Thanks for a very compelling, though disturbing, article. It’s always enlightening to read your material.
Sandra,
I don’t idealize real medicine. My general point is that real medicine discovers its illnesses in nature; psychiatry invents its “illnesses”, and its “treatment” of these “illnesses” differs little from street drug pushing. Real medicine is a valid, bona fide profession. Psychiatry is a hoax.
Rachel777,
And a very pointed satire. Thanks.
Miranda,
I agree. The good doctor doth protest way too much!
CatNight,
“Trauma defines us all…” That’s a very helpful concept. We need to address these things, not occlude our self-perception with pills. Thanks.
You’re right. Chemical imbalance is a marketing slogan.
Steve,
Absolutely never!
Brett,
So the hoax has, literally, gone round the world!
PacificDawn,
I’m not sure what this means: perhaps that we’re all a little different neurologically? I would agree with that. We’re all a little different in almost every respect.
Slaying_the_Dragon_of_Psychiatry,
Thanks for your support.
johnbitz,
I don’t, routinely or otherwise, “erase the experiences of those who *have* found meds helpful”, though I do challenge the notion that psychiatric drugs can be considered meds.
I have never claimed that “everyone agrees that other medical diagnoses are entirely homogenous with clear cut etiologies”.
My position is really very simple: that the loose collections of vaguely-defined problems of thinking, feeling, and behaving that psychiatry calls mental illnesses are not illnesses in any ordinary sense of the term, and that the drugs that psychiatry dispenses so liberally to “treat” these so-called illnesses almost always do more harm than good, especially in the long term.
Feel free to critique my work, but please confine your critiques to material that I have actually written. I make myself very clear.
Phoebe,
Thanks for coming in. You’re absolutely right – sadness is the natural response to loss and adverse experiences. The distinction between “endogenous depression” and “exogenous depression” was always a hoax. Endogenous depression was, by definition, sadness for which psychiatrists couldn’t identify a precipitating event(s). It was a very pure kind of arrogance (unique, I think, to psychiatry) to conclude that therefore no precipitating source of the sadness exists. As you so correctly say, they didn’t find these sources because they didn’t look hard enough. And they didn’t look hard enough because it suited their purpose not to find them. As you say: money and power.
Salimur,
You’ve identified a major issue. A chemical process is not necessarily pathological.
Rachel777,
Yeah, right. Lol.
bcharris,
Very true. Thanks for this important point.
Lawrence,
Nice!
Rosalee,
I think that’s a good answer. At present, psychiatry has a stifling effect on these kinds of creative ideas. Psychiatry says: Send them to us – we’ll take care of them. And society shrugs, and says OK. Take psychiatry out of the picture, and we’ll find that there are other non-medical ways to help people.
KateL,
Helping people to cope with depression is not a hi-tech activity. People have been doing it successfully for thousands of years. As psychiatry fades, I expect we’ll see a return to these ways.
KateL,
Thanks.
Rachel777,
It would also be great if the real doctors would start to point out psychiatry’s flaws.
Slaying the Dragon,
Thanks.
Rosalee,
Putting dents in the façade of psychiatry. That’s a perfect description. Enough dents, and the thing breaks.
Frank,
Thanks for the correction. And yes, the quackery, with its disastrous results, continues.
Julie,
Psychiatry has lost the intellectual and moral arguments. All they have left is PR – spin. Calling us deniers is just another example of this. But spin can only take one so far.
I do indeed think there will come a time when people will look back on this era and shake their heads in disbelief and horror.
Oldhead,
Yes. They make great use of the word “may”.
Richard,
Thanks.
teegee,
When they ridicule you, you know you are having an effect.
Lawrence,
Maybe.
Frank,
Yes. And he never came clean about the Risperdal scandal.
Auntie Psychiatry,
Yes. It seems unlikely that he’ll abandon the ship he has sailed so long and for such profit.
streetphotobeing,
Thanks for the link.
Markps2,
Thanks.
Rachell777,
You’re probably right.
ConcernedCarer,
Thanks for coming in, and for your words of encouragement.
Best wishes.
Rachel777,
Yes. But I still have hope. Perhaps a deluded hope, but hope nonetheless. The hope that psychiatry, with its fake illnesses and destructive “treatments”, will perish from the land.
Lawrence,
Beautiful analogy!
Oldhead,
“So has society lost its ability to recognize false logic, or are people too intimidated to reveal their inner suspicions when they pick up on any of the disingenuous contradictions permeating such thoroughly mediocre propaganda?”
