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So your credentials consist of personal anecdotes? Maybe it's time to start taking the issue more seriously. I think it's a serious issue deserving a more serio

So your credentials consist of personal anecdotes? Maybe it's time to start taking the issue more seriously. I think it's a serious issue deserving a more serious approach. For example, you might try reading literature with multiple different perspectives on the issue. Then try to figure out which ideas are right and why. (If you've already done this, forgive me, and please please inform me why Szasz is mistaken, I would love to learn something.)

Mz 13y ago
FYI: I have done lots of reading. I spent time in therapy. Etc. And, for a time, I essentially had an unpaid "consultancy" where parents who had super difficult kids who had been failed by all the experts would get given my email address and talk with me a bit and a year or so later I would hear back that their "impossible" kid was getting their act together. So I strongly suspect that I know what I am talking about, better than most so-called experts.
gruseom 13y ago
I like Szasz too, as well as his hippie counterpart R.D. Laing (whom you might check out if you're interested), but please, don't play intellectual hardball in this thread. The OP just lost his brother.
- xenophanes2 13y ago
  People are spreading very bad, destructive ideas that will result in more dead brothers. I think that's more important than being "nice". Also, Szasz and Laing are closer to opposites than counterparts. See for example: http://www.amazon.com/Antipsychiatry-Quackery-Squared-Thomas-Szasz-ebook/dp/B004E0Z3SG/ http://www.amazon.com/Antipsychiatry-Quackery-Squared-Thomas... Quote from the book, by Szasz: > In the late 1960s, a group of psychiatrists, led by David Cooper (1931-86) and Ronald D. Laing (1927-89), began to criticize conventional psychiatry, especially so-called somatic treatments. But instead of advocating the abolition of Institutional Psychiatry, they sought to replace it with their own brand, which they called "Anti-psychiatry." By means of this dramatic misnomer, they attracted attention to themselves and deflected attention from what they did, which continued to include coercions and excuses based on psychiatric authority and power. Thus, antipsychiatry is a type of psychiatry. The psychiatrist qua health-care professional is a fraud, and so too is the antipsychiatrist. In Psychiatry.The Science of Lies, I showed that psychiatry-an imitation of medicine-is a form of quackery. In this volume, I show that antipsychiatry-a form of alternative psychiatry-is quackery squared. > > For more than a half century, I have consistently asserted two simple but fundamental propositions: mental illnesses do not exist, and coercions justified by them are wrong. Anyone who seeks to help others must eschew the use of force. Not a single antipsychiatrist has ever agreed with these principles or abided by these practices. Subsuming my work under the rubric of antipsychiatry betrays and negates it just as effectively and surely as subsuming it under the rubric of psychiatry. My writings form no part of either psychiatry or antipsychiatry and belong to neither. They belong to conceptual analysis, social-political criticism, and common sense. This is why I rejected, and continue to reject, psychiatry and antipsychiatry with equal vigor.
- mynameishere 13y ago
  How is he playing hardball? He's being dickish crank. BTW, dickish crank, your hour-old xenophanes2 account seems to have already been hell-banned.
  - deleted 13y ago
    [deleted]
- xenophanes 13y ago
  People are spreading very bad, destructive ideas that will result in more dead brothers. I think that's more important than being "nice". Also, Szasz and Laing are closer to opposites than counterparts. See for example: http://www.amazon.com/Antipsychiatry-Quackery-Squared-Thomas-Szasz-ebook/dp/B004E0Z3SG/ http://www.amazon.com/Antipsychiatry-Quackery-Squared-Thomas... Quote from the book, by Szasz: > In the late 1960s, a group of psychiatrists, led by David Cooper (1931-86) and Ronald D. Laing (1927-89), began to criticize conventional psychiatry, especially so-called somatic treatments. But instead of advocating the abolition of Institutional Psychiatry, they sought to replace it with their own brand, which they called "Anti-psychiatry." By means of this dramatic misnomer, they attracted attention to themselves and deflected attention from what they did, which continued to include coercions and excuses based on psychiatric authority and power. Thus, antipsychiatry is a type of psychiatry. The psychiatrist qua health-care professional is a fraud, and so too is the antipsychiatrist. In Psychiatry.The Science of Lies, I showed that psychiatry-an imitation of medicine-is a form of quackery. In this volume, I