Awesome TV Ad: Psychiatry—Labeling Kids with Bogus 'Mental Disorders'

[Foundation_Of_Liberty]

Awesome TV Ad:
Psychiatry—Labeling Children with Bogus 'Mental Disorders'

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wv49RFo1ckQ


Also check out this:
Making a Killing: The Untold Story of Psychotropic Drugging


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UDlH9sV0lHU

[Kludge]

Idunno. I always hear the "Back in My Day..." folks talking about this, but I never saw anything like it in school - though I grew up in a very conservative district. There simply weren't people going around taking medication because a quack said they had ADHD, though there certainly were kids who were impaired because of how their brains processed and reacted to their environment.

A doctor's assistant told me I had social anxiety disorder at the age of 17 and prescribed xanax without consulting my GP who said it was a mistake after I made a trip to the "ultra-conscious" ward from a bad reaction. My GP simply told me to join a support group if it became disabling and that was it.

Growing up, I worked for my mom who was a self-employed case manager for the mentally disabled. Before that, she worked at an organization which housed ultra-violent mentally ill kids where I'd go for misc. reasons like a snow day w/o someone at the house. Quite recently, I lived with a schizophrenic who was very polite and God-fearing when he wasn't throwing large pieces of wood across his work area, shouting that his wife was a lying sack of shit to a person who wasn't there. And after that, I lived next to a bipolar woman who stole medication & could go from calmly telling jokes to being suddenly humiliated because she was sobbing uncontrollably and begging us not to tell her husband. There are certainly kids and adults with not just debilitating, but extremely dangerous mental disorders - so just writing it all off as quack doctors labeling kids and making them feel disabled is potentially irresponsible and dangerous.

I mean - if it's happening, then it should be called out, but I just don't see it happening too much (the psychiatry field has been railing against misclassification of ADD/ADHD for quite a long time), with the exception of the no-threat "clinically depressed" who I have trouble understanding why the government insists on taking custody of. I did see a few depressed people the government had absolutely no business deciding needed to have their dignity stripped of - but more often than not, in my experiences, the people classified as having a mental disorder usually do - and it isn't infrequent that they're a hazard to the people around them.

[specsaregood]

I liked the ad and approve of the message for the most part...So I had to drill into the "about us" expecting to find exactly what I found:


CCHR was co-founded in 1969 by the Church of Scientology and Professor of Psychiatry Emeritus Dr. Thomas Szasz at a time when patients were being warehoused in institutions and stripped of all constitutional, civil and human rights.


Of course this is also why Tom Cruise made it a point to go shake Dr Paul's hand backstage of the Tonight show back in 08.

[Churchill2004]

I liked the ad and approve of the message for the most part...So I had to drill into the "about us" expecting to find exactly what I found:


Of course this is also why Tom Cruise made it a point to go shake Dr Paul's hand backstage of the Tonight show back in 08.

Scientology is load of dangerous crap, but you bolded the wrong part of that. Thomas Szasz is a great libertarian with an admirable history of fighting against things like involuntary commitment. I don't necessarily buy into his ideas completely, but if you want to understand the legitimate points to the anti-psychiatry, anti-"mental illness" point of view, stripped of the insanity of some celebrity science fiction cult, then Szasz is the man to read. (He's made clear he doesn't agree with Scientology as a whole, they're just allies of convenience on this one issue of great importance to him) Reason has a bunch of good stuff on him if you search for him in their archives (he also appears as a Contributing Editor on their masthead), this is a good place to start. (http://reason.com/archives/2005/05/01/thomas-szasz-takes-on-hiscriti)

I'm not wholly convinced of his argument- clearly there are a lot of personality types which we've mislabeled "disorders", but which in their more extreme can be greatly helped by therapy and some medications- but it's a valuable insight, and Szasz is second only to Orwell in elucidating how language shapes our society. As someone who was diagnosed ADD, I think the diagnosis may be well be deeply flawed, but I'm glad I have my stimulant meds like Focalin and Adderall. I take them as I see fit to help get things like schoolwork or other tedious tasks done, and they are helpful.

