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Articles on the Mental Health Field
The dark side of psychiatric drugs
- "These chemicals, capable of throwing the minds of users into chaos, have a long and well-documented history of creating insanity in persons who take them. In 1956, two years after the introduction of Thorazine, researchers reported that the drug caused psychosis, hallucinations, and increased anxiety. They speculated that this drug-induced insanity arose from the chemically straitjacketing effect of the drug..."--The dark side of psychiatric drugs
- "...The agency of biopsychiatry is performing the greatest magic show on earth. The incredible illusion of biologically caused mental illness serves as a powerful enforcer of oppression, consistently distracting our attention from the reality of social injustice and the devastating results on individuals and on society..."--The Enforcer
THE CASE AGAINST PSYCHIATRIC COERCION
- "Making use of the fashionable rhetoric of rights, a prominent psychiatrist describes adding the "right to treatment" -- a euphemism for coercive drugging and so-called "outpatient commitment" -- to civil commitment as a "policy more realistically and humanely balancing the right to be sick with the right to be rescued."
- "In modern, Western medicine, it is a well-established moral and legal principle that a person's body belongs to him and that medical intervention without the permission of the patient is tantamount to assault and battery."-- Thomas Szasz, Professor of Psychiatry Emeritus
Parity for mental illness, disparity for the mental patient
Mental illness reform threatens to strap patients, consumers
- "...A doctor who did not see Deaton until months later ordered him admitted to the hospital. After four days, when Deaton sought to leave, he was tied down with leather restraints. He was diagnosed as having "borderline personality disorder," a catch-all label psychiatrists can pin on a lot of people who don't fit more specific diagnostic categories. And after Deaton thought out loud about killing himself or the nurse who first had him tied down, the shrinks added "homicidal and suicidal ideation" for good measure. In fact, however, the most abnormal thing about John Deaton was that his father's employer provided extraordinarily rich insurance coverage for mental illness. ..."--Mental illness reform threatens to strap patients, consumers
Mental Patients' Liberation: Why? How?
- "Inside the hospital, of course, mental patients are a recognizable group with a recognizable identity: that of victims in a living hell..."--Mental Patients' Liberation: Why? How?
Psychiatric Drugs: Cure or Quackery
- "...most psychiatric drugs...promote feelings of despondency and unhappiness - even if they are called antidepressants. ..."--Psychiatric Drugs: Cure or Quackery
The Case Against Psychotherapy
- "... Garth Wood, M.D., a British psychiatrist, included the following statements in his book The Myth of Neurosis published in 1986: "Popularly it is believed that psychiatrists have the ability to `see into our minds,' to understand the workings of the psyche, and possibly even to predict our future behavior. In reality, of course, they possess no such skills. ..."--The Case Against Psychotherapy
The Myth of Bioligical Depression
- " As psychiatrist Peter Breggin, M.D., said in 1994, "there's no evidence that antidepressants are especially effective" (Talking Back to Prozac, St. Martin's Press, p. 200). In studies placebos often do as well. "--The Myth of Bioligical Depression
In Genes We Trust: When Science Bows to Racism
- "J. PHILLIPE RUSHTON At the University of Western Ontario in Canada, psychology professor J. Phillipe Rushton, who has benefited from more than $441,000 in Pioneer Fund awards from 1981-1992, argues that behavioral differences among blacks, whites, and Asians are the result of evolutionary variations in their reproductive strategies. ... Blacks, according to Rushton, have larger genitals, making them more promiscuous, and smaller brains, making them less intelligent than whites and Asians..."--In Genes We Trust: When Science Bows to Racism
PSYCHIATRIC STIGMA follows you everywhere you go for the rest of your life
- "In his book The Powers of Psychiatry, Emory University
professor Jonas Robitscher, J.D., M.D., said: "Psychiatrists have
been so criticized for the errors or vagueness in their labeling
procedures because the label produces a new disability, which often
remains as a burden"--Psychiatric Stigma Follows you everywhere you go...UNJUSTIFIED PSYCHIATRIC COMMITMENT in the U.S.A.
