I think that the problem with psychiatry is not that it doesn't work, but that other things work as well. For instance, a much larger percent of mentally ill patients smoke, and everyone immediately assumes that this is an effect and not cause, and takes the individual on his word when they say "cigarettes help me deal with it," which is a common claim that I've heard repeated by psychiatrists during my therapy. I think meditation is likely more effective than medication, and so is good health
Further, as far as proof of negative side-effects go, the drug companies admit to such side-effects in warnings about them. So, why should I have to prove what they readily acknowledge? All I am doing is confirming the experience of the side effects they list. But, I would add the caution that the samples you get from a doctors office give a very limited list of side-effects and I think everyone should educate themselves on the side-effects and make a fully informed decision.
Consequently, objective proof is impossible and you can not claim that there is any objective proof beyond the self-report of patients, and the fact that objective chemicals are being manipulated in the "hope" that such manipulation will produce subjective benefits.
Again you accuse me of lying by claiming, "You lie that they have given no proof, or that it's all anecdotal." I think I already addresed this in another response, but to be clear, anecdotal evidence is evidence, but not proof, since any proof in this area is necessarily subjective because the benefits of psych meds are subjective.
In fact, what I am arguing is the very opposite of what you accuse me of. I am arguing that what is true for some is not true for all. Just because some people benefit from psych meds does not mean that all will.
Again you assume more than I said, when you state "It's not a good argument for everyone to stop using drugs because the side effects are too bad for some people." Now you are assuming that I made an argument that I nowhere posited. You are very intellectually dishonest in the way you read my posts. You word this argument you accuse me of in a way that assumes I am illogically arguing that what is true for some is true for all. I nowhere made such an argument.
You read more into what I said than what I actually said. Thus, you create a straw man fallacy based on your assumptions. I certainly have not anywhere in my posts "tried to convince anyone not to trust their doctors. You are just lying about what I said now. I have simply laid out my experience in the hope of cautioning people not to assume that psychiatrists and doctors actually know how psych meds will affect them personally. The positive benefits are based on generalizations.
Also, you give nothing but assertions and bad logic. You offer no proof and make yourself a hypocrite by accusing me of doing the same thing you are doing, offering argument. Your assertions, and that is all you offer, are themselves anecdotal.
Well, in the first place I didn't lie and say, " that psychiatrists have not given evidence that proves some medications are effective for some people," that's your interpretation of what I have said. But, I do agree that I am saying that, "their evidence [is] anecdotal." The only objective thing they can say is what chemicals psych meds affect. Whether or not that affect is benefical is subjective and anecdotal. So, it seems you are confused about what I said since I couldn't mean both.
@ghostwrangler64 I accused you of lying if you think psychiatrists don't give evidence, but I should have allowed for the possibility that you think the evidence they present is flawed, so maybe you wouldn't call it "evidence". Oh well. I don't have the time or interest to keep up this argument with you. We've more or less presented our cases and we're unlikely to agree with each other. Thanks for your comments.
they are false until proven true. Your approach is to say they are true until proven false, yet this is the approach of gullibility and naivete'. Thus, we approach the issue differently, mostly because I suffered for believing it was true until proven false, and you haven't. Nevertheless, this difference is the main source of conflict and disagreement, and no argument will be able to logically necessitate a polar shift. Thus, logic alone, while necessary, it is not sufficient.
@ghostwrangler64 No, I think studies have proven that psychiatric medications work for some people. Deniers are the ones who generalize that psychiatry does not work for anyone, and who give no evidence or bad evidence, usually anecdotes about some people for whom treatment is not effective. We might disagree about what counts as proving these true, or whether they have been proven true, but you're way off base to deny that they have been proven and call me naive.
the growth would also grow at the same rate and you would actually never be able to perceive the growth. The claim is logically coherent (internally consistent because there is nothing to contradict it), but not necessarily true because there is no external evidence to validate it. Neither you nor psychiatry has provided sufficient proof. I don't have to disprove psychiatry since it is psychiatry that has the burden of proof, and without that proof there is actually nothing to disprove, because
Hopefully this is my last post on part 1. I wanted to clarify why your argument is circular reasoning. Your argument implies that because your argument is coherent it is therefore logical, and if it is logical it is therefore true. The problem is that "coherence" is not sufficient to determine truth even though it is necessary. For instance, if I said that everything grows twice its size every 24 hours, You wouldn't be able to prove me wrong because all the instruments you would use to measure..
@ghostwrangler64 I think I see what you mean by an argument not being true just because it seems coherent or logical, as exemplified by all of your comments here. If you said that everything grows twice its size every 24 hours, the burden of proof for that claim would be on you, not on me or ppl listening to you. I feel that psychiatrists have proven that some medications are effective for some people. You lie that they have given no proof, or that it's all anecdotal.
So, the actual number affected by adverse side effects is rather sketchy simply because the statistics are not formulated to quantify the percentage of people adversely affected, but only those who are positively affected or receive no benefit. That is, the statistics are formulated to hide pertinent information behind an either/or fallacy.
Lastly, the statistics for the effectiveness of psychiatric drugs is only around 50 to 60 percent. That leaves 40 to 50 percent who receive no benefit or experience adverse side effects, and this does not include those who continue taking the drugs despite experiencing side effects either because the benefit is greater than the sde effect, or because they are forced to.
@ghostwrangler64 If these drugs are effective for 50-60 percent of people, that may be better than having no treatment at all. Lots of medications for non-psychiatric physical ailments have annoying side effects, sometimes bad enough to outweigh the problem they treat. Everyone has to weigh that for themselves. It's not a good argument for everyone to stop using drugs because the side effects are too bad for some people.
Also, you apparently have not spent enough time with people who have been poisoned, crippled, and brain damaged by psychiatric drugs and treatments. You certainly didn't include the possibility of the "weed" in your analogy having any adverse and toxic side effects, nor anyone in your analogy who used the "weed" and died from an allergic reaction to it, or left with permanent brain damage from the side effects. Not biased at all are you?
You are also being hypocritical in your application of logic by using it only to confirm what you want to believe, then mischaracterizing the other side of the argument with straw man fallacies. You then take the experience of one person in your analogy (debbie) an "unrepresentative example" and try to imply that it is therefore "logical" to generalize, which you disavow as logical when you claim that "psychiatry denyers" are doing the same thing, yet you do it in your false analogy.
In essence, you are using logic only to support your own position based on the assumption that you are right, and then arguing that you are right because you are being logical. Unfortunately, this is what's called a circular argument since you have no scientifically valid evidence to prove that you are right to begin with since it is all anecdotal anyway. That's why you have to create the circular argument you have presented.
Further, the issue is about trust, not logical fallacies. I have personally been overmedicated by an incompetent psychiatrist and ended up in the hospital from it with a rebound migraine with aura, and worsening of symptoms. Why take more of something that is making you sicker? Now I am oversensitive to all ssri's. Just like you say in your argument to dismiss people like me, just because some people benefit from the drug does not mean everyone will.
@ghostwrangler64 That's fine, if you don't trust doctors or psychiatrists, there might not be anything I could say to convince you. But you're moving a step beyond and possibly harming others if you try to convince other people not to trust doctors or psychiatrists based on your anecdotal evidence. If what you say is true, I'm sorry to hear that your psychiatrist was incompetent and meds aren't effective for you. It doesn't prove that anyone else should avoid psychiatry or medications.
To begin with, your straw man fallacy about what antipsychiatry people believe is just as erroneous, because you are stereotyping them as if they all think the way you claim. Secondly, the hypothesis of mental illness causes and treatment, as well as your analogy are anecdotal. While your analogy is useful in describing a thought process, it does nothing to validate the claims of psychology since the claims of psychology are also anecdotal.
@ghostwrangler64 If you want to lie and say that psychiatrists have not given evidence that proves some medications are effective for some people, or that their evidence was all anecdotal, there's not much use in me trying to convince you otherwise. Like usual, you make assertions with nothing to back them up, incorporating phrases that sound reasonable in your denials of psychiatry, but you won't move past assertions. Your response shows that my generalizations about psych deniers is accurate.
I have dealt with severe psychotic manic fits since I was 4 years old, at this point in my life it is seen as an annoyance akin to diarrhea and while I come out of my state quickly, it doesn't make it easier socially. Two classes of meds have and still help me stay the most sane, anticonvulsants and stimulants and given my seasonal mania and hyperactivity, I only need them for summer. AP's and AD's make me nuts and many are not helped by any meds at all so to deny them is ridiculous...
Mary Ellen Copeland created the WRAP plan after trying every medication out there and not getting any help from them and that is a self-help skills book that helps many issues and managing their issues.
For example, I can be on my therapeutic dose of Depakote in the summer and not be balanced in diet and exercise and closing the blinds earlier and still end up manic from a lack of sleep and obsessing regardless of meds. Meds are meant to establish a baseline to behave in a balanced way....
The only problem psychiatry has is that the science hasn't caught up sufficiently, and there is alot of corruption within the drug companies keeping it that way.
Excellent video.Many non-psych meds have side effects. Some anti-Psychiatry and the "religion' of Scientology mix up cause and effect with things like more suicide among psychiatric patients using antidepressants. Have they ever considered the possibility that because antidepressants are given to a population of people who are already more suicidal than the general public that they are particularly at risk for suicide no matter what? That it's not the drug but people's propensity for suicide?
I can say for a fact that medications can cause suicidal tendencies.
I have never been suicidal, never wanted to die, never attempted anything, however while being treated for depression I was prescribed two separate medications; Wellbutrin and Cymbalta.
I can tell you for a fact that they DID increase suicidal idealization.
As soon as I stopped taking them I felt better physically AND mentally (I was less depressed), and had no suicidal idealization.
@DaedalEVE Sorry to hear about your experience, but you can't generalize from your experience that they harm everyone. The way to make that generalization is to analyze their effect on many people, which proves that they are helpful for some. If you had an allergic reaction to penicillin, would you generalize that it's harmful to everyone, or to most people?
You're correct, I can not say they harm everyone, nor do I. I am saying that in my experience they have caused far more harm than good, and I know of others who can say the same. Then again I also know a couple people who say it helped.
The point is, we need to stop looking to drugs as a one stop shot to fix what ails ya.
I want to see psychiatric reform in which we stop using this faulty medical model and go back to treating emotions as natural things, instead of avoiding them.
Also, you have to not only look at the physical effects of drugs on an individual, but the personal and social repercussions.
I own firearms, legally. Well a year ago a friend mistakenly thought I was suicidal and called the police. I had my home illegally searched, my guns seized, and was drug off to an emergency room solely on the call that person made. I was immediately released, because I was fine... however I never got my property, I lost many friends, and nearly lost my job.
The reason the police took me to the hospital in the first place, to spite no signs of depression or being suicidal, is because I was at that time being treated for depression (I was taking a low dose of wellbutrine).
The reason I was not allowed to have my firearms back was because the detective in charge LIED, saying I could not legally own them BECAUSE I was being treated for depression.
This is the sort of stuff that happens to people because of labels, and because of meds.
To take this issue to court would have cost more than the value of what was taken... so I just used that money to repurchase what I had.
Being labeled by the current mental health system, or being on medication, some how makes you less valuable as a person in the eyes of others. It gives them free reign to violate your civil rights, and take about your property and/or freedom on their say so alone.
I have no history of violence, never been arrested, yet look what happened to me.
