NUMB SOCIETY

I had the pleasure to meet with Jack Walters and Fred Strugartz at the IAM Counseling Retreat Center in New Albany, PA. Jack Walters made a striking comment to me about how people today desire to be 'numb'. I began to reflect on this further. In the past, individuals were more willing to delve into the core issues that impacted their emotional well being. Today, we frequently have a generation of apathy. There is no longer this desire to address pain and distress, to go through the process (which can often be painful), to go through the catharsis that may lead to transformation. Instead, society looks for escape and to be numb. The psychiatric establishment greatly profits and enjoys this new societal development and are able to prescribe the very things to create this 'numbness'. Managed care companies are accomplices, not beng concerned about psychotherapy which would produce long lasting results and address a person as a human being, but are rather concerned with the less costly avenue of inducing the numbness.

The Three Jewels

In Buddhism is identified the Three Jewels- the Buddha, the Dharma, and the Sangha.
Whether ine is a Buddhist or not, these three jewels are an important part of wholeness and being able to overcome adversity and emotional distress.
First, the Buddha does not reflect just a historical figure, but enlightened mind. To have a mind that is not centered in the past or grasping for the future, but can find peace and joy in this present moment that is often so fleeting. If individuals truly thought about how time is fleeting, how short our span is, they would not spend their time in quarrels and in greedy attachment.
Second, the Dharma implies truth. Within this lies conceptions of how one should relate to others and the virtues involved. If we live a life of Truth, a life of virtue, we can become more content and our human relations and society itself will prosper.
Lastly, Sangha. Sangha implies community. If we can once again forge into community, to be able to reach consensus, to share our thoughts, feelings, and our selves with one another, and to be able to form unity, our existence will be more harmonious. I see this often in the breakdown of families, where the sense of community has been lost and it is also responsible for the breakdown of society itself.

PSYCHIATRY AND THE DEATH OF THE SOUL

Another part of the problem with psychiatry, is that these are individuals who are trained to suppress behavior by drugs but have no training in understanding experiences. What causes people emotional distress are often questions of meaning and are spiritual problems. Psychiatrists, with no understanding of this, enter into a realm where they can do nothing but tranquilize a person. People in innocence come to them thinking their suffering can be relieved. But the form of alleviating suffering often only brings further suffering of another kind later. A pill cannot relieve the spectrum of emotion thought and emotion that leads to distress. Destroying the brain through psycho-surgery or by numbing it with drugs does not bring anyone a lasting peace. As Laing states, "Doctors in all ages hae made fortunes by killing patients by means of their 'cures'. The difference in psychiatry is that it is the death of the soul."

ABUSE OR ABUSE, TAKE YOUR PICK

Child Protective Services is a misnomer. They do not protect children. CPS has become an arm of bio-psychiatry and often functions in a gestapo like manner. Many parents who have become informed of the dangers of psychiatric drugs and refused to give them to their children have been threatened by CPS with removal of their children from their home. While CPS is busying itself with this infringement of parental rights, real situations of abuse are overlooked. I recall two nightmare experiences of my own with CPS. One involved a 5 year old boy who it was certain was being sexually abused. The teacher and myself made repeated calls to CPS about the situation who took no action until the 10th call. They removed the child for a brief time only to insist on placing the child abck with the mother who while not the offender was well aware of the abuse and completely inept in her skills as a parent. There was no change required on the part of the mother, and no protection given to the child that future problems would not impact him. In another situation, I was aware of the abuse of an 11 year old by his step-father. The step-father had an extensive history of abusive behavior. The mother remained in a state of denial to protect the step-father and the expense of the child. I found this child a bright young person with a lot of creativity and in one on one situations he was a great kid. His environment was one of chaos and despair, a horrible vortex taking the life out of him and leading him to self-destruction. CPS had been involved many times here. Nothing was ever accomplished and their final recommendation was for residential treatment of the child. Why is it the child's fault? What exactly is he being 'treated' for whereas the abusive environment is not being treated in any fashion at all. Psychiatry has its hands on another child who will be a cash cow. It is not their concern to prevent the abuse anbd resolve the distress impacting the child, instead they will send him to residential treatment, ply him with their drugs, and make a nice buck in the process. When they are done, they will return him again to the abusive home environment only for the cycle to start again. Who benefits? The psychiatric establishment. The child is taken from one abuse only to face another of a different kind.