show that antipsychiatry-a form of alternative psychiatry-is quackery squared. > For more than a half century, I have consistently asserted two simple but fundamental propositions: mental illnesses do not exist, and coercions justified by them are wrong. Anyone who seeks to help others must eschew the use of force. Not a single antipsychiatrist has ever agreed with these principles or abided by these practices. Subsuming my work under the rubric of antipsychiatry betrays and negates it just as effectively and surely as subsuming it under the rubric of psychiatry. My writings form no part of either psychiatry or antipsychiatry and belong to neither. They belong to conceptual analysis, social-political criticism, and common sense. This is why I rejected, and continue to reject, psychiatry and antipsychiatry with equal vigor.
scott_s 13y ago
What did Mz say that you are objecting to? Everything she said aligns with what I have read and heard about suicide.
- doktrin 13y ago
  If I understand the parent correctly, he agrees with a certain Thomas Szasz' [1] opinions on psychiatry. Central among his opinions is the assertion that mental illness is a "myth" due to the lack of observable changes at the cellular level (or at autopsy), and that mental illness patients are "malingerers". My opinion : the dude sounds like an ass and his opinions are eye-rolling. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Szasz http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Szasz
  - einhverfr 13y ago
    Mental illness is a really tough thing to discuss in an objective way. See the debates about the DSM-5. I personally think mental health and mental illness are socially constructed. This being said, the experiences relating to mental illness are very real. The larger question is how we make sense of them as a society. For something like depression how much of the illness is cognitive? How much is biological? How much is social? Somehow that last question never gets asked.
    - Mz 13y ago
      That last is very hard to ask because the vast majority of people are raised with either a guilt or shame model, thus asking it comes across as finger pointing. Anyway, I need to go so cannot elaborate.
      - einhverfr 13y ago
        It's not a question of finger pointing so much as asking what social structures we have that make this harder. You mentioned your kids live with you. How hard would it be if they didn't? Does the fact that we stigmatize adults living with their parents and make mental illness into an individual problem contribute to it?
saalweachter 13y ago
I don't give two shits what Thomas Szasz thought about mental illness, because he wasn't a scientist or even a doctor, he was a goddamn libertarian philosopher. He found mental illness philosophically inconvenient because he couldn't see a way around the State being morally justified in providing coercive treatment to the mentally ill, so he just decided they didn't exist. He was an asshole who spent sixty years shitting over real science to promote his politics, and you're an asshole for trying to promote his politics at a digital wake.
- JustinCEO 13y ago
  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Szasz http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Szasz > In 1938, Szasz moved to the United States, where he attended the University of Cincinnati for his Bachelor of Science in medicine, and received his M.D. from the same university in 1944.[7]
  - saalweachter 13y ago
    Fine, he was a morally bankrupt doctor. I agree I should not have claimed otherwise in my initial invective and apologize for my error, but let me reiterate: his stance on mental illness did not originate from his medical or scientific observations, but from his philosophy. And despite living through fifty years of startling advances in medicine, where huge swaths of mental illness were found to have biological origins in the brain, he never recanted. So fuck him, he was an asshole.
    - doktrin 13y ago
      > And despite living through fifty years of startling advances in medicine, where huge swaths of mental illness were found to have biological origins in the brain Pretty much this. Having just heard about him today, it's clear his [Szasz] statements reflect technological limitations of yesteryear combined with intense personal bias. Why anyone would still espouse the concepts this guy put forward is beyond me.
    - prestadige 13y ago
ChrisClark 13y ago
So, what you are saying is that if I notice that a friend of mine is suicidal, I should not try to spend time with him in person? Am I still allowed to talk to him on the phone? Email? Can I be within a kilometer of his house? Is it like a restraining order? All the comment you replied to is saying is that if you notice a friend in trouble, spend time with him. You seriously think that is an awful thing?