@DaedalEVE In some of your posts, it sounded like you were saying that psychiatry and medication are generally more harmful than helpful. But the story you're telling is of people stigmatizing you and discriminating you based on your status. That applies to everyone with mental illness, whether or not they approve or disapprove of standard modern psychiatry or pharmaceutical treatments for mental illness.
Understand that "more harmful than helpful" does not mean the same thing as "not helpful at all" or "harmful to everyone".
It is harmful BECAUSE it stigmatizes. In my case it was also ineffective (which is a story for another time).
The end result is you have a system that is regarded by most as this glorious magical solution, that in reality not only fails to do what it claims too, but actually does more harm in many cases.
@DaedalEVE Youtube doesn't make their comment threads very clear, so I'm not sure who you were replying to. Scientologists apparently have religious beliefs that psychiatry is wrong or harmful or doesn't work. I recognize that not everyone who opposes or denies the effectiveness of psychiatry is a Scientologist.
Someone had made a comment that led me to believe that the anti-psychiatry movement and Scientology went hand in hand. I've noticed a lot of comments trying to discredit the validity of that movement by arguing that "it's all just a bunch of Scientology nut job".
I support the anti-psychiatry movement, but have nothing to do with Scientology, so I took offense and wanted an explanation.
I don't think psychology is wrong, but I believe the current system and model are.
often is no one there, and something has to be done. Many people are emotionally overwhelmed. So this, honestly, is why I think that (based on my experience with over a hundred mentally ill people) these drugs can work for some, and don't work for others. Some drugs, on the other hand (like haldol) are so powerful that they just completely ruin the person's cognition, but do make the symptoms go away. In a way, I did this to myself naturally.
I guess my point is that I sympathize more with people who take them, and believe they 'work' by neutralizing symptoms, especially when combined with that certain psychological process. I just maintain that the way things are is not right, the way the drugs are touted is not right, etc.
I maintain my earlier view that the drugs are not the solution to emotional illness. Mental illness is a human condition, not a medical one.
However,
I understand why people take stuff like valium, xanax, zoloft, etc. Many drugs have blunt effects, and if you combine this with a belief that they work (and in a way, they do suppress symptoms, even if they don't solve the underlying problem) then the result can be a massive improvement. I have seen this in relatives, personally.
It doesn't even mean a fake numb. It feels very real. The feelings are rendered distant and almost irrelevant. I 'self-tranquilized' for about three years as a result of excessive feeling and literally did not notice things almost all of the time. In this manner, the drugs can have extreme effectiveness depending on the person. If our society had empathy, there would be no need for this. It is a social cop out. But even if ideally this wouldn't be the case, there is the reality that there (cont)
You "sound " convincing, but if any viewers understand scientific research, please delve into the clinical trials data, the true study outcomes, and the sleazy deceptive methodology by Big Pharma & U.S. Psychiatry. Careful study shows the psych meds are ineffective, worse than no-treatment, and OFTEN harmful. Science is not a majority vote, subject to massive propaganda -- which has misled doctors, public, courts, etc. Apologists for psych-meds must not know what a national outrage this is.
Oh, and as the father of an adult son with schophrenia, who does "well" when on Zyprexa and visits the hospital when we stops, I know what it's like to converse with people that have a bizarre sense of "logic". But, then with my son I know it is his illness causing it. But, these other people...Yikes! "Never argue with an idiot. They drag you down to their level, then beat you with experience."
Thanks for the video. You're preaching to the choir here. The logic of many of the nay-sayers makes sense if you believe that aliens came here in airplanes. Also, I read a lot of the posts and it's hard to say if some of them were aimed at you or some of the knuckle-heads. Keep up the good work and you are hereby nominated for sainthood for being such a supportive friend (husband?)
Thanks. I don't know if there's hard evidence to support this, but it seems like people with mental illness do better when they have supporting family and friends. I remember reading studies about orphaned babies in countries with few nurses or staff in the orphanage. When babies only get a few minutes interaction per day with an adult or parent figure, a huge percentage of them have brain damage and many of them just die, even if their physical needs were being met. ...
(Continued)... So that seems to support the idea that humans seriously need social interaction, and it can affect us in severe and surprising ways when we don't get it.
If you feel you are informed and you decide to take these drugs fine. It's your life. I'm not going to be preachy and try to tell you whats best for you. My main concerns are as I stated below.
Thats not real medicine. The weed is not going to "pretty much clear up her problem". For example- If you smoke and have trouble breathing, an inhaler drug wont cure you.
Drugs (the weed) only cover up symptoms and it has side effects.
Also, the drug manufacturers use misleading advertizing to make you think they know the true cause and their drug treats the cause when they do not.
You might say it's a bad analogy to psychiatric drugs, but you don't get to rewrite my hypothetical situation to prove your point.
Maybe my video wasn't clear or you read too much into it. I was talking about a plant that was taken as tea, not one that was smoked. I made no claims about marijuana or any other smoked medication as effective treatment for mental illness.
The best way to eliminate misleading ads and bad behavior from pharma companies is to remove profit and capitalism from all health care.
That some ads are misleading does not mean their drugs are generally ineffective.
Oh, and some psych meds have side effects. Welcome to the world of pharmaceuticals. Lots of drugs used for treating physical illness have bad side effects. People have to decide whether the side effects are worth it. That's not a good argument against psych meds.
I dont like the idea of socialised healthcare and I definitely dont like the current system. I dont have an answer there. Two of my problems with psych drugs is misleading advertising leading people to believe that these drugs correct a chemical imbalance when the companies cant show or prove this, and that they are focusing on kids. I dont want my kid going to school and being "diagnosed" add or bipolar based on a checklist created by these people. It's profit motivated.
Psychiatry has no lagitament science. It is all theoretical with out any biological test. Just as the science of eugenics was theoritical. that of course lead to the Halocoust, puting faith in a science with out any proof is dangerous.
Oh I see so John Nash didnt actually have hallucinations like they are depicted on the film, do think that perhaps if there where no potential legal ramifications in not mentioning that Nash never took the drugs then they wouldn't have bothered to mention it.
No, I don't think there were any "potential legal ramifications" in not mentioning that Nash never took the drugs. Have there been any legal ramifications for Sylvia Nassar when she wrote the book and accurately reported about Nash's life? Have there been legal ramifications for the Wikipedia article that directly states Nash never took antipsychotic meds again?
I think Howard or Goldsman foolishly used their "artistic license" for propagandistic purposes. But no conspiracy.
... This has been observed in many older people who experienced delusions and hallucinations. The fact that it happens to this one man as a prominent example, does not mean we should conclude that medication is harmful to everyone, or that younger people can achieve the same results with no treatment, or that most older people will have the same results this one man had.
Wikipedia article on Nash says, "after 1970 he was never committed to the hospital again and never took antipsychotic medication again. The film "A Beautiful Mind" fabricated him later taking the then new atypical antipsychotics, which Nash attributes to the screenwriter (whose mother, he notes, was a psychiatrist) not wanting to incite people to stop taking their medication."
His symptoms apparently lowered without treatment as he grew older. ...
5:25 regarding John Nash. If John Nash did not take medication (24 years off) when getting the Nobel, then why does the film portray him as having been on them? seeing as John Nash attributes his success to the medication at the end which as is said on DVD was not actually the case, then surely would it not have been better to make a film about someone whos life has been made a success by being on the medication? if so why did they not do this?
Watch the dvd with commentary. Somewhere in the scene where the Nobel representative approaches Nash to talk with him, you will hear Ron Howard or Akiva Goldsman admit that it was not true Nash had used the "newer" drugs at that time in his life. If you've read the biography of Nash on which the film is based, you'll know this is not the only liberty they took. He never had visual hallucinations as extensive as depicted in the film. He split up from his wife for a long period.
Correction: Alicia divorced John Nash in 1963. They lived together again in 1970 and remarried in 2001. The film seems to show them staying married their whole lives.
Basically the movie helps people understand a little bit what it must be like to have delusions and hallucinations, to struggle with them for many years even when you can't find an effective treatment. I'm sure there are people like that today. But the movie is not a strict biography at all.
Why would the filmmakers do that? I think Howard says that they were afraid that people would watch the movie and come away with the message that medication is not necessary. He wanted to make it seem like drugs are necessary. I don't think I would have done it that way.
"Why would the filmmakers do that? I think Howard says that they were afraid that people would watch the movie and come away with the message that medication is not necessary. He wanted to make it seem like drugs are necessary. I don't think I would have done it that way"
That precisely my point, if they where afraid of making it look like medication is not neccessary if it is neccesary, then why use a person who has won a Nobel peace prize after having not taken the medication for + 20 yrs.
The arguments of the psych deniers that you speak of are really full of fallacy. People who have had a bad experience with psychiatry should be carefull not to use false arguments. I have had a lot of very bad experiences with psychiatrists, yet I wouldn't argue that all psychiatrists are bad and all psychiatry is bad.
Your first point "psychiatrists don't know everything about mental illness, so therefore they now nothing", I actually never heard until now. What I have heard is kind of the oposite, critics say psychiatrist do claim do know things that they actually can't prove, like knowing that there are chemical imbalances or a genetic cause.
I know what you speak of. These deniers have one slight experience and know a friend who has had one slight experience and get prescribed by Psych. Then go off it, then they are fine again but they get a sense that psychiatry is evil in someway. It's helped me I'm schizoaffective, I know what horrors lurk if I refuse my meds. Lithium has worked wonders, and so has the anti-psych meds. With a little weight-gain but by reducing the med to the right amount solves it.
spectacular video!!! I have always known that anti psychiatrist had flawed logic and you explained those flaws perfectly. Thank you for posting this video. Five stars for you my friend!
Please go to Yahoo and type in "Horrible Truth About Psychiatric Drugs" to see a research paper exposing these drugs. Also so the search "Documented Proof Psychiatric Drugs Shorten Lifespan". Be sure to include the quotes. You will learn information no psychiatrist will tell you. These drugs destroy fertility and libido and cause impotence and extream disphoria and obesity. The promote suicide and violence not prevent it.
LOL, I love how you think a "research paper" would be titled "Horrible Truth about" anything. Here's an interesting sentence from that piece: "A Freemason probate judge by the name of Richard P. Carey sent me by his order to a state mental health facility where I was repeatedly drugged by court order." ... "He attempted to silence me but the Almighty Father Yehovah protected me."
crap it makes you so fat. psychiatry deniers are against your jobe because it kills, knows no cure, no roots of illness, anything! go eat your donuts and plan how to squize more money from patients telling them stories even you don't believe
Psychiatry's "cure" rates are on par with the rest of medicine. There are "roots of illness", you just need to do a literature search. What it is lacking is as good as an understanding of the pathology (what is actually broken). This is difficult because of the nature of psychiatric illness and the lack of easy ways to study it-- you can't just cut open the brain and see the problem (in most cases, but not all!). "stories even you don't believe": what do you mean by that?
Quite legitimate arguments. Psychiatry is good but not great. However, I have taken meds before that have not helped with my condition. Therefore, going by the idea of the video, taking those things is not logical, and those who prescribed them were in error.
Not taking them if they haven't helped you is logical. But that doesn't mean it was an "error" to prescribe them to you, if this was the best known treatment for your problem. Not all treatments are 100% effective for everyone, whether we're talking about psychiatric treatments or physical medicine. Some people don't respond to chemotherapy, but it could still be the best known treatment for some problems, not an error.
I was wondering what motivated you to make these videos? I really like them, and thanks for putting them up. Has anyone ever "converted" from anti-psychiatry in these discussions???
