Links to other pages on MentalHealthStigma: Stigma Survey Psycho Tropic Ads Subverting the Law Along Came a "Spider" PsychoMedia Movie Gallery How to Spot a "Mental Patient" One Flew Out of the Cuckoo's Nest Fast For Freedom in Mental Health ***************************************************** Kendra's Law and Laura's Law: prelude to Murphy's Law the voice of reason: excerpt from Violence and Mental Illness "It is perfectly possible for a man to be out of prison, and yet not be free - to be under no physical constraint and yet to be a psycho-logical captive, compelled to think, feel and act as the representatives of the national state, or of some private interest within the nation, want him to think, feel and act." (Brave New World Revisted, Chapter XII). IS THE TREATMENT ADVOCACY CENTER ONE OF THOSE "CHARITABLE GROUPS" THAT THIS ARTICLE IS REFERRING TO? ****************************************************** Please note that this website is neither an endorsement, nor a denouncement, of psychiatry. This is an anti-stigma/anti-abuse website. That psychiatry would be used to perpetrate these abuses is not a denunciation of psychiatry, but a denunciation of the system which allows these abuses under the guise of psychiatry. This website is not intended to glamorize or romanticize "mental illness". It is however intended to counter the current trend by the media and so-called "advocates for the mentally-ill", like the Treatment Advocacy Center, to demonize "mental patients." David @ mentalhealthstigma.com ****************************************************** "In all my research on violence for a book published several years ago, I had not seen one credible study — meaning that the small amount of research done in this area is not worth a damn - showing that society has more to fear from patients labeled "mentally ill" than other people in the community. For example, there has never been any appropriate follow-up of patients that has determined whether the absence of treatment leads to violence. The very foundation of forced treatment is ideology and fear-mongering and not science." (Nicholas Regush) ****************************************************** On September 28th, 2002, the Treatment Advocacy Center succeeding in tearing down the last bastion of "freedom, justice and equality" for all Americans labeled mentally-ill. This is the day that the California version of Kendra’s Law, called Laura’s Law, was signed into effect. And now that New York City and California have paved the way, the rest of the nation will soon follow suit and introduce their own versions of Kendra’s Law. Kendra's Law and Laura's Law are the "New World" versions of the Jim Crow laws of the south. Of course the sponsors of these Machiavellian laws insist that they are prompted by humanitarian motives of compassion and altruism. They claim that Laura’s Law will provide a safety net for "people in need of help and unable to make rational decisions concerning care" (Los Angeles Times, 8/26/02). But who are really the people who are "unable to make rational decisions"? According to the California Governor’s press release Governor Davis Signs Laura’s Law, this law is "expected to reduce homelessness, hospitalization, and involvement in the criminal justice system." Yet, whoever penned this expectation must have had their tongue firmly planted in their cheek, because "Kendra’s Law" has proven that, in fact, the exact opposite is true. Since Kendra’s Law was passed in New York City five years ago (8/3/99), not only has homelessness skyrocketed and hospitalizations soared, but the number of mental health recipients entering the criminal justice system has increased so significantly that mental health courts have had to be established to divert "the mentally-ill" away from jails and prisons. And in a classic example of double jeopardy, should the defendant choose to opt out to any of the alternatives this court may be authorized to impose, he or she must plead guilty to the charges pending against them. Obviously, the expectation that this law will "reduce homelessness, hospitalization, and involvement in the criminal justice system" is clearly a smokescreen. New York City officials recently submitted a proposal to house the homeless offshore on retired cruise ships (Associated Press). This is just 1 degree short of incarceration. The only difference is that there are no steel bars. Picture yourself a victim of Enron. You have lost all of your life's savings and you find yourself homeless. Now you are warehoused offshore, away from the rest of society. You become so depressed that you seek counseling and mental health services. Now, to top it all off, you are labeled "mentally-ill". Where does the real threat to our society come from? "The mentally-ill" or the morally-ill? Just prior to the passage of Kendra’s Law, New York City politicians insisted that there were no funds available to finance self-help peer-support initiatives, sorely needed mental health services, or affordable housing for "the mentally-ill." Yet following the passage of Kendra’s Law, $32,000,000 miraculously materialized to fund forced treatment and involuntary outpatient commitment services for that first year alone. Millions more have materialized since then to continue to enforce Kendra’s Law. The irony behind this is that because of the criminal acts of two or three individuals, which were blamed on "mental illness", thousands of mental health recipients in New York City are being deprived of services that those millions of dollars could have provided. All of this cleverly takes place under the guise of protecting society from "the mentally-ill." If the sponsors of these laws were really interested in protecting society, they’d put violent criminals behind bars, not milk the taxpayers for all they’re worth by laying the blame on mental illness and squandering their hard-earned tax dollars on forced treatment (which only re-traumatizes "the mentally-ill" thereby justifying the need for more taxpayer dollars). It doesn’t seem to me like that’s in the interest of protecting society... it seems to me that that’s more like pillaging society.  