.
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And as for “miracles”: for me, these mean good things that can’t be explained. And I see no need for getting entangled in someone else’s religiously tedious explanations, be they religious, or “scientific”.
My question is this: why do some people insist on needing to explain the unexplainable? And my answer is this: some people need to be seen as god, and scientists are no exception.
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The Catholic Church has its own arbitrary checklist for declaring new “saints”, which includes at least two incidents they arbitrarily consider “miracles”. This makes about as much sense as a group of psychiatrists arbitrarily declaring new “diagnoses” via arbitrary checklists for their own arbitrary bible, the DSM .
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I was referring to the Catholic Church which has its own arbitrary criteria for determining whomever they arbitrarily deem a “genuine saint”, which includes at least two things they arbitrarily deem a “genuine miracle”, which makes about as much sense as psychiatry’s arbitrary checklists for its definitely ingenuine DSM.
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Craziness is defining what’s subjective as objective.
Psychiatry and psychology are perfect examples.
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The university system, like the societies that create them, capitalize on destructive dynamics that preserve societies’ distorted values.
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The author is looking for clarity in all the wrong places.
Even her writing is over the top.
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Anthony Knox says, “Believing in the existence of something for which there is no evidence is the very definition of “religion”.
That makes psychiatry a religion, “evidently”.
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Most people who work in the “mental health system” are obsessed with seeing what’s “wrong” in the person, instead of what’s happened to the person. And even if they do happen to consider what’s happened to the person, they still pathologize/label their reaction to what’s happened to them.
It’s a bollixed system from start to finish.
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How in god’s name does anyone think they know better than anyone else what qualifies a “genuine miracle”?
Oh, the irony…
The miracle is the fact that “educated” people manage to keep a straight face while thinking like this. Which suggests they must be delusional, which makes sense regarding psychiatry, since that DEFINITELY qualifies as delusional.
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Thank you, sam.
I forgot to add that while most psychiatrists have lost their nerve, they still have plenty of gall.
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Thank you, boans.
Yes, I agree. (Most) psychiatrists are masters of looking good, and not much else.
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Why has it taken so long for “the experts” to figure out what lots of ordinary people have already known for a long time? Maybe they’re finally realizing they can no longer ignore the handwriting on the wall.
Looks to me like they’re trying to claim the narrative before getting caught with their pants down.
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Everyone needs a sense of agency, control, freedom and privacy, of being heard, included and valued for who they are, not the objectification, isolation, exclusion and brute force used by traditional psychiatry, which is essentially sanitized brutality.
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Universities claim to be dedicated to the transmission of knowledge and wisdom. But if this were true, why are so many dedicated to modeling and motivating some of the worst in human nature: bias, intolerance, favoritism.
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It’s mystifying how seemingly intelligent people manage to find ways to further complicate their already confused lives.
A little caution goes a long way.
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People who work in areas like “psychiatry” and “psychology” have reached the apex of dissociation, as they have the delusion they’re helping people. But all these do is provide a way for them to intellectually distance themselves (dissociate) from feelings and fears they can’t face in themselves. Another word for this is “othering”, or labeling, it’s “gold standard”, which has always been a means of survival, conscious or not.
And universities are great places to academically dissociate.
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Why does it take so long for “educated” people to figure things out? Why can’t they just admit the garbage they’ve been selling doesn’t do anything but numb the brain???
It sounds like the jerks are starting to pay attention to what’s happening on the sidelines and are trying to get ahead of the narrative that’s being created by people who actually know what they’re talking about. But as stupid as the “experts” are showing themselves to be (once again), they at least sense they’re starting to look stupid, which, btw, they actually are.
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Darkness and silence invite sleep which quiets the mind and gives the body a chance to regenerate. And hormones can be very sensitive to light-dark cycles.
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People have a right to “believe” whatever they want. And I don’t really give a damn one way or the other, as long as they don’t try and shove what they “believe” down my throat.