My wife takes anti-psychotic medication which has been clearly effective from what I have seen over several years. You could say I have a vested interest in people not talking smack or spreading lies and half-truths about psychiatric treatments. She used to talk about mental illness politics a lot on her youtube channel "melsbasketcase" and a lot of haters and psychiatry deniers left nasty comments for her. They repeat the same logical fallacies time & time again, so I responded with this vid.
im pretty upset to just discover that my friend from hospital, with many common traits, is dead at 29, even though she complied with treatment and pretty much followed the program as far as i know. Life on meds & months in institutions are rough and i have been feeling like lashing out all day wondering how this could happen. Thank you for this video-it has answered my question &been very comforting, reminding me the meds are generally helpful. Your logic is good, and restores my hope.
Psychiatry can work for some people. It seems to be working ok for me, but I'm disillusioned by the side effects. I'm tired all the time, I'm sexually defunct, and it caused like 60 pound of weight gain. I'm looking at possible diabetes, high cholesterol, and heart disease in the future. These things don't run in my family either....
Actually, the Soteria project was killed by lack of funding...but not because the outcome was bad. In fact, the outcomes of the patients were equally as successful as treatment with drugs. The project was killed because it competed with big pharma. That's a fact. You're not comfortable with conspiracies, but they happen every day, man.
I don't know exactly what happened with Soteria house, but I'm saying funding might have dried up because the funders did not see proof of positive results, or enough positive results to validate the claims of Mosher, Breggin or the people running Soteria house. I could be wrong.
You should read the book about Soteria house. It's called "Soteria." It shows how the results are positive, but the project was still killed through lack of funding. The APA and Big Pharma kill anything that competes with their model.
I'm not sure the stakes are any worse for a mentally ill person than any other person. Since mental illness can only be identified by behaviors and talking to a person, no one knows for sure when a 'normal' person will go off their rocker.
I think we're treading in the waters of opinion here. You may think that Breggin and other anti-psychiatrists exaggerate their data, but one could say the same thing about biopsychiatry in general. The typical psychiatrist is convinced of the genetic, chemical, and structural abnormality hypotheses, even though none of them are proven. It's equally possible that a different, psychospiritual cause is operative in the case of mental illness.
Yeah, we're just getting down to the point of disagreeing on which authorities to believe, so we probably won't be able to convince each other. Shall we agree to disagree?
People with the most severe cases of mental illness can't function well in society even with medication. Medication is hardly 100% effective in treating problems of the mind. All they really do is dull feelings and thoughts. So if a person can't work even when they're taking medication, what's the benefit of taking the medication at all? Anyway, suicide is a civil right. If a person wants to kill themself, they have the right to do that.
I've repeated the comparison btw psych meds and chemotherapy, which is less than 100% effective and has many negative effects, but is the best known treatment at this time for some problems. That should have made it clear that I don't believe, and never said, that medication is 100% effective in treating mental illness.
I did use the loaded expression "function in society", but I wouldn't say being able to work is the best indicator of a person's worth or quality of life...
A person who can't hold down a job might still take meds in order to take care of himself, maintain hygeine, feed himself, etc. People can still have an okay quality of life even if they can't work. I don't know how to measure the fear or emotional pain that might go on for a person who is psychotic or delusional or severely depressed, but I bet some people would choose drugs with harsh side effects instead of those things.
Suicide as a civil right? Maybe for terminally ill people who are suffering, I have sympathy. For people who are depressed, I'd rather convince them to treat their depression (even with talk therapy, even if they are biased against drug treatment) than pretend that they are making some reasonable action based on a civil right. For people who are hallucinating or delusional, obviously effective treatment would be preferable to letting them kill themselves.
How do you know that Debbie's diarreah hasn't disappeared naturally...run its course, and she only believes the weed is effective? I concede that pscychiatric medication appears to be effective for some people, but since we don't know how the medication works, we can't honestly say that it's the medication that's working when people feel better.
When we track enough people saying they felt better after taking medication, and compare it with the rates of people saying they felt better after taking placebo, then we can say that there's a correlation between taking medication and people saying it works. It seems less and less plausible that this is a coincidence or simply correlation without causation, especially for meds that are tested and compared against placebos.
Yeah, medications do seem to work for some people, but you haven't addressed the fact that psychiatric drugs are toxic and can cause brain damage or death. They do work for some people, but they're dangerous.
I haven't addressed or denied that some psychiatric drugs have harmful side effects. But compare this with chemotherapy, which is toxic to the cancer cells, and often toxic to the rest of the system. There are drugs and treatments for physical illnesses which have severe side effects and serious trade-offs for anyone considering whether to use them. That's not a reason to reject all psychiatric drugs, or most psychiatric drugs.
Psychiatrists downplay the seriousness of the side effects. Often, they neglect to inform the patient of those side effects. I think if patients knew more about how toxic psychiatric drugs can be, they would refuse the treatment. You should read, "Toxic Psychiatry" by Peter Breggin, M.D.
And for those psychiatrists who fully explain the seriousness of side effects, for patients who are well informed, I suppose you're just willing to dismiss them anyway as quacks and suckers.
Breggin exaggerates the seriousness of side effects, downplays the danger of leaving mental illness untreated, and exaggerates the effectiveness of talk therapy, as if the only problem is therapists don't pay enough attention or show enough affection to patients. How do we measure whether the psychiatrist is being kind enough to patients? It's a non-falsifiable hypothesis.
People should research and possibly get a second opinion before using any treatment with severe side effects, whether we're talking about anti-depressants, anti-psychotics or chemotherapy.
Cancer can be fatal, which is why people are willing to undergo dangerous, toxic treatments, even though the treatments are not 100% successful at stopping cancer. Likewise with psych meds, I'm not sure you're considering how dangerous it can be for some mental illnesses to go untreated.
Can you point to evidence that psychiatric drugs are "toxic" or that they cause brain damage? I'm aware of some psych meds that increase chances of death in older people, which is why those drugs are clearly labelled as ones that should not be given to older people. As long as doctors and consumers follow the labels and warnings, then that should be factored out. Aspirin is known to cause or trigger Reye's syndrome in children, but that's no reason to condemn all use of aspirin.
I have read it. He emphasizes the bad side effects of psych drugs, minimizes or rejects the positive benefits, and he asserts that most or all mental illness can be effectively treated by old-school talk therapy a la Freud. He bases that view on his personal anecdotes, not on science.
I know a psychiatrist who claims schizophrenics gradually develop brain damage over the years, each time they have an untreated psychotic episode. He claims that continuing on psych meds will *prevent* that brain damage.
Right. He claims. Does he have proof that those episodes cause brain damage. In contrast, it's been proven that toxic psychiatric drugs cause brain damage. Have you ever heard of Tardive Dyskenesia? It's basically irreversible brain damage caused by antipsychotic drugs.
I'm aware of tardive dyskinesia, but I'm not sure if you or Breggin are accurate when you characterize it as "brain damage." It's a neurological problem that causes involuntary movements. It's not like people with TD become zombies or lose their intelligence, although I'm sure Breggin and his fans would prefer if they could leave that false impression.
Meanwhile, compare with chemotherapy and other treatments for physical illnesses which can be toxic and harmful, not 100% effective.
With chemotherapy and surely with some other drugs or surgeries or treatments for physical illness, the best thing we can do is a dangerous procedure with harmful side effects, but can still be the best alternative to stop a fatal physical illness, or an illness that is more harmful and more dangerous than the bad side effects.
As you over-emphasize the harmful side effects, it seems like you are ignoring or minimizing the real danger of some untreated mental illnesses. Depression isn't just an annoyance - it leads some people to suicide. Same with bipolar disorder, schizophrenia and others. Even for people who don't commit suicide, it can mean horrible quality of life. For some, the choice may be living in fear and unable to function in society and take care of themselves the rest of their lives, vs bad side fx.
Other treatments exist for mental illness (even schizophrenia), but psychiatry and big pharma are such powerful lobbies that funding doesn't exist for these alternative techniques.
Other treatments exist for mental illness. Other treatments that have proven effective do not exist, or have not been publicized very well. Please leave the "Big Pharma" conspiracy theories elsewhere. Capitalism needs to be cut out of healthcare, but it doesn't mean that general medicine or psychiatry are totally ineffective.
I suspect funding doesn't exist for Breggin's anecdotal evidence and the claims of Soteria houses cuz they are bad science, not because conspiracy blocks funding.
Yeah, TD is mostly a cosmetic probblem, but at least you admit that it's a neurological problem. Most people would prefer not to have TD. The point is that people with schizophrenia have been shown to recover with success rates as good (or better when you consider the fact that they're not plagued by the horrible side effects of the drugs) as with medication treatment in supportive pscyhosocial rehabilitation programs. See the book Soteria house for an in depth account of this.
Great, I look forward to more and more positive evidence from Soteria methods piling up in the coming years, eventually overturning the big pharma conspiracy and the corrupts consensus of psychiatrists. Forgive me if I don't hold my breath until then.
Do you acknowledge the stakes when a person is actually suffering from a mental illness?
We could quibble over whether doctors over-diagnosis serious mental illness, but in cases where we could agree that a person has a serious mental illness, do you recognize what it's like when they are untreated? I suppose you don't agree that alternatives like talk therapy (proposed by Breggin and Szasz) have failed to produce positive results for almost 100 years in most ppl with mental illness.
I'm not sure that psychotherapy is totally ineffective. I know from my own experience with schizoaffective disorder that when I'm psychotic, reality and reason are really difficult to manage. However, projects like the Soteria house have shown that psychosocial rehabilitation is equally as effective as drugs....actually better because there's no side effects. How do you know other forms of therapy haven't worked? Who told you that? A psychiatrist?
I've read about psychiatry, and more history about it since my activist wife has been challenged by psychiatry deniers. I had a psychology minor in college, but Melinda has read way more books and articles in recent years, so she knows better than I do, in spite of her occasional bouts of paranoia and her continuing use of anti-psychotics.
except recent studies have shown that SRI drugs are no more effective at treating depression than placebo. Something no often taken into account in psychiatry
I agree with a lot of what you say. But I find it sad when I hear these foster kids saying that they where given many different medications all at once, when they are logically upset that they have been seperated from their families. I say, why so much medication all at once and they ask why too when they have a logical reason to feel that way. I also heard another one say that one of the drugs made him feel a surge of high energy and courage, that made him jump off a bridge.
FYI: Just learned a really cool psych disorder with objective findings, tests, and successful treatment. Pseudocyesis-- usually in a woman that really wants to get pregnant... Her periods stop, and belly grows. Can show all objective signs of pregnancy including + pregnancy test and lactation etc but no fetus. Treatment is showing "mom" the fetus-less ultrasound--> belly shrinks. The belly also shrinks during surgical anesthesia when certain parts of the brain are "off". First described 300bc.
I just reviewed the literature and yoga as an adjunct to pharmacotherapy was better than drugs alone for depression and schiz. There are no studies of yoga vs drugs. Adding yoga to a treatment regimen worked better when depression was mild or already in remission. So I will take your advice and recommend yoga for depressed and schiz pts, especially when their diseases are milder. Thanks for the info.
Makaldasa, thank you SO MUCH for actually b eing serious and considering yoga. But seriously, yoga isn't merely stretching, and wearing a leotard *lol* is not compulsory. It's actually best to be nude so you can see which parts of your body need the most help. Drunkeness shouldn't be considered being mental because the mental symptoms all stem from the physiological effects. Basically, all mental symptoms stem from physiological symptoms, and that's partly why yoga works; it creates bodily bliss
"Basically, all mental symptoms stem from physiological symptoms..."