That’s a great question. How can they continue to get away with this drivel? My hope (belief?) is that as more and more people join the ranks of anti-psychiatry, we’ll reach a sort of critical mass that will be hard for psychiatrists to ignore.
Of course, they’re already positioning themselves for this. Remember the great psychiatrist Ronald Pies, MD, asserting that psychiatry never really promoted the chemical imbalance theory! And currently Allen Frances is busy pushing the fairy tale that it was not psychiatry that was doing all the damage, but rather the mean ol’ GPs, and of course, pharma.
Fiachra,
Yes. Some things don’t change.
astrong,
Sorry to learn of your tardive dyskinesia. Interestingly, virtually every member of the general public with whom I’ve discussed this has expressed the belief that the tardive dyskinesia and the akathisia are “symptoms of the illness”. When I explain that they’re adverse effects of the drugs, the response is invariably one of utter disbelief. But psychiatry has done nothing to dispel this misperception.
Danzig666,
Thanks for coming in. Certainly the dogmatism and the spurious nature of the “diagnoses” are dehumanizing, destructive, and disempowering.
Slaying_the-Dragon_of_Psychiatry,
Thanks.
PatH_America,
Thanks for the encouragement.
Rachel777,
I’m long retired. But I well remember the time when psychiatrists argued vehemently against “schizophrenics” finding any kind of productive, independent life, on the grounds that they couldn’t cope with the stress. A self-fulfilling prophecy; especially when the hapless individuals were loaded with neuroleptics.
Someone Else,
Yes. And a lot more besides.
bcharris,
Nice!
astrong,
It would be interesting if someone could conduct a study to see how many psychiatrists or their children/spouses take these pills.
Oldhead,
Yes. They are annoying. They won’t take their pills as ordered by THE DOCTOR. The fact that they know intuitively that the pills are destroying them is irrelevant. What a farce!
Rachel777,
Nice!
Steve,
Dr. Lieberman has also, on another occasion, described us anti-psychiatry activists as “rabid ideologues” (https://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/879623). Rationality is not his strong suit.
Streetphotobeing,
Yes. Unless he’s a hopeless case!
Frank,
Nice! The genetically perfect psychiatrists “treating” the genetically flawed “patients”. What next?
ConcernedCarer,
Psychiatry is definitely not OK. It is something fundamentally flawed and rotten. But they get away with what they do because the general public can’t believe that a “legitimate” medical specialty could possibly be this destructive.
Steve,
Thanks for putting it so plainly and succinctly.
Neil,
I don’t think any reasonable person would interpret my contention that psychiatry is a hoax as implying that every single psychiatrist is complicit in that hoax.
This string began when you questioned/challenged my characterization of psychiatry as a hoax. I responded to this by pointing out the twin deceptions that the vast majority of psychiatrists promote: that depression, and a wide array of other human problems, are caused by neuropathology; and that psychiatric drugs remedy this pathology. The onus, I suggest, was on you at that point to come back with some facts, references, or evidence to the contrary, or at least, a cogent argument.
But in your response, you completely ignored the deception/hoax issue, and instead launched several groundless ad hominem attacks at me.
I responded to each of these attacks, and pointed out that you seemed more interested in scoring points than in substantive debate.
Now you’re back asking me what evidence I have for my accusations of deception. But you’re missing the point. The statements concerned are false. So when psychiatrists promote these statements, they either don’t realize that they’re false (in which case, they’re not too bright), or they are being deceptive. As I don’t consider psychiatrists as a group to be particularly obtuse, the deception conclusion is inevitable. If you wish to read more on my position on this matter, please see my post Psychiatry DID Promote the Chemical Imbalance Theoryhttp://behaviorismandmentalhealth.com/2014/06/06/psychiatry-did-promote-the-chemical-imbalance-theory/
You say that I “foreground drugs”, which I assume means emphasize. This is untrue. I respect the rights of each individual to ingest whatever he or she chooses. What I challenge, and emphatically condemn, is the fact that psychiatry uses blatant deception to induce people to take these drugs. They tell people, who present no indications or evidence of neurological illness, that they have such an illness, and that the drugs are necessary to remedy this disorder.
You have throughout this string failed to address the matter of the twin deceptions, and have consistently avoided substantive debate. But in your response to Phoenix, you “question” whether I really want to have a substantive debate or merely want to “vent a longstanding grudge”. The implication being that my critiques of psychiatry stem, not from any objective assessment of its activities or perspectives, but rather from some personal vituperation of my own. Is it possible that you imagine that this kind of petty retorting constitutes substantive debate? Is it possible that you consider these gratuitous, deprecative attacks as having some value?