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I don’t get it…
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Traditional trappings of success (college degrees, professional/social distinction, expensive lifestyle) wards off unconscious feelings of dissatisfaction and prevents social rejection. And the university system, like the society that created it, capitalizes on these destructive dynamics to preserve society’s distorted values.
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Steve Spiegel says, “…only psychiatry uses redundancy to promote legitimacy.”
Definition for redundancy: not or no longer needed or useful; superfluous
Freud was trained as a neurologist which was why psychiatry was believed to be a “medical science”. But since he hard time establishing his practice, he had plenty of time to wonder about patients whose problems defied physical explanation. And while many of his ideas were very insightful, a lot of them were just plain nutty—products of his own out of control imagination and habitual misogyny. So eventually, a few people got wise to the guy and came up with their own take on things, but not before his ideas took root in the public consciousness.
There’s nothing more prone to fads then the “mental health” system. And psychiatry’s redundancy is reflected time and time again whenever the latest psychiatric drug comes on the market, or some half-cocked “therapist” writes another book to publicize their own brand of “groundbreaking” “psychotherapy”. And neither of these are legitimate.
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The only thing that most “mental health experts” know how to do better than others is how to con vulnerable people.
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boans says, “What sort of delusional visions are conjured up when people speak like this?” [“treatment”]
The idea of “treatment” itself is a delusional vision—and a lot of mental health “professionals” en-vision themselves as saviors—which suits very nicely their visions of grandiosity.
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And since emotional struggles are generally perceived as weakness, or in today’s jargon “mental illness”, people who struggle (or viewed as “different”) are often met with suspicion and kept at an arm’s length using various means of rejection and sometimes outright hostility.
Dynamics like these flourish in traditional college environments where competition is lauded and worldly success is venerated, so fears of “not succeeding”, or “not fitting in” make a lot of people nervous and therefore want to avoid like a contagion those experiencing difficulties because it reminds them of their own insecurities surrounding failure or not fitting in. And these feelings are often hidden underneath all the hype.
So people who don’t fall in line with societies’ expectations in thought, appearance or actions are often roundly criticized or even dismissed because people don’t want to be associated with anything they perceive as “illness”/weakness i.e. “failure” (which equals rejection, the most primal fear) because vulnerability is antithetical to the whole college spiel of “winning”, something society lives and dies by. It’s a vicious circle covered up by the ballyhoo of college life.
And fears of litigation are behind a lot of what drives the whole scenario these days.
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Stigma (fear) against “mental illness” has primal origins.
Emotional struggle on some level means vulnerability, which generates feelings of overwhelm/weakness, which leads to feelings of helplessness, which ultimately triggers fears of rejection, a feeling first felt at some point in infancy. So receiving attention and feeling accepted (having one’s need met) are associated with survival, both physical and emotional.
And most adults continue playing this out as soon as certain levels of prosperity are achieved, by running around seeking validation and grabbing whatever status they perceive as important in their environment, as this wards off feelings of isolation and helplessness felt as infants.
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There’s not a chance in hell that psychiatrists will ever willingly “share” their power, because without it, what have they got? Not much more than anyone else, except an ability to write “prescriptions” for chemical junk. And so-called “psycho-therapy” is word junk.
They’re naked as jaybirds and deep down they know it.
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Stigma around mental illness has been around for thousands of years. And fear is at the root of it. And contrary to popular belief, things like “psychiatry, “psychology” and the so-called “mental health system” are built on stigma (fear) and do a good job of passing it along.
And universities are products of elitist thinking, no matter their geographical location. And elitism breeds unhealthy competition and discrimination that leads to destructive power dynamics on which most societies (and families) are based.
What passes for “education” about “mental illness” in traditional venues like universities actually promotes and continues spreading misinformation (fears) about what is believed to be “mental illness” while stoking feelings of superiority towards those who have either not had an opportunity for such “education”, or have chosen to bypass it.
Imo, having exceptional intellectual ability has nothing to do with emotional intelligence. Unfortunately, the world values and operates on an ability to process large amounts of complex information or an ability to express oneself eloquently more than emotional intelligence. And the same goes for exceptional athletic or so-called artistic/creative ability. So universities, (especially private ones) end up being highly curated, controlling environments that are more concerned with liability because this affects their marketability (image) which ultimately affects their funding. Simply stated, universities are more concerned with their reputation.
