Tag: The Myth of Mental Illness
Psychiatry Needs a New Metaphor
The metaphor of āmental diseaseāĀ is doing more harm than good. Rather than being a tool for communication, it has crossed the boundary from a metaphor to a theory that underpins much of what happens within public mental health services. This places psychiatrists in a position of dutiful compliance with what is essentially a fallacious model.
If āMental Illnessesā Arenāt Real Illnesses, What Are They?
Szasz clarified what mental illnessĀ isn't, but not what it is, and itĀ isĀ something. I will show that it's just a concept that evolved in order to dehumanize those who cope in ways that don't further society's survival, and thus to justify their exclusion so as to maximize society's efficiency.
A Conversation about Having Conversations about Psychiatry
In spite of constantly increasing opportunities to tell different stories to the canonical story of bio-psychiatry, it can be risky for academics to voice a different perspective than the mainstream model of mental illness. In this conversation, a communication professor and a psychology professor discuss their challenges and personal experiences with going against the grain, such as what it means to be labeled āanti-psychiatryā by colleagues and responding to students upset to learn their medications may not be all they thought they were.