That sounds suspiciously like a biological model of mental illness. So it's suddenly biological when you can put it in terms of yoga, but it's not biological when we're talking about the effects of chemicals on the brain? Ugh.
But the literature you found about the helpful effects of yoga were *in addition to* pharmacotherapy, not a replacement, right? So it still doesn't support PoidHater's claims that no drug treatment is effective for any mental illness.
I see valid criticism of doctors over-prescribing sometimes, and ppl should be made aware of all the effects of a drug before taking it. But "Deniers" go too far when they generalize that all psych meds are harmful & ineffective.
contrary to a lot of what I'm watching in psych denier videos there are tests for mental illness and there are cures. Mental Disorder: alcohol intoxication. Test: blood ethanol level. Cure: time.
There you go. "Mental illness" is not by any means objective, but subjectively dependant on society. Can you say, "brainwashing"! This society values neurosis over peace, violence over brotherhood, and dysphoria over euphoria. The true lunatics are the average Joe's and Jane's, not the "eccentrics". Of course people are going to suffer from behavioral problems when trying to conform to the neurotic public. Don't you see the inherent evil in all this?
I have gathered from your posts that your idea of psychiatrist's mentally ill is someone that's eccentric-- that has some different ideas that we don't agree with so we want to drug them and make them think like we do. This is not the case.
I interviewed a 9 year old girl who 3 months before had been totally fine and doing very well in school. She suddenly began crying 6-8 hours a day-- "I just feel really sad but I don't know why." She had auditory hallucinations as she went to sleep-- telling her to cut herself with knives which she did. She saw a hallucination of a friend and chased it into traffic. She jumped out of her second story window to kill herself. "I didn't used to feel like this, I don't want to be like this anymore."
yes, mental illness does change with society. It is defined as a psychological, behavioral, or physiological pattern that occurs in an individual and is usually associated with distress or disability that is not expected as part of normal development or culture. So it depends on the culture.
Do you not see the parallels here between Brave New World and 1984, and modern society? Normal development, as defined by who? David Rockefellar and his collegues? What a ridicuous notion, that being drunk is a mental disorder. What has this world come to? So Jesus, had he truly existed, was mental? If you are to be a psychiatrists, please recommend Hatha yoga to your patients. You will not believe how many sould have been saved by this, without the aid of drugs. Count me out of this society...
actually being drunk as a mental disorder is not a ridiculous notion at all. You ingest an intoxicant that gives you delirium. It causes disorder in your liver over the long term, it causes disorder in your brain in the short and long term. Is botulism not a disorder? That is the ingestion of a toxin causing short term effects as well. It might be hard trying to get a catatonic schizophrenic to do yoga. You think we should put the depressed in leotards and make them stretch? This is your answer?
Alcohol intoxication really needs to be a mental disorder. Think about it-- an ER doc gets a psych consult on an old man he thinks has alzheimer's. Psych checks him out and diagnoses him as just being drunk. This needs to be a diagnosis because it is commonly seen and stands in contrast to other disorders that may carry a bleaker prognosis requiring radically different treatment.
One point I failed to mention is how many symptoms of "mental illness" are similar or the same as something called "Kundalini syndrome", which is an over excitation of the Kundalini force in the coccyx, and its existence scientifically supported. The fact that psychology (id. government) considers a spiritual crisis as pathological in nature is enough to make any intellect skeptical of psychology (id government).
There is way more proof of the claims of psychiatrists than there is for "kundalini force" moving through the coccyx. Where is your "scientific support"? List some references or stop making baseless, unsupported assertions. Your superstition is worse than worthless, it is potentially harmful.
"Kundalini syndrome" is listed as a psychiatric disorder in the DSM, could you PLEASE stop having such an attitude? We are discussing facts here, not having a playground fight.
It's funny that the wikipedia entry on this syndrome says, 'In an article from the Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease theorists Turner, Lukoff, Barnhouse & Lu have implied that the Kundalini-symptomatology might be placed under the DSM-IV diagnostic category "Religious or Spiritual Problem".'
You should tell those researchers and the journal's peer reviewers that it's already IN the DSM. Could you tell us where you found it? It has lots of section numbers and stuff.
I plan on going in to psychiatry and I can assure you that your assessment of the field is far off base. In the future, I will not give any meds that are not effective, why would I? These drugs have side effects and I want to make my patients better, not worse. Why would I give a drug that only has bad side effects but no benefit? True, we don't know what causes many diseases-- psych and otherwise... especially in psych. But that is something that draws me to the field-- it wasn't long ago that
Benzos have a multiplying effect with alcohol because they hit the same receptor (GABA-a). Thats why you shouldn't drink when on them. I understand mistrust of medicine, disease is a scary thing. The brain is where behavior and emotions come from, and it would be crazy to think that every other organ in the body can get sick except for the brain.
Opiates have multiplying effect with alcohol, too, as well as cocaine, MDMA, meth, pscilocybin mushrooms, LSD, barbituates, and cannabis. I was on Lorazepam at one time, so I can confirm this first-hand, even though science has already done so. And there is the main issue, the "totally normal" fallacy. Psychologists don't have a cure for mental illness because it cannot be defined. For things like AIDS and cancer, there is a strong definition of a cure. The reason it cannot be defined is simple;
I don't know what the zoloft commercial controversy is. I won't defend drug companies because I really really don't like them. But they do have psych meds that work. Some don't work that well and some do... but every approved drug works better than placebo. I've seen patients in the throws of psychosis be given an antipsychotic drug and be totally normal not long after. It is very impressive and I can say from personal experience that they work.
There is no definition for normal, and that is what I am saying here; there CANNOT be such a thing as "mental illness" because its existence depends on a model of normalcy. And who do you think controls this model? Morals and values of mainstream societies change very often, every decade. This decade's black sheep was the preceding decade's hero. The reason the antipsychotic worked on this patient is because all they do is, excuse my language, knock you the fuck out!
Psychosis is a symptom of anxiety. There is ALOT to be anxious about not only in modern society (but specifically), but also in merely being a conscious being.
Re: drug commercials, I agree that it is unethical to try selling drugs to consumers as if they should bypass or influence doctors. This is a problem with CAPITALISM, not unique to psychiatry, and it does not discredit all the claims of psychiatry. We could remove profit from psychiatry and all healthcare, thumbs up from me, and then we would be able to argue about whether the remaining claims of psychiatry are true without the distraction of arguing money.
So if it's a problem with CAPITALISM and you are well aware that psychology works with capitalism, then why would you trust it? I don't understand your condratictory world view. Please choose one set of postulates, and stick to them.
I don't understand you question about psychology with capitalism. My point is that capitalism is unfair and harmful to some people, but it can taint the claims people make about psychiatry or general medicine or lawncare. It will be good when we can remove that taint, but the fact that these fields of knowledge have been tainted by capitalism does not prove that ALL or MOST claims of psychiatry or general medicine or lawncare have been wrong or lies or a conspiracy, as you imply.
The neurotransmitter theory is based on experiments on dead frogs. Obvious is the fact that dead frogs are no good parallel to living humans in real time. Recent evidence of this is supposedly based on scientists actually putting probes between the synapses of a living person and detecing the mechanism. Obviously, to study the role of neurotransmitters in human behavior this way is impractical. But nowadays, all new evidence is based on these kinds of experiments, thus making it irrefutable.
I think that the problem with psychiatry is not that it doesn't work, but that other things work as well. For instance, a much larger percent of mentally ill patients smoke, and everyone immediately assumes that this is an effect and not cause, and takes the individual on his word when they say "cigarettes help me deal with it," which is a common claim that I've heard repeated by psychiatrists during my therapy. I think meditation is likely more effective than medication, and so is good health
blueantipole 2 months ago
At least you have insight, you know you're talkiing shite.
Makethemhearragtime 3 months ago
Further, as far as proof of negative side-effects go, the drug companies admit to such side-effects in warnings about them. So, why should I have to prove what they readily acknowledge? All I am doing is confirming the experience of the side effects they list. But, I would add the caution that the samples you get from a doctors office give a very limited list of side-effects and I think everyone should educate themselves on the side-effects and make a fully informed decision.
ghostwrangler64 4 months ago
Consequently, objective proof is impossible and you can not claim that there is any objective proof beyond the self-report of patients, and the fact that objective chemicals are being manipulated in the "hope" that such manipulation will produce subjective benefits.
ghostwrangler64 4 months ago
Again you accuse me of lying by claiming, "You lie that they have given no proof, or that it's all anecdotal." I think I already addresed this in another response, but to be clear, anecdotal evidence is evidence, but not proof, since any proof in this area is necessarily subjective because the benefits of psych meds are subjective.
ghostwrangler64 4 months ago
In fact, what I am arguing is the very opposite of what you accuse me of. I am arguing that what is true for some is not true for all. Just because some people benefit from psych meds does not mean that all will.
ghostwrangler64 4 months ago
Again you assume more than I said, when you state "It's not a good argument for everyone to stop using drugs because the side effects are too bad for some people." Now you are assuming that I made an argument that I nowhere posited. You are very intellectually dishonest in the way you read my posts. You word this argument you accuse me of in a way that assumes I am illogically arguing that what is true for some is true for all. I nowhere made such an argument.
ghostwrangler64 4 months ago
You read more into what I said than what I actually said. Thus, you create a straw man fallacy based on your assumptions. I certainly have not anywhere in my posts "tried to convince anyone not to trust their doctors. You are just lying about what I said now. I have simply laid out my experience in the hope of cautioning people not to assume that psychiatrists and doctors actually know how psych meds will affect them personally. The positive benefits are based on generalizations.
ghostwrangler64 4 months ago
Also, you give nothing but assertions and bad logic. You offer no proof and make yourself a hypocrite by accusing me of doing the same thing you are doing, offering argument. Your assertions, and that is all you offer, are themselves anecdotal.
ghostwrangler64 4 months ago
Well, in the first place I didn't lie and say, " that psychiatrists have not given evidence that proves some medications are effective for some people," that's your interpretation of what I have said. But, I do agree that I am saying that, "their evidence [is] anecdotal." The only objective thing they can say is what chemicals psych meds affect. Whether or not that affect is benefical is subjective and anecdotal. So, it seems you are confused about what I said since I couldn't mean both.
ghostwrangler64 4 months ago
@ghostwrangler64 I accused you of lying if you think psychiatrists don't give evidence, but I should have allowed for the possibility that you think the evidence they present is flawed, so maybe you wouldn't call it "evidence". Oh well. I don't have the time or interest to keep up this argument with you. We've more or less presented our cases and we're unlikely to agree with each other. Thanks for your comments.
deidzoeb 4 months ago
they are false until proven true. Your approach is to say they are true until proven false, yet this is the approach of gullibility and naivete'. Thus, we approach the issue differently, mostly because I suffered for believing it was true until proven false, and you haven't. Nevertheless, this difference is the main source of conflict and disagreement, and no argument will be able to logically necessitate a polar shift. Thus, logic alone, while necessary, it is not sufficient.
ghostwrangler64 4 months ago
@ghostwrangler64 No, I think studies have proven that psychiatric medications work for some people. Deniers are the ones who generalize that psychiatry does not work for anyone, and who give no evidence or bad evidence, usually anecdotes about some people for whom treatment is not effective. We might disagree about what counts as proving these true, or whether they have been proven true, but you're way off base to deny that they have been proven and call me naive.
