1. The Myth
A “mental illness” is a real disease. “Mental illnesses” are brain diseases.
1. The Reality
There is no litmus test to determine whether a person has a “mental illness” or not. We have found no “mental illness” virus, bacteria, or genes. “Mental illnesses” are not brain diseases by definition. When a physical cause for a “mental illness” is discovered in the brain, then it ceases to be a “mental illness”, and it becomes a neurological disorder.
2. The Myth
There are many “sick” people out there in the community who are not getting the treatment they need because of “stigma”.
2. The Reality
20 % of the US population are on psychiatric drugs, 11 % of the US population are on anti-depressants, if anything there is an epidemic in the over-diagnosis of psychiatric disorder. This untreated-people-in-the-community ruse is being used by pharmaceutical companies to expand their markets.
3. The Myth
“Stigma” keeps people who are “sick” from seeking much needed treatment.
3. The Reality
When people are forced into mental health treatment against their will and wishes, how can you speak of “stigma” preventing people from seeking treatment? You’ve got people who don’t want to be treated being treated. If they aren’t actively engaged in seeking treatment, the state can always impose treatment upon them, so much for “stigma” preventing anybody from receiving it.
4. The Myth
“Mental illness” is a lifelong debilitating condition from which people seldom recover.
4. The Reality
People can and do recover from serious “mental illness” labels.
5. The Myth
Commitment to a mental hospital is used as a last resort.
5. The Reality
People are sent to state hospitals because communities have not created more safe and effective community treatment resources and supports.
6. The Myth
‘Anti-psychotic’ drugs are medication.
6. The Reality
Neuroleptic drugs, the so-called ‘anti-psychotic’ drugs, are not medicinal in the slightest, and they are not particularly anti-psychotic. They can, in fact, given long term use, increase the psychotic symptoms they are credited with suppressing.
7. The Myth
Mental health treatment is safe.
7. The Reality
There are many mental health treatments used in standard psychiatric practice today that are physically harmful.
8. The Myth
Mental health treatment is improving.
8. The Reality
We have this 25-30 year mortality gap, and it has been growing for years, between people served by the mental health system and the general population. I wouldn’t call dying at a younger age an improvement.
9. The Myth
Drug treatment makes people better.
9. The Reality
Drug treatment has tended to destroy the physical health of people in mental health treatment. There are more and better ways to treat people in the mental health field, and we need to explore some of those other ways more fully.
10. The Myth
Neurological research is on the verge of great discoveries that will prove useful in treating people in the mental health system.
10. The Reality
We’ve been hearing the same sort of scientific breakthrough claims for hundreds of years now, and every time we hear them, we‘re more or less back where we started.
Filed under: Alternatives, Biological Psychiatry, Brain Damage, Conflict of Interest, Discrimination, Education, Force, Fraud, Human Rights, Mental Health Care, Oppression, Pharmaceutical Company, Psychiatric Drugs, Recovery, Research, self help, State Hospital, Violence |
Lunatic Fringe 
11. The Myth
Psychiatrists are real doctors.
11. The Reality
Psychiatrists have gone to medical school, and have an “M.D.” after their name, but the vast majority know nothing about how to help a person heal, get well and stay well….
They label; they write prescriptions, they lock people up….
The vast majority cause much more harm than good.
Duane
You’re right on the mark with that one, Duane. Truly caring doctors are very few and far between.
There is something ethically unsound, I think, about labeling people and drugging them on the grounds that they are a threat to the public safety, without considering that they are that public, too. Alienation pervades the whole process.
Mental health treatment needs a paradigm shift. Drugs should not be the first and only line of defense against mental health issues. Doctors need to work with nature rather than against her. They also need to put things back into a social context. A social context that doesn’t exclude their part in it.
Now if any reader has a myth that he or she think I’ve missed, this is your opportunity! I invite you to add it in the comment section here, as Duane has done, and maybe then we can extend this list to include the Top Twenty Myths of Mental Health Treatment today.
1. Disease does not require physical proof, so it is an appropriate enough word; I do not think it works well when associated with the mind, although. The term “mental illness” needs to go because of the loading attached to it.
Neuro-physiological symptoms amount to the same thing and this is a term I prefer because it does not have the stigma attached to it.