And, please. Don't get me wrong! I would not be so pompous as to deny that there may be rare instances when such treatment may actually be necessary. There's always an exception to the rule. But when such exceptionally rare cases are used as a standard to justify incarcerating and denying a whole group of people their rights, not only is this deceptive, misleading, and highly questionable at best, but the very principles of American democracy hang in the balance. Haven't we learned anything from the lessons of World War II - when the first people to lose their rights in Nazi Germany were "the mentally-ill"? Nine times out of ten people forced into treatment are forced into treatment for - to use the words of the Treatment Advocacy Center - "displaying disruptive symptoms of mental illness." Ironically, Kendra's Law and Laura's Law are actually old policies which have merely been re-packaged under a new name. This was inevitable as the mounting death toll behind these coercive practices engendered outrage and demanded reform. Author John A. Stormer reveals in his controversial 1964 book None Dare Call it Treason that: "...legal systems have been established in a majority of states for involuntary and compulsory hospitalization and treatment of neurosis. These state laws have been based on a prototype bill published originally by the Federal Security Agency of the Public Health Service, now a part of the Department of Health, Education & Welfare. Entitled a Draft Act Governing Hospitalization of the Mentally Ill, it is, in fact, a skeleton bill designed for adoption uniformly by federal, state, and territorial governments to radically alter commitment procedures... if you won't consent to voluntary treatment, a police officer can arrest you. You can be subjected to 3 to 5 days of treatment of the psychiatrist's choosing before you even get a hearing to protect your rights in most states. Treatment can include electric shock treatments, chemotherapy, hypnosis or conceivably a frontal lobotomy... Basically, all that is necessary to revoke all the constitutional rights of any citizen is to accuse him of being mentally-ill." (None Dare Call it Treason, John A. Stormer, Chapter IX, Mental Health). Even the L. A. Times editorial applauding Laura's Law acknowledges this in an apologetic paragraph meant to allay concerns about the true motives behind this law: "Involuntary commitment. Without any context, the term sounds chilling, a throwback to half a century ago, when greedy relatives or uncaring communities sometimes confined people to state psychiatric hospitals simply because they were misfits. There, they were controlled with medications that often turned patients into virtual zombies, blurring their vision, stiffening their muscles and dulling their memories. Such 'snake pits' have been shuttered for decades, and psychiatric medications have come on the market that clarify rather than stupefy the mind. Now, some 40 years after abusive practices were halted, the pendulum has swung to the other extreme." Once again, the author of this editorial must have had his tongue firmly planted in his cheek, because the pendulum has never left the other side and the snake pits haven't been shuttered, they've merely been reconstructed. Versions of Kendra's Law and Laura's Law have been on the books for decades. In fact, the only thing that has changed are the names and the reasons behind them. For those of you who truly believe that these types of abuses are a thing of the past, you might be surprised to learn that New York Times investigative journalist, Clifford J. Levy, was just awarded the Pulitzer Prize (2003) for his expose' on the abuse of the mentally-ill in state-regulated homes titled "Broken Homes."  When these laws were first introduced they were passed to protect "the mentally-ill" from themselves, now they are passed to protect society from "the mentally-ill". The reason why the justification behind these laws had to be altered was because when they were initially passed the constitutional rights of the patient made it difficult to apply them. The latest bill recently introduced is called the Our Lady of Peace Act which allocates over $1 billion to states to report any person who has a diagnosis of mental illness to the Justice Department. $1,000,000,000!!! This bill was allegedly introduced to "close loopholes in gun laws", but careful review of the bill reveals that it is just another attempt to equate mental illness as synonomous with violence. It suggests that reporting individuals diagnosed as "mentally-ill" to the Justice Department will prevent tragedies like the one that took place at the Our Lady of Peace church. Because the perpetrator in this incident who had gunned down two innocent victims after purchasing a rifle, was so-called "mentally-ill" (God forbid someone should suggest that he might be morally-ill, such irrational reasoning is anathema to these advocates of forced treatment), the implication behind the Our Lady of Peace bill is that gun violence is directly linked to mental illness. However, when one considers that the majority of mental health recipients live below the poverty level and can't even afford to purchase a firearm, much less own one, it becomes painfully obvious that closing loopholes in gun laws is not the real motive behind this bill. While the stated objective behind this virtuous-sounding bill is a concern for public safety - the knee-jerk reaction surrounding its proposal (symptomatic of CineMania) betrays the reality that it is actually intended to insure that anyone diagnosed as "mentally-ill" is reported to the Justice Department. Isn't it funny how we always get the bill, but we never get