It’s too bad being a good person isn’t enough.
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Mutual collaboration with people who legally have the upper hand is impossible, and attempts at doing so is nothing but a performance in futility.
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Psychiatry can’t change in any meaningful way because it’s foundation is flawed, the flaw being a belief in “mental illness”.
And mouthing terms like “bio-psycho-social” doesn’t change anything. But it is good for a laugh or two.
Psychiatry won’t change because it works in ways that matter most to those who practice it, those ways being power, prestige, and money.
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Psychiatry can’t change in any meaningful way because it’s flawed at its core, and the core is “mental illness”.
And idiotic mouthfuls like “bio-psycho-social” don’t change anything. But it is good for a laugh or two.
And psychiatry won’t change because it works in ways that matter most to those who “practice” it, those ways being power, prestige and money.
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Neuroleptics used to be called chemical lobotomies or chemical straight-jackets, which is exactly what they are.
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Relying on “professionals” to help with personal matters, no matter how trying, provides a field day for opportunists.
No one can claim “expertise” unless they’ve been through it themselves, or have been by the side of someone who has, and definitely NOT in a “clinical” sense.
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The “clinical gaze” is what psychiatry is all about. And psychology isn’t much better. But it’s useful for keeping the powers that be and those who follow them comfortably dissociated.
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Mr. Ruck is right. Healing is, above all, relational, and this includes the relationship one has with one’s own self. But traditional “psycho-therapy” is not relational in any meaningful sense. It’s a sad and sterile substitute for the real thing.
Imo, the world would be a much better place if people stopped feeding/paying the beasts of psychiatry and psychology and instead started feeding/paying each other in more ways than one. And creating awareness through MIA is how this is already happening.
Relationships that involve emotional intimacy should never be based on money, as money is never the right incentive, especially in relationships based on a power imbalance. And money is a major incentive, no matter what self-deluded do-gooders would have people think.
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“Psychiatry at a Crossroads”???
Psychiatry’s a dead end that insists on calling itself a “cul de sac”.
And it isn’t “at a crossroads”. It’s driving the wrong way down a one-way street on an endless road to nowhere.
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Could it be that articles like this signify the last gasps of a dying “profession”? One can only hope. More likely it’s more lip service, or fear-induced naval-gazing in yet another feeble attempt to save their lying asses.
The only thing that needs to happen is for psychiatry and its cohorts to be liquidated, terminated, and utterly eradicated like any other failed business venture. And calling themselves “science” or “healing arts” is the biggest load of bullshit ever perpetrated on society.
But psychiatry et al is far worse than a failed business or “healing” venture. They are the termites of modern society.
And what are the “termites of society”? Well, according to academia.edu, it refers to people who exploit others. And I can’t think of a better term for psychiatry and its cohorts.
And if they insist on pointing to “the science”, they need look no further than the increasing numbers of people “diagnosed” with a “disorder” and the steady accumulation of “diagnoses” in DSM. It’s the manifestation of wish fulfillment for psychiatrists.
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Research like this is a disgusting waste of resources that would have been better spent on feeding and housing those in need rather than feeding the egos of people more interested in adding to their curriculum vitae.
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It’s not about the lies. It’s about people believing the lies.
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It’s not about the lies. It’s about people believing the lies.
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sanneman says, “The ADHD narrative is severely polluted and many professionals should reconsider the information they provide.”
People should reconsider ANY information ANY professional provides.
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Some say cruelty is the point. So is greed.
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Religions metaphorically express the meaning and feeling of being alive. They hold intrinsic value individually and culturally.
But psychiatry and psychology have no intrinsic value, scientifically or spiritually, as both are ethically vacant—and take pride in being so. And the harder these pathetically gruesome quagmires try to be socially relevant, the more they fail society, as coldly analyzing the human experience dignifies no one. They are prime examples of intellectual perversity born of intellectual grandiosity, that mimics science while being religiously intolerant—thus wreaking havoc in people’s lives in all kinds of ways.