2. Plenty of people who do not need treatment are on treatment. People who really need help are scared to come forward because they know that they will be locked up, drugged up, and left to rot.
3. If you work in a competitive environment for instance, admitting to having had treatment will work against you. People are scared of losing their children. Once you let the system in, it takes over. It monitors you and what might have been considered a normal angry reaction, say, suddenly becomes a reason to cart you off to the funny farm.
4. And from serious conditions.
6. Anti-psychotic medication can turn you psychotic. These people dick around with people’s brains without a jot of understanding about what they are doing. It is completely hit and miss. Every individual is different and they are going to be differently affected at different times depending upon their situation; how much they ate, drank, and so on are factors that change the way a drug functions. These drugs operate by changing the symptoms from one thing to another. A new rack of symptoms to deal with is not the way to good health or to a cure.
10. I do have some hope here that neurological research is going to de-bunk psychiatry. You can see how psychiatrists are tending to attach themselves to scientific practices in order to weather the storm.
12. The Myth
Physical force is an appropriate way to approach a patient.
12. The Reality
Physical force is the worst possible way to approach anyone. Violating a person’s boundaries, taking away their human rights and terrorising them will make them ill if they were not already. Getting over these things and feeling free to live a normal life after being treated so badly is truly a challenge.
We have a communication problem here, G M. If you continue to nit pick in this fashion, sooner or later, you are going to be met by silence. I have neither the time nor inclination to spend my entire life haranguing with you.
1. Way back in 1960 Dr. Thomas Szasz published a now classic essay, The Myth of Mental Illness. This essay is online, and I suggest that you read it.
2. Repeal mental health law, and this situation no longer applies. Mental health law is the sole basis for forced treatment. Get rid of mental health law, and people will no longer be threatened with assault mascerading as therapy.
3. Mental health law means mental health records and a paper trail. Repeal mental health law, and the horrors associated with it should be mitigated.
4. Seriousness is a matter for dispute. It is from membership in the Church of Biological Psychiatry that the notion of “mental illness” achieves its traumatic profundity. Outside of the Church of Biological Psychiatry people practice skeptism.
6. Many many things are wrong with the current paradigm of care that relies so heavily on pharmaceuticals. I wouldn’t say its because these drugs affect every individual differently because I don’t think that is the case. Given a certain weight, etc., and a certain dosage of a drug, you’re going to get the same effects, more or less. Seeking the answer to social and personal problems through drugs is not the way to go regardless of whether those drugs are seen as medicinal or recreational. Drugs are a way of getting around problems by masking them rather than dealing with them directly. Take as many drugs as you like, the problem remains, and the problem itself will have to be dealt with eventually, or avoided again in one fashion or another.
10. The research being conducted today is guided by bias. It is not being conducted by people with open minds. I think the predominating theory is just plain wrong, and you unfortunately don’t have a lot of people conducting research starting from more sound premises. Much of this research is merely a matter of supporting the drug industry, and this support in turn compounds the problem.
I like your myth in the main, but I think I would rephrase it. People can resist psychological persuasion, but force is the power of the state. How about something along the lines of…
12. The Myth
Forcible treatment is effective treatment
12. The Reality
Long term institutionalization, and long term forced drugging, weaken people’s mental and emotional stability. Forced treatment retraumatizes trauma victims. Treatment, and the dependency that derives from it, create additional debilitating circumstances on top of psychiatric labeling that challenge the ability of people who have experienced such to recover.
What are you talking about? Pot, kettle again, I take it. I believe truth to be important and I believe the exploration of ideas to be important. I also stand for those who understand what it is to be crippled by distress. If you have a problem with any of that, it is very much your problem; alienating someone who holds these views is hardly enlightened behaviour.
You do not have to respond to everything I say. If you choose to exchange views then so be it. If I see something I wish to comment on, then so be it. Live and let live. Meet me with silence and that is fine by me. I prefer not to spend my time squabbling with you.
1. I know of him and his theories; I shall read it.
2. That is basically what I said.
3. Of course.
4. This is an area of dispute between us. “Traumatic profundity” is only too real. We agree on how people should be treated, however.
5. Near enough. Definitely re. masking.
10. Yes, that is an issue. It is a bit of a “wait and see” situation for the time being.
12. I think you have a few more there..
Like I said, I think we have a communication problem.