the services? Kendra's Law, Laura's Law and the Our Lady of Peace Act all reflect the latest "scientific" findings that "the mentally-ill" are responsible for violence in our society. One can only wonder whether or not it is merely a coincidence that a notorious electroshock hospital located in Louisville, Kentucky, is called the Our Lady of Peace Hospital. The real irony is that nowadays up is down and down is up, illegality is protected by the law, violence is peace and peace is violence. I recently listened in amazement to a clergyman on a popular radio news broadcast refer to people who are anti-war and pro-peace as haters and bigots. The irony of hearing "a man of God" espousing war and referring to lovers of peace as haters and bigots left me bewildered. And because of newspaper headlines like Get the Violent Crazies off Our Streets, television mockumentary reports like Call for Help, and psycho-horror movies like Schizo, the rights of "the mentally-ill" can be denied based upon the premise that they are not just a threat to themselves, but they are a threat to society. Would it be politically correct for me to identify Muslims as the cause of worldwide terrorism based upon the recent acts of a few? Why, then, is it politically correct to identify "the mentally-ill" as the cause of violence in our society based upon the behavior of a few? All the 20th Century pseudo-sciences of eugenics, euthanasia, biopsychiatry, ethnic cleansing and sterilization were inspired, incited and empowered by similar fear-inducing propaganda, distorted half-truths and slanderous allegations. ****************************************************** "Our most basic human rights which we are guaranteed by the United States Constitution - rights even granted to killers, rapists, and terrorists, are denied to people who have been labeled "mentally-ill." The burden of proof for involuntary commitment is based solely on "probable cause", "reasonable grounds", or "a reason to believe" that there is a danger to self or others. By contrast, for a criminal to be convicted of a crime and incarcerated, his violation of the law has to be proven "beyond a reasonable doubt."David @ mentalhealthstigma.com ****************************************************** A sickening feeling overcame me the day that I read the newspaper article about Kendra Webdale, who was savagely shoved to her death by an individual diagnosed as "mentally-ill". Not only because of the vicious way in which she was hurled to her death, but because she was an innocent victim who did not deserve to die and because I knew that the advocates of forced treatment would exploit this bizarre tragedy for all it was worth to further their own agenda, which ultimately culminated in the passage of Kendra's Law. A similar feeling overcame me when I read the article about Laura Wilcox who was brutally gunned down by another person who was diagnosed as "mentally-ill". Once again, not only because of the vicious way in which she was killed, but because she was an innocent victim who did not deserve to die. Just like the 37 "EDP’s" (police jargon for "the mentally-ill") who were gunned down by law enforcement officers in 1998 did not deserve to die. Yet now, with the passage of Kendra’s Law and Laura’s Law, a mere diagnosis of mental illness, and the presumption of violence that goes along with that diagnosis, is enough to justify the killing of an "EDP". And as I contemplated this bitter irony, I recalled an article written by journalist Kelly Patricia O’Meara from Insight Magazine titled "The Forgotten Dead of St. Elizabeth's", wherein she noted that "in the 14-year period between 1950 and 1964, more American deaths occurred in state and county mental institutions than in all of the nation's armed conflicts beginning with the Revolutionary War and ending with the Persian Gulf War. Between 1965 and 1990, the total number of mental-hospital inpatient deaths exceeded the number of battle deaths in the same wars by 70 percent. Inpatient deaths topped out at 1,103,000 during this 25-year period, compared with 650,563 recorded deaths in battles." What is uniquely disturbing about these numbers is that in 1955 the process of deinstitutionalization had been started, and by 1960, 90% of all inpatients had been re-integrated back into the community. One can only imagine the number of patients that would have perished had it not been for deinstitutionalization. In retrospect, one of the hitherto unforeseen benefits of deinstitutionalization is that tens of thousands, possibly even hundreds of thousands, of lives were spared. As author and PhD student from the University of British Colombia, Richard Ingram, keenly points out in his brilliant analysis "Reports from the Psych Wars": "In short, the war on mental illness has been the most lethal confrontation in which the United States has ever been engaged." Newspaper editorials declare that these laws honor the legacy of Kendra Webdale and Laura Wilcox. If this is so, why have no laws been passed to honor the legacy of the over 1 million patients who met their deaths in psychiatric institutions between 1965 and 1990, mostly due to forced treatment. Were these people who were "unworthy of life" because they were "mental patients" or have private interest groups cleverly succeeded in profiting off of the deaths of Kendra Webdale and Laura Wilcox by claiming that their deaths were the result of an untreated mental illness? Has it ever occurred to these private interest groups that some people have no compunction about taking an innocent life because they have been taught to believe that there is no such thing as right or wrong? In fact, isn’t there a distinct possibility that some people actually get off on being violent? Or have the words wicked and evil been eliminated from the dictionary? The infamous serial killer Ted Bundy once boasted in a now-famous quote: "I'm the coldest son of a b---h you'll