[Foundation_Of_Liberty]

Scientology is load of dangerous crap, but you bolded the wrong part of that. Thomas Szasz is a great libertarian with an admirable history of fighting against things like involuntary commitment. I don't necessarily buy into his ideas completely, but if you want to understand the legitimate points to the anti-psychiatry, anti-"mental illness" point of view, stripped of the insanity of some celebrity science fiction cult, then Szasz is the man to read. (He's made clear he doesn't agree with Scientology as a whole, they're just allies of convenience on this one issue of great importance to him) Reason has a bunch of good stuff on him if you search for him in their archives (he also appears as a Contributing Editor on their masthead), this is a good place to start. (http://reason.com/archives/2005/05/01/thomas-szasz-takes-on-hiscriti)

I'm not wholly convinced of his argument- clearly there are a lot of personality types which we've mislabeled "disorders", but which in their more extreme can be greatly helped by therapy and some medications- but it's a valuable insight, and Szasz is second only to Orwell in elucidating how language shapes our society. As someone who was diagnosed ADD, I think the diagnosis may be well be deeply flawed, but I'm glad I have my stimulant meds like Focalin and Adderall. I take them as I see fit to help get things like schoolwork or other tedious tasks done, and they are helpful.Pardon me, but purely hypothetically, if someone was hooked say on cocaine or opium, would he not find those drags "helpful"?

I am not accusing you. I merely point out that the psychiatric industry wants you to be hooked for life, because it means more money for them. To them "a patient cured is a customer lost." If you were not mentally sick, they'd rather get you sick, through their drugs, and have you hooked on their drugs for ever. It is a "good" business model, which parallels the business model of drag cartels, except that drag cartels do not pretend that it is good for you.

[ctnjason]

Some issues in america are only seen (or given the intervention) here. So many "disorders" are slapped on a family to get hooked on medication, treatment, etc.

I watched the documentary "babies" with my wife. Many times i asked her did she think they worried about ADHD, child psychological anxiety disorders, etc. Some parts of the world they accept the fact that this is the way their child is and hope for the best :-p

[CaliforniaMom]

I wonder, does the CPS ever take away kids if the parents refuse to put them on Ridalin or other ADHD drugs?

[ctnjason]

I wonder, does the CPS ever take away kids if the parents refuse to put them on Ridalin or other ADHD drugs?

I actually wouldnt be surprised if something like that is down the pipe. You dont vaccinate, school, feed, cloth, discipline the way someone likes..... you get a knock at the door. I wouldnt be surprised if medicate is added to that list.

[Philhelm]

The first video needed a scene in which a child with the label of "narcissistic, megalomaniacal sociopath" being removed to reveal "politician" underneath.

[Philhelm]

I actually wouldnt be surprised if something like that is down the pipe. You dont vaccinate, school, feed, cloth, discipline the way someone likes..... you get a knock at the door. I wouldnt be surprised if medicate is added to that list.

I guarantee that this will become a reality. As more people put faith into pseudo-science, the punishment of those who do not subscribe to it will become a reality. I'm not totally against psychology, but I put very little stock into it all the same, especially since it has been used to oppress people. Does a PhD really give the authority for one human to judge the worth of another?

[Anti Federalist]

I wonder, does the CPS ever take away kids if the parents refuse to put them on Ridalin or other ADHD drugs?

Yes.


Tammy Kabiak’s decision to stop came about gradually, after several years of doubt. After Ritalin was begun, Kabiak noticed the development of side effects in her son—memory loss, shaking, bad headaches, sleep disturbances, and loss of appetite. Years later, she researched the drug and became increasingly concerned. Tammy learned that her son was taking a Schedule-II controlled substance, meaning the drug was in the same category as cocaine and methamphetamines. Due to their highly addictive nature, these substances are under continual surveillance by the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration; they’re overseen as well by a United Nations body called the International Narcotics Control Board. So this was not a harmless medicine, as her son’s school had led her to believe, but an addictive substance. Even more disturbing, Kabiak learned that Ritalin could be fatal when given to children with heart problems, and her son had a heart condition. In light of these new insights, the choice seemed obvious. She would wean her son off the medication. Interestingly, once the Ritalin was stopped, many of the disturbing symptoms she had observed over the years also ceased.

Kabiak informed the school of her decision. She showed them medical records documenting the severe consequences that the child had suffered with the drug. And she showed them how, when he was taken off the drug, those conditions improved. The school challenged her, though, and charged her with being an unfit parent, and now threatened to take her other two children away. They did take her son away, putting him into a boy’s home where psychiatric drugs were forcibly given to him. “The school took my son to a hospital without [first notifying] me,” Kabiak remembers. “When I got there, they refused to let me take him home and said if I didn’t sign papers they would call child protection and have my rights as a mother severed.”[lxii]

Currently a resident at a home for children with problems, Kabiak’s son demonstrates anger and depression. As a result, he now takes more drugs, including the antidepressant Zoloft. What those in charge don’t seem to consider is that the new symptoms may well be a response to the sudden, traumatic uprooting or even an effect of Ritalin. Unfortunately, Tammy Kabiak is a poor person, and does not have the financial wherewithal to challenge what has been done to her family.