Lol! No kidding. Take a look back at your ‘consumer empowerment’ post and you will find I say pretty much the same thing as Duane. The difference is that when I said it, you disagreed. Go figure.
I think that you read what I say with a preconceived notion about where I am coming from. Try dropping the suspicion and the judgement and just read. I often post a comment in support of what you have said only to be surprised to find you attacking me when I return.
I like to extrapolate the ideas we discuss here to a point where I can see practical implementation. I think that when I do this, you lose sight of the fact that I am considering the original idea a given. Just something for you to be aware of. I shall be aware of the fact that my clarity of vision does not always transfer to the page. Also note that a desire for truth, clarity, and an inclusive model is not the same thing as nit picking.
In terms of how people are treated and the need for kindness and respite rather than incarceration, we think the same.
We have our differences when it comes to the reality of certain conditions. I agree that the old terminology needs to go, but we will require some new terminology along the way. I see no point in avoiding that.
What happens when you and I get into a debate about illness is the unstoppable force immovable object routine. This is how we got started in the first place. Your life observations lead you to believe one thing, mine lead me to know another.
I cannot sit back and agree with the notion that there is no such thing as a disease/sickness/illness/whatever you want to call it of the mind. To me, when you claim this, you are denying people who experience these things their existence. You are essentially labeling them non-existent. Do you see that? That way leads us backwards to a time when people were locked away out of sight because they didn’t ‘fit in’.
This is what happens in a place that is in denial about you know what:
And just thirty years ago on Staten Island:
With anyone, how they got there is less important than the fact they did and need help to get better. We agree that the methodology needs to change radically.
I think another issue is that I take you out of your comfort zone. When I asked you for your thoughts on key implementation points, you only really responded to the one you didn’t think would work. It is important to air ideas and work them through; that is how you find out if they are practical. Maybe this way of thinking makes you uncomfortable because it takes you closer to doing something new.
I am concerned about the way science is headed because of the preponderance of big pharma and I think that collective action is required now before things get ugly. Eugenics is just around the corner, MFV. It won’t be long before “forced treatment” includes tinkering with your genes.
It all started right where you are:
http://hnn.us/articles/1796.html
Beware.
We have a communication problem. I’m blogging. I’m not trying to arrive at a concensus. I responded to one of your comments in an affirmative fashion, and you got piqued. The dialogue rambled unevenly on for awhile. Okay. Good and well enough. I’m not going to argue minutiae with you forever. Next page.
All right. If you are just blogging and do not need to “arrive at a consensus”, then there is no reason for you to respond to anything I say.
No, I was not piqued about that.
So, that’s it then, is it? Talk and no action? That’s all right, if that is what it is; I just thought you and everyone here wanted to actually do something about all of this. The things I posted here are diabolical not “minutiae”. They are serious aspects of the problem and need addressing in order for change to be established. Putting the blinkers on when a point is well made and makes you feel uncomfortable does not change anything.
But I understand. You want to do your thing and this is it.
I don’t think you do understand. I’m not trying to pick a fight with you, but you seem to be trying to pick a fight with me. I’ve said it 3 times before in the comments to this post, and I’m going to make it a 4th. We have a communication problem.
Did you watch the films?
I am attempting to communicate to you the danger of disavowing any and all kinds of conditions currently labeled mental illness. I do not see how I can be any clearer.
It is not my intention that we fight, it is my intention that we learn and become better people for it.
Yes, I watched the videos. Off topic or not, let’s go there…
This institute in Serbia, where they can get an investigation by implying torture, hmmm. Torture of one sort or another seemed to be occuring there. People are tortured in institutions in the USA and Great Britain, too. It’s a start though. This is an instance where somebody wants to recognise torture as torture.
The situation in Serbia is horrific. It should be a priority to relieve it certainly. You don’t need people treated like that. I believe there are similar institutions in other poorer countries around the world.
In China they’ve been institutionalizing people for their beliefs. In Russia, too. In the Americas and Northern Europe they are institutionalizing people for being alone in their beliefs.
The Willowbrook School thing was a flash back to an expose’ Geraldo Rivera did in 1972. 1972 – today? We don’t even have a clue! What he didn’t show was how things might have changed since then if they have done so. Institutional mistreatment is not history.