ever meet! I just liked to kill. I wanted to kill." And, ironically, this is a fact that most criminals will not freely admit - because no criminal wants to go to jail. They want to remain free so they can continue their criminal activities. Is mental illness a valid excuse for such behavior? Or more likely... is it not? The New York Daily News headline in response to the latest attack by the Washington Sniper got it right: "He Kills for the Thrill." (10/8/02) Sure! There might be additional reasons behind such a rampage. Maybe his or her car didn't start that morning? Maybe he or she feels that the world owes them something? Maybe he or she has been trained to kill and now feels that it is their right to do so? But the bottom line is that they enjoy the kill. They enjoy asserting their dominance over an unsuspecting prey. An interesting point to be made here is that in the 1800's the psychiatric field of study known today as psychopathology or sociopathology was then known as moral insanity. What psychiatrists often mistake for a "mental illness" is actually a "moral illness." And, unfortunately, there is no psychiatric solution for moral insanity because psychiatry doesn't operate within the realm of what is right and what is wrong. That's why we have jails and prisons! Experts in the field of psychiatry might be surprised to learn that the criteria used for the insanity defense is based on the 19th century McNaughten Rules which state that a person is not guilty by reason of insanity if "at the time of committing the act, he was laboring under such a defect of reason from disease of the mind as not to know the nature and quality of the act he was doing, or if he did know it, that he did not know what he was doing was wrong." The McNaughten criteria which define insanity are incompatible with the objectives of psychiatry which deny the existence of right and wrong. As the highly esteemed Dr. G. Brock Chisholm, co-founder of the World Federation for Mental Health, blithely stated back in 1945: "...the pretense is made that to do away with right and wrong would produce uncivilized people, immorality, lawlessness, and social chaos. The fact is that most psychiatrists and psychologists and other respected people have escaped from moral chains and are able to think freely." (Psychiatry: Journal of Biology and Pathology of Interpersonal Relations 9, no. 1, February 1946). Why then have psychiatrists been delegated to make determinations of legal insanity? How can you ethically and objectively assess whether or not a person understands the difference between right and wrong, when you yourself don't believe in right and wrong. Isn't this an obvious conflict of interests? "No rule of law can possibly be sound or workable which is dependent upon the terms of another discipline whose members are in profound disagreement about what those terms mean... this is not simply a matter of experts disagreeing on opinions or diagnosis, which often occurs, but disagreement at the threshold of what their critical terms means." (Supreme Court Justice Warren E. Burger, 1961) Just as there is a seperation between Church and state (for obvious reasons), there should also be a seperation between psychiatry and the state (for obvious reasons). Our Constitutionally guaranteed rights have been effectively usurped by psychologists and psychiatrists who have sidestepped the medical profession and have skillfully maneuvered their way into the criminal justice system where they have  been deputized by the state to infringe upon our most fundamental human right, the freedom of thought! According to many within the psychiatric profession, human behavior is actually determined by an abundance or shortage of naturally produced chemicals in the brain. This abundance or shortage of chemicals in the brain allegedly identifies those individuals who are pre-destined to be violent... because at the root of every violent thought is a chemical imbalance. Therefore, human behavior, is, in effect, driven by instinct, not by thought. And, of course, this chemical imbalance is most readily apparent in "the mentally-ill." Those of us who choose to believe in a higher, more profound reasoning behind human behavior, are invariably found to be "mentally-ill." It's time to stop private interest groups from subverting the law and put violent criminals where they belong - in jail. Let's stop confusing "the mentally-ill" with the morally-ill. This confusion creates convenient scapegoats for the media to vilify and allows the multi-billion dollar industry which spawns these practices to continue fleecing the American taxpayer to fund their forced treatment programs. Request an accounting from your government officials of what's being done with the millions of taxpayer dollars that are being funneled annually into these forced treatment programs. To quote the TAC, "it's time to stop the madness" by exposing the preposterous claim that chemical restraints will deter violent individuals from engaging in violence. This self-serving claim recalls the medieval Latin dictum "credo quia absurdum est" (I believe it because it is absurd). David @ mentalhealthstigma.com ****************************************************** Turning "Mental Patients" into Criminals ****************************************************** What Saith the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court "The makers of our Constitution undertook to secure conditions favorable to the pursuit of happiness. They recognized the significance of man's spiritual nature, of his feelings and of his intellect. They knew that only a part of the pain, pleasure and satisfactions of life are to be found in material things. They sought to protect Americans in their beliefs, their thoughts, their emotions and their sensations. They conferred, as against the Government, the right to be let alone - the most comprehensive of rights and the right most