If you wish to discuss/debate the hoax issue, or indeed any issue on which I have written, then by all means come back. If your comments are pertinent and objective, I will respond. But if you persist in these vacuous and groundless attacks, I will not respond.
Stephen,
Yes, they lost their insight when they dared to disagree with the psychiatrists as to what they should or should not ingest!
Phoenix,
Thank you for these interesting perspectives, and for your encouraging words.
Oldhead,
I agree entirely that we should maintain an actively adversarial stance to psychiatry. Psychiatry is not going to “see the light” and abandon their destructive, disempowering, and stigmatizing activities. Nor will they abandon their spurious concepts, because their very existence as “medical practitioners” depends on these concepts.
We need to maintain and support the critiquing of psychiatry as vigorously, and on as many fronts, as possible.
Neil,
The essence of my response to you (above) was that psychiatry has been actively promoting two enormous deceptions for decades. If you are disputing this, then please send me references to support the illness assertions or the curative assertions concerning the drugs. I would be happy to take a look, and, as I’ve said many times in my posts, if the evidence disproves my position, I will promptly apologize for my errors. In the absence of such proof, or even a convincing argument, however, what kind of “moderation” are you expecting? A destructive, disempowering hoax is a destructive, disempowering hoax.
To the best of my knowledge, there is nothing in my writings that could even remotely be described as Utopian. If you have seen something of that sort, I would be grateful if you could draw it to my attention.
With regards to the assertions that I do, in fact, make, they are eminently testable against reality. For instance, if it were demonstrated that all the individuals whom psychiatry identifies as “having major depression” were found to have a particular neurological pathology in a part of the brain associated with emotions, then my assertion fails, or at the very least is in serious trouble. To date, despite decades of lavishly-funded and highly motivated research, no such findings are to hand.
You assert that I seem to lack sympathy for people who have been damaged by psychiatry. How you can interpret any of my writings in that light is beyond my comprehension. I have enormous sympathy toward the people who have been damaged (some, very severely) by psychiatry. Indeed, my primary motivation in writing these posts, which I’ve been doing for the past nine years, stems precisely from sentiments of that sort.
I assume that your reference to my “lofty” position is sarcasm.
Your leap from my response to the assertion that I believe psychiatrists’ clients deserve their fate because they are too stupid to see through the hoax is groundless. I have never said, or even implied, anything of the sort, and it is difficult to avoid the perception that you are resorting to ad hominem attacks rather than substantive debate.
Oldhead,
Thanks for coming in. I agree whole-heartedly that psychiatry needs to go, and I believe that the PTM document will promote that objective.
Phoenix,
Thanks for this interesting perspective.
Paradoxically, although I’m very clear about aims, methods, perspectives, and philosophy of the psychiatric profession, I cannot say the same about the profession of psychology. This is because, almost from its beginning, psychology glommed onto psychiatry as a ready-made portal to the “mental health’ business. And in many (perhaps most) cases, psychologists adopted psychiatry’s spurious philosophy whole-heartedly. At present, psychologists in America are lobbying hard at state level for prescribing “privileges”, and in some states have already achieved this. Psychology was co-opted by psychiatry decades ago.
During my own career (I’m long retired), I always opened my discussions with people who came to me for help with a simple question: “How can I help you?” I then shut up and listened.
And here’s the great heresy: most of what I did that was helpful wasn’t so much a product of specialized training in psychology, as a willingness to listen, an ability to empathize, and some personal experience of life’s vicissitudes and challenges.-
Slaying the Dragon,
Thanks for this. Please see my response to Frank Blankenship above.
You are, in my view, correct in pointing out that psychiatry will try to co-opt the PTM perspective. Watch for statements like: careful and experienced psychiatrists have always been cognizant of these matters, etc.
My own position has always been that psychiatry’s systematic medicalization of all human problems is a destructive, disempowering hoax which has done and continues to do untold damage to people world-wide.
It is also my position that psychiatry is irremediable, for the simple reason that they cannot let go of their spurious illnesses and their destructive “treatments”. Psychiatry must go, and it is to this end that I direct all my writing.
In my view, the PTM document sets out clearly and in great detail the shortcomings of the psychiatric model, particularly the fact that psychiatric “diagnoses” are routinely used to conceal many of the great flaws and injustices in our society.
