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@JDaviesPhD @ReadReadj DSM psychiatry holds the unenviable distinction of never having discovered or diagnosed a single illness, while excelling at socially constructing them, all politically motivated to serve the interest of the regime in persecuting its opponents as its unofficial thought police.

@JDaviesPhD For the first time in history, almost everything we do, think, or feel either violates some law or can be interpreted as a symptom of a mental illness. Thus, we all became either imprisonable or institutionalizable ex officio. But only if we dare to criticize/oppose authority.

"What your doctor won’t tell you about antidepressants..." on the disabling effects of antidepressant withdrawal. sciencefocus.com/wellbeing/what…

@JDaviesPhD It's disheartening how otherwise competent scientists in their fields of activity, either out of ignorance but mostly to avoid the ostracizing "science denier" label, dodge their ethical duty of exposing the medicalization of the human condition, thus tacitly legitimizing it.

Stigma from mental health professionals arises from a pathologising ideology that casts people in distress as dysfunctional, maladapted, disordered & ill, rather than as individuals in pain, in need, in burgeoning awareness, or in protest against conditions holding them back.

@JDaviesPhD Neoliberalism will always unscrupulously deny any responsibility in exacerbating the social determinants of growing mental anguish, choosing instead ideological explanations such as the mythological chemical imbalances fixable only by the proliferation of psychopharmacology.

Instead of tackling the social determinants of rising mental anguish, neoliberal society spreads mass psych-drug prescribing; turning the outcomes of its policies into the acqusition of profit, while gaslighting people, via medicalisation, as to the real origins of their distress

@JDaviesPhD For always making the choice to stand firmly on the right side of history in a profession that has failed far too often to do so and the courage to speak truth to power, that is one regret that Dr. James Davies has no reason to be concerned about.

“I wish I had been less preoccupied with being clever, and more with being kind.” - Irvin D. Yalom, reflecting upon his decades of clinical practice.

@JDaviesPhD Trend or purpose, what is certain is that it's as old as psychiatry itself, intensifies proportionally to the level of social discontent, and is legitimized in the DSM, which is thickened with each new iteration by the factory of diseases and inclusion criteria that is the APA.

There’s a worrying resurgence in the mental health professions of pathologising young people’s legitimate political & social grievances - e.g. via claims young people are merely ‘externalising’ their internal deficits, with treatment (not activism) proposed as the right response.

@JDaviesPhD They sold us capitalism as the only viable alternative to Soviet communism, imperfect but at least functional, ignoring that its golden age was the result of ruling-class compromises meant to avoid the looming revolution and that privatizations bankrupted the Soviet economy.

It's less a mental health crisis that's afflicting young adults, than a crisis of demoralisation. Low wages, high debts/rents mean that most can't save for the future, which is the primary compensation for doing unfulfilling work. Seeing no way out is demoralising a generation.

@joannamoncrieff @lustpith The peculiarity that from tobacco and alcohol to junk food and antidepressants, the only coping mechanisms that are tolerated or even prescribed as treatments are either the sole cause or an aggravating factor in most illnesses exposes how and for whom the system really works.

Our massive use of antidepressants and prescription drugs is the symptom of a social problem. "The deeper problem is a culture that reflexively medicates instead of teaching people how to cope." newsweek.com/why-america-me…

@justin_garson From the times of forced insulin shock therapies and lobotomies to the days of prescribed SSRIs, all psychiatric interventions approved with the hope of future scientific redemption hover around 100% failure rates, most ending up being deemed either harmful or forms of torture.

@justin_garson The schizophrenia label is the superficial justification for the harmfulness of their drug interventions intended to make society look away from the fraud of the unfalsifiable hypotheses made up to confirm the very profitable myth of the mother of all 'mental illnesses.'

@JDaviesPhD The medicalization of the distress it causes and the sedation of the frustration it provokes through institutions like psychiatry are vital to the survival of a dysfunctional system that relies on the ever more efficient exploitation of the many in favor of the few.

Psychiatry & much psychotherapy have little interest in sociological explanations of people's distress, as their mandate isn't to change society, but the individual. Yet when such explanations offer genuine insight, their omission sabotages the integrity & efficacy of any care.

@JDaviesPhD If made by any real science, the fraudulent claim that emotional distress is caused by medical illnesses meant to justify invasive medical practices forced against the most vulnerable members of society would be criminally prosecuted, and psychiatry should make no exception.