valued by civilized men." (Justice Louis D. Brandeis, Olmstead vs. United States, 1928)"Nothing in this utterance suggested that Justice Brandeis thought that an individual possessed these rights only as to "sensible" beliefs, "valid" thoughts, "reasonable" emotions, or "well-founded" sensations. I suggest he intended to include a great many foolish, unreasonable and even absurd ideas which do not conform, such as refusing medical treatment at a great risk." (Chief Justice Warren E. Burger, 1964)  ***************************************************** Excerpts from a National Council on Disability Report "Misconceptions about dangerousness are among the justifications that allow the maltreatment and abuse of people with psychiatric disabilities. With the exception of people with psychiatric disabilities themselves, few people question such routine practices as involuntary commitment, forced drugging, segregation both in institutions and community programs, and the routine use of restraint and seclusion. In order to learn more about the problems of psychiatric disability,  the National Council on Disability (NCD) conducted a hearing specifically on this topic. At the hearing, held in Albany, New York, in November of 1998, NCD heard testimony from mental health professionals, lawyers, advocates and relatives of people with psychiatric disabilities. However unlike most investigations on the topic of psychiatric disability, the primary participants in this hearing were people with psychiatric disabilities themselves, who testified passionately and eloquently both about the mistreatment they had experienced or witnessed, and their proposals for real and viable change. NCD heard testimony graphically describing how people with psychiatric disabilities have been beaten, shocked, isolated, incarcerated, restricted, raped, deprived of food and bathroom privileges, and physically and psychologically abused in institutions and in their communities. The testimony pointed to the inescapable fact that people with psychiatric disabilities are systematically and routinely deprived of their rights, and treated as less than full citizens or full human beings.""People with psychiatric disabilities are the only Americans who can have their freedom taken away and be institutionalized or incarcerated without being convicted of a crime and with minimal or no respect for their due process rights. They are the only Americans who can routinely be forced to submit to medical treatments against their will. When people with psychiatric disabilities die in facilities that are supposed to serve and protect them, their deaths are rarely investigated, and even when they are, criminal charges are rarely filed. This is not happening in some Third World country. This is happening every day in the United States, and such practices are generally ignored or defended by mental health professionals, political leadership, and the media.""Based on the testimony it received, NCD has concluded that the manner in which American society treats people with psychiatric disabilities constitutes a national emergency and a national disgrace. Because people with psychiatric disabilities are routinely deprived of their most fundamental rights, NCD believes that drastic change is necessary in a number of systems that deal with this population. Changes must be made not only in the mental health system, but in the criminal and civil justice systems, housing, income supports, education, job training, and many others, so that people with psychiatric disabilities are guaranteed their fundamental rights as American citizens." (National Council on Disability Report, January 20th, 2000) ****************************************************** "Where illegality reigns by law, the rule of reason must withdraw." Goethe ****************************************************** Laws that authorized slavery were based on the stereotype that the African was a savage and was only 3/4's human.  Laws that prohibited women from voting were based on the stereotype that women were "the weaker sex" and were victims of their ovaries - unable to make rational decisions because they suffered from frequent bouts of hysteria (sound familiar?).Laws which laid the foundation for the wholesale slaughter of Jewish people in Nazi Germany were based on the stereotype of the greedy Jewish businessman. They were labeled as "inciters of war" by those who were amassing the largest war machine in history. Today’s laws legalizing forced treatment are based on the stereotype that "mental patients" are a danger to themselves and others. These laws are the current version of the  "Jim Crow" laws of the South and thrive on the belief that "might makes right." ****************************************************** 21 Days that Rocked the World: the 21 Day Fast for Freedom against Forced Treatment that shook the world ****************************************************** New York Post 8/7/02 The Latest Victims of Forced Treatment: Our Children When I first saw this front-page headline I was amazed that a local paper had the courage to print an expose’ which questioned the ethical nature of forced treatment, because the diversity of these purveyors of forced treatment is so wide and varied that they range from executive members of the mental health community, to so-called "advocates for the mentally-ill", to pharmaceutical corporate executives, all the way down to our trusted school board officials. In this era of CineMania, not even our children are safe from the frenzied advocates of forced treatment. And as they all ducked for cover, only the apologists were left behind to contain the damage and clean up the mess. This newspaper article so disturbed me that I chose to delay posting any type of commentary until I had gotten over the initial shock. This article exposes the hellish nightmare of a mother and child who are the latest victims of forced treatment. The 