Neil,
For decades, psychiatrists (including psychiatric leaders) have avidly promoted the falsehood that depression which crosses arbitrary and vaguely defined thresholds of severity, duration, and frequency is caused by brain pathology; specifically neurotransmitter imbalance. This is a monstrous deception, but is compounded by the even more appalling suggestion that this supposed pathology is corrected by psychiatric drugs (especially SSRIs). This is a hoax: something intended to deceive or defraud. Similar comments can be made concerning other psychiatric “diagnoses”.
Frank,
Like you, I am also wary of replacing the psychiatric system with another system. Given the fundamental dynamics of our present society, there is always the possibility that a replacement system can be co-opted by commercial forces. Indeed, I imagine that commercial interests have already set their sights on the PTM framework and the “opportunities” that might lie therein. I like the notion of a get-off-my-back non-system, and I think Lucy’s comment above is apt.
I personally favor a mutually supportive non-system along the AA model, but without the dogmatism and religious overtones that put so many people off AA. But we also need a radical transformation of our societal values and institutions.
In my view, the great value of the PTM framework is not that it provides an alternative system, but rather an alternative perspective. Depression is not an illness, but rather an entirely understandable response to truly dreadful circumstances and oppressive discriminative institutions.
Stevie,
The terms “disorder” and “illness” and “disease” are used interchangeably in general medicine and in psychiatry. Moreover, if the APA had something other than illness in mind when they coined this title in 1952, they’ve had lots of time to clarify the matter.
Anonymous2016,
Yes. In my view, Dr. Pies is a kind of perfect reflection of psychiatry’s errors and self-serving notions.
Fiachra,
There is absolutely nothing good about psychiatry!
Steve,
I agree. The psychiatrists’ medicalization of non-medical problems is a self-serving hoax.
Lawrence,
Yes. And the APA hired the services of Porter Novelli, a world-renowned PR company. PR is all they have left.
Stephen,
And the great irony here is that prior to these studies, Nancy Andreasen had invented the term “Broken Brain”. It’s the title of her 1984 book!
Registeredforthissite,
Tragically, many psychologists are fully hooked into the psychiatric hoax.
Registeredforthissite,
And thank you for your support.
littleturtle,
The central problem of psychiatry is that it’s based on a lie – that the problems listed in the DSM are illnesses. Because of this lie, they promote a medical model, which incidentally (or perhaps not) works to their advantage.
Francesca,
You’re welcome.
Stephen,
Thanks for putting this so well.
Oldhead,
Thanks.
Steve,
It’s hard to argue with any of that. And mindfulness was an incredible reach!
Someone Else,
Thanks. Psychiatry really does kill, and I think the link between the mass murders/suicides and SSRI’s, when it’s finally confirmed unequivocally, will be the final nail in the coffin.
Peter,
Very good point. Thanks.
littleturtle,
I’m glad to hear that you’re getting help. But I see no parallel between general medicine and psychiatry. But that’s a long discussion.
Lawrence,
I did indeed read How Psychiatry Evolved into a Religion. It’s a beautiful piece, and the historical analysis is 100% accurate. I’ve read several posts that you’ve put up on MIA, and I’m extremely gratified that we have someone of your skill, experience, and forthrightness on our side.
littleturtle,
I’m not sure we ever really did. Even during the psychoanalytic period, there was lots of bio-bio-bio back at the asylums.
Truth,
And thank you also.
Slaying_the_Dragon_of_Psychiatry,
Thank you for your kind and encouraging words.
John,
True. Not really extraordinary – psychiatry as usual, perhaps.
mik,
Exactly! The fact that they are proposing this kind of shabby advertising is tantamount to admitting that they have nothing of substance to offer.
Frank,
And tragically, I have to acknowledge that one of these professions is psychology, who hang in for the sake of the crumbs that fall fro the rich man’s table.
Best wishes.
Bramble,
Perhaps there are some who’ve seen a romanticized version in a movie or something like that, but I imagine that kind of romance wears off pretty soon.
Stephen,
It’s interesting that some of them are willing to admit the hoax privately, but won’t take the next logical step!
Bonnie,
Thanks for a very compelling, though disturbing, article. It’s always enlightening to read your material.
Sandra,
I don’t idealize real medicine. My general point is that real medicine discovers its illnesses in nature; psychiatry invents its “illnesses”, and its “treatment” of these “illnesses” differs little from street drug pushing. Real medicine is a valid, bona fide profession. Psychiatry is a hoax.