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I believe there’ll come a day in the not-too-distant future when psychiatry disintegrates from its own unbridled confidence—in no small part because MIA keeps spreading the word.
Thank you, MIA.
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Years ago, I adopted a puppy dog from the local pound. She looked and acted fine, but she shook violently on the way to her new home, although I held her close and spoke to her gently. And when she got there, it became apparent that she’d been badly mistreated. She wouldn’t let anyone affectionately pat her near her rear, as she was afraid people were going to hit her. And for two weeks she wouldn’t go near her bowl of food until no one was looking, and then she’d grab most of it in her mouth and hide it. And she didn’t want to get in the car because she thought she was going to be taken away from a home that loved her. But with unreserved affection, she eventually learned to feel secure and trust people. But up until she left this world, there were times she did things that revealed she never forgot what she’d been through. And people are no different.
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An article worth reading from the New York Times: “For 175 Years: Treating the Mentally Ill With Dignity”, by Debbie M. Price.
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Well said, Nijinsky.
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Breaking points aren’t just physical, they emotional, psychological, and spiritual as well. And everything collapsing can open the way for reassessing and clarifying one’s life. Some call it spiritual rebirth. “Illness” it is not.
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Adding psychiatric “medications” to unprocessed trauma is a recipe for disaster like no other. But no one need depend on so-called “mental health professions” for this either. But that’s something few “therapists” have the brains to realize or balls to mention to anyone, especially their so-called “clients”. Most hide behind a useless alphabet of dubious “qualifications”, while lacking the most important one of all: an ability to listen respectfully.
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Psychotherapy is just as barbaric, imo.
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Religions are ways for people to metaphorically express the beauty (and sometimes horror) of the human experience. It’s what gives religion and experience of living their intrinsic value. It’s the reason religions have existed since the beginning of time.
But psychiatry and psychology are different in all sorts damaging ways, as the purpose of both are perverse, imo. And the harder these try to be relevant (scientifically or religiously) the worse they fail, as coldly analyzing the human experience dignifies no one. They are monstrous examples of intellectual smugness born of hubris and self-absorbed grandiosity that mimics science while being religiously intolerant. And both need to dissolve, as neither are either religion OR science, but nevertheless wreak havoc in both ways.
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Psychiatry and psychology aren’t science. They’re religious propaganda, period.
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Psychiatry and psychology habitually ignore the intrinsic value of the human heart, because doing so would weaken their foolishly incessant claim of being “scientific”.
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Imo, the only thing the “mental health professions” offer is a polluted stream of ever-increasing “psychopathologies”, ever-increasing toxic substances to “treat” them, or one of its ever-increasing “psychotherapies”, all of which are based on a pay-to-play, power-imbalanced, artificial “relationship”. And with Big Pharma’s steadfast contributions, it’s become a medicalized Ponzi scheme of epic proportions.
And while most religions are guilty at some time in history of inflicting damage in the name of their respective gods, most were originally based in honoring the dignity of each and every human being. And this ultimately brings out the best in people.
But psychiatry and psychology do nothing of the sort. They are fields obsessed with defining, redefining, and ultimately sentencing people to lives of needless limitation and psychological pain in the name of “therapy”, most of which can be avoided if people simply avoid those who work in the system, as most who do are obsessed with finding what’s wrong in the person, instead of what’s wrong in their past or present surroundings. And they’re neglecting to do so, via their ridiculously vast roster of supposed “diagnoses and treatments” brings out the worst in people—and most clearly in the “therapists” themselves.
And we all know who benefits most from such hopelessly dogmatic thinking.…
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Other mental health clinicians are just as limited as the psychiatric ones, as most operate from the same one-dimensional, sickness-obsessed perspective.
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Religious blasphemy has some new names: “non-compliance” and “treatment resistance”.
The DSM is no more medical than the Bible. It’s a book of psychiatric sins.
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Most religions don’t pretend to be science, except for — of course — the religion of psychiatry/psychology.