Alright, let me try to guide this discussion back on topic again…
13. The Myth
People are not mistreated in mental institutions today.
13. The Reality
Forced treatment is mistreatment.
Maybe the thing to do is to replace myth no. 12 with the above myth as the suggestion in both is so similar in nature.
We could then replace myth no 13. perhaps with…
13. The Myth
Neglect is an acceptable form of mental health treatment.
13. The Reality
Neglect is a human rights violation.
The films are completely on topic. I was addressing your first statement.
“I cannot sit back and agree with the notion that there is no such thing as a disease/sickness/illness/whatever you want to call it of the mind. To me, when you claim this, you are denying people who experience these things their existence. You are essentially labeling them non-existent. Do you see that? That way leads us backwards to a time when people were locked away out of sight because they didn’t ‘fit in’.”
There is a big crossover between neurological and psychological. I think the more that becomes apparent to medical science, the sooner people are going to realise the current form of approach is archaic.
I have already made comments on your first set of myths so we don’t need to go over them all again. I like the idea of identifying key points like this but I do have different views on certain issues and on exactly how I would phrase things.
I would say that people who are not in distress are not ill and that nobody has the right to lock somebody up for being different. Equally, nobody has the right to lock up people who are in distress or who are suffering from any trauma induced condition.
It is torture, yes. And you are right to muse over that because torture is the right word for what is happening in our first world countries too. What is happening in Serbia is extreme, but look at those children on Staten Island. And yes, what happened next is anyone’s guess.
Forced mental health treatment is a human rights issue. The trouble is that for all the talk of human rights, particularly in the US, respecting them is another matter entirely. As long as the premise is to drag people off and lock them up, you are always going to get this prison guard mentality amongst medical staff.
My 12 was more to do with initial approach, so addresses police conduct. I have separated some of yours into more points for clarity; see what you think:
12. The Myth
Physical force is an appropriate way to approach a person in distress.
12. The Reality
Physical force is the worst possible way to approach anyone. Violating a person’s boundaries, taking away their human rights and terrorising them will make them ill if they are not already. Getting over these things and feeling free to live a normal life after being treated so badly is truly a challenge.
13. The Myth
People are not mistreated in mental institutions today.
13. The Reality
Forced treatment is mistreatment.
13. The Myth
Forced treatment is effective treatment.
13. The Reality
Forced treatment re-traumatises trauma victims.
14. The Myth
Neglect is an acceptable form of mental health treatment.
14. The Reality
Neglect is a human rights violation.
15. The Myth
Long term forced treatment is effective.
15. The Reality
Long term forced drugging weakens people’s mental and emotional stability and causes permanent injury and death. The only people to benefit long term are drug companies and their shareholders.
16. The Myth
Long term institutionalisation helps patients recover.
16. The Reality
Long term institutionalisation keeps the business of incarceration afloat. Patients become dependent and this causes additional debilitation. Recovery from this dependency and the accompanying psychiatric labels is challenging.
This is a great work in progress, MFV. It would be good for you to chew over the points and edit them into a watertight set that you can publicise and distribute.
I wouldn’t call “force” an “approach”. This was my reasoning for rephrasing # 13. # 16 is redundant with # 15. Maybe if we had a myth about the lack of science behind labeling, or the harm that comes of it, or both. I will look into the possibilities when I can make the time.
That is the point really, MFV. The police and the doctors make a first “approach” to people in distress with force and that is wrong. De-escalation is key. Terrifying people out of their wits and essentially arresting them – or worse – is an appalling way to start; to have that followed up by doctors pinning you down and sticking needles in you is an appalling follow-up. By the time a person actually takes stock of their situation, they have been assaulted and have had their rights and their person violated. That is why I think a specific Myth to cover that truamatising process would be a good thing.
With 15 and 16, I was making a differentiation between long term drugging, which can take place outside of a facility with the assistance of relatives, and long term incarceration. The drugs appear in both Myths but institutionalisation alone has its effect.
Here’s a start on another one then:
Myth
Psychiatry is based upon sound scientific principles.
Reality
Psychiatry bases the majority of its conclusions upon personal opinion and conjecture. Pharmaceutical companies and doctors in the American Psychiatric Association who hold stock in these companies are fabricating mental illnesses in order to profit from pushing drugs onto healthy individuals.