Rachel777,
And a very pointed satire. Thanks.
Miranda,
I agree. The good doctor doth protest way too much!
CatNight,
“Trauma defines us all…” That’s a very helpful concept. We need to address these things, not occlude our self-perception with pills. Thanks.
Rosalee,
Thanks for coming in and for your encouragement.
Steve,
I agree.
Frank,
Beautiful!
[email protected],
You’re right. Chemical imbalance is a marketing slogan.
Steve,
Absolutely never!
Brett,
So the hoax has, literally, gone round the world!
PacificDawn,
I’m not sure what this means: perhaps that we’re all a little different neurologically? I would agree with that. We’re all a little different in almost every respect.
Slaying_the_Dragon_of_Psychiatry,
Thanks for your support.
johnbitz,
I don’t, routinely or otherwise, “erase the experiences of those who *have* found meds helpful”, though I do challenge the notion that psychiatric drugs can be considered meds.
I have never claimed that “everyone agrees that other medical diagnoses are entirely homogenous with clear cut etiologies”.
My position is really very simple: that the loose collections of vaguely-defined problems of thinking, feeling, and behaving that psychiatry calls mental illnesses are not illnesses in any ordinary sense of the term, and that the drugs that psychiatry dispenses so liberally to “treat” these so-called illnesses almost always do more harm than good, especially in the long term.
Feel free to critique my work, but please confine your critiques to material that I have actually written. I make myself very clear.
Phoebe,
Thanks for coming in. You’re absolutely right – sadness is the natural response to loss and adverse experiences. The distinction between “endogenous depression” and “exogenous depression” was always a hoax. Endogenous depression was, by definition, sadness for which psychiatrists couldn’t identify a precipitating event(s). It was a very pure kind of arrogance (unique, I think, to psychiatry) to conclude that therefore no precipitating source of the sadness exists. As you so correctly say, they didn’t find these sources because they didn’t look hard enough. And they didn’t look hard enough because it suited their purpose not to find them. As you say: money and power.
Salimur,
You’ve identified a major issue. A chemical process is not necessarily pathological.
Rachel777,
Yeah, right. Lol.
bcharris,
Very true. Thanks for this important point.
Lawrence,
Nice!
Rosalee,
I think that’s a good answer. At present, psychiatry has a stifling effect on these kinds of creative ideas. Psychiatry says: Send them to us – we’ll take care of them. And society shrugs, and says OK. Take psychiatry out of the picture, and we’ll find that there are other non-medical ways to help people.
KateL,
Helping people to cope with depression is not a hi-tech activity. People have been doing it successfully for thousands of years. As psychiatry fades, I expect we’ll see a return to these ways.
KateL,
Thanks.
Rachel777,
It would also be great if the real doctors would start to point out psychiatry’s flaws.
Slaying the Dragon,
Thanks.
Rosalee,
Putting dents in the façade of psychiatry. That’s a perfect description. Enough dents, and the thing breaks.
Frank,
Thanks for the correction. And yes, the quackery, with its disastrous results, continues.
Julie,
Psychiatry has lost the intellectual and moral arguments. All they have left is PR – spin. Calling us deniers is just another example of this. But spin can only take one so far.
KindRegards,
Thank you for the encouraging words.
Fiachra,
Thanks. It’s nice to be back.
Stephen,
Her name is Paula Caplan. She wrote an article titled Diagnosisgate: Conflict of Interest at the Top of the Psychiatric Apparatus, published in Aporia in 2015. http://www.oa.uottawa.ca/journals/aporia/articles/2015_01/commentary.pdf
There’s a link to this in my post.
Bramble,
Thanks for the info and the link.
Eric,
Thanks.
Frank,
Nice!
Auntie,
Nice summary of psychiatric defense strategy!
Rosalee,
Thanks.
Oldhead,
I do indeed think there will come a time when people will look back on this era and shake their heads in disbelief and horror.
Oldhead,
Yes. They make great use of the word “may”.
Richard,
Thanks.
teegee,
When they ridicule you, you know you are having an effect.
Lawrence,
Maybe.
Frank,
Yes. And he never came clean about the Risperdal scandal.
Auntie Psychiatry,
Yes. It seems unlikely that he’ll abandon the ship he has sailed so long and for such profit.
streetphotobeing,
Thanks for the link.
Markps2,
Thanks.
Rachell777,
You’re probably right.
ConcernedCarer,
Thanks for coming in, and for your words of encouragement.
Best wishes.