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Religion offers hope. Psychiatry/psychology offer confusion.
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Psychiatry and psychology are definitely shibboleths. It’s the only thing they can reasonably lay claim to. And deep down they know this, which is why they cling so tightly to their one-dimensional medical model with such religious fervor. And the insane part is they can’t see how ridiculous this is. It shows their own incredible “lack of insight”.
The main difference between psychology/psychiatry and religion is that where most religions offer some kind of redemption, psychiatry and psychology do not. All they offer is an endless stream of “psychopathology”, which renders them incapable of seeing beyond people’s imperfections. And their “treatments” are an extension of their own pathology. It’s all very nihilistic.
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Psychiatry and psychology are definitely shibboleths. It’s the only thing they can reasonably lay claim to. And deep down they know this, which is why they cling so tightly to their one-dimensional medical model with an almost religious fervor. And the insane part is they can’t see how ridiculous this is. It’s an incredible lack of insight.
The main difference between psychiatry/psychology and religion is that most religions offer some kind of redemption, whereas psychiatry/psychology can’t see beyond people’s imperfections. All they offer is a stream of endless psychopathology. They’re the definition of nihilism. And whereas most religions seek god, most psychiatrists and psychologists believe (unconsciously) they ARE god.
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Hi Boans,
I’m sorry for what you’ve been through. Mental health professionals’ claims of confidentiality are false because patients’ files are not. And the fact that few if any legislators recognize this as an abuse of confidentiality is unconscionable.
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Correction: Psychiatry and psychology reliably, categorically and conveniently deny real science anytime it contradicts their carefully crafted false narrative.
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Once upon a time, churches ruled large areas in the western world. These days it’s the mental health industrial complex.
Once upon a time, people who were castigated were called “sinners”. Today they’re called “mentally ill”.
Once upon a time, the only means to absolution were to “confess one’s sins” to church officials. Nowadays people are compelled to confide in people they don’t trust, claim diagnoses they don’t agree with, and take psychiatric “medications” they don’t want.
Whoever said “the more things change, the more they stay the same” was spot on.
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Psychiatry and psychology reliability and categorically deny real science anytime it goes against their carefully crafted false narrative. But they pretend to be scientific because they know it makes them sound convincing.
Their peculiar habit of denying real science clearly indicates how indoctrinated most psychiatrists and psychologists actually are, especially when doctors of other specialties happen to believe the patients who tell them of problems they’re having with psychiatric “medications”. But this doesn’t happen very often.
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Most psychiatrists and psychologists harbor a religious belief in a medical model that not only distorts reality, but makes a mockery of the scientific method.
And while some define science as the act of interpreting an observation of the environment that is limited by the tools available for observing, most psychiatrists and psychologists fail to recognize the most important tool for observation and interpretation, and that is having an open mind. But thankfully most religions and art welcome imagination, while psychiatry and psychology definitely do not.
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Psychiatry and psychology’s refusal to perceive the intrinsic value of the human heart is what makes them so harmful and dangerous.
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Psychiatry and psychology’s inability to perceive value in the human experience is the reason they habitually disease-ify the human experience. It’s how they fend off their own unconscious fears and desires.
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Religion and art are symbolic (metaphorical) ways that humans use to create and express the truth, reality and meaning in the human experience. It’s what gives them intrinsic value and is why they exist. Their power comes from acknowledging the dignity of the human experience (spirit), and is the reason both have existed since time immemorial. But religion goes from good to bad when it becomes dictatorial and intolerant, two words that best describe most psychiatry and psychology. And these two fields, unlike religion and art, flourish by medicalizing, categorizing, and coldly analyzing the human experience which dignifies no one. They are monstrous examples intellectual smugness brought on by huge amounts of hubris and self-congratulatory self-absorption that not only mimics religious intolerance, but actually is religious intolerance.
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Thank you for sharing your heartbreaking story. It’s a testament for why psychiatry needs to be deemed a criminal enterprise.
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You can’t find meaning in things that are intrinsically meaningless.