- "In 1992, U.S. Representative Patricia Schroeder of Colorado held hearings investigating the practices of psychiatric hospitals in the United States. Rep. Schroeder summarized her committee's findings as follows: "Our investigation has found that thousands of adolescents, children, and adults have been hospitalized for psychiatric treatment they didn't need; that hospitals hire bounty hunters to kidnap patients with mental health insurance; that patients are kept against their will until their insurance benefits run out;..."--UNJUSTIFIED PSYCHIATRIC COMMITMENT in the U.S.A.
Ten Good Reasons Psychiatry should be abolished
Suicide: A Civil Right
"...People are thought of as mentally ill only when their thinking, emotions, or behavior is contrary to what is considered acceptable, that is, when others (or the so-called patients themselves) dislike something about them. One way to show the absurdity of calling something an illness not because it is caused by a biological abnormality but only because we dislike it or disapprove of it is to look at how values differ from one culture to another and how values change over time. ..."
Lost memories: Shock therapy hindered recovery
The Unjustified rise of Psychiatry
- "...Considering the pattern of abuse, error, and fraud throughout the history of the mental health professon, why is it we are always able to see the errors and sins that our predecessors made, but not begin to question the motives behind our own actions? Patients, the public, and lawmakers should maintain a healthy skepticism towards mental health professionals. Few disciplines in recent history have been as susceptible to fads and unproven claims of success as the mental health profession has. If there is one piece of advice to heed, Albert Einstein said it best: " 'If you want to find out anything...about the methods they use, I advise you to stick closely to one principle: Don't listen to their words, fix your attention on their deeds' " (Szasz 1974, 2). ..."--The Unjustified rise of Psychiatry
Toxic Psychiatry
The Role of Psychiatry in Mind Control
- "This article will demonstrate how the branch of medicine called Psychiatry has been perverted, and how it has inflicted untold harm on our society in the name of science. Psychiatry, incidentally, is still being used in this pseudo-scientific cloak ... It is the primal blueprint for mind control."--Thomas A. Dorman, M.D.
- "...the intermingling of Christian and psychiatric dogma has had the most damaging effect on the foundation of the church this century..."--Christianity & Psychiatry
The Future of Mental Health: Radical changes ahead
- "In an editorial, "In Bed Together at the Market--Psychiatry and the Pharmaceutical Industry," psychiatrist Matthew Dumont urged that psychiatry declare itself an arm of the pharmaceutical industry."--The Future of Mental Health: Radical changes ahead
- "On the contrary, psychiatrists fiercely attack those who doubt the scientific nature of their hypotheses. To unsatisfied clients they reply by saying: "Who can believe a schizophrenic?". But when the same patient claims to be "cured" thanks to some strange poisonous cocktail of psycho-pharmaceuticals, he is then considered to be reliable and is shown off as living proof the validity of the psychiatrist’s hypothesis."--Psychiatrists are dreaming
- "...Nearly all scientists challenge the existence of repressed memories. Untold damage is being done to individuals and families by those who press this pseudo-science..."--Repressed Memory Syndrome
- "...The Courant's nationwide investigation of restraint-related deaths underscores just how faulty -- how rife with conflicts of interest, how self-protective, how ultimately ineffective -- the system of industry oversight and government regulation really is. The health care industry is left to police itself, but often doesn't..."--Deadly Restraint
Mental Illness Subject Of Much Misconception
- "...Most people are surprised to learn that mental illness diagnoses such as schizophrenia, substance abuse, and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, as well as compulsive behavior, anxiety, and depression are not based on any identifiable biological problem. There is no known physical or neurological abnormality, and no blood test, urine test, brain scan, or genetic marker by which it can be discerned..."--Mental Illness Subject Of Much Misconception
Shrinking the Freedom of Thought: How Involuntary Psychiatric Treatment Violates Basic Human Rights
- "...A psychiatrist who deliberately took one small dose of another neuroleptic, Thorazine (chlorpromazine), in order to evaluate its effects, wrote a description of the experience: "I felt overwhelmed by the blahs. I felt tired and lethargic, motivated to do nothing. My thinking was turned down from 78 to 16 rpms, my mouth got dry and I just didn't care all that much about anything..."--Shrinking the Freedom of Thought
Doctor's financial stake in shock therapy
- "...He concludes with an attack on doctors who criticize shock treatment and attaches a form to have patients sign when they consent to shock therapy.