Mz 13y ago

FYI: I have done lots of reading. I spent time in therapy. Etc. And, for a time, I essentially had an unpaid "consultancy" where parents who had super difficult kids who had been failed by all the experts would get given my email address and talk with me a bit and a year or so later I would hear back that their "impossible" kid was getting their act together. So I strongly suspect that I know what I am talking about, better than most so-called experts.

gruseom 13y ago

I like Szasz too, as well as his hippie counterpart R.D. Laing (whom you might check out if you're interested), but please, don't play intellectual hardball in this thread. The OP just lost his brother.

xenophanes2 13y ago
People are spreading very bad, destructive ideas that will result in more dead brothers. I think that's more important than being "nice". Also, Szasz and Laing are closer to opposites than counterparts. See for example: http://www.amazon.com/Antipsychiatry-Quackery-Squared-Thomas-Szasz-ebook/dp/B004E0Z3SG/ http://www.amazon.com/Antipsychiatry-Quackery-Squared-Thomas... Quote from the book, by Szasz: > In the late 1960s, a group of psychiatrists, led by David Cooper (1931-86) and Ronald D. Laing (1927-89), began to criticize conventional psychiatry, especially so-called somatic treatments. But instead of advocating the abolition of Institutional Psychiatry, they sought to replace it with their own brand, which they called "Anti-psychiatry." By means of this dramatic misnomer, they attracted attention to themselves and deflected attention from what they did, which continued to include coercions and excuses based on psychiatric authority and power. Thus, antipsychiatry is a type of psychiatry. The psychiatrist qua health-care professional is a fraud, and so too is the antipsychiatrist. In Psychiatry.The Science of Lies, I showed that psychiatry-an imitation of medicine-is a form of quackery. In this volume, I show that antipsychiatry-a form of alternative psychiatry-is quackery squared. > > For more than a half century, I have consistently asserted two simple but fundamental propositions: mental illnesses do not exist, and coercions justified by them are wrong. Anyone who seeks to help others must eschew the use of force. Not a single antipsychiatrist has ever agreed with these principles or abided by these practices. Subsuming my work under the rubric of antipsychiatry betrays and negates it just as effectively and surely as subsuming it under the rubric of psychiatry. My writings form no part of either psychiatry or antipsychiatry and belong to neither. They belong to conceptual analysis, social-political criticism, and common sense. This is why I rejected, and continue to reject, psychiatry and antipsychiatry with equal vigor.
mynameishere 13y ago
How is he playing hardball? He's being dickish crank. BTW, dickish crank, your hour-old xenophanes2 account seems to have already been hell-banned.
- deleted 13y ago
  [deleted]
xenophanes 13y ago
People are spreading very bad, destructive ideas that will result in more dead brothers. I think that's more important than being "nice". Also, Szasz and Laing are closer to opposites than counterparts. See for example: http://www.amazon.com/Antipsychiatry-Quackery-Squared-Thomas-Szasz-ebook/dp/B004E0Z3SG/ http://www.amazon.com/Antipsychiatry-Quackery-Squared-Thomas... Quote from the book, by Szasz: > In the late 1960s, a group of psychiatrists, led by David Cooper (1931-86) and Ronald D. Laing (1927-89), began to criticize conventional psychiatry, especially so-called somatic treatments. But instead of advocating the abolition of Institutional Psychiatry, they sought to replace it with their own brand, which they called "Anti-psychiatry." By means of this dramatic misnomer, they attracted attention to themselves and deflected attention from what they did, which continued to include coercions and excuses based on psychiatric authority and power. Thus, antipsychiatry is a type of psychiatry. The psychiatrist qua health-care professional is a fraud, and so too is the antipsychiatrist. In Psychiatry.The Science of Lies, I showed that psychiatry-an imitation of medicine-is a form of quackery. In this volume, I show that antipsychiatry-a form of alternative psychiatry-is quackery squared. > For more than a half century, I have consistently asserted two simple but fundamental propositions: mental illnesses do not exist, and coercions justified by them are wrong. Anyone who seeks to help others must eschew the use of force. Not a single antipsychiatrist has ever agreed with these principles or abided by these practices. Subsuming my work under the rubric of antipsychiatry betrays and negates it just as effectively and surely as subsuming it under the rubric of psychiatry. My writings form no part of either psychiatry or antipsychiatry and belong to neither. They belong to conceptual analysis, social-political criticism, and common sense. This is why I rejected, and continue to reject, psychiatry and antipsychiatry with equal vigor.