deidzoeb 4 months ago
the growth would also grow at the same rate and you would actually never be able to perceive the growth. The claim is logically coherent (internally consistent because there is nothing to contradict it), but not necessarily true because there is no external evidence to validate it. Neither you nor psychiatry has provided sufficient proof. I don't have to disprove psychiatry since it is psychiatry that has the burden of proof, and without that proof there is actually nothing to disprove, because
ghostwrangler64 4 months ago
@ghostwrangler64 Yes, it is psychiatry that has the burden of proof. We just disagree whether they have proven it.
deidzoeb 4 months ago
Hopefully this is my last post on part 1. I wanted to clarify why your argument is circular reasoning. Your argument implies that because your argument is coherent it is therefore logical, and if it is logical it is therefore true. The problem is that "coherence" is not sufficient to determine truth even though it is necessary. For instance, if I said that everything grows twice its size every 24 hours, You wouldn't be able to prove me wrong because all the instruments you would use to measure..
ghostwrangler64 4 months ago
@ghostwrangler64 I think I see what you mean by an argument not being true just because it seems coherent or logical, as exemplified by all of your comments here. If you said that everything grows twice its size every 24 hours, the burden of proof for that claim would be on you, not on me or ppl listening to you. I feel that psychiatrists have proven that some medications are effective for some people. You lie that they have given no proof, or that it's all anecdotal.
deidzoeb 4 months ago
So, the actual number affected by adverse side effects is rather sketchy simply because the statistics are not formulated to quantify the percentage of people adversely affected, but only those who are positively affected or receive no benefit. That is, the statistics are formulated to hide pertinent information behind an either/or fallacy.
ghostwrangler64 4 months ago
Lastly, the statistics for the effectiveness of psychiatric drugs is only around 50 to 60 percent. That leaves 40 to 50 percent who receive no benefit or experience adverse side effects, and this does not include those who continue taking the drugs despite experiencing side effects either because the benefit is greater than the sde effect, or because they are forced to.
ghostwrangler64 4 months ago
@ghostwrangler64 If these drugs are effective for 50-60 percent of people, that may be better than having no treatment at all. Lots of medications for non-psychiatric physical ailments have annoying side effects, sometimes bad enough to outweigh the problem they treat. Everyone has to weigh that for themselves. It's not a good argument for everyone to stop using drugs because the side effects are too bad for some people.
deidzoeb 4 months ago
Also, you apparently have not spent enough time with people who have been poisoned, crippled, and brain damaged by psychiatric drugs and treatments. You certainly didn't include the possibility of the "weed" in your analogy having any adverse and toxic side effects, nor anyone in your analogy who used the "weed" and died from an allergic reaction to it, or left with permanent brain damage from the side effects. Not biased at all are you?
ghostwrangler64 4 months ago
You are also being hypocritical in your application of logic by using it only to confirm what you want to believe, then mischaracterizing the other side of the argument with straw man fallacies. You then take the experience of one person in your analogy (debbie) an "unrepresentative example" and try to imply that it is therefore "logical" to generalize, which you disavow as logical when you claim that "psychiatry denyers" are doing the same thing, yet you do it in your false analogy.
ghostwrangler64 4 months ago
In essence, you are using logic only to support your own position based on the assumption that you are right, and then arguing that you are right because you are being logical. Unfortunately, this is what's called a circular argument since you have no scientifically valid evidence to prove that you are right to begin with since it is all anecdotal anyway. That's why you have to create the circular argument you have presented.
ghostwrangler64 4 months ago
Further, the issue is about trust, not logical fallacies. I have personally been overmedicated by an incompetent psychiatrist and ended up in the hospital from it with a rebound migraine with aura, and worsening of symptoms. Why take more of something that is making you sicker? Now I am oversensitive to all ssri's. Just like you say in your argument to dismiss people like me, just because some people benefit from the drug does not mean everyone will.
ghostwrangler64 4 months ago
@ghostwrangler64 That's fine, if you don't trust doctors or psychiatrists, there might not be anything I could say to convince you. But you're moving a step beyond and possibly harming others if you try to convince other people not to trust doctors or psychiatrists based on your anecdotal evidence. If what you say is true, I'm sorry to hear that your psychiatrist was incompetent and meds aren't effective for you. It doesn't prove that anyone else should avoid psychiatry or medications.
deidzoeb 4 months ago
To begin with, your straw man fallacy about what antipsychiatry people believe is just as erroneous, because you are stereotyping them as if they all think the way you claim. Secondly, the hypothesis of mental illness causes and treatment, as well as your analogy are anecdotal. While your analogy is useful in describing a thought process, it does nothing to validate the claims of psychology since the claims of psychology are also anecdotal.
ghostwrangler64 4 months ago
@ghostwrangler64 If you want to lie and say that psychiatrists have not given evidence that proves some medications are effective for some people, or that their evidence was all anecdotal, there's not much use in me trying to convince you otherwise. Like usual, you make assertions with nothing to back them up, incorporating phrases that sound reasonable in your denials of psychiatry, but you won't move past assertions. Your response shows that my generalizations about psych deniers is accurate.
deidzoeb 4 months ago
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analyzeigmailcom 7 months ago
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analyzeigmailcom 7 months ago
I have dealt with severe psychotic manic fits since I was 4 years old, at this point in my life it is seen as an annoyance akin to diarrhea and while I come out of my state quickly, it doesn't make it easier socially. Two classes of meds have and still help me stay the most sane, anticonvulsants and stimulants and given my seasonal mania and hyperactivity, I only need them for summer. AP's and AD's make me nuts and many are not helped by any meds at all so to deny them is ridiculous...
HerrSpieldose 1 year ago
Mary Ellen Copeland created the WRAP plan after trying every medication out there and not getting any help from them and that is a self-help skills book that helps many issues and managing their issues.
For example, I can be on my therapeutic dose of Depakote in the summer and not be balanced in diet and exercise and closing the blinds earlier and still end up manic from a lack of sleep and obsessing regardless of meds. Meds are meant to establish a baseline to behave in a balanced way....
HerrSpieldose 1 year ago
The only problem psychiatry has is that the science hasn't caught up sufficiently, and there is alot of corruption within the drug companies keeping it that way.
spartacandream 1 year ago
everyone knows something :D
gjljhjb1 1 year ago
Excellent video.Many non-psych meds have side effects. Some anti-Psychiatry and the "religion' of Scientology mix up cause and effect with things like more suicide among psychiatric patients using antidepressants. Have they ever considered the possibility that because antidepressants are given to a population of people who are already more suicidal than the general public that they are particularly at risk for suicide no matter what? That it's not the drug but people's propensity for suicide?
updownjunkie 2 years ago
@updownjunkie
I can say for a fact that medications can cause suicidal tendencies.
I have never been suicidal, never wanted to die, never attempted anything, however while being treated for depression I was prescribed two separate medications; Wellbutrin and Cymbalta.
I can tell you for a fact that they DID increase suicidal idealization.
As soon as I stopped taking them I felt better physically AND mentally (I was less depressed), and had no suicidal idealization.
DaedalEVE 1 year ago
@updownjunkie
I currently take NO medication, do not see a psychiatrist, and am perfectly fine.
I do however see a therapist in order to deal with issues that arose as a result of having been on those medications.
Be aware that these medications DO alter brain chemistry and DO change the way your brain processes information. They are psychotropic in nature.
I once believed in the effectiveness of medication, that is until I experienced for myself what they can do to you. How they harm you.
DaedalEVE 1 year ago
@DaedalEVE Sorry to hear about your experience, but you can't generalize from your experience that they harm everyone. The way to make that generalization is to analyze their effect on many people, which proves that they are helpful for some. If you had an allergic reaction to penicillin, would you generalize that it's harmful to everyone, or to most people?
deidzoeb 1 year ago
@deidzoeb
You're correct, I can not say they harm everyone, nor do I. I am saying that in my experience they have caused far more harm than good, and I know of others who can say the same. Then again I also know a couple people who say it helped.
The point is, we need to stop looking to drugs as a one stop shot to fix what ails ya.
I want to see psychiatric reform in which we stop using this faulty medical model and go back to treating emotions as natural things, instead of avoiding them.
DaedalEVE 1 year ago
@deidzoeb
Also, you have to not only look at the physical effects of drugs on an individual, but the personal and social repercussions.
I own firearms, legally. Well a year ago a friend mistakenly thought I was suicidal and called the police. I had my home illegally searched, my guns seized, and was drug off to an emergency room solely on the call that person made. I was immediately released, because I was fine... however I never got my property, I lost many friends, and nearly lost my job.
DaedalEVE 1 year ago
@deidzoeb
The reason the police took me to the hospital in the first place, to spite no signs of depression or being suicidal, is because I was at that time being treated for depression (I was taking a low dose of wellbutrine).
The reason I was not allowed to have my firearms back was because the detective in charge LIED, saying I could not legally own them BECAUSE I was being treated for depression.
This is the sort of stuff that happens to people because of labels, and because of meds.
DaedalEVE 1 year ago
@deidzoeb
To take this issue to court would have cost more than the value of what was taken... so I just used that money to repurchase what I had.
Being labeled by the current mental health system, or being on medication, some how makes you less valuable as a person in the eyes of others. It gives them free reign to violate your civil rights, and take about your property and/or freedom on their say so alone.
I have no history of violence, never been arrested, yet look what happened to me.
DaedalEVE 1 year ago
@DaedalEVE In some of your posts, it sounded like you were saying that psychiatry and medication are generally more harmful than helpful. But the story you're telling is of people stigmatizing you and discriminating you based on your status. That applies to everyone with mental illness, whether or not they approve or disapprove of standard modern psychiatry or pharmaceutical treatments for mental illness.
deidzoeb 1 year ago
@deidzoeb
That is what I'm saying, for the most part.
Understand that "more harmful than helpful" does not mean the same thing as "not helpful at all" or "harmful to everyone".
It is harmful BECAUSE it stigmatizes. In my case it was also ineffective (which is a story for another time).
The end result is you have a system that is regarded by most as this glorious magical solution, that in reality not only fails to do what it claims too, but actually does more harm in many cases.
DaedalEVE 1 year ago
@updownjunkie
And out of curiosity what does Scientology have to do with the anti-Psychiatry movement?
I'm a middle class, Partial Agnostic (Catholic base beliefs), and constitutional-Libertarian.
Where do I fit into your little generalization?
DaedalEVE 1 year ago
@DaedalEVE Youtube doesn't make their comment threads very clear, so I'm not sure who you were replying to. Scientologists apparently have religious beliefs that psychiatry is wrong or harmful or doesn't work. I recognize that not everyone who opposes or denies the effectiveness of psychiatry is a Scientologist.
deidzoeb 1 year ago
@deidzoeb
Someone had made a comment that led me to believe that the anti-psychiatry movement and Scientology went hand in hand. I've noticed a lot of comments trying to discredit the validity of that movement by arguing that "it's all just a bunch of Scientology nut job".
I support the anti-psychiatry movement, but have nothing to do with Scientology, so I took offense and wanted an explanation.
I don't think psychology is wrong, but I believe the current system and model are.
DaedalEVE 1 year ago
often is no one there, and something has to be done. Many people are emotionally overwhelmed. So this, honestly, is why I think that (based on my experience with over a hundred mentally ill people) these drugs can work for some, and don't work for others. Some drugs, on the other hand (like haldol) are so powerful that they just completely ruin the person's cognition, but do make the symptoms go away. In a way, I did this to myself naturally.
sociopathicregret 2 years ago 2
I guess my point is that I sympathize more with people who take them, and believe they 'work' by neutralizing symptoms, especially when combined with that certain psychological process. I just maintain that the way things are is not right, the way the drugs are touted is not right, etc.
sociopathicregret 2 years ago
Diedzoeb,
I maintain my earlier view that the drugs are not the solution to emotional illness. Mental illness is a human condition, not a medical one.