Rachel777,
Yes. But I still have hope. Perhaps a deluded hope, but hope nonetheless. The hope that psychiatry, with its fake illnesses and destructive “treatments”, will perish from the land.
Lawrence,
Beautiful analogy!
Oldhead,
“So has society lost its ability to recognize false logic, or are people too intimidated to reveal their inner suspicions when they pick up on any of the disingenuous contradictions permeating such thoroughly mediocre propaganda?”
That’s a great question. How can they continue to get away with this drivel? My hope (belief?) is that as more and more people join the ranks of anti-psychiatry, we’ll reach a sort of critical mass that will be hard for psychiatrists to ignore.
Of course, they’re already positioning themselves for this. Remember the great psychiatrist Ronald Pies, MD, asserting that psychiatry never really promoted the chemical imbalance theory! And currently Allen Frances is busy pushing the fairy tale that it was not psychiatry that was doing all the damage, but rather the mean ol’ GPs, and of course, pharma.
Fiachra,
Yes. Some things don’t change.
astrong,
Sorry to learn of your tardive dyskinesia. Interestingly, virtually every member of the general public with whom I’ve discussed this has expressed the belief that the tardive dyskinesia and the akathisia are “symptoms of the illness”. When I explain that they’re adverse effects of the drugs, the response is invariably one of utter disbelief. But psychiatry has done nothing to dispel this misperception.
Danzig666,
Thanks for coming in. Certainly the dogmatism and the spurious nature of the “diagnoses” are dehumanizing, destructive, and disempowering.
Slaying_the-Dragon_of_Psychiatry,
Thanks.
PatH_America,
Thanks for the encouragement.
Rachel777,
I’m long retired. But I well remember the time when psychiatrists argued vehemently against “schizophrenics” finding any kind of productive, independent life, on the grounds that they couldn’t cope with the stress. A self-fulfilling prophecy; especially when the hapless individuals were loaded with neuroleptics.
Someone Else,
Yes. And a lot more besides.
bcharris,
Nice!
astrong,
It would be interesting if someone could conduct a study to see how many psychiatrists or their children/spouses take these pills.
Oldhead,
Yes. They are annoying. They won’t take their pills as ordered by THE DOCTOR. The fact that they know intuitively that the pills are destroying them is irrelevant. What a farce!
Rachel777,
Nice!
Steve,
Dr. Lieberman has also, on another occasion, described us anti-psychiatry activists as “rabid ideologues” (https://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/879623). Rationality is not his strong suit.
Streetphotobeing,
Yes. Unless he’s a hopeless case!
Frank,
Nice! The genetically perfect psychiatrists “treating” the genetically flawed “patients”. What next?
ConcernedCarer,
Psychiatry is definitely not OK. It is something fundamentally flawed and rotten. But they get away with what they do because the general public can’t believe that a “legitimate” medical specialty could possibly be this destructive.
Steve,
Thanks for putting it so plainly and succinctly.
Neil,
I don’t think any reasonable person would interpret my contention that psychiatry is a hoax as implying that every single psychiatrist is complicit in that hoax.
This string began when you questioned/challenged my characterization of psychiatry as a hoax. I responded to this by pointing out the twin deceptions that the vast majority of psychiatrists promote: that depression, and a wide array of other human problems, are caused by neuropathology; and that psychiatric drugs remedy this pathology. The onus, I suggest, was on you at that point to come back with some facts, references, or evidence to the contrary, or at least, a cogent argument.
But in your response, you completely ignored the deception/hoax issue, and instead launched several groundless ad hominem attacks at me.
I responded to each of these attacks, and pointed out that you seemed more interested in scoring points than in substantive debate.
Now you’re back asking me what evidence I have for my accusations of deception. But you’re missing the point. The statements concerned are false. So when psychiatrists promote these statements, they either don’t realize that they’re false (in which case, they’re not too bright), or they are being deceptive. As I don’t consider psychiatrists as a group to be particularly obtuse, the deception conclusion is inevitable. If you wish to read more on my position on this matter, please see my post Psychiatry DID Promote the Chemical Imbalance Theory http://behaviorismandmentalhealth.com/2014/06/06/psychiatry-did-promote-the-chemical-imbalance-theory/
You say that I “foreground drugs”, which I assume means emphasize. This is untrue. I respect the rights of each individual to ingest whatever he or she chooses. What I challenge, and emphatically condemn, is the fact that psychiatry uses blatant deception to induce people to take these drugs. They tell people, who present no indications or evidence of neurological illness, that they have such an illness, and that the drugs are necessary to remedy this disorder.