There are two there..
Myth
Psychiatry is based upon sound scientific principles.
Reality
Psychiatry bases the majority of its conclusions upon personal opinion and conjecture.
Myth
The American Psychiatric Association is an impartial body acting in the interests of patients everywhere.
Reality
Pharmaceutical companies and doctors in the American Psychiatric Association who hold stock in these companies are fabricating mental illnesses in order to profit from pushing drugs onto healthy individuals.
That’s a good one!
I think this is such an excellent idea. You can turn this into an anti-psychiatry check list that helps people identify and protest against the issues they confront.
I’m working on the right language to apply here. 16 is redundant without changing the language, and I will see about doing so. Long term neuroleptic drug use is not safe. Duh. I think with the way it is worded right now the distinction is clear enough between incarceration and treatment (sp. drug treatment).
As far as psychiatry being based on sound science is concerned, what do they say, neccesity is the mother of invention. You start with the problem, an emergency situation where people in distress are concerned, and a solution is imperative. The scientific pretensions we can do without. Biological psychiatry uses this pseudo-science in a very questionable fashion. Biological psychiatry uses its scientific pretensions to oppress people,
The APA is not a psychiatric treatment, but you are very on target about their ties to the drug industry. This speaks directly to the bad science involved. There is a lot of research being conducted today, but much of this research is being conducted merely as a ploy to increase drug company profits. Biological psychiatry and the drug companies must have a relationship almost by definition. This taints most of the research that is being conducted. Researchers aren’t looking into the effects the drugs have on people because doing so could negatively affect drug company profits. Researchers are conducting a mad gene hunt because positing a biological base to “mental disorder” could positively affect drug company profits. What is most apparent in this research slant is bias.
If long term treatment is ineffective it doesn’t support recovery.
15. The Myth
Long term drug treatment is safe.
15. The reality
The drugs used to suppress psychosis cause a neurological condition and a metabolic syndrome. Due to this metabolic syndrome people in mental health care are dying on average 25 years earlier than the rest of the population. The drugs have been shown to decrease brain tissue, and they cause cognitive decline. The long term effects of these drugs are often confused with the symptoms of mental disorder. People should not be maintained on these drugs over long and indefinite periods of time.
I don’t think 16 is redundant because the effects caused by incarceration are different from those caused by drugging. There is a lot of crossover but it pays to separate them. Another situation you can have, don’t forget, is incarcerated patients being denied drugs they have become dependent upon. That happens.
I still think you need to separate the initial approach to a person in distress from forced treatment. That first contact is important. Having said that, like the APA, it doesn’t really constitute a treatment; maybe you could have a broader title like “The Top Twenty Myths of Psychiatry”, or however many you come up with.
I am waiting to see what happens with the genetic and epigenetic research before I reach a conclusion.
This is your baby, so it is up to you how you word things ultimately. My sense of it is to edit the points and keep them clean with the minimum of crossover. Those presented as bullet points work well; more points with less information in them work best.
Long term institutionalization is not the problem it used to be. It is still a problem, yes, but it’s not the problem it used to be. How about…
16. The Myth
Long term hospitalization is beneficial…
It is not, and actually it never was. I associate long term institutionalization with forced treatment, too, and we’ve dealt with that one.
16, The Reality
People come out of hospitals in worse condition than when they went in. Long term hospitalization can result in people being less equipped to deal with the struggles of daily life than they were before hospitalization. The institution, in some instances, has become a school for helplessness. Warehousing people in institutions is not good for the people being warehoused, nor it is beneficial for society as a whole.
The big problem that is not being addressed here is the institution without walls, or the mental health ghetto. I wouldn’t be surprised to find mental health consumers wearing behavior monitoring ankle bracelets in the future. I think long term drugging covers the problems with outpatient commitment, but the real problem is much broader. The system is excellent at disabling people, it just isn’t very good at enabling them. You’ve got a lot of people working at paralegals in the mental health field, but that can be adding to the problem we’ve already got. You don’t have as many people employed at good jobs with decent salaries in other fields. A life in “mental health” is not my idea of a life, and it’s also a contributing factor in this expanding system we’ve got. The economic burden the tax payers are saddled with is also increased by this self-perpetuating system as they are the ones paying for it. Many of these tax payers actual work for a living.