However,
I understand why people take stuff like valium, xanax, zoloft, etc. Many drugs have blunt effects, and if you combine this with a belief that they work (and in a way, they do suppress symptoms, even if they don't solve the underlying problem) then the result can be a massive improvement. I have seen this in relatives, personally.
sociopathicregret 2 years ago
It doesn't even mean a fake numb. It feels very real. The feelings are rendered distant and almost irrelevant. I 'self-tranquilized' for about three years as a result of excessive feeling and literally did not notice things almost all of the time. In this manner, the drugs can have extreme effectiveness depending on the person. If our society had empathy, there would be no need for this. It is a social cop out. But even if ideally this wouldn't be the case, there is the reality that there (cont)
sociopathicregret 2 years ago
You "sound " convincing, but if any viewers understand scientific research, please delve into the clinical trials data, the true study outcomes, and the sleazy deceptive methodology by Big Pharma & U.S. Psychiatry. Careful study shows the psych meds are ineffective, worse than no-treatment, and OFTEN harmful. Science is not a majority vote, subject to massive propaganda -- which has misled doctors, public, courts, etc. Apologists for psych-meds must not know what a national outrage this is.
drwatw 2 years ago 2
CarefulStudyOfData&ResearchShowsPsychDrugsIneffective.PatientsOff DrugsDoBetter.FDAIsInCahootsWithBigPharma,WhichInfiltratesPsychiatry&Politics.Doctors&PublicMisledBy Propaganda.BADsideEffectsCommon.FirstDoNoHarm.SleazyFDA&PharmaResearchForPropaganda,then$.EvenSleazyResearchCan'tHideDrugsIneffective&Harmful.TrueScientistBendsOverBackwardsToDisproveOwnPetTheory.ThusPsychiatryIsn'tTrueScience.PsychiatryWantsToKeepProfit&KeepIllusionThatIt'sRealMedicine.MajorityDisagreeWithMe,ButTruthWillComeOut.
drwatw 2 years ago
Cute. I got that. I think the diarrhea analogy is also quite fitting for a certain pseudo-religion that I can think of.
davidm1952 2 years ago
Oh, and as the father of an adult son with schophrenia, who does "well" when on Zyprexa and visits the hospital when we stops, I know what it's like to converse with people that have a bizarre sense of "logic". But, then with my son I know it is his illness causing it. But, these other people...Yikes! "Never argue with an idiot. They drag you down to their level, then beat you with experience."
davidm1952 2 years ago
Thanks for the video. You're preaching to the choir here. The logic of many of the nay-sayers makes sense if you believe that aliens came here in airplanes. Also, I read a lot of the posts and it's hard to say if some of them were aimed at you or some of the knuckle-heads. Keep up the good work and you are hereby nominated for sainthood for being such a supportive friend (husband?)
davidm1952 2 years ago
Thanks. I don't know if there's hard evidence to support this, but it seems like people with mental illness do better when they have supporting family and friends. I remember reading studies about orphaned babies in countries with few nurses or staff in the orphanage. When babies only get a few minutes interaction per day with an adult or parent figure, a huge percentage of them have brain damage and many of them just die, even if their physical needs were being met. ...
deidzoeb 2 years ago
(Continued)... So that seems to support the idea that humans seriously need social interaction, and it can affect us in severe and surprising ways when we don't get it.
deidzoeb 2 years ago
If you feel you are informed and you decide to take these drugs fine. It's your life. I'm not going to be preachy and try to tell you whats best for you. My main concerns are as I stated below.
coronet67 2 years ago 2
Thats not real medicine. The weed is not going to "pretty much clear up her problem". For example- If you smoke and have trouble breathing, an inhaler drug wont cure you.
Drugs (the weed) only cover up symptoms and it has side effects.
Also, the drug manufacturers use misleading advertizing to make you think they know the true cause and their drug treats the cause when they do not.
coronet67 2 years ago
You might say it's a bad analogy to psychiatric drugs, but you don't get to rewrite my hypothetical situation to prove your point.
Maybe my video wasn't clear or you read too much into it. I was talking about a plant that was taken as tea, not one that was smoked. I made no claims about marijuana or any other smoked medication as effective treatment for mental illness.
deidzoeb 2 years ago
You said weed and I meant what you said. I took it that you meant just a random wild plant, not marijuana.
coronet67 2 years ago
Sorry, you mentioned the example of smoking and then mentioned "weed" so I thought you were talking about pot.
deidzoeb 2 years ago
The best way to eliminate misleading ads and bad behavior from pharma companies is to remove profit and capitalism from all health care.
That some ads are misleading does not mean their drugs are generally ineffective.
Oh, and some psych meds have side effects. Welcome to the world of pharmaceuticals. Lots of drugs used for treating physical illness have bad side effects. People have to decide whether the side effects are worth it. That's not a good argument against psych meds.
deidzoeb 2 years ago
I dont like the idea of socialised healthcare and I definitely dont like the current system. I dont have an answer there. Two of my problems with psych drugs is misleading advertising leading people to believe that these drugs correct a chemical imbalance when the companies cant show or prove this, and that they are focusing on kids. I dont want my kid going to school and being "diagnosed" add or bipolar based on a checklist created by these people. It's profit motivated.
coronet67 2 years ago 2
Psychiatry has no lagitament science. It is all theoretical with out any biological test. Just as the science of eugenics was theoritical. that of course lead to the Halocoust, puting faith in a science with out any proof is dangerous.
wildguy8989 3 years ago
Oh I see so John Nash didnt actually have hallucinations like they are depicted on the film, do think that perhaps if there where no potential legal ramifications in not mentioning that Nash never took the drugs then they wouldn't have bothered to mention it.
GooseBooster 3 years ago
No, I don't think there were any "potential legal ramifications" in not mentioning that Nash never took the drugs. Have there been any legal ramifications for Sylvia Nassar when she wrote the book and accurately reported about Nash's life? Have there been legal ramifications for the Wikipedia article that directly states Nash never took antipsychotic meds again?
I think Howard or Goldsman foolishly used their "artistic license" for propagandistic purposes. But no conspiracy.
deidzoeb 3 years ago
... This has been observed in many older people who experienced delusions and hallucinations. The fact that it happens to this one man as a prominent example, does not mean we should conclude that medication is harmful to everyone, or that younger people can achieve the same results with no treatment, or that most older people will have the same results this one man had.
deidzoeb 3 years ago
Wikipedia article on Nash says, "after 1970 he was never committed to the hospital again and never took antipsychotic medication again. The film "A Beautiful Mind" fabricated him later taking the then new atypical antipsychotics, which Nash attributes to the screenwriter (whose mother, he notes, was a psychiatrist) not wanting to incite people to stop taking their medication."
His symptoms apparently lowered without treatment as he grew older. ...
deidzoeb 3 years ago
5:25 regarding John Nash. If John Nash did not take medication (24 years off) when getting the Nobel, then why does the film portray him as having been on them? seeing as John Nash attributes his success to the medication at the end which as is said on DVD was not actually the case, then surely would it not have been better to make a film about someone whos life has been made a success by being on the medication? if so why did they not do this?
GooseBooster 3 years ago
Watch the dvd with commentary. Somewhere in the scene where the Nobel representative approaches Nash to talk with him, you will hear Ron Howard or Akiva Goldsman admit that it was not true Nash had used the "newer" drugs at that time in his life. If you've read the biography of Nash on which the film is based, you'll know this is not the only liberty they took. He never had visual hallucinations as extensive as depicted in the film. He split up from his wife for a long period.
deidzoeb 3 years ago
Correction: Alicia divorced John Nash in 1963. They lived together again in 1970 and remarried in 2001. The film seems to show them staying married their whole lives.
Basically the movie helps people understand a little bit what it must be like to have delusions and hallucinations, to struggle with them for many years even when you can't find an effective treatment. I'm sure there are people like that today. But the movie is not a strict biography at all.
deidzoeb 3 years ago
Why would the filmmakers do that? I think Howard says that they were afraid that people would watch the movie and come away with the message that medication is not necessary. He wanted to make it seem like drugs are necessary. I don't think I would have done it that way.
deidzoeb 3 years ago
"Why would the filmmakers do that? I think Howard says that they were afraid that people would watch the movie and come away with the message that medication is not necessary. He wanted to make it seem like drugs are necessary. I don't think I would have done it that way"
That precisely my point, if they where afraid of making it look like medication is not neccessary if it is neccesary, then why use a person who has won a Nobel peace prize after having not taken the medication for + 20 yrs.
GooseBooster 3 years ago
3:32 "Some people can die from eating a tiny particle of peanuts" (based on a biological variance)
and the drugs are handed out with no consideration to anything other than how a person feels or acts.
GooseBooster 3 years ago
The arguments of the psych deniers that you speak of are really full of fallacy. People who have had a bad experience with psychiatry should be carefull not to use false arguments. I have had a lot of very bad experiences with psychiatrists, yet I wouldn't argue that all psychiatrists are bad and all psychiatry is bad.
suarez976 3 years ago
Your first point "psychiatrists don't know everything about mental illness, so therefore they now nothing", I actually never heard until now. What I have heard is kind of the oposite, critics say psychiatrist do claim do know things that they actually can't prove, like knowing that there are chemical imbalances or a genetic cause.
suarez976 3 years ago
I know what you speak of. These deniers have one slight experience and know a friend who has had one slight experience and get prescribed by Psych. Then go off it, then they are fine again but they get a sense that psychiatry is evil in someway. It's helped me I'm schizoaffective, I know what horrors lurk if I refuse my meds. Lithium has worked wonders, and so has the anti-psych meds. With a little weight-gain but by reducing the med to the right amount solves it.
schizoflux 3 years ago
spectacular video!!! I have always known that anti psychiatrist had flawed logic and you explained those flaws perfectly. Thank you for posting this video. Five stars for you my friend!
glutamate23 3 years ago
This has been flagged as spam show
Please go to Yahoo and type in "Horrible Truth About Psychiatric Drugs" to see a research paper exposing these drugs. Also so the search "Documented Proof Psychiatric Drugs Shorten Lifespan". Be sure to include the quotes. You will learn information no psychiatrist will tell you. These drugs destroy fertility and libido and cause impotence and extream disphoria and obesity. The promote suicide and violence not prevent it.
medmatic 3 years ago
LOL, I love how you think a "research paper" would be titled "Horrible Truth about" anything. Here's an interesting sentence from that piece: "A Freemason probate judge by the name of Richard P. Carey sent me by his order to a state mental health facility where I was repeatedly drugged by court order." ... "He attempted to silence me but the Almighty Father Yehovah protected me."
deidzoeb 3 years ago
Excellent video, especially in light of all this recent scientology BS.
northxinstar 3 years ago
Dude. Your logic is fallacious.
You don't know everything, therefore YOU know nothing.
GAME OVER.
LEarn to fucking argue.
Blackbeanz12 3 years ago
This guy needs to see a Psychiatrist!!!!!!!