And psychiatry and psychology are intrinsically meaningless as both insist on ignoring the intrinsically important role of the human heart.
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Psychiatry and psychology both claim to have discovered scientifically valid explanations for just about everything under the sun while failing to recognize that matters of the heart and mind are not matters to be approached “scientifically”.
And while psychiatry has proven itself to be scientifically invalid, psychology is equally vacant, as it also fails to offer much more than anyone with a modicum of common sense and insight would come up with on their own. Nor has either come to realize that observing and naming behavior is scientifically meaningless, whether or not it’s done “clinically”, which makes both fields one huge cosmic joke.
And what is a cosmic joke? Believing the false projections of the limited mind.
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“But they (psychiatrists and psychologists) manage to squeeze the meaning out of just about everything.”
CLARIFICATION: In my experience, psychiatry and psychology manage to obscure or destroy worthwhile meaning in and of just about everything.
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Come to think of it, psychiatry or psychology is more like using a chain saw in the dark, that’s for sure.
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Using science to “treat” the soul is about useful as using a sledgehammer to trim one’s hair.
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Rasx asks, “Wouldn’t image-making then be closer to the truth about existence, or at least as close to it in some way, as analytic reasoning?”
Interesting question. I think things get confusing when essentially mushy stuff like psychology and psychiatry claim to be science while acting like religion. They try to be all things to all people, but end up having no claim to anything worthwhile. But they do manage to squeeze the meaning out of just about everything.
Rasx then asks, “Wouldn’t poetry and literature and religion and metaphor generally be valid means of expressing truth then?”
Poetry, literature, religion and metaphor are not just valid ways of expressing truth and experience, they’re essential to sharing truth and experience. And analytical reasoning is another valid way of finding and expressing truth and experience. But this is where psychiatry and psychology fall off a cliff, so to speak, as neither deal meaningfully with either truth or experience, and definitely not analytical reasoning.
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Image-making is the unique way humans find meaning. Poetry and literature and religion are all metaphors to find and express meaning. Which is essentially the meaning, purpose, or reason for art. It’s something uniquely human.
Psychiatry and psychology are hopelessly materialistic, imo, as they stupidly think mouthing “scientific” terms and engaging in “scientific” research gives them credibility, which is stupider still, because there’s nothing more meaningless than endless reams of “scientific” data, most of which is meaningless either materially or spiritually. It’s an expensive waste of time, a lose-lose situation that’s all form and no substance. It’s medicine’s junk food.
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Psychiatry and Psychology try to be religion AND science while failing at both.
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Psychiatry and psychology aren’t medical practice. They’re propaganda, imo.
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There is no “meaning making” in psychiatry and psychology. That’s the first illusion. Unless you consider propping up some professional’s ego and bank account meaningful.
Psychiatrists and psychologists are the worst people to turn to for things like that, imo. And I bet they make “meaning making” a “disorder” if they haven’t already.
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Most psychiatrists and psychologists seek to reduce, control and define the indefinable because they’re unconsciously terrified of life’s paradoxical vagueness and complexities. They childishly cling to science while stubbornly denying life’s ultimate uncertainty. But their stubborn belief in the reliability and appropriateness of a “scientific” approach makes them a religion all their own as it seeks to perform the function of traditional religions, which is mainly to quell anxieties. But it’s a far more dangerous one, as their aping of scientific language and protocols give them an illusion of objective reality.
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And how does this economic practice think it’s helping the human citizen?
By thinking too much of themselves and not enough of others, while enjoying too much the spoils of their profession, which primarily involve exerting power over others while living large.
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Thank you, Mr. Wells. I like your comments, too.
I especially agree with your question regarding where the art and artistry has gone in the practice of learning how and why to be, and how to become, a better human. It’s certainly not a question that science can answer, and it’s definitely not one it should even try answer. These questions are an anathema to the so-called “science of psychiatry” for obvious reasons, and also to its self-congratulatory cousin known as the “science of psychology” for somewhat less obvious reasons, but the reasons for both are the same: big egos and even bigger hubris, as both are in areas they don’t belong.
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