I like that for 16.
When you talk about “the institution without walls”, I share your concerns. Remember the article about the so-called “smart pill” that tells on you when you haven’t taken your medicine?
The medicalisation of the masses is a symptom of the creeping totalitarianism we are seeing across many areas of operation in western society. The DSM is a weapon to silence dissent.
Screwing tax payers to perpetuate dysfunctional yet lucrative methods of control goes hand in glove with the need to keep people fully occupied with making ends meet whilst they feed the machine.
How about, synthesizing and adding to some earlier comments…
17. Myth: Psychiatry is a science.
Reality: Psychiatry is a pseudoscience. Its practices don’t qualify as scientific by even the most basic and widely accepted definitions of science. For example, the criterion of falsifiability (scientific hypotheses must be falsifiable). The influence of pharmaceutical companies has ensured that any studies that cast doubt on the safety or efficacy of an established, profitable drug will be largely ignored, thus making a fair chunk of psychiatric hypotheses (e.g., “Atypical antipsychotics are effective treatments for psychosis,” “antipsychotics correct underlying neurochemical imbalances”) unfalsifiable.
Very true. We know a lot about what neuroleptic drugs do. Researchers usually don’t factor in neuroleptics at all. The disease is blamed, lifestyles did it, etc. If the truth ever comes out, nobody will be able to ignore the fact that a great deal of iatrogenic harming takes place in the mental health field. These researchers have a vested interest in diverting attention away from the profession that does the treating, and the treatment. Science is less discriminating when it comes to the evidience. This or that item alone will never reveal the whole story. Keep certain matters suppressed, and nobody is none the wiser. Suppressing evidence is not science, suppressing evidence is a cover up.
When someone writes an article he/she maintains the plan of a
user in his/her brain that how a user can understand it.
Thus that’s why this article is perfect. Thanks!
I don’t completely get your drift, but the NARSAD (now Brain & Behavior Research Foundation) top ten list exists purely for propaganda purposes, that is, there is nothing scientific about that list at all. It’s a matter of these mental health professions trying to tell people how to think about mental health. There is a theory behind that list, but it’s only a theory, and it’s hardly the only theory, nor the most valid one. The list is based on bias, and there isn’t a lot of reliable evidence to back it up. Before you say this or that group of people has not the ability to express self-control, you should conduct some tests to see if your statement has any validity or not. Don’t expect people to take your word on faith. The “mental illness” religion of the “mental health” profession just doesn’t wash. Simply conducting a survey of professional opinion is not going to make a round earth flat however much folks believe that round earth to be flat. I imagine there is one group this list does serve, and that group is comprised of the executive directors of pharmaceutical companies. Their aim, if you hadn’t guessed, has little to do with mental health, and everything to do with the profit.
I wanted to thank you for this very good read!! I definitely
loved every bit of it. I have got you book
marked to check out new things you post…
This jibes very well with my own thoughts and experiences on the matter. I was once prescribed an antipsychotic by an authoritarian posing as a doctor (in retrospect I was incredibly naïeve back then but how was I to know?) while not even exhibiting signs of psychosis (depression was the label they used), and it severely impacted my state of mind. Overnight I became slow-witted, sluggish, completely numb and my will to live all but evaporated so I ended up attempting suicide which left me with physical trauma far worse than my previous emotional suffering.
So yes I can attest to the truth of the fact that psychotropic medication is harmful and should be avoided at all cost. If psychiatry was a legitimate branch of medecine and its remedies and cures where effective and evidence based (i.e proven to work and offer benefits outweighing the risks) then surely I would go to them for treatment (who wants to suffer voluntarily?) but as I found out the hard way it’s a nasty, crude, harmful, fascist sect of fanatics who habitually harm people while completely shredding their dignity and violating their human rights.
A pox on them I say, may there come a day when these angels of death are held accountable for their actions and either medicine actually finds physical causes for these supposed illnesses (and with it effective cures) or give up their pretenses altogether and at least leave suffering folk alone instead of making it worse and adding insult to injury.
I encourage you to persevere in your task and continue to be a free voice contradicting the multitudes of brain-washed believers and their priests the psychiatrists. Sapere aude! Break free of psychiatric madness and thought control!