- But Abrams doesn't tell the medical students one thing: He owns Somatics Inc., one of the nation's two shock machine manufacturers..."--Doctor's financial stake in shock therapy
The Nobody Show, WEOS 89.7FM Geneva, NY. Taped on 1/24/96
- "...This is really fascinating, there are about 160 suits out against Eli Lilly, for murder and suicide mostly, people who either committed murder or suicide or mutilated themselves or done something horribly violent on prozac..."--The Nobody Show
Former patient still suffering
- "...McQueen says shock destroyed large parts of her memory:.."
Mental hospitals, not spas
Patients held captive in scam, suit claims
- "...Patients coming to Florida for treatment of problems with alcohol, food or relationships brought their tennis rackets and golf clubs, expecting leisurely stays at luxurious resorts or health spas.
- Instead, they found themselves admitted to psychiatric hospitals, misdiagnosed and held captive until their health insurance ran out, major insurers charged in a lawsuit filed against a group of Florida clinics. Insurers charged the scheme cost them $39 million over five years. ..."--Mental hospitals, not spas
MPD (Multiple Personality Disorder) Faith or Fact
- "...The client is so desperate that she agrees with the therapist and from there moves on to intense therapy (usually involving hypnosis). She remembers things that never happened, accusing loved ones (mother, father, brothers and sisters, aunts and uncles) of horrendous acts that never occurred..."
- "...fraud in the mental health industry goes beyond being a problem; it's more like an all-pervasive condition. By way of introductory illustration, let's look at the recent legal problems of a company that owned several chains of psychiatric hospitals, National Medical Enterprises (NME)...
- ...In April 1994, NME paid almost $375 million in fines to the US Department of Justice for violations of Federal law. NME had announced that it would completely divest itself of its psychiatric hospitals and reserved $237 million to cover the write-offs for selling them. All told, NME's settlements and fines have totaled $927 million..."
- "...Several self-styled experts in MPD have been sued by former patients for misdiagnosing them as Multiple Personality/DID. Bennett Braun and Roberta Sachs, who were shown on the Frontline expose of the case of Mary Shanley et al were sued along with the hospital in Chicago. Braun recently settled his case with former patient Patricia Burgus for $10.6 million..."