AmarylisN 3 years ago
I know you are kidding but what, specifically, do you think is wrong with the video?
makaldasa 3 years ago
crap it makes you so fat. psychiatry deniers are against your jobe because it kills, knows no cure, no roots of illness, anything! go eat your donuts and plan how to squize more money from patients telling them stories even you don't believe
razwanel2000 3 years ago
Psychiatry's "cure" rates are on par with the rest of medicine. There are "roots of illness", you just need to do a literature search. What it is lacking is as good as an understanding of the pathology (what is actually broken). This is difficult because of the nature of psychiatric illness and the lack of easy ways to study it-- you can't just cut open the brain and see the problem (in most cases, but not all!). "stories even you don't believe": what do you mean by that?
makaldasa 3 years ago
Quite legitimate arguments. Psychiatry is good but not great. However, I have taken meds before that have not helped with my condition. Therefore, going by the idea of the video, taking those things is not logical, and those who prescribed them were in error.
Ablooga237 3 years ago
Not taking them if they haven't helped you is logical. But that doesn't mean it was an "error" to prescribe them to you, if this was the best known treatment for your problem. Not all treatments are 100% effective for everyone, whether we're talking about psychiatric treatments or physical medicine. Some people don't respond to chemotherapy, but it could still be the best known treatment for some problems, not an error.
deidzoeb 3 years ago
I was wondering what motivated you to make these videos? I really like them, and thanks for putting them up. Has anyone ever "converted" from anti-psychiatry in these discussions???
makaldasa 3 years ago
My wife takes anti-psychotic medication which has been clearly effective from what I have seen over several years. You could say I have a vested interest in people not talking smack or spreading lies and half-truths about psychiatric treatments. She used to talk about mental illness politics a lot on her youtube channel "melsbasketcase" and a lot of haters and psychiatry deniers left nasty comments for her. They repeat the same logical fallacies time & time again, so I responded with this vid.
deidzoeb 3 years ago
im pretty upset to just discover that my friend from hospital, with many common traits, is dead at 29, even though she complied with treatment and pretty much followed the program as far as i know. Life on meds & months in institutions are rough and i have been feeling like lashing out all day wondering how this could happen. Thank you for this video-it has answered my question &been very comforting, reminding me the meds are generally helpful. Your logic is good, and restores my hope.
brownbag7 3 years ago
Psychiatry can work for some people. It seems to be working ok for me, but I'm disillusioned by the side effects. I'm tired all the time, I'm sexually defunct, and it caused like 60 pound of weight gain. I'm looking at possible diabetes, high cholesterol, and heart disease in the future. These things don't run in my family either....
SteveSchlotterer 3 years ago
Actually, the Soteria project was killed by lack of funding...but not because the outcome was bad. In fact, the outcomes of the patients were equally as successful as treatment with drugs. The project was killed because it competed with big pharma. That's a fact. You're not comfortable with conspiracies, but they happen every day, man.
SteveSchlotterer 3 years ago
I don't know exactly what happened with Soteria house, but I'm saying funding might have dried up because the funders did not see proof of positive results, or enough positive results to validate the claims of Mosher, Breggin or the people running Soteria house. I could be wrong.
deidzoeb 3 years ago
You should read the book about Soteria house. It's called "Soteria." It shows how the results are positive, but the project was still killed through lack of funding. The APA and Big Pharma kill anything that competes with their model.
SteveSchlotterer 3 years ago
I'm not sure the stakes are any worse for a mentally ill person than any other person. Since mental illness can only be identified by behaviors and talking to a person, no one knows for sure when a 'normal' person will go off their rocker.
SteveSchlotterer 3 years ago
I think we're treading in the waters of opinion here. You may think that Breggin and other anti-psychiatrists exaggerate their data, but one could say the same thing about biopsychiatry in general. The typical psychiatrist is convinced of the genetic, chemical, and structural abnormality hypotheses, even though none of them are proven. It's equally possible that a different, psychospiritual cause is operative in the case of mental illness.
SteveSchlotterer 3 years ago
Yeah, we're just getting down to the point of disagreeing on which authorities to believe, so we probably won't be able to convince each other. Shall we agree to disagree?
deidzoeb 3 years ago
Ha ha, that's cool, bro :-) You're a good guy, and I wish you well!
SteveSchlotterer 3 years ago
People with the most severe cases of mental illness can't function well in society even with medication. Medication is hardly 100% effective in treating problems of the mind. All they really do is dull feelings and thoughts. So if a person can't work even when they're taking medication, what's the benefit of taking the medication at all? Anyway, suicide is a civil right. If a person wants to kill themself, they have the right to do that.
SteveSchlotterer 3 years ago
I've repeated the comparison btw psych meds and chemotherapy, which is less than 100% effective and has many negative effects, but is the best known treatment at this time for some problems. That should have made it clear that I don't believe, and never said, that medication is 100% effective in treating mental illness.
I did use the loaded expression "function in society", but I wouldn't say being able to work is the best indicator of a person's worth or quality of life...
deidzoeb 3 years ago
A person who can't hold down a job might still take meds in order to take care of himself, maintain hygeine, feed himself, etc. People can still have an okay quality of life even if they can't work. I don't know how to measure the fear or emotional pain that might go on for a person who is psychotic or delusional or severely depressed, but I bet some people would choose drugs with harsh side effects instead of those things.
deidzoeb 3 years ago
Suicide as a civil right? Maybe for terminally ill people who are suffering, I have sympathy. For people who are depressed, I'd rather convince them to treat their depression (even with talk therapy, even if they are biased against drug treatment) than pretend that they are making some reasonable action based on a civil right. For people who are hallucinating or delusional, obviously effective treatment would be preferable to letting them kill themselves.
deidzoeb 3 years ago
Yeah, EFFECTIVE treatment. Treatment with drugs doesn't work for a lot of people, so they choose suicide instead of living.
SteveSchlotterer 3 years ago
How do you know that Debbie's diarreah hasn't disappeared naturally...run its course, and she only believes the weed is effective? I concede that pscychiatric medication appears to be effective for some people, but since we don't know how the medication works, we can't honestly say that it's the medication that's working when people feel better.
SteveSchlotterer 3 years ago
When we track enough people saying they felt better after taking medication, and compare it with the rates of people saying they felt better after taking placebo, then we can say that there's a correlation between taking medication and people saying it works. It seems less and less plausible that this is a coincidence or simply correlation without causation, especially for meds that are tested and compared against placebos.
deidzoeb 3 years ago
Yeah, medications do seem to work for some people, but you haven't addressed the fact that psychiatric drugs are toxic and can cause brain damage or death. They do work for some people, but they're dangerous.
SteveSchlotterer 3 years ago
I haven't addressed or denied that some psychiatric drugs have harmful side effects. But compare this with chemotherapy, which is toxic to the cancer cells, and often toxic to the rest of the system. There are drugs and treatments for physical illnesses which have severe side effects and serious trade-offs for anyone considering whether to use them. That's not a reason to reject all psychiatric drugs, or most psychiatric drugs.
deidzoeb 3 years ago
Psychiatrists downplay the seriousness of the side effects. Often, they neglect to inform the patient of those side effects. I think if patients knew more about how toxic psychiatric drugs can be, they would refuse the treatment. You should read, "Toxic Psychiatry" by Peter Breggin, M.D.
SteveSchlotterer 3 years ago
And for those psychiatrists who fully explain the seriousness of side effects, for patients who are well informed, I suppose you're just willing to dismiss them anyway as quacks and suckers.
deidzoeb 3 years ago
Breggin exaggerates the seriousness of side effects, downplays the danger of leaving mental illness untreated, and exaggerates the effectiveness of talk therapy, as if the only problem is therapists don't pay enough attention or show enough affection to patients. How do we measure whether the psychiatrist is being kind enough to patients? It's a non-falsifiable hypothesis.
deidzoeb 3 years ago
People should research and possibly get a second opinion before using any treatment with severe side effects, whether we're talking about anti-depressants, anti-psychotics or chemotherapy.
Cancer can be fatal, which is why people are willing to undergo dangerous, toxic treatments, even though the treatments are not 100% successful at stopping cancer. Likewise with psych meds, I'm not sure you're considering how dangerous it can be for some mental illnesses to go untreated.
deidzoeb 3 years ago
Can you point to evidence that psychiatric drugs are "toxic" or that they cause brain damage? I'm aware of some psych meds that increase chances of death in older people, which is why those drugs are clearly labelled as ones that should not be given to older people. As long as doctors and consumers follow the labels and warnings, then that should be factored out. Aspirin is known to cause or trigger Reye's syndrome in children, but that's no reason to condemn all use of aspirin.
deidzoeb 3 years ago
Read, "Toxic Psychiatry" by Peter Breggin, M.D. It's a medical doctor's point of view on the toxicity of psychiatric drugs.
SteveSchlotterer 3 years ago
I have read it. He emphasizes the bad side effects of psych drugs, minimizes or rejects the positive benefits, and he asserts that most or all mental illness can be effectively treated by old-school talk therapy a la Freud. He bases that view on his personal anecdotes, not on science.
deidzoeb 3 years ago
I know a psychiatrist who claims schizophrenics gradually develop brain damage over the years, each time they have an untreated psychotic episode. He claims that continuing on psych meds will *prevent* that brain damage.
deidzoeb 3 years ago
Right. He claims. Does he have proof that those episodes cause brain damage. In contrast, it's been proven that toxic psychiatric drugs cause brain damage. Have you ever heard of Tardive Dyskenesia? It's basically irreversible brain damage caused by antipsychotic drugs.
SteveSchlotterer 3 years ago
I'm aware of tardive dyskinesia, but I'm not sure if you or Breggin are accurate when you characterize it as "brain damage." It's a neurological problem that causes involuntary movements. It's not like people with TD become zombies or lose their intelligence, although I'm sure Breggin and his fans would prefer if they could leave that false impression.
Meanwhile, compare with chemotherapy and other treatments for physical illnesses which can be toxic and harmful, not 100% effective.
deidzoeb 3 years ago
With chemotherapy and surely with some other drugs or surgeries or treatments for physical illness, the best thing we can do is a dangerous procedure with harmful side effects, but can still be the best alternative to stop a fatal physical illness, or an illness that is more harmful and more dangerous than the bad side effects.
deidzoeb 3 years ago
As you over-emphasize the harmful side effects, it seems like you are ignoring or minimizing the real danger of some untreated mental illnesses. Depression isn't just an annoyance - it leads some people to suicide. Same with bipolar disorder, schizophrenia and others. Even for people who don't commit suicide, it can mean horrible quality of life. For some, the choice may be living in fear and unable to function in society and take care of themselves the rest of their lives, vs bad side fx.
deidzoeb 3 years ago
Other treatments exist for mental illness (even schizophrenia), but psychiatry and big pharma are such powerful lobbies that funding doesn't exist for these alternative techniques.
SteveSchlotterer 3 years ago
Other treatments exist for mental illness. Other treatments that have proven effective do not exist, or have not been publicized very well. Please leave the "Big Pharma" conspiracy theories elsewhere. Capitalism needs to be cut out of healthcare, but it doesn't mean that general medicine or psychiatry are totally ineffective.
I suspect funding doesn't exist for Breggin's anecdotal evidence and the claims of Soteria houses cuz they are bad science, not because conspiracy blocks funding.
deidzoeb 3 years ago
Yeah, TD is mostly a cosmetic probblem, but at least you admit that it's a neurological problem. Most people would prefer not to have TD. The point is that people with schizophrenia have been shown to recover with success rates as good (or better when you consider the fact that they're not plagued by the horrible side effects of the drugs) as with medication treatment in supportive pscyhosocial rehabilitation programs. See the book Soteria house for an in depth account of this.
