Jeffrey Lieberman, president-elect of the American Psychiatric Association, wrote an invited commentary for Scientific American's MIND Guest Blog. Lieberman's commentary is most remarkable for the lack of respect Lieberman apparently has for other professionals and for others with a different perspective than he has about the DSM, how we treat people who experience emotional and/or behavioral difficulties as a society I don't believe that Lieberman is unaware, uninformed or ignorant; however, in this commentary, he attempts to paint professionals and others who are critical of harmful, discriminatory psychiatric practices as "real people who don’t want to improve mental healthcare."
As if there is only one way to look any of the issues involved, and if one's perspective in not aligned with Jeffrey Lieberman's, one is unworthy of consideration, and undeserving of respect. Presumably Lieberman says because they are "against the diagnosis and treatment of mental illnesses." Lieberman presumes too much about a diverse group of people. He seems to be intentionally misleading readers about the core issues that the American Psychiatric Association and it's bible, The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual has been widely criticized, and boycotted by professionals.
a few excerpts from "DSM-5: Caught between Mental Illness Stigma and Anti-Psychiatry Prejudice" via Scientific American:
"But there’s another type of critique that does not contribute to this goal. These are the groups who are actually proud to identify themselves as “anti-psychiatry.”
These are real people who don’t want to improve mental healthcare, unlike the dozens of psychiatrists, psychologists, social workers and patient advocates who have labored for years to revise the DSM, rigorously and responsibly. Instead, they are against the diagnosis and treatment of mental illnesses—which improves, and in some cases saves, millions of lives every year—and “against” the very idea of psychiatry, and its practices of psychotherapy and psychopharmacology. They are, to my mind, misguided and misleading ideologues and self-promoters who are spreading scientific anarchy.
Being “against” psychiatry strikes me as no different than being “against” cardiology or orthopedics or gynecology—which most people, I think, would find absurd. No other medical specialty is targeted by such an “anti” movement.
This relatively small “anti-psychiatry” movement fuels the much larger segment of the world that is prejudiced against people with disorders of the brain and mind and the professions that treat them. Like most prejudice, this one is largely based on ignorance or fear–no different than racism, or society’s initial reactions to illnesses from leprosy to AIDS. And many people made uncomfortable by mental illness and psychiatry, don’t recognize their feelings as prejudice. But that is what they are."
The dubious claim "mental illness is like any other illness" and pharmacological treatment is like insulin to a person with diabetes, are allegedly used to "fight stigma" it just absurd Lieberman in effect, asserts that psychiatry is the like any other medical specialty. Psychiatrists, unlike other medical specialists, use the Police and the Courts as 'medical instruments' to capture unwilling patients, have them adjudicated in Courts of Law as a person with a brain disease then further claim the"disease" is incurable, but treatable.
Conveniently, psychiatrists fail to acknowledge the drugs they use are teratogenic, and minimally effective for a minority of people with a diagnosis of schizophrenia. The drugs cause numerous diseases and neurological impairments and increase risk of the person experiencing an early death. The civil commitment laws in the U.S. lower the evidentiary standards, the hearings do not follow standard court procedures--- The courts in the U.S. do not require any evidence the person has a disease, to support a psychiatrist's expert opinion. Psychiatrists need not offer any evidence the recommended treatment will "effectively treat" the person adjudicated. Psychiatric diagnoses and the treatment protocols used by psychiatry were created by a political process consensus; not a medical or scientific process. Additionally, unlike psychiatrists, when any other medical specialist testifies in a court of law they are required to submit evidence that conforms to The Rules of Evidence required in court proceedings. Psychiatrists who offer professional opinions in court hearings in person or by affidavit stating for instance, "patient x has schizophrenia, a brain disease that requires medical treatment" are not required to submit any supporting evidence to substantiate their assertion the person has an actual brain disease, or that drugs and/or electroshock will be an effectively treated.
The reality is DSM5 has been much discussed and debated, but it is more than an exaggeration to state the DSM5 "ignited a broad dialogue on mental illness and opened up a conversation about the state of psychiatry and mental healthcare in this country." While the DSM5 may be a catalyst for debate and discussion, it seems to me that the APA and the professionals involved with DSM5 development stifled debate, refusing to acknowledge or even respectfully listen to critics. The fact is, people who self-identify as psychiatric survivors, have been "discussing the state of psychiatry and mental healthcare in this country" longer then I've been alive...
All due respect to Jeffrey Lieberman, this commentary reads like a juvenile justification; with lame excuses proffered for the failures of psychiatric professionals, accompanied by an attempt to rewrite history. "asylums were little more than humane warehouses, and Freudian theory..."
read Jeffrey Lieberman's commentary here
Lieberman and the American Psychiatric Association he will be leading, refuse to acknowledge psychiatry's victims, in effect, invalidating them and pretending their traumatic injuries are caused an allegedly diseased brain....It's utterly despicable adding insult to injury, (and injury to injury) failing to perform an ethical duty: HELP those with iatrogenic injuries to recover as fully as possible. Lieberman, is not unusual, he would rather abdicate his ethical duty to former and current psychiatric patients who have been grievously harmed by harmful standard practices which include using brain damaging treatments that are still used today. It is ironic all things considered, Lieberman seems to be encouraging a perspective that includes pretending my son Isaac and other people with profound iatrogenic injuries aren't worthy of being heard, worthy of having their human rights respected or worthy of having their injuries treated; that seems prejudiced to me.
@href="https://twitter.com/drjlieberman">drjlieberman Your implication that any conceptual critique of psychiatric assumptions must be motivated by ideology or self-promotion is >>
— Sam Thompson (@uilleannair) May 21, 2013
@drjlieberman >> deeply offensive. Many are sceptical of the medical model because they feel it serves distressed people poorly. You may >>
— Sam Thompson (@uilleannair) May 21, 2013
@drjlieberman >> disagree, but to impugn bad faith on behalf of psychiatry's critics is insulting, and unworthy of someone in your position.
— Sam Thompson (@uilleannair) May 21, 2013
. @nasw @apa @unboundradionet Jeffrey Lieberman, incoming president of the APA---> #DoucheCentral twubs.com/DoucheCentral
— SocialWorkUnplugged (@URTRiPiN) May 21, 2013
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