HORROR STORIES FROM THE MENTAL HEALTH SYSTEM
- "... ' The people who write such things ' do so because we have experienced the truth about shock treatment. We say shock treatment is 'bogus' because it is presented as treatment, when in fact it is torture; we say shock treatment is ' barbaric ' because it is often forced upon persons against their will; we say shock treatment is 'destructive' because it has caused many of us to suffer permanent memory loss and irreversible brain damage. We affirm our right to remind others about these things. And if the shoe pinches, so much the worse for the guilty ones. We will not be quiet. We will remember. We declare our solemn right to remember the atrocities we have endured, in spite of the brutal attempts by psychiatrists to make us forget. . . . "--HORROR STORIES FROM THE MENTAL HEALTH SYSTEM
HOW PSYCHIATRY IS MAKING DRUG ADDICTS OUT OF AMERICA'S SCHOOL CHILDREN
- "...Cyril Kolocotronis, an inmate at Western State Hospital in Ft. Stellacoorn, Washington described the electroshock he had received:
- ...A jolt of power jars you into the darkness of temporary death. It's a darkness you can't see or perceive. It's the equivalent of death, except you wake up again. You wake up upstairs in your cell and they feed you breakfast. It destroys some of the cells in your brain and erases your treasured memory. The war-criminal doctor gives you not one of these, but 15, and one guy got 100! .... And every doctor applying electricity to the flesh knows it harms. His sins are seen by the skies and by himself. He's worse than an Auschwitz fanatic. AND NO MATTER WHAT HE TELLS YOU AND WHAT PROPAGANDA HE SPREADS. HE WON'T TAKE SHOCK TREATMENTS HIMSELF OR GIVE THEM TO ANY MEMBERS OF HIS FAMILY. ..."--MASS MURDERERS IN WHITE COATS
Logical Errors in Mental Health
- "... Although many believe the DSM is a scientific document, its most important function is insurance reimbursment. Drug companies play a particularly important role in the development of diagnostic categories. As Ketcham and Kirk (1997) explain: "Drug companies have a direct financial interest in expanding the number of people who can be defined as having a mental disorder and who then might be treated with chemical products" (p. 13). Might this explain the dramatic increase of diagnoses in DSM? ..."--Logical Errors in Mental Health
5 Psychiatric workers charged in scam
- "...Former patient Lynn Carl was awarded $5.8 million by a jury in August 1997 in the civil suit she brought against Gloria Keraga, M.D., one of the defendants in the criminal trial. In that case, Keraga testified that she believed the gist of the memories of satanic ritual abuse that Carl developed while in therapy with her. ..."--5 Psychiatric workers charged in scam
PSYCHIATRIC TECHNIQUE GETS SHOCKING BOOST FROM MEDIA
- "...Media outlets could easily do better. Picking up the phone, we quickly reached two doctors in the San Francisco area who have been denouncing electroshock for more than 20 years.
- The injury is not the `side effect' -- it's the treatment," said psychiatrist Lee Coleman, who has written that "electroshock works by damaging the brain." Electroshock's results "are completely consistent with any acute brain injury, such as a blow to the head from a hammer. In essence, what happens is that the individual is dazed, confused, and disoriented, and therefore cannot remember or appreciate current problems..."
25 GOOD REASONS WHY PSYCHIATRY MUST BE ABOLISHED
- "...psychiatrists routinely violate people's civil rights, human rights and constitutional rights such as imprisoning innocent people without court trial or public hearing ("involuntary commitment"), and subjecting them to cruel and unusual punishments or tortures such as forced drugging, electroconvulsive brainwashing, psychosurgery, solitary confinement, "chemical restraints", and 4-point or 5-point restraints. ..."--25 GOOD REASONS WHY PSYCHIATRY MUST BE ABOLISHED
Psychiatric Drugs Shorten Life Span
- "...It is very clear that the motivation behind the administration of neuroleptic drugs to the "mentally ill" and others is eugenic in nature. For those who do not know what eugenics is, it is idea that he human race can be improved by preventing "inferior stock" from reproducing and by inducing an early death. ..."--Psychiatric Drugs Shorten Life Span
Senior Citizens Targeted for Incarceration in Mental Hospitals
- "...Why would a hospital bring people in this way.? They charged Medicare $700/day for each patient (hostage). Also the psychiatrists charged their usual high fees. They even charged the government for psychotherapy for Alzheimers patients. It is well known that they do not benefit from such therapy. ..."--Senior Citizens Targeted for Incarceration in Mental Hospitals
The Christian Activist
A Summons to the Good Fight
- "...As the semester progressed, her anxieties increased and she dropped out of school and shortly thereafter placed herself in a psychiatric ward hoping to find relief. Ellen spent over ten years in the mental health system, following the mental health professionals’ advice, taking lithium, a drug that dampened her spirits, and slowed down her metabolism so that the strikingly attractive young woman she had been became in her words, "a round ball. ..."--The Christian Activist
- "From the stories one hears, one could conclude that psychiatrists haven't a clue to the meaning of the word "ethics". Just as they feel they can define what is normal or not for the rest of us, so they feel they themselves can do no wrong. ..." --Confessions of a Psychiatrist
- "...Clinical psychologists, grow up. ... Be real science-practitioners; stop just pretending, misleading people and misrepresenting things. You are neither doing the best you can NOR are you doing "ok". ...