scott_s 13y ago

What did Mz say that you are objecting to? Everything she said aligns with what I have read and heard about suicide.

doktrin 13y ago
If I understand the parent correctly, he agrees with a certain Thomas Szasz' [1] opinions on psychiatry. Central among his opinions is the assertion that mental illness is a "myth" due to the lack of observable changes at the cellular level (or at autopsy), and that mental illness patients are "malingerers". My opinion : the dude sounds like an ass and his opinions are eye-rolling. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Szasz http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Szasz
- einhverfr 13y ago
  Mental illness is a really tough thing to discuss in an objective way. See the debates about the DSM-5. I personally think mental health and mental illness are socially constructed. This being said, the experiences relating to mental illness are very real. The larger question is how we make sense of them as a society. For something like depression how much of the illness is cognitive? How much is biological? How much is social? Somehow that last question never gets asked.
  - Mz 13y ago
    That last is very hard to ask because the vast majority of people are raised with either a guilt or shame model, thus asking it comes across as finger pointing. Anyway, I need to go so cannot elaborate.
    - einhverfr 13y ago
      It's not a question of finger pointing so much as asking what social structures we have that make this harder. You mentioned your kids live with you. How hard would it be if they didn't? Does the fact that we stigmatize adults living with their parents and make mental illness into an individual problem contribute to it?

saalweachter 13y ago

I don't give two shits what Thomas Szasz thought about mental illness, because he wasn't a scientist or even a doctor, he was a goddamn libertarian philosopher. He found mental illness philosophically inconvenient because he couldn't see a way around the State being morally justified in providing coercive treatment to the mentally ill, so he just decided they didn't exist. He was an asshole who spent sixty years shitting over real science to promote his politics, and you're an asshole for trying to promote his politics at a digital wake.

JustinCEO 13y ago
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Szasz http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Szasz > In 1938, Szasz moved to the United States, where he attended the University of Cincinnati for his Bachelor of Science in medicine, and received his M.D. from the same university in 1944.[7]
- saalweachter 13y ago
  Fine, he was a morally bankrupt doctor. I agree I should not have claimed otherwise in my initial invective and apologize for my error, but let me reiterate: his stance on mental illness did not originate from his medical or scientific observations, but from his philosophy. And despite living through fifty years of startling advances in medicine, where huge swaths of mental illness were found to have biological origins in the brain, he never recanted. So fuck him, he was an asshole.
  - doktrin 13y ago
    > And despite living through fifty years of startling advances in medicine, where huge swaths of mental illness were found to have biological origins in the brain Pretty much this. Having just heard about him today, it's clear his [Szasz] statements reflect technological limitations of yesteryear combined with intense personal bias. Why anyone would still espouse the concepts this guy put forward is beyond me.
  - prestadige 13y ago

ChrisClark 13y ago

So, what you are saying is that if I notice that a friend of mine is suicidal, I should not try to spend time with him in person? Am I still allowed to talk to him on the phone? Email? Can I be within a kilometer of his house? Is it like a restraining order? All the comment you replied to is saying is that if you notice a friend in trouble, spend time with him. You seriously think that is an awful thing?