SteveSchlotterer 3 years ago
Great, I look forward to more and more positive evidence from Soteria methods piling up in the coming years, eventually overturning the big pharma conspiracy and the corrupts consensus of psychiatrists. Forgive me if I don't hold my breath until then.
deidzoeb 3 years ago
Do you acknowledge the stakes when a person is actually suffering from a mental illness?
We could quibble over whether doctors over-diagnosis serious mental illness, but in cases where we could agree that a person has a serious mental illness, do you recognize what it's like when they are untreated? I suppose you don't agree that alternatives like talk therapy (proposed by Breggin and Szasz) have failed to produce positive results for almost 100 years in most ppl with mental illness.
deidzoeb 3 years ago
I'm not sure that psychotherapy is totally ineffective. I know from my own experience with schizoaffective disorder that when I'm psychotic, reality and reason are really difficult to manage. However, projects like the Soteria house have shown that psychosocial rehabilitation is equally as effective as drugs....actually better because there's no side effects. How do you know other forms of therapy haven't worked? Who told you that? A psychiatrist?
SteveSchlotterer 3 years ago
I've read about psychiatry, and more history about it since my activist wife has been challenged by psychiatry deniers. I had a psychology minor in college, but Melinda has read way more books and articles in recent years, so she knows better than I do, in spite of her occasional bouts of paranoia and her continuing use of anti-psychotics.
deidzoeb 3 years ago
except recent studies have shown that SRI drugs are no more effective at treating depression than placebo. Something no often taken into account in psychiatry
Psychiatry is not scientific!
Ironzealot7531 3 years ago
... and based on that, we can reasonably, scientifically generalize that "Psychiatry is not scientific!" ???
deidzoeb 3 years ago
I agree with a lot of what you say. But I find it sad when I hear these foster kids saying that they where given many different medications all at once, when they are logically upset that they have been seperated from their families. I say, why so much medication all at once and they ask why too when they have a logical reason to feel that way. I also heard another one say that one of the drugs made him feel a surge of high energy and courage, that made him jump off a bridge.
Faridellion 3 years ago
FYI: Just learned a really cool psych disorder with objective findings, tests, and successful treatment. Pseudocyesis-- usually in a woman that really wants to get pregnant... Her periods stop, and belly grows. Can show all objective signs of pregnancy including + pregnancy test and lactation etc but no fetus. Treatment is showing "mom" the fetus-less ultrasound--> belly shrinks. The belly also shrinks during surgical anesthesia when certain parts of the brain are "off". First described 300bc.
makaldasa 3 years ago
I just reviewed the literature and yoga as an adjunct to pharmacotherapy was better than drugs alone for depression and schiz. There are no studies of yoga vs drugs. Adding yoga to a treatment regimen worked better when depression was mild or already in remission. So I will take your advice and recommend yoga for depressed and schiz pts, especially when their diseases are milder. Thanks for the info.
makaldasa 3 years ago
Makaldasa, thank you SO MUCH for actually b eing serious and considering yoga. But seriously, yoga isn't merely stretching, and wearing a leotard *lol* is not compulsory. It's actually best to be nude so you can see which parts of your body need the most help. Drunkeness shouldn't be considered being mental because the mental symptoms all stem from the physiological effects. Basically, all mental symptoms stem from physiological symptoms, and that's partly why yoga works; it creates bodily bliss
PoidHater 3 years ago
"Basically, all mental symptoms stem from physiological symptoms..."
That sounds suspiciously like a biological model of mental illness. So it's suddenly biological when you can put it in terms of yoga, but it's not biological when we're talking about the effects of chemicals on the brain? Ugh.
deidzoeb 3 years ago
But the literature you found about the helpful effects of yoga were *in addition to* pharmacotherapy, not a replacement, right? So it still doesn't support PoidHater's claims that no drug treatment is effective for any mental illness.
I see valid criticism of doctors over-prescribing sometimes, and ppl should be made aware of all the effects of a drug before taking it. But "Deniers" go too far when they generalize that all psych meds are harmful & ineffective.
deidzoeb 3 years ago
contrary to a lot of what I'm watching in psych denier videos there are tests for mental illness and there are cures. Mental Disorder: alcohol intoxication. Test: blood ethanol level. Cure: time.
makaldasa 3 years ago
There you go. "Mental illness" is not by any means objective, but subjectively dependant on society. Can you say, "brainwashing"! This society values neurosis over peace, violence over brotherhood, and dysphoria over euphoria. The true lunatics are the average Joe's and Jane's, not the "eccentrics". Of course people are going to suffer from behavioral problems when trying to conform to the neurotic public. Don't you see the inherent evil in all this?
PoidHater 3 years ago
I have gathered from your posts that your idea of psychiatrist's mentally ill is someone that's eccentric-- that has some different ideas that we don't agree with so we want to drug them and make them think like we do. This is not the case.
makaldasa 3 years ago
I interviewed a 9 year old girl who 3 months before had been totally fine and doing very well in school. She suddenly began crying 6-8 hours a day-- "I just feel really sad but I don't know why." She had auditory hallucinations as she went to sleep-- telling her to cut herself with knives which she did. She saw a hallucination of a friend and chased it into traffic. She jumped out of her second story window to kill herself. "I didn't used to feel like this, I don't want to be like this anymore."
makaldasa 3 years ago
This is mental illness-- it isn't some eccentric guy who doesn't "conform".
makaldasa 3 years ago
and anti-psychotics don't knock you out by the way, they get rid of psychosis.
makaldasa 3 years ago
yes, mental illness does change with society. It is defined as a psychological, behavioral, or physiological pattern that occurs in an individual and is usually associated with distress or disability that is not expected as part of normal development or culture. So it depends on the culture.
makaldasa 3 years ago
Do you not see the parallels here between Brave New World and 1984, and modern society? Normal development, as defined by who? David Rockefellar and his collegues? What a ridicuous notion, that being drunk is a mental disorder. What has this world come to? So Jesus, had he truly existed, was mental? If you are to be a psychiatrists, please recommend Hatha yoga to your patients. You will not believe how many sould have been saved by this, without the aid of drugs. Count me out of this society...
PoidHater 3 years ago
actually being drunk as a mental disorder is not a ridiculous notion at all. You ingest an intoxicant that gives you delirium. It causes disorder in your liver over the long term, it causes disorder in your brain in the short and long term. Is botulism not a disorder? That is the ingestion of a toxin causing short term effects as well. It might be hard trying to get a catatonic schizophrenic to do yoga. You think we should put the depressed in leotards and make them stretch? This is your answer?
makaldasa 3 years ago
Alcohol intoxication really needs to be a mental disorder. Think about it-- an ER doc gets a psych consult on an old man he thinks has alzheimer's. Psych checks him out and diagnoses him as just being drunk. This needs to be a diagnosis because it is commonly seen and stands in contrast to other disorders that may carry a bleaker prognosis requiring radically different treatment.
makaldasa 3 years ago
One point I failed to mention is how many symptoms of "mental illness" are similar or the same as something called "Kundalini syndrome", which is an over excitation of the Kundalini force in the coccyx, and its existence scientifically supported. The fact that psychology (id. government) considers a spiritual crisis as pathological in nature is enough to make any intellect skeptical of psychology (id government).
PoidHater 3 years ago
There is way more proof of the claims of psychiatrists than there is for "kundalini force" moving through the coccyx. Where is your "scientific support"? List some references or stop making baseless, unsupported assertions. Your superstition is worse than worthless, it is potentially harmful.
deidzoeb 3 years ago
"Kundalini syndrome" is listed as a psychiatric disorder in the DSM, could you PLEASE stop having such an attitude? We are discussing facts here, not having a playground fight.
PoidHater 3 years ago
It's funny that the wikipedia entry on this syndrome says, 'In an article from the Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease theorists Turner, Lukoff, Barnhouse & Lu have implied that the Kundalini-symptomatology might be placed under the DSM-IV diagnostic category "Religious or Spiritual Problem".'
You should tell those researchers and the journal's peer reviewers that it's already IN the DSM. Could you tell us where you found it? It has lots of section numbers and stuff.
deidzoeb 3 years ago
I plan on going in to psychiatry and I can assure you that your assessment of the field is far off base. In the future, I will not give any meds that are not effective, why would I? These drugs have side effects and I want to make my patients better, not worse. Why would I give a drug that only has bad side effects but no benefit? True, we don't know what causes many diseases-- psych and otherwise... especially in psych. But that is something that draws me to the field-- it wasn't long ago that
makaldasa 3 years ago
Benzos have a multiplying effect with alcohol because they hit the same receptor (GABA-a). Thats why you shouldn't drink when on them. I understand mistrust of medicine, disease is a scary thing. The brain is where behavior and emotions come from, and it would be crazy to think that every other organ in the body can get sick except for the brain.
makaldasa 3 years ago
Opiates have multiplying effect with alcohol, too, as well as cocaine, MDMA, meth, pscilocybin mushrooms, LSD, barbituates, and cannabis. I was on Lorazepam at one time, so I can confirm this first-hand, even though science has already done so. And there is the main issue, the "totally normal" fallacy. Psychologists don't have a cure for mental illness because it cannot be defined. For things like AIDS and cancer, there is a strong definition of a cure. The reason it cannot be defined is simple;
PoidHater 3 years ago
And you people are still ignoring the Zoloft commercial controversy, how strange.
PoidHater 3 years ago
I don't know what the zoloft commercial controversy is. I won't defend drug companies because I really really don't like them. But they do have psych meds that work. Some don't work that well and some do... but every approved drug works better than placebo. I've seen patients in the throws of psychosis be given an antipsychotic drug and be totally normal not long after. It is very impressive and I can say from personal experience that they work.
makaldasa 3 years ago
There is no definition for normal, and that is what I am saying here; there CANNOT be such a thing as "mental illness" because its existence depends on a model of normalcy. And who do you think controls this model? Morals and values of mainstream societies change very often, every decade. This decade's black sheep was the preceding decade's hero. The reason the antipsychotic worked on this patient is because all they do is, excuse my language, knock you the fuck out!
PoidHater 3 years ago
Psychosis is a symptom of anxiety. There is ALOT to be anxious about not only in modern society (but specifically), but also in merely being a conscious being.
PoidHater 3 years ago
Re: drug commercials, I agree that it is unethical to try selling drugs to consumers as if they should bypass or influence doctors. This is a problem with CAPITALISM, not unique to psychiatry, and it does not discredit all the claims of psychiatry. We could remove profit from psychiatry and all healthcare, thumbs up from me, and then we would be able to argue about whether the remaining claims of psychiatry are true without the distraction of arguing money.
deidzoeb 3 years ago
So if it's a problem with CAPITALISM and you are well aware that psychology works with capitalism, then why would you trust it? I don't understand your condratictory world view. Please choose one set of postulates, and stick to them.
PoidHater 3 years ago
I don't understand you question about psychology with capitalism. My point is that capitalism is unfair and harmful to some people, but it can taint the claims people make about psychiatry or general medicine or lawncare. It will be good when we can remove that taint, but the fact that these fields of knowledge have been tainted by capitalism does not prove that ALL or MOST claims of psychiatry or general medicine or lawncare have been wrong or lies or a conspiracy, as you imply.
deidzoeb 3 years ago
The neurotransmitter theory is based on experiments on dead frogs. Obvious is the fact that dead frogs are no good parallel to living humans in real time. Recent evidence of this is supposedly based on scientists actually putting probes between the synapses of a living person and detecing the mechanism. Obviously, to study the role of neurotransmitters in human behavior this way is impractical. But nowadays, all new evidence is based on these kinds of experiments, thus making it irrefutable.
PoidHater 3 years ago