12 year-old child was reduced to pleading with his mother to stop giving him a drug which was making him psychotic - because she was being forced by school officials to "dope my kid." According to New York Post journalist Douglas Montero: "A 12-year-old boy whose school forced him to take drugs to control his hyperactivity is headed for court saying the medication pushed him over the edge, causing him to plead, "Mom, make it stop - there’s a person inside my head telling me to do bad things." And his desperate mom was accused of child abuse by the school when she stopped giving him the drugs..." This 12 year-old boy's troubles began in 1997 when a teacher alleged that he was exhibiting symptoms of ADHD. School officials promptly referred him to a pediatrician, who, according to his mother Patricia Weathers, prescribed Ritalin after spending just a few minutes reviewing his first-grade school file. "The school was telling me that he couldn't learn unless I medicated him," she said. But the medication itself seemed to be the cause of the problem. By the third grade he began to hear voices and started experiencing such severe anxiety that he was chewing on his sleeves, collars and pencils. School officials told Weathers that her son was bi-polar and was suffering from social anxiety. They suggested more medication - and this time the doctor prescribed a cocktail of Dextrostat (another version of Ritalin) and Paxil, an anti-anxiety drug. "They kept labeling him with disorders, not realizing that the side effects of the drugs was making him act this way," Weathers said. "My son was becoming psychotic with these drugs... he was out of control." Finally, out of desperation, in December of 1999 Patricia Weathers stopped drugging her son when he pleaded with her: "Mom, make it stop - there's a person inside my head telling me to do bad things." That was when school board officials banned him from returning to school, and in February of 2000 they filed a complaint against her with the New York State Child Abuse and Maltreatment Register accusing her of medical-neglect, educational-neglect and child-abuse. Reading this expose' reminded me of an article I had read years ago in a phamplet published as a public service by the Citizens Commission on Human Rights which stated: "An NIMH-sponsored report, The Role of Schools in Mental Health (1962), referred to how school and education was being reinterpreted: Education does not mean teaching people to know what they do not know - it means teaching them to behave as they do not behave... it also said that should parents resist their child and the whole family being referred to a psychiatrist or psychologist to undergo diagnosis or treatment, the teacher and school authorities should apply all reasonable pressures to parents until they stop resisting." When I first read this article it sounded too unbelievable to be possible. Almost like a conspiracy theory. Certainly something like this could never happen in the United States. Upon reflection, however, I realize now that that's exactly why these abuses occur, because most Americans would never believe that such a thing could happen in the United States of America. What is truly alarming about this case is that - not only was this child's welfare endangered, under the guise of mental health, by school officials - but that his mother was accused of child abuse because she wanted to protect him. Six months after she stopped giving him the drugs, a physical examination revealed that her son had a heart murmur. Weathers believes that the heart murmur was caused by the drugs. Heart murmur is contraindicated as a side effect of drugs similar to Ritalin. (Please note that this commentary is not meant to be a critique of the use of Ritalin or any other medications when used as an effective remedy for their intended purposes, but is meant to be a critique of the abuse and misuse of medications for the purposes of forced treatment.) David @ mentalhealthstigma.com ***************************************************** "Force is the best medicine," declares a prominent psychiatrist. "The right to refuse treatment is one right too many," says another. As the psychiatric slaveholder sees it, the psychiatric slave ought never to have a right to self-determination." (Coercion and Psychiatry)  ***************************************************** Forced Treatment in India 8/7/2001 CONSEQUENCES OF FORCED TREATMENT IN INDIA: 25 INMATES BURN TO DEATH! New York Times, 8/7/01: "25 Inmates Die Tied to Poles in Fire in India in Mental Home" by Barry Bearak: New Delhi, Aug. 6th; Fire swiftly consumed a thatch-walled shelter for the mentally-ill in southern India this morning, killing at least 25 inmates who were shackled to poles, the police said. Some witnesses reported that when they first heard screams they assumed that it was the customary ranting. Then they saw the blaze lighting up the predawn. "Everyone inside was chained around their feet, and they didn't have much of a chance getting out of that shed," said Mumtaj Begum, a woman at the scene. The shelter was little more than a shanty made of palm fronds, one of a dozen or more places to stow the mentally-ill in Erwadi, a town about 350 miles south of Madras. Inmates were manacled, the authorities said. They slept on the ground. No doctors worked at the privately owned facility, and any hopes for psychiatric recovery were placed in miracles. Erwadi is a pilgrimage where a Muslim saint was buried 800 years ago. Care for the mentally-ill is no source of pride in impoverished India. The fire joins many other ghastly incidents that have been portrayed at length in newspaper accounts and lawsuits. But little is ever remedied. The cause of the fire was unknown and the shelter's owners were arrested as the police pursue an investigation. "There are clear guidelines to prevent the chaining of people, but no one is paying much attention," said