- ... people who are non-scientists, but pretend to be scientists and/or stand on the pretense of being scientists, end up showing many of the behaviors of those with anti-social personality. ... they strongly tend to show moral degradation and inordinate non-critical self-acceptance, like those with anti-social personality ... they show great pretentiousness and defend it to the point of using deception"--CORE PSYCHOLOGY WEB PAGE
Counselors Feeding on the Misfortune of Others
- "The burgeoning counselling industry was branded ‘ethically bankrupt’ and highly destructive by a trauma expert yesterday.
- "Professor Yvonne McEwen accused professional counsellors of turning Britain into a nation of victims in order to ‘prop up a lot of flagging medical careers.’
- "She said: ‘The rights of the victims are being sacrificed to keep counsellors in jobs. They have produced a victim culture. The so-called professionals have created it. It’s totally reprehensible that the medical profession is colluding in this. This is a Western condition invented in the West and used in the West.’ ..." --Counselors Feeding on the Misfortune of Others
- A number of surveys . . . reveal some worrisome statistics about therapists’ lives and well-being. At least three out of four therapists have experienced major distress within the past three years, the principal cause being relationship problems. More than 60 percent may have suffered a clinically significant depression at some point in their lives, and nearly half admitted that in the weeks following a personal crisis they’re unable to deliver quality care. As for psychiatrists, a 1997 study by Michael Klag, M.D., found that the divorce rate for psychiatrists who graduated from Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine between 1948 and 1964 was 51 percent—higher than that of the general population of that era, and substantially higher than the rate in any other branch of medicine. . . .
- According to psychologist David Lester, Ph.D., director of the Center for the Study of Suicide, mental health professionals kill themselves at an abnormally high rate... "
THE PSYCHOLOGY EPIDEMIC AND ITS CURE
- "Psychology is not a uniform body of scientific knowledge, like thermodynamics or organic chemistry. It rather refers to a complex menagerie of ideas and theories, many of which are contradictory. Psychology has not proven itself capable of dealing effectively with the human mind and with mental and emotional processes. Thus it can hardly be regarded as a science. ..."
What if Psychotherapies Had to Meet FDA Standards for Effectiveness, Safety, Appropriateness?
- "The problem for psychotherapists is that, if a criterion and policy for efficacy similar to that used by the FDA for drugs is established for new and already existing psychotherapies, then most psychotherapy as currently practiced would have to be banned by the regulating agency. ..."--What if Psychotherapies Had to Meet FDA Standards for Effectiveness, Safety, Appropriateness?
Shock Treatment, Brain Damage, and Memory Loss: A Neurological Perspective
"...From a neurological point of view ECT is a method of producing amnesia by selectively damaging the temporal lobes and the structures within them. When it was first introduced it was only one of several methods of producing brain damage employed in psychiatry, including insulin coma (1927)* ..."--Shock Treatment, Brain Damage, and Memory Loss: A Neurological Perspective
GOVERNMENT ACTION CURBS PUBLIC ETHICAL OVERSIGHT
OF HUMAN GENE EXPERIMENTS, SAYS UD MEDICAL ETHICIST
"...The controversial disbandment of a 20-year-old federal committee will eliminate the government's only forum for public oversight on the ethics of experimenting with human genes, says medical ethicist Therese Lysaught. ..."--GOVERNMENT ACTION CURBS PUBLIC ETHICAL OVERSIGHT...
"...Psychiatric drugs can sometimes cause the opposite effect from what they are supposed to. People can become confused or agitated or freak out from using psychiatric drugs, which is often seen as another sign of mental illness. ..."--SOS Drug Information Sheets
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