I am not part of the Church of Scientology, nor, as far as I know, is any of the two professors that speak in the videos.
Randi also, like Scientology, claims that there maybe is life in the Universe.
Does this make him a Scientologist?
As for the other link, I just would like to ask you if the damage in the brain can be the consequence and not the cause of so-called schizophrenia, also considering that many so-called schizophrenics get treated with many drugs..
I think these videos may be relevant to the discussion, because they reflect the viewpoint that nothing is a mental disorder, so I transcripted, below, for your convenience.
I do think there is a lot to say about this. For instance, they argue that these disorders are not diseases, therefor, there are no mental disorders, and it is systematically used to stigmatize people who we do not conform. I don't think that is correct.
Apparently, the study mentioned in the OP also did not share that point of view, and decided on a definition which includes the behavior of 20% of young Americans.
Anyway, here are the transcripts, in case someone wants to respond to the videos posted by MM
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Video 1 : Dr Thomas Szasz on Psychiatry
Dr. Thomas Szasz, Professor Emeritus of Psychiatry at the State University of New York, Syracuse.
Dr. Szasz: "When the school authorities tell a mother that her son is sick and needs to be on drugs how in the world is she to know that, that is simply a lie. How is she to recognize that what experts now call "Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder" is simply not a disease. Now, such a mother is not an expert in the history of psychiatry. She does not know that psychiatrists have, for hundreds of years, used diagnostic terms -so-called diagnostic terms- to stigmatize and control people. I will only give you a few dramatic examples.
When black slaves in the South ran away to freedom, it wasn't that they wanted to be free, they suffered from a disease called drapetomania, from drapetes, runaway slave, and mania. I'm not making this up. This was a legitimate diagnosis, just like Attention Deficit Disorder is. Women, half the population of mankind, of course, if they were foolish enough to rebel against domination by man, well, then they had a serious disease called hysteria, which was due to their wandering womb.
Now none of those behaviors was ever a disease and, of course, is not a disease. Nor is Attention Deficit Disorder a disease. No behavior or misbehavior
is a disease or can be a disease. That's not what diseases are. So it doesn't matter how a child behaves. There is nothing to examine. If he is sick, then there must be some objective science to it, which can be diagnosed by physicians and objective tests. That's why as soon as you go to a doctor,
they take a lot of blood and take x-rays. They don't want to hear how you behave.
When I went to medical school, sixty years ago, there were only a handful of mental diseases. I think there were no more than six or seven. Now there are more than three hundred. And new ones are, quote, "discovered" every day.
Labeling a child as mentally ill is stigmatization, not diagnosis. Giving a child a psychiatric drug is poisoning, not treatment. Diseases are malfunctions of the human body, of the heart, the liver, the kidney, the brain, and so forth. Typhoid fever is a disease. You all know that, you don't question that. Spring fever -- <laughter> all you have to know is English. Hehe. Spring fever is not a disease.
The task we set ourselves, to combat psychiatric coercion, is important. I think it's important, you all think it's important. Not enough people think it's important. It's a noble task, a task in the pursuit of which we must, regardless of obstacles, persevere. Our conscience commands that we do no less."
<Citizens Commission on Human Rights - CCHR - Established 1969> ®
CCHR EAST US WWW.CCHREUS.ORG
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Video 2 : Jeffrey A. Schaler, Ph.D., Professor of Psychology
Dr. Jeffrey Schaler
Psychologist and Professor
at American University
2006 Thomas Szasz
Award Winner
Dr. Schaler: "Ladies and gentlemen, it is a great honor to receive this award tonight, named for my dear friend and colleague, Thomas Szasz.
As Thomas Szasz wrote, years ago, the only true political virtue is obedience to authority, and the only true political sin is independance. Independance renders authority useless and that is what infuriates it so.
You've undoubtedly been told you're mentally ill for daring to say that the emperor called psychiatry, has no clothes. Not to mention stupid and "unscientific". At least this is what some of my colleagues say about me at one university. So if this is something that has happened to you, I'm here to say that you are not alone.