Ravi Nair, executive director of the South Asia Human Rights Documentation Center. "The treatment of the mentally-ill is a tragedy." He added, "In both India and Pakistan, there's this superstition that if a mental patient is kept near the grave of a saint, they will be cured by some sort of hocus-pocus." About 45 people lived in the overcrowded tumbledown shelter, the police said. Some were not manacled as tightly as others and were able to flee uninjured. Five inmates were hospitalized with severe burns. Many of the bodies, blackened with fire, remained at the scene for several hours. Some were sitting up, their arms locked in place like plastic dolls. The bodies defied identification. Forced Treatment in India ***************************************************** It is dangerous to be right in matters on which the established authorities are wrong... Voltaire ***************************************************** ARE PSYCHIATRISTS IN NEED OF FORCED TREATMENT AND INVOLUNTARY OUTPATIENT COMMITMENT? New York Daily News 1/10/03 PSYCHO ANALYST  PRESCRIPTION FOR MURDER: PSYCHIATRIST ARRESTED ATTEMPTING TO PURCHASE ILLEGAL FIREARM IN BID TO MURDER PATIENT WHO SCORNED HIM!(According to a 1010 WINS radio report, relatives of Dr. Karpf stated that he needed the firearm to "protect himself from  his mental patients.") Who is really in need of forced treatment? In 1997 Psychology Today reported "psychologists and other mental health professionals may actually be more screwed up than the rest of us." The article entitled "Why Shrinks Have so Many Problems" reveals that psychiatrists commit suicide at rates twice those of other physicians, and citing a 1980 APA (American Psychiatric Association) study, states: "The occurrence of suicide by psychiatrists is quite constant year-to-year, indicating a relatively stable over-supply of depressed psychiatrists." (Psychology Today, July/August 1997, page 62). And as if that were not enough, another article in the "Journal of Clinical Psychiatry" reports that not only do psychiatrists have the highest suicide rate among medical practitioners, but that their suicide rates are three times higher than the general population. ("Suicide by Psychiatrists...", Journal of Clinical Psychiatry, vol. 41, no. 8, August 1980). Prescription drug abuse is another disturbing revelation. One survey of 500 practising psychiatrists reported in the New England Journal of Medicine in 1988 revealed that psychiatrists have much higher rates of psychoactive drug use - the usage rate being 83% - with 48% of those drugs being prescribed for self-treatment. In fact, according to the APA study quoted above, 56% of those who committed suicide, did so under the influence of self-prescribed psychotropic medications. Marital breakdown rates were also similarly disturbing, with psychiatrists leading every other branch of the medical profession. Psychiatrists were more likely to have marriages of shorter duration and were more likely to have problems due to extramarital affairs. ("What Makes Our Marriages Lousy", Medical Economics, 10/1/79). And let's not forget that between 1950 and 1964, more Americans died in United States federal, state and county "mental institutions" than the number of Americans killed in the Revolutionary War, the War of 1812, the Mexican War, the Civil War, the Spanish-American War, World War I, World War II, the Korean War, Vietnam, and the Persian Gulf War combined. David at mentalhealthstigma.com ***************************************************** Psychiatrist Busted as Park Avenue Pill Pusher New York Daily News 7/30/03 Four days a week, he tended to his well-heeled clients at his Park Ave. office near 80th St. But on Tuesdays, the Manhattan psychiatrist used a different office at another location to sell psycho-tropic medications, such as xanax and klonopin. He did not take medical histories and his patients never had to mention what ailed them. "Steerers" would receive a kickback of 10 to 20 pills after his so-called patients filled their prescriptions, which they would then sell for $10 apiece on the street, investigators said. The 40-year-old psychiatrist was charged with numerous counts of criminal sale of a controlled substance.Would it be acceptable of me to suggest that all psychiatrists are murderous and crooked - based on the behavior of a few? Why then is it acceptable to suggest that all "mental patients" are violent - based on the behavior of a few? It's time to stop private interest groups from subverting the law and put violent criminals where they belong, in jail. Let's stop confusing "the mentally-ill" with the morally-ill. This confusion creates convenient scapegoats for the media to vilify and allows the multi-billion dollar industry which spawns these practices to continue fleecing the American taxpayer to fund their forced treatment programs. Request an accounting from your government officials of what's being done with the millions of taxpayer dollars that are being funneled annually into these forced treatment programs. To quote the TAC, "it's time to stop the madness" by exposing the preposterous claim that chemical restraints will deter violent individuals from engaging in violence. This self-serving claim recalls the medieval Latin dictum "credo quia absurdum est" (I believe it because it is absurd). David at mentalhealthstigma.com **************************************************** Where does the real threat to our society come from... the mentally-ill or the morally-ill? *************************************************** ADVOCATES OF FORCED TREATMENT TARGET OF LAWSUIT Two of the nation’s most vocal supporters of involuntary outpatient commitment now find themselves staring at a $12.7 million lawsuit filed by the lawyer hired two years ago to direct their Law and Psychiatry Center at George Mason University in Fairfax, Va. The suit, filed in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia