THE FRAUD OF DEPRESSION AS A "MENTAL ILLNESS" IS AS OUTRAGEOUS AS THE ENTIRE DOGMA OF PSYCHIATRY
by Benjamin Merhav
The
obvious conclusion must be, then, that psychiatry is no more than a
primitive quackery. As its deadly dangerous "treatments" are imposed on
people of all ages and genders - in flagrant violation of their basic
human rights - it is also fascist. Yet the shrinks - the perpetrators -
have got the full protection of the state and of its laws. That makes
all the politicians, who form governments and legislate the laws,
accomplices in the psychiatric crimes. They should be made aware of this
truth too, and be made accountable for their failure to outlaw
psychiatry forthwith !
The article below highlights the arbitrary and capricious dogma and politics of psychiatry in one small corner of its human rights violations. The author's main contribution is by correctly and convincingly pointing out some of the hidden connections between psychiatry and contemporary politics.
Here is the article :
http://www.alternet.org/health/154915/how_psychiatry_stigmatizes_depression_sufferers
Viewing depression as a "brain defect" has resulted in the
glorification of insipid happiness, particularly among our politicians.
April 9, 2012
Viewing depression as a
“brain defect” rather than a “character defect” is supposed to reduce
the stigma of depression, according to the American Psychiatric
Association, the National Alliance for the Mentally Ill, and the rest of
the mental health establishment. But any defect can be stigmatizing.
What if depression is the result of neither a brain defect nor a
character defect?
At one time in U.S. history, Americans actually elected a known depression sufferer as president. In Lincoln’s Melancholy,
Joshua Wolf Shenk reports that Abraham Lincoln’s long-time law partner
William Herndon observed about Lincoln that “gloom and sadness were his
predominant state.” And Shenk reports that Lincoln experienced two major
depressive breakdowns which included suicidal statements that
frightened friends enough to form a suicide watch. However, in Lincoln’s
era, when depression was seen as neither a character defect nor a brain
defect, Lincoln’s depression actually helped him politically more than
it hurt him. Lincoln’s depression gained him sympathy and compassion,
and drew people toward him, as it “seemed not a matter of shame but an
intriguing aspect of his character, and indeed an aspect of his grand
nature,” according to Shenk.
Today,
when we treat depression as a brain defect, it appears unlikely that
anyone with Lincoln’s temperament would receive a U.S. presidential or
vice presidential nomination. In 1972, George McGovern’s vice
presidential running mate Thomas Eagleton was shoved off the ticket
because of his history of depression and medical treatment for it. And
today, it would seem near impossible for a candidate who had received
electroshock for depression to be elected president.
Lincoln’s
words, humor, and face revealed a man who suffered from deep pains.
This is also true for Winston Churchill, William Tecumseh Sherman, and
other critically thinking leaders who have suffered from depression.
Lincoln, Churchill, and Sherman visibly experienced pain but inspired
people because of, in part, their capacity to overcome their pain.
Today, we reject leaders who visibly suffer from pain.
While
Lincoln, Churchill, and Sherman were certainly not without flaws, so
too are the “compulsively upbeat”— the “bright-sided,” to use Barbara
Ehrenreich’s term. The U.S. political preference for the compulsively
upbeat became clear with the ascent of Ronald Reagan. Reagan’s
reputation as a “great” and a “transformative” president has been
cemented not only by the corporate media and Republicans but by
Democrats such as Bill Clinton and Barack Obama. All this despite
Reagan’s committing one of the most heinous offenses in U.S.
presidential history—selling arms to Iran in violation of an embargo so
as to illegally fund the Nicaraguan Contras. Reagan’s offenses have been
largely ignored by present America; but not ignored, especially by
modern American politicians, is the fact that Reagan’s sunny disposition
defeated his more downbeat political rivals and helped create the
Reagan legacy.
