To be clear - I have nothing against people helping people.
Which is presumably what people wish to do.
However, for centuries "Psychiatry" has clearly done very much the opposite - and has hence nearly irreperably damaged a fundamental human endeavour - Medicine.
The first principle - traditionally, correctly and obviously of Medicine - is "FIRST DO NO HARM".
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A decent "psychiatrist" should not only avoid "hospitalising"/imprisoning his clients/patients/victims AT ALL COSTS etc.
This has been very much the case now for some time and is starting to be even more so.
They should also - I believe - start to have exactly the same attitude to the highly questionable so-called "Medication" involved as well.
Why should ANY doctor define himself by medication given???
Why should an eye doctor define himself by giving out ocular glasses???....
Exercise, peace and quiet, exposure to the countryside, periods of quiet escape/retreat are - I would say - far more important for people who are experiencing PROBLEMS IN LIVING.
I have nothing personally against any Psychiatrist. They are often as trapped in an ideology and an institution as anyone else. If I had studied Medicine I could easily have ended up choosing Psychiatry as an option in the belief that I would be helping people by doing so. All Psychiatrists have to have medical degrees.
We owe a great deal to Szasz for having the clarity of mind to point out at an early point of his own career that the Emperor has no clothes on at all and yet keeps "trying to put more on" so to speak.
Let's not be victims of sheer stupidity - often with entirely innocent beginnings - and let's try and make things better.
I sincerely hope so. And that we can go forward peacefully and in a spirit of deep forgiveness.
Love and best wishes,
The Sofa.
(By the way, I do not genuinely believe myself to be a Sofa. It is just a metaphor. Or something like that. OK? Great!)
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Incidentally, an interesting exercise would be to replace the piece of language "mental illness" with the piece of language "problems in living" or something like it whenever one can.
It could be quite revealing.
[Similar to "replacing" or "translating" "Economics" with/as "Household Management" which is both revealing and quite hilarious.
E.G. Stephanie Flanders, Household Management Correspondent of the BBC. etc. etc.]
Which is presumably what people wish to do.
However, for centuries "Psychiatry" has clearly done very much the opposite - and has hence nearly irreperably damaged a fundamental human endeavour - Medicine.
The first principle - traditionally, correctly and obviously of Medicine - is "FIRST DO NO HARM".
-----------------------------
A decent "psychiatrist" should not only avoid "hospitalising"/imprisoning his clients/patients/victims AT ALL COSTS etc.
This has been very much the case now for some time and is starting to be even more so.
They should also - I believe - start to have exactly the same attitude to the highly questionable so-called "Medication" involved as well.
Why should ANY doctor define himself by medication given???
Why should an eye doctor define himself by giving out ocular glasses???....
Exercise, peace and quiet, exposure to the countryside, periods of quiet escape/retreat are - I would say - far more important for people who are experiencing PROBLEMS IN LIVING.
I have nothing personally against any Psychiatrist. They are often as trapped in an ideology and an institution as anyone else. If I had studied Medicine I could easily have ended up choosing Psychiatry as an option in the belief that I would be helping people by doing so. All Psychiatrists have to have medical degrees.
We owe a great deal to Szasz for having the clarity of mind to point out at an early point of his own career that the Emperor has no clothes on at all and yet keeps "trying to put more on" so to speak.
Let's not be victims of sheer stupidity - often with entirely innocent beginnings - and let's try and make things better.
I sincerely hope so. And that we can go forward peacefully and in a spirit of deep forgiveness.
Love and best wishes,
The Sofa.
(By the way, I do not genuinely believe myself to be a Sofa. It is just a metaphor. Or something like that. OK? Great!)
---------------------------
----------------------------
Incidentally, an interesting exercise would be to replace the piece of language "mental illness" with the piece of language "problems in living" or something like it whenever one can.
It could be quite revealing.
[Similar to "replacing" or "translating" "Economics" with/as "Household Management" which is both revealing and quite hilarious.
E.G. Stephanie Flanders, Household Management Correspondent of the BBC. etc. etc.]