The controversy regarding the myth of mental illness and psychiatry is not about science or medicine, it's about power. When psychiatrists start agreeing with you, well, then perhaps you ought to reconsider your position: something may be wrong.
So I'd like to say a few disobedient things, which is especially true because I was trained as a psychologist, and when a member of the profession criticizes it's own, it's considered especially sacriligious. What do we know, that is true, that the cult of psychiatry keeps telling us is false? First, the idea that there is a known brain lesion causing mental illness. The truth is, we cannot know who is mentally ill and who is not, by looking at pictures of their brains or analysing their blood.
Psychiatrists had to invent their own book of diseases, because pathologists would have nothing to do with them. It's called the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual for Mental Disorders, the DSM, a great work... of fiction. What's the difference... <applause> What's the difference between the DSM and a scientific book of disease? Every disorder in the DSM is invented. Every disease listed in a pathology textbook, is discovered. Real disease is found in a cadaver, at autopsy. Mental illness is not. Mental illness refers to something that a person does. Real disease refers to something that a person has. Consider this yet another way. It takes one person to have a real disease. It takes two people to have a mental illness.
If you're alone on an island, you could develop a real disease, like cancer or heart disease. But you cannot develop a mental illness, such as hyperactivity or schizophrenia. This is because mental illness is alway diagnosed on the basis of some sort of social conflict: when people do something that others find objectionable, they can be diagnosed as mentally ill. If the person doing the diagnosing is more powerful than the person diagnosed, then there is/was trouble. In this sense, the diagnosis of mental illness is always a weapon. Not so when it comes to diagnosing real disease. Think of how, when people get angry with one another, they inevitably resort to some kind of diagnosis. They say: 'You're crazy!'; 'You're mentally ill!'; 'You're paranoid!'. Can you imagine somebody getting angry with someone and saying: 'You have diabetes!'; 'You have parkinson's disease!'.
Social conflict has nothing to do with developing a real disease. You don't develop diabetes, because someone doesn't like the way you think, speak, or behave. You have to have someone else present to judge that your behavior is morally good or bad in order to have a mental illness. So diagnosis is a weapon, a tool people use against one another. Especially when there is some kind of power conflict present.
And what of treatment? Treatment for mental illness is punishment. Look at our criminal justice system. When someone commits a crime and a psychiatrist is in the courtroom, a defendant may go to a mental institution instead of a prison. Can you imagine a judge saying: 'I sentence you to treatment for your cancer.' I submit to you that psychiatric treatment is worse than prison. For in prison they don't judge how long people should be deprived of liberty on the basis of what they think about themselves and the world. In a mental institution, ofcourse, this is the case. If you don't think about yourself and the world correctly, you'll be punished longer.
Psychiatrists love to say that mental illness is a real disease just like cancer. The analogy between mental illness and real disease is not reciprocal. It doesn't hold both ways. Having cancer is not like being depressed. We don't shock people who have cancer to make them better, especially if they don't want to be shocked.
Consider how melanoma, a deadly form of skin cancer, is a disease here as well as in Northern India. If you have melanoma, does it cease to exist if you move to another country, another culture? Ofcourse not. If you're wandering the foothills of the Himalayas and meditating for 15 hours a day, you may very well be called a holy man in India. Take that same person, have him walk across the grounds of the Washington Monument in Washington D.C. and he's diagnosed a paranoid schizophrenic and committed to a mental hospital. What do you think psychiatrists would do if Jesus were alive today? Or Buddha? Or Muhammed. Badabing! Right into a mental hospital, injected with drugs to stop their crazy beliefs and speech. Psychiatrists today are the true grand inquisitors. They would crucify the holy men and women of yesterday in an instant.
My father was sent from Nazi Germany to America in 1933, when he was about 15 years old. From the time he was sent out of Germany by his family, because he was a jew, until his dying day, five years ago, he had nightmares that the Nazis were persecuting him. He fought against them his whole life, awake and asleep. I used to ask him: "Dad, what were people thinking in Germany, back then? What were they thinking when they saw the Nazis parading about?" And he used to say: "Nobody took them seriously. Nobody believed they could ever have the power to do what they did. We laughed at them."