You have throughout this string failed to address the matter of the twin deceptions, and have consistently avoided substantive debate. But in your response to Phoenix, you “question” whether I really want to have a substantive debate or merely want to “vent a longstanding grudge”. The implication being that my critiques of psychiatry stem, not from any objective assessment of its activities or perspectives, but rather from some personal vituperation of my own. Is it possible that you imagine that this kind of petty retorting constitutes substantive debate? Is it possible that you consider these gratuitous, deprecative attacks as having some value?
If you wish to discuss/debate the hoax issue, or indeed any issue on which I have written, then by all means come back. If your comments are pertinent and objective, I will respond. But if you persist in these vacuous and groundless attacks, I will not respond.
Stephen,
Yes, they lost their insight when they dared to disagree with the psychiatrists as to what they should or should not ingest!
Phoenix,
Thank you for these interesting perspectives, and for your encouraging words.
Oldhead,
I agree entirely that we should maintain an actively adversarial stance to psychiatry. Psychiatry is not going to “see the light” and abandon their destructive, disempowering, and stigmatizing activities. Nor will they abandon their spurious concepts, because their very existence as “medical practitioners” depends on these concepts.
We need to maintain and support the critiquing of psychiatry as vigorously, and on as many fronts, as possible.
Neil,
The essence of my response to you (above) was that psychiatry has been actively promoting two enormous deceptions for decades. If you are disputing this, then please send me references to support the illness assertions or the curative assertions concerning the drugs. I would be happy to take a look, and, as I’ve said many times in my posts, if the evidence disproves my position, I will promptly apologize for my errors. In the absence of such proof, or even a convincing argument, however, what kind of “moderation” are you expecting? A destructive, disempowering hoax is a destructive, disempowering hoax.
To the best of my knowledge, there is nothing in my writings that could even remotely be described as Utopian. If you have seen something of that sort, I would be grateful if you could draw it to my attention.
With regards to the assertions that I do, in fact, make, they are eminently testable against reality. For instance, if it were demonstrated that all the individuals whom psychiatry identifies as “having major depression” were found to have a particular neurological pathology in a part of the brain associated with emotions, then my assertion fails, or at the very least is in serious trouble. To date, despite decades of lavishly-funded and highly motivated research, no such findings are to hand.
You assert that I seem to lack sympathy for people who have been damaged by psychiatry. How you can interpret any of my writings in that light is beyond my comprehension. I have enormous sympathy toward the people who have been damaged (some, very severely) by psychiatry. Indeed, my primary motivation in writing these posts, which I’ve been doing for the past nine years, stems precisely from sentiments of that sort.
I assume that your reference to my “lofty” position is sarcasm.
Your leap from my response to the assertion that I believe psychiatrists’ clients deserve their fate because they are too stupid to see through the hoax is groundless. I have never said, or even implied, anything of the sort, and it is difficult to avoid the perception that you are resorting to ad hominem attacks rather than substantive debate.
Oldhead,
Thanks for coming in. I agree whole-heartedly that psychiatry needs to go, and I believe that the PTM document will promote that objective.
Phoenix,
Thanks for this interesting perspective.
Paradoxically, although I’m very clear about aims, methods, perspectives, and philosophy of the psychiatric profession, I cannot say the same about the profession of psychology. This is because, almost from its beginning, psychology glommed onto psychiatry as a ready-made portal to the “mental health’ business. And in many (perhaps most) cases, psychologists adopted psychiatry’s spurious philosophy whole-heartedly. At present, psychologists in America are lobbying hard at state level for prescribing “privileges”, and in some states have already achieved this. Psychology was co-opted by psychiatry decades ago.
During my own career (I’m long retired), I always opened my discussions with people who came to me for help with a simple question: “How can I help you?” I then shut up and listened.
And here’s the great heresy: most of what I did that was helpful wasn’t so much a product of specialized training in psychology, as a willingness to listen, an ability to empathize, and some personal experience of life’s vicissitudes and challenges.-
Slaying the Dragon,
Thanks for this. Please see my response to Frank Blankenship above.
You are, in my view, correct in pointing out that psychiatry will try to co-opt the PTM perspective. Watch for statements like: careful and experienced psychiatrists have always been cognizant of these matters, etc.
My own position has always been that psychiatry’s systematic medicalization of all human problems is a destructive, disempowering hoax which has done and continues to do untold damage to people world-wide.
