tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3737633890176949647.post6269773193718245613..comments2023-08-22T10:06:28.678+01:00Comments on Discursive of Tunbridge Wells: Am I Still Bipolar? Emerging from the Shadow of the DSMCCCU Applied Psychologyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12127528347937708211noreply@blogger.comBlogger8125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3737633890176949647.post-44737440797911759312014-03-06T20:14:02.302+00:002014-03-06T20:14:02.302+00:00CCCU - psychology is a lie and a frame of labeling...CCCU - psychology is a lie and a frame of labeling to control, PERIOD.emcolohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13775044849968704768noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3737633890176949647.post-41755103772441771582013-11-18T09:48:26.054+00:002013-11-18T09:48:26.054+00:00I know such views are deeply felt Jim. I'm not...I know such views are deeply felt Jim. I'm not always sure where they take us though. While I personally am very uncomfortable with diagnoses (for reasons of validity, reliability and location of the problem in the individual) there are issues that weigh on the other side. In some senses a diagnostic labels can also take us to a more compassionate place compared to some of the alternatives (judgements of moral weakness etc.). There are many people who are very attached to their diagnosis and experience is as a validation of something important about their experience. There is also the issue, far from negligible, that we operate in a system where such labels aren't going to disappear in a hurry and there is a need to think about how we come up with a compassionate and helpful response to others within that. Myself and a colleague have recently been giving some presentations to try and outline these issues for a general audience. There is a kind of audio slide show (also available on this site) which may be of interest. http://discursiveoftunbridgewells.blogspot.co.uk/2013/09/is-life-disease.html. John McGowanCCCU Applied Psychologyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12127528347937708211noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3737633890176949647.post-60047092709200361612013-11-17T16:58:14.594+00:002013-11-17T16:58:14.594+00:00- 'Modern psychiatry — with its Diagnostic and...- 'Modern psychiatry — with its Diagnostic and Statistical Manuals of non-existing diseases and their coercive cures — is a monument to quackery on a scale undreamed of in the annals of medicine.' -Thomas Szaz<br /><br />-“The problem with psychiatric diagnoses is not that they are meaningless, but that they may be, and often are, swung as semantic blackjacks: cracking the subject’s dignity and respectability destroys him just as effectively as cracking his skull. The difference is that the man who wields a blackjack is recognized by everyone as a thug, but one who wields a psychiatric diagnosis is not.” – Thomas Szasz<br /><br />” We are also survivors of one of the meanest systems of oppression ever developed and its victims and its critics. We are the ones to tell the truth that mental illness is an illusion, intellectually and scientifically, but also a system of social control of unprecedented thoroughness and persuasiveness. It is our role to expose this illusion and to free us all – for we are the constrained, oppressed. limited by this phantom of mental illness. We stand with reason against error and superstition, with imagination against conformity and oppression. What good luck to be part of such a good struggle for freedom and human rights.” Kate Millet<br /><br /> ‘Modern’ psychiatrists are no more legitimate as psychotherapists than German psychiatrists of the 1930s who brought the world their version of eugenics, involuntary sterilization, mass ‘euthanasia’, and their further contribution to the Holocaust and WW2. This contemporary ‘bio’-psychiatry should have been outlawed and banned from the medical profession at the Nuremberg trials following the War- American psychiatry reportedly came to the rescue of their German counterparts for the protection of their 'profession', and continue to perpetrate their inhumanity and false thesis (in different guises)in the USA and world wide, with the assistance of the pharmaceutical giants and big government. Today's psychiatrist is no more qualified in ‘psycho-therapy’ than your plumber or garbage collector by virtue of their ‘education’ and indoctrination in psychiatry! -jim keiser https://www.facebook.com/pages/Mental-healthpsychiatric-watchdog-reform-activity/170568593024064jim keiserhttps://www.facebook.com/pages/Mental-healthpsychiatric-watchdog-reform-activity/170568593024064noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3737633890176949647.post-12449364039936828232013-06-21T13:17:45.491+01:002013-06-21T13:17:45.491+01:00I take the point of the writer above that these is...I take the point of the writer above that these issues are a matter of perspective. I know that there are many service-users who find it helpful to have a label. In fact, I think I found it helpful at first as it gave a name to my difficult experiences. Getting rid of it has been less easy, though, and the impact of it within my family has been colossal. Ironically, the analogy with some being able to tan more easily in the sun than others was made deliberately, because it is biological. No-one would bother to point out such a difference, but if there is a slight difference in the way your nervous and endocrine systems are wired, it's considered very important. Fay Thomasnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3737633890176949647.post-84857423707883800852013-06-21T10:57:28.889+01:002013-06-21T10:57:28.889+01:00Whether biological causes are more shaming/stigmat...Whether biological causes are more shaming/stigmatising than psychological causes is a matter of perspective. One could argue that "defective genes" are out of anyone's control, whereas psychological stress is a product of, for example, "bad parenting", laying the blame on apparently free-willed behaviour (but what caused that?).<br /><br />Surely the point is that biological, psychological, and social factors all play a part. In each individual, that part played will vary (we know that, very rarely, single gene mutations cause a genetic form of schizophrenia, but we also know, for example, that ethnic minorities experience higher prevalences of schizophrenia when they are a minority, but not in their country of origin. Meaning in that example social factors are more important than inheritance. Overall, in the case of schizophrenia, the variation accounted for by genetics is about 50%. You can show this by looking at identical twins who were separated at birth. It's very simple, robust piece of science.) <br /><br />Ultimately, the distinctions between biology, psychology, and sociology are merely practical conventions of scale -- reality isn't cut up into pieces or theories, it's one big humming symphony with multiple levels of organisation, in the wet matter of the brain, in how we experience our thoughts, and so on.<br /><br />The tanning analogy seems particularly badly chosen given that propensity to tan is biologically determined.<br /><br />Ultimately, the blame-game is a fruitless exercise. It doesn't matter what particular contribution biological, psychological or social factors made in any particular case, and how would you quantify them anyway? The point is that, deep down, we all want to be happy, and in our own way, with our own limitations, we try our best. That is a source of compassion.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3737633890176949647.post-33035440818091369772013-06-19T14:40:52.167+01:002013-06-19T14:40:52.167+01:00What a heartbreaking situation for a family. Medic...What a heartbreaking situation for a family. Medics very glibly apply the labels but I don't think much thought is given to how they actually impact on people's lives. We keep reading about the stigma of mental illness and how much better things are today than in the past. This might be true to some extent, but I also think it's somewhat illusory. The fact that people are talking more openly about their diagnoses doesn't necessarily mean that they're less discriminated against. What is in the law is one thing, but we really need to change hearts and minds. Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3737633890176949647.post-68369851688349027632013-06-18T14:29:21.716+01:002013-06-18T14:29:21.716+01:00I found this post really interesting and relevant,...I found this post really interesting and relevant, particularly as it is from the viewpoint of someone who has been given these labels in the past. We are debating similar issues in Powys at the moment (medicalisation of everyday life etc), and one of my colleagues told me about the Skeptics in the pub sessions in Lewes which is how I found this blog. I like the analogy "some people tan more easily in the sun than others." Jackie Nhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05293038655478909058noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3737633890176949647.post-16261648529231806122013-06-14T17:08:34.629+01:002013-06-14T17:08:34.629+01:00It is confusing what's going on right now. Esp...It is confusing what's going on right now. Especially if you've been personally touched by mental illness. I've been thinking of it as vulnerability plus. Or something like that. Being vulnerable then having circumstances that make it worse. Rosie Carmichaelnoreply@blogger.com