Now, while I encourage you to laugh in the face of those psychiatrists who argue that 2 plus 2 doesn't equal 4, know too, that we must also take them seriously, especially when it comes to the harm they have done to people in the name of helping them. For if we do not, history will repeat itself. We are building a resistance to the psychiatric Gestapo. The Citizens Commission on Human Rights is an important partner in the fight for liberty and justice. That is why we are here tonight and that is why we will be together tomorrow. Thank you."
Borderline Personality DisorderWP is not a Personality Disorder that is Borderline, it is a Disorder of a Borderline Personality. Or in quasi-Math syntax:
It's (Borderline Personality) Disorder, not Borderline (Personality Disorder).
ETA: It occurs to me that you may have been joking, but this is a common enough mis-conception that I still feel it worth commenting.
I think 1 in 5 is probably a low number. I hire a lot of people, and I end up losing more than 2 in 5 during the first couple weeks because the person is not able to perform a simple job. They are just not capable of showing up at the same time every day and staying alert and awake for 12 hours.
Inability to work is a life affecting condition IMHO.
I think 1 in 5 is probably a low number. I hire a lot of people, and I end up losing more than 2 in 5 during the first couple weeks because the person is not able to perform a simple job. They are just not capable of showing up at the same time every day and staying alert and awake for 12 hours.
Inability to work is a life affecting condition IMHO.
Let's see....we don't have to fight lions or bears anymore unless we want to. Some of actually seek fighting lions and bears for the "thrill," and some think that's missing from our lives now.
There are a lot of us. So many, we can't form the close bonds in small, tight-knit communities we used to have to form a few thousand years ago to survive. We don't know each other, and that's scary. There's too damned many of us to know anymore.
We don't work the way we used to. We sit a lot. We ride a lot. We mostly don't farm, don't hunt, or even have to get our own water.
We end up with a lot of repressed hostility, anxiety, confusion...we have too many toys, too many things to plug in and program and pay for. We have too many of us to compete with, to the point the competition stops centering around who does the best job, but silly things like who looks better, speaks better, or knows the right people. We don't know how to get what we want, and half the time, we don't even know what we want or why we even want it.
Who would all this, and more, not make a little crazy?
Some psychologists think everyone has basic emotional needs that have to be met to a certain extent, at least sometimes in people's lives, for us to be mentally healthy, claiming that anyone who has them all met is a lot less likely to get mentally ill. They say the needs include:
Security: The feeling that we have a safe territory around us, so we can live our lives without fear as far as possible, and enjoy privacy whenever we need to.
Control: We need to feel as if we're in control of our lives and that we're free to make our own decisions about what we do in them, at least to some extent. They say the more interests and activities we're involved in, the more we can maintain that sense of control, because then, if someone loses control of one part of their lives, for instance if they lose a job, they'll at least know they can determine what they do in other parts of their lives.
Attention: They say we need to receive some from others, at least sometimes; and that we also need to give it.
Emotional connection to others: That can include friendship or emotional intimacy. They say it means we ought to have at least one person who will understand us, who we can share our hopes, dreams and ideas with. They say for some people, talking to a pet can fulfil their need for emotional connection, but many people need more than that.
Connection to the wider community: They say we need to feel as if we're part of something bigger than ourselves. That could include working for a cause or charity, or being part of a team - anything that takes our focus off ourselves, and gives us a sense of belonging and purpose in life.
Paying attention to the mind-body connection: They say we can succumb to mental illness more easily if we don't take care to eat healthily and exercise, and if we don't sleep enough.
A sense of meaning, goals in life and purpose: They say we need to be physically or mentally challenged a bit, by having problems to solve. They say if we don't occupy our imaginations with things that stimulate them and challenge them to invent creative solutions to things, they can be under-used, and can focus on things that are unhealthy and create problems for us, like magnifying little concerns out of all proportion, till we see them as major problems. On the other hand, if we use our imagination in creative ways, focusing it outward on something interesting rather than on ourselves, we can feel satisfaction when it manages to find solutions to the challenges we've set it.