It is also my position that psychiatry is irremediable, for the simple reason that they cannot let go of their spurious illnesses and their destructive “treatments”. Psychiatry must go, and it is to this end that I direct all my writing.
In my view, the PTM document sets out clearly and in great detail the shortcomings of the psychiatric model, particularly the fact that psychiatric “diagnoses” are routinely used to conceal many of the great flaws and injustices in our society.
Neil,
For decades, psychiatrists (including psychiatric leaders) have avidly promoted the falsehood that depression which crosses arbitrary and vaguely defined thresholds of severity, duration, and frequency is caused by brain pathology; specifically neurotransmitter imbalance. This is a monstrous deception, but is compounded by the even more appalling suggestion that this supposed pathology is corrected by psychiatric drugs (especially SSRIs). This is a hoax: something intended to deceive or defraud. Similar comments can be made concerning other psychiatric “diagnoses”.
Frank,
Like you, I am also wary of replacing the psychiatric system with another system. Given the fundamental dynamics of our present society, there is always the possibility that a replacement system can be co-opted by commercial forces. Indeed, I imagine that commercial interests have already set their sights on the PTM framework and the “opportunities” that might lie therein. I like the notion of a get-off-my-back non-system, and I think Lucy’s comment above is apt.
I personally favor a mutually supportive non-system along the AA model, but without the dogmatism and religious overtones that put so many people off AA. But we also need a radical transformation of our societal values and institutions.
In my view, the great value of the PTM framework is not that it provides an alternative system, but rather an alternative perspective. Depression is not an illness, but rather an entirely understandable response to truly dreadful circumstances and oppressive discriminative institutions.
Stevie,
The terms “disorder” and “illness” and “disease” are used interchangeably in general medicine and in psychiatry. Moreover, if the APA had something other than illness in mind when they coined this title in 1952, they’ve had lots of time to clarify the matter.
Anonymous2016,
Yes. In my view, Dr. Pies is a kind of perfect reflection of psychiatry’s errors and self-serving notions.
Fiachra,
There is absolutely nothing good about psychiatry!
Steve,
I agree. The psychiatrists’ medicalization of non-medical problems is a self-serving hoax.
Lawrence,
Yes. And the APA hired the services of Porter Novelli, a world-renowned PR company. PR is all they have left.
Stephen,
And the great irony here is that prior to these studies, Nancy Andreasen had invented the term “Broken Brain”. It’s the title of her 1984 book!
Registeredforthissite,
Tragically, many psychologists are fully hooked into the psychiatric hoax.
Registeredforthissite,
And thank you for your support.
littleturtle,
The central problem of psychiatry is that it’s based on a lie – that the problems listed in the DSM are illnesses. Because of this lie, they promote a medical model, which incidentally (or perhaps not) works to their advantage.
Francesca,
You’re welcome.
Stephen,
Thanks for putting this so well.
Oldhead,
Thanks.
Steve,
It’s hard to argue with any of that. And mindfulness was an incredible reach!
Someone Else,
Thanks. Psychiatry really does kill, and I think the link between the mass murders/suicides and SSRI’s, when it’s finally confirmed unequivocally, will be the final nail in the coffin.
Peter,
Very good point. Thanks.
littleturtle,
I’m glad to hear that you’re getting help. But I see no parallel between general medicine and psychiatry. But that’s a long discussion.
Lawrence,
I did indeed read How Psychiatry Evolved into a Religion. It’s a beautiful piece, and the historical analysis is 100% accurate. I’ve read several posts that you’ve put up on MIA, and I’m extremely gratified that we have someone of your skill, experience, and forthrightness on our side.
littleturtle,
I’m not sure we ever really did. Even during the psychoanalytic period, there was lots of bio-bio-bio back at the asylums.
Truth,
And thank you also.
Slaying_the_Dragon_of_Psychiatry,
Thank you for your kind and encouraging words.
John,
True. Not really extraordinary – psychiatry as usual, perhaps.
mik,
Exactly! The fact that they are proposing this kind of shabby advertising is tantamount to admitting that they have nothing of substance to offer.
Frank,
And tragically, I have to acknowledge that one of these professions is psychology, who hang in for the sake of the crumbs that fall fro the rich man’s table.
Best wishes.
Bramble,
Perhaps there are some who’ve seen a romanticized version in a movie or something like that, but I imagine that kind of romance wears off pretty soon.
Stephen,
It’s interesting that some of them are willing to admit the hoax privately, but won’t take the next logical step!