The Carroll family is another one that got into trouble with the psychiatric establishment because of problems with a son. When seven-year old Kyle Carroll, a first-grader, was prescribed Ritalin after a diagnosis of ADHD, his parents, Michael and Jill Carroll, worried about the drug’s side effects. But when they decided to stop the drug, school administrators alleged child abuse, and the Carrolls found themselves on a New York statewide list of alleged child abusers. They were thrust into a family court battle to clear their name and prevent their child from being removed from their home.

“I told the school I wanted to take him off the Ritalin to see how he does the first couple of weeks,” recounts Michael Carroll. “A week after that, Child Protection came knocking on the door. They basically said that by not giving him the drug we’d be charged with neglect for not following doctor’s orders.” The Carrolls were taken to court, where they were ordered to administer all drugs prescribed by the physician. They were fortunate in that their pediatrician stopped writing the prescription; therefore, their not medicating their son was no longer going against the court order. But their reputation as parents has been tarnished, and the Carrolls are still in the process of trying to clear their name.

In yet another upstate New York case, parents had agreed to try Ritalin on their seven-year-old boy but changed their minds after witnessing serious side effects. The school district objected and said that taking the child off Ritalin constituted child abuse. Unconscionably, Child Protective Services hauled this family into court. The judge said that not giving the child Ritalin put the parents at risk of having the boy taken away.

Richard Wexler is executive director for the National Coalition for Child Protection Reform in Alexandria, Virginia, author of Wounded Innocence: The Real Victims in the War Against Child Abuse,[lxiii] and a writer on the child welfare system for the New York Times and the Chicago Tribune. Discussing the above case and ones like it, he explains his belief that the school district and Child Protective Services are interfering in medical decisions that should be between the child, the parents, and their doctors, and, in the process, doing enormous harm to children. “Imagine the specter, being a small child, seven-years-old. Suddenly strangers are questioning you about the most intimate details of your life. The child may be pulled out of his class to the principal’s office and suddenly asked all sorts of very difficult questions like ‘Do you think your parents really love you?’ ‘How do they discipline you?’ ‘How do they treat you?’ That’s terribly scary. The younger the child, the scarier it is.

“And hanging over everything is the specter that you might suddenly be taken away, not only from your parents but from everything loving and familiar…. In a situation where the child is actually removed, if a child is very young he or she may experience it as akin to a kidnapping. I recall one case in which a child was dragged away, literally kicking and screaming, and the child kept yelling, ‘I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry.’ She thought that she must have done something wrong for which she was being punished.”[lxiv]

Child protective workers have complete power over parents, which is sometimes necessary for rescuing children from real and serious abuse. But sometimes workers get carried away; they can get into the mindset of assuming that every case put before them is one of serious abuse. Dr. Wexler points out that for a child protection agency to automatically call parents negligent for not administering a controversial psychiatric drug to their child, and, irrespective of the circumstances, to subject them to the same rules as someone who just beat their child, is grossly unfair to those parents. “We know that these cases have arisen,” states Wexler, although often cases of alleged negligence are complicated by a variety of factors.[lxv]

http://www.familyrightsassociation.com/bin/white_papers-articles/drugging_our_children/

[EndDaFed]

The first video needed a scene in which a child with the label of "narcissistic, megalomaniacal sociopath" being removed to reveal "politician" underneath.

Those terms are contradictory. A narcissist has the capacity for empathy where a sociopath does not.

[Foundation_Of_Liberty]

Those terms are contradictory. A narcissist has the capacity for empathy where a sociopath does not.
It's an interesting contradiction. I heard Hitler was very good with children and dogs, but ordered the murder of millions of Jews. I think such people cling to narcissism to stay sane in view of their horrific crimes.

[EndDaFed]

It's an interesting contradiction. I heard Hitler was very good with children and dogs, but ordered the murder of millions of Jews. I think such people cling to narcissism to stay sane in view of their horrific crimes.

Those disorders are distinct in nature and are well established in the psychiatric literature. Saying they are in any way the same is a fundamental mistake akin to a physicist claiming the nuclear force is the same as gravity.

[Romantarchist]

Is this ad actually airing on TV? If so, awesome! (diagnosed with ADHD but no longer believe it exists)

[HazyHusky420]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kKyMvjPJdtM