late last month, includes allegations of breach of contract and fraud. Named as defendants in the lawsuit are the Theodore and Vada Stanley Foundation, doing business as the Stanley Foundation Research Programs; NAMI Research Institute; E. Fuller Torrey, M.D.; the Treatment Advocacy Center (TAC); and TAC’s executive director, Mary Zdanowicz. They were served notice of the suit beginning Sept. 27. The suit is being brought by Paul Stavis, who in 1999 became director of the newly formed Law and Psychiatry Center at George Mason. The public university received funding for the center from the Stanley Foundation, which also finances the Treatment Advocacy Center and the NAMI Research Institute. The center was established to examine the social and legal implications of deinstitutionalization and to seek ways to address problems associated with untreated illness. But Stavis alleges that once his academic work ran afoul of the pro-commitment stance of the center’s funders, the suit’s defendants did everything in their power to ruin his reputation and force the university to fire him. On Sept. 21, the university informed Stavis that his position at the center would be terminated, effective at the end of the fall semester. He filed suit shortly thereafter. "Basically, they wanted him to be a shill," Rodney R. Sweetland III, lead counsel for the plaintiff, said. According to the complaint, Torrey told Stavis in a written correspondence prior to the termination that "the creation of the Law and Psychiatry Center at GMU was done specifically to generate articles for law reviews which could be cited in support of assisted treatment in general and outpatient commitment, conditional release in particular." The precipitating event, Sweetland said, was a scholarly article Stavis wrote that appeared in Catholic University’s Journal of Contemporary Health Law & Policy in 2000. The article examined the use of advance directives for people with serious mental illness. Shortly after its appearance, Torrey and Zdanowicz began putting pressure on Stavis, Sweetland claims. "Apparently they didn’t like his impartiality." Prior to taking the position at the law center, Stavis served as counsel to the New York State Commission on the Quality of Care for the Mentally Disabled. In that role he created a first-of-its-kind process that gave an administrative panel the power to make medical care decisions for mentally incompetent patients, removing the process from the courtroom. In order to entice Stavis to take the law center position, Sweetland said, Torrey agreed that if the GMU Law School did not continue his employment for the full five-year term, that Stavis would be employed by TAC for the remainder of that term. But once the article appeared, he said, Zdanowicz and Torrey began treating Stavis as "a traitor amongst them" and began working to undermine his position at the university. Referring to Stavis’s allegations, Zdanowicz said last week that the defendants were "still trying to figure out what he’s talking about." TAC had been served notice of the lawsuit on Oct. 1st and had not yet retained a lawyer, she said. The defendants have 20 days to respond. The suit comprises five counts: Interference with contractual relationship; conspiracy to interfere with business and profession; breach of contract; fraud; and civil conspiracy. The lawsuit is a tort suit seeking punitive damages, and under Virginia law, those damages can be tripled. "These were intentional acts," Sweetland said. "This is not merely breach of contract." Included in the lawsuit is the charge that Torrey and Zdanowicz entered into an illegal kickback arrangement designed to maintain the Treatment Advocacy Center’s 501(c)3 status. According to the complaint, the Stanley Foundation provided money to George Mason University that the school then paid to TAC in order to maintain the appearance that TAC received financial support from multiple sources. In order to achieve 501(c)3 status, an organization must have more than one donor. And TAC doesn’t fit that bill, Sweetland said. "They’re a lobbying organization. That’s what they do." If TAC loses that designation, it will have to revert to private foundation status, he said. And that would have serious consequences on tax deductions that have been taken by TAC donors. According to Sweetland, the Stanley Foundation gives the university hundreds of thousands of dollars a year. Unsure of the exact figure, he has subpoenaed the defendants’ budgetary documents. George Mason University hasn’t been included in the lawsuit for tactical reasons, namely not to get the Commonwealth of Virginia involved, Sweetland said. However, the two deans named in the complaint will have to answer to their own faculty about issues of academic freedom. The Eastern District of Virginia has a reputation for quick justice, and Sweetland predicts that "this will go in front of a jury in less than a year." (©2001 Manisses Communications Group, Inc.) ***************************************************** "I HAVE SWORN UPON THE ALTAR OF GOD ETERNAL HOSTILITY AGAINST EVERY FORM OF TYRANNY OVER THE MIND OF MAN!" Thomas Jefferson  **************************************************** Forced Treatment Links: Forced Psychiatric Treatment - Against Psychiatric Coercion - Drug Mistreatment - The Ritalin Outrage Copyright © 2007 MentalHealthStigma.com, All Rights Reserved Fair Use Notice: Please note that MentalHealthStigma.com contains copyrighted (©) material, the use of which has not necessarily been authorized by the copyright owner. These materials are presented strictly for educational purposes only and therefore constitute a fair use of copyrighted material as provided for in section 107 of the U.S. Copyright Law. MentalHealthStigma.com does not sell any products of any kind and does not profit in any way from the use of these copyrighted materials. 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