A sense of status: They say we need to feel we have some importance in life or in the community, not necessarily a position of importance to a whole community; it could be status as a mother or father. But they say we need to feel that at least someone values us.
They say we need to have a sense of competence or achievement: That'll make sure we don't suffer from low self-esteem. They say we can achieve this by investigating and learning new things and improving the skills we already have. That will increase our sense of purpose in life, and make us more confident that we're reasonably talented so we can feel good about ourselves.
It may well be that lots and lots of people's problems stem from the fact that they aren't getting a lot of those needs met; and rather than being helped or inspired to get them met, they're being put on medication, so their real problems don't go away. I know of far too many people who are very unhappy because instead of getting help, they were just offered medication. And it's even worse when it happens to children.
I call bull on those videos. Explain a person hearing voices or having delusions and killing their family. Are they just fine? No problems?
I have two good friends and a co worker who have schizophrenia and it is real. I have seen my friends go from sane to not sane and if they did not have psychiatric help they would feel much worse. They believed in paranoid delusions that were so out of this world. Like nothing they would ever say before. It all started very quickly too.
They were never quite the same after the disease hit but when they take meds they act much better. I have experienced that a lot so I know what I'm talking about. There are mental diseases.
It's true that there are conflicts of interest between any doctor and patient but this is true regardless of mental illness. They do have a house and a boat to pay off after all. That issue comes down to monetary-ism and that’s a whole other story.
I also think that there is a very real general anxiety in our society because this society creates a environment that would promote that kind of mental problem.
Those are very touching videos. Too bad they are a total lie.
How to lift depression ...Fast (The Human Givens Approach)
by Joe Griffin and Ivan Tyrrell
Freedom from Addiction: The Secret Behind Successful Addiction Busting (Human Givens Approach)
by the same authors
How to Master Anxiety: All You Need to Know to Overcome Stress, Panic Attacks, Trauma, Phobias, Obsessions and More (Human Givens Approach)
by the same authors
There's hype in the titles; but they are good books.
You might be able to find articles by those authors that express those views more briefly than the books do on the Internet.
CHICAGO — Almost one in five young American adults has a personality disorder that interferes with everyday life, and even more abuse alcohol or drugs, researchers reported Monday in the most extensive study of its kind.
The disorders include problems such as obsessive or compulsive tendencies and anti-social behavior that can sometimes lead to violence. The study also found that fewer than 25 percent of college-aged Americans with mental problems get treatment.
One expert said personality disorders may be overdiagnosed. But others said the results were not surprising since previous, less rigorous evidence has suggested mental problems are common on college campuses and elsewhere.
Experts praised the study's scope — face-to-face interviews about numerous disorders with more than 5,000 young people ages 19 to 25 — and said it spotlights a problem college administrators need to address.
Study co-author Dr. Mark Olfson of Columbia University and New York State Psychiatric Institute called the widespread lack of treatment particularly worrisome. He said it should alert not only "students and parents, but also deans and people who run college mental health services about the need to extend access to treatment."
Counting substance abuse, the study found that nearly half of young people surveyed have some sort of psychiatric condition, including students and non-students ... cont. at link above. ----------------------------------------------------------------
I sincerely wonder if it every dawned on the psychiatric community, who seem to think a good percentage of us are "ill," that it is perhaps their ignorance of genetics that is the real problem. The human family is as diverse as the stars, for good reason. It's called SURVIVAL.
Those who drew that 1 in 5 conclusion must be sick. Alternatively, maybe abnormality in their eyes is the norm in our eye.
After reading the OP, I started wondering: am I the 1 in 5?
abnormally easy and well paying maybe...
It is a significant percentage of the population that cannot perform simple tasks, cannot follow a simple routine, or cannot conduct themselves professionally within a group of a few dozen other adults. And these are the people who made it through the interview. There are many more who have such a severe addiction, obsession, or anxiety problem that they cannot even stay cool through a 15 minute interview.
I had one a few months ago: he showed up late, had sweat literally pouring off his face, and answered every question by talking about how he always thinks about his deceased brother-in-law, who died 6 years ago, and had been long suffering with a terminal illness.
