25 REASONS TO ABOLISH BIO-PSYCHIATRY

25 GOOD REASONS TO ABOLISH PSYCHIATRY
(slightly revised - August 1998)

by Don Weitz

1. Psychiatrists are more harmful than helpful.

2. Psychiatrists are more unethical than ethical .

3. Psychiatrists do not empower - they disempower people.

4. Psychiatry is not a medical science.

5. Psychiatry is quackery, a pseudo-science which lacks independent diagnostic tests, testable hypotheses, and cures for "mental illness".

6. Psychiatrists can not accurately and reliably predict dangerousness, violence or any other type of human behaviour, yet make such claims as "expert witnesses".

7. Psychiatrists have already caused a worldwide epidemic of brain damage by prescribing brain-disabling treatments such as the neuroleptics, antidepressants, electroconvulsive brainwashing (ECB or electroshock), and psychosurgery ("lobotomy").

8. Psychiatrists manufacture hundreds of "mental disorders" classified in its bible titled Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders(DSM). The DSM is not a scientific work but a catalog of negative moral judgments which psychiatrists use to medicalize, target and stigmatize dissidents and alternative ways of perceiving, interpreting or being in the world.

9. Psychiatrists fraudulently diagnose people's life crises as symptoms of "schizophrenia" or "mental illness".

10. Psychiatrists falsely claim, without scientific proof, that "schizophrenia" is not only a real disease but caused by a "biochemical imbalance in the brain", genetic factors or a "genetic predisposition"--in fact, there are no scientifically-established biochemical and genetic factors in "schizophrenia" or any other "mental illness".

11. Psychiatrists routinely misinform psychiatric prisoners ("involuntary patients"), their families and the public by claiming that brain-disabling procedures as the neurotoxins (e.g.,"anti-psychotic medication", "antidepressants"), electroconvulsive brainwashing (ECB), psychosurgery and other behaviour modification or mind-control procedures
are "safe, effective and lifesaving"--the exact opposite is the case.

12. Psychiatrists routinely deceive or lie to psychiatric prisoners, other prisoners, their families and the public.

13. "Psychiatrists routinely misinform or not inform psychiatric prisoners and other prisoners about their treatments' many toxic and permanently disabling effects such as memory loss, tardive dyskinesia, parkinsonism, dementia (all signs of brain damage), and death.

14. Psychiatrists routinely threaten, intimidate and coerce psychiatric prisoners and other prisoners into consenting to health-threatening treatments such as the antidepressants, neuroleptics, ECB, and hi-risk experiments.

15. Psychiatrists routinely violate the ethical and legal principle of "informed consent" by failing to inform psychiatric prisoners and others about non-medical alternatives such as safe survivor-controlled crisis centres, drop-ins, self-help/advocacy groups, holistic/naturopathic medicine, and affordable supportive housing.

16. Psychiatrists are sexist in frequently stereotyping women in crisis as "hysterical" or "overemotional", overdrugging, electroshocking and blaming women whenever they voice real complaints or openly express their feelings and emotions such as sadness pathologized as "depression".

17. Psychiatrists are homophobic; the American Psychiatric Association once officially labeled homosexuality as "mental illness", later voted not to classify it as an illness.

18. Psychiatrists are ageist in targeting elderly people, especially women, for antidepressants and electroshock - a form of elder abuse.

19. Psychiatrists are racist and classist in disproportionately drugging African-Americans, African-Canadians and poor people, labeling them "schizophrenic" or "psychotic", and subjecting children of colour to experimental drugs or hi-risk experiments.

20. Psychiatrists routinely violate people's human rights and constitutional rights such as incarcerating innocent people without trial or public hearing ("involuntary commitment" or preventive detention), and subjecting them to cruel, degrading and inhumane punishments or tortures such as forced drugging, forced electroshock, psychosurgery, solitary confinement and other "restraints".

21.Psychiatrists masterminded the mass murder of hundreds of thousands of psychiatric prisoners, disabled children and elderly people in hospitals during The Holocaust in Nazi Germany and "selected" hundreds of thousands of concentration camp prisoners for death. There is still no mention of this psychiatrically-administered, mass murder program code-named "T4/euthanasia" in psychiatric textbooks and histories. In Canada, very few medical schools provide lectures on "T4".

22. Psychiatrists have participated in mind-control experiments in the United States, Canada and other countries since the early 1950s.

23. Psychiatry, particularly involuntary-biological psychiatry, is inherently coercive and based on three Fs: Fear, Force and Fraud.

24. Psychiatry is essentially fascist.

25. Psychiatry is a direct threat to democracy, human rights and life.

TREATMENT

If we look at the definition of treatment we will find two possible definitions:

1. action or behavior towards a person

2. management in the application of medicines, surgery, etc.

When we use the term 'treatment' in regards to those undergoing emotional distress, it appears that the main viewpoint is to solely look in terms of the second definition. In the past, such view of treatment led to oppression through such things as electroshock, lobotomy, and insulin coma. There was no examination of the first definition which is the key definition. If we are to use the term 'treatment' at all, then it must be connected to human rights and dignity, and thus how a person decides to 'treat' their client is based on how the therapist chooses to conduct themselves towards the person. Once again we see that treatment is the true sense is the building of relationship.

RESPONSE TO SCRANTON TIMES

am responding to the letters of James Scott, Debby Rabold, and Kelly Bentler of January 1, 2007. First, the National Alliance for the Mentally Ill, in which Mr. Scott is a Board Member, like psychiatry receives much of its funding from the pharmaceutical industry, thus it is not suprising that there would be the promotion of the 'chemical imbalance' theory in regards to emotional distress. Each era of psychiatry has given us a new conception, each often as oppressive as the first. Biological determinism and the theory of distress arising from so-called chemical imbalances is a popular and majority idea in the mental health field today. However, there is no evidence to support such a concept. Such an idea helps to further the profits of the pharmaceutical industry who are able to make lifelong mental patients in need of their products through the promulgation of such chemical imbalance concepts. The President of the American Psychiatric Association recently stated that there is no 'clear cut test" to demonstrate chemical imbalances. Elliot Valenstein, Ph.D. says, “[T]here are no tests available for assessing the chemical status of a living person’s brain.” The late Dr. Loren Mosher who had headed Schizophrenia research for the National Institutes of Mental Health stated, “…there are no external validating criteria for psychiatric diagnoses.”
As there is no demonstrable physical abnormality, there is no disease. What is termend mental illness are not diseases but experiences in reaction to many challenging factors. Thus, psychiatric 'medications' are not addressing any core emotional issue but merely subduing behaviors and it comes with a price in terms of adverse effects. Drugs do not teach people new skills, people do. I was a friend of the late Dr. Loren Mosher, head of Schizophrenia research for NIMH in the 70's. Mosher found with his Soteria project that simply having a support network of caring, compassionate individuals was deemed more effiective than the traditional 'methods'. This is what the mental health system must return to- to truly seeking to understand the experiences of individuals, to listen, and not to force unwanted 'treatments' on the vulnerable. I received my Doctorate of Education in Community Counseling and am proud to be a professional who is a vocal critic of bio-psychiatry and to also to be a supporter of the many psychiatric survivors.
If Mrs. Bentler chooses to take psychiatric drugs, that is her choice, but individuals need informed consent and to be fully aware of the risks involved and that there do exist more humane and dignified psychosocial approaches