My point is that this man was really not all that unique. I think, if anything, the study understates the scope of the problem. A LOT of people depend heavily on their support system of friends and family and would not do very well on their own.
Mental disorders aren't just about being abnormal though, it's having an abnormality which causes them harm. For instance, a person with an IQ in the top 2% (all other things being equal) does not have a mental disorder, whereas a person in the lower 2% does, even though they're equally abnormal. How abnormal they are isn't really the important question, but rather how unpleasant their lives are.
How to lift depression ...Fast (The Human Givens Approach)
by Joe Griffin and Ivan Tyrrell
Freedom from Addiction: The Secret Behind Successful Addiction Busting (Human Givens Approach)
by the same authors
How to Master Anxiety: All You Need to Know to Overcome Stress, Panic Attacks, Trauma, Phobias, Obsessions and More (Human Givens Approach)
by the same authors
There's hype in the titles; but they are good books.
You might be able to find articles by those authors that express those views more briefly than the books do on the Internet.
I hate to be a killjoy, but with so much gobbledegook plaguing the field of clinical psychology these days, I simply don't have the time, energy, or effort to waste anymore reading these grandiose-sounding "get better now" type books unless direct studies exist that have survived critical scrutiny by strong research-minded scientist-practitioners (not just cobbled references to other people's work supporting armchair flights of fancy).
I had never heard of these therapists or the "Human Givens" approach before, so I tried searching for different key words and these authors' names through my university's psychology search engines. The result: not a single peer-reviewed publication came up under these people or this particular approach.
Have these guys ever operationalized any of their ideas or offered any testable hypotheses?
The schizophrenia section in particular seemed rife with wildly speculative departures from a tiny number of cherry-picked studies with no references or citations of any kind.
While I don't think that positive psychology is complete bollocks, I think some of this teeters on instillation of false hope (e.g., "Enormous savings could be made if those using less effective counselling and psychotherapy methodology were trained so that they could act quickly to stop stress, anxiety and depression triggering major breakdowns in those genetically predisposed to developing psychosis").
I would recommend the following books by these excellent clinical researchers whose high quality work has fared very well through the peer-review wringer for many, many years (there are many more, but here's a good start):
Anxiety Disorders and Phobias: A Cognitive Perspective by Aaron Beck, Gary Emery, and Ruth Greenberg
Mastery of Your Anxiety and Worry: Workbook (Treatments That Work) by Michelle G. Craske and David H. Barlow
Cognitive Therapy of Depression (The Guilford Clinical Psychology and Psychopathology Series) by Aaron T. Beck, A. John Rush, Brian F. Shaw, and Gary Emery
Mastering Depression through Interpersonal Psychotherapy: Patient Workbook (Treatments That Work) by Myrna W. Weissman
Social Skills Training for Schizophrenia, Second Edition: A Step-by-Step Guide (TREATMENT MANUALS FOR PRACTITIONERS) by Alan S. Bellack, Kim T. Mueser, Susan Gingerich, and Julie Agresta
Clinical Handbook of Psychological Disorders, Fourth Edition: A Step-by-Step Treatment Manual by David H. Barlow
Yes, the emphasis isn't solely about deflecting from "normalcy" but also if those deflections carry with them certain thoughts, feelings, or behaviors that are *associated with* (careful using "cause" here) functional impairment across different areas of living (social/interpersonal, occupational, etc.) and/or high levels of distress although the latter isn't necessary for, say, antisocial folks, who may feel fine about destroying their neighbor's property.
For instance, a person with an IQ in the top 2% (all other things being equal) does not have a mental disorder, whereas a person in the lower 2% does, even though they're equally abnormal. How abnormal they are isn't really the important question, but rather how unpleasant their lives are.
Just to point something out: you seem to be using "abnormal" rather loosely here in a more statistical (standard deviation-esque) sense. In clinical psych, this word is more technically restricted in scope in that it conveys dysfunction of some sort that is interfering and/or distressing to the person in question. But yes, you are spot-on about the emphasis on the unpleasantness factor (plus interference).
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That issue comes down to monetary-ism and that’s a whole other story.