Americans have
been increasingly socialized to be terrified of the overwhelming pain
that can fuel depression, and they have been taught to distrust their
own and other’s ability to overcome it. This terror, like any terror,
inhibits critical thinking. Without critical thinking, it is difficult
to accurately assess the legitimacy of authorities. And Americans have
become easy prey for mental health authorities’ proclamation that
depression is a result of a brain defect. But what does science actually
say about the brain defect theory of depression?
Science and the Brain Defect Theory of Depression
The reality is there is no scientific proof that depression is caused by either a character defect or a brain defect.
Medical conditions such as hypothyroidism and anemia can cause
depression, but the American Psychiatric Association’s diagnostic
manual, the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM),
states that a patient should not be diagnosed with the psychiatric
disorder of depression when the symptoms of depression are due to a
general medical condition. The mental health establishment is committed
to the idea that depression is a separate brain disorder, and it has
declared several biological-chemical-electrical theories for it.
For nearly a generation, doctors and the general public have been
told that depression is caused by an imbalance of neurotransmitters,
most notably serotonin. However, in the 1990s, this theory was
disproved, but the National Institute of Mental Health made no serious
effort to communicate this to the general public until 2007, and even
today today, the National Alliance for the Mentally Ill, an influential
U.S. institution that disseminates mental health information, keeps this
truth buried. Here’s the details of this history.
For quite some time, unknown to most of the general public and even
many doctors, researchers have used a variety of methods to test the
serotonin (and other neurotransmitter) imbalance theory of depression.
Research methods included comparing serotonin metabolites in depressed
and nondepressed people, and depleting serotonin levels through a
variety of means and then observing whether this caused depression. The
results? Elliot Valenstein, professor emeritus of psychology and
neuroscience at the University of Michigan, in Blaming the Brain,
reported in 1998 that it is just as likely for people with normal
serotonin levels to feel depressed as it is for people with abnormal
serotonin levels, and that it is just as likely for people with
abnormally high serotonin levels to feel depressed as it is for people
with abnormally low serotonin levels. Valenstein concluded,
“Furthermore, there is no convincing evidence that depressed people have
a serotonin or norepinephrine deficiency.”
In 1999 the journal International Clinical Psychopharmacology
( in “Antidepressants and the Brain”) reported on serotonin,
norepinephrine, and dopamine depletion studies, and stated that
“depletion in unmedicated patients with depression did not worsen the
depressive symptoms, neither did [depletion] cause depression in healthy
subjects with no history of mental illness.”
In 1996 Pharmacopsychiatry (in “The Revised Monoamine Theory
of Depression: A Modulatory Role fo Monamines, Based on New Findings
from Monamine Depletion Experiments in Humans”) reported that
nonmedicated subjects—whether depressed or nondepressed —do not suffer
depression deterioration in response to depletion of serotonin,
dopamine, or norepineprhine. Ironically, subjects previously medicated
with antidepressants do suffer depression deterioration in response to
depletion of these neurotransmitters. In other words, a person’s
naturally occurring level of serotonin (and other neurotransmitters) is
unrelated to depression but, as psychiatrist Grace Jackson writes in
2005 in Rethinking Psychiatric Drugs, “The available evidence suggests
that antidepressants may induce persistent sensitivities in the brain
which increase a patient’s vulnerability to recurrent depression beyond
that which would occur naturally.”
Thus, by the 1990s, it was known in the scientific community that the
serotonin (and other neurotransmitters) imbalance theory of depression
had been disproved. Yet, as detailed in Society in 2008 (“The Media and the Chemical Imbalance Theory of Depression”),
the general public continued to hear—through antidepressant
commercials, the mainstream media, and some mental health
authorities—about the neurotransmitter imbalance theory of depression.
Even today, the National Alliance for the Mentally Ill states on its Web site,
“Scientists believe that if there is a chemical imbalance in these
neurotransmitters [norepinephrine, serotonin and dopamine], then
clinical states of depression result.”
So, many Americans are surprised to discover that by 2007 the
National Institute of Mental Health had moved on to another theory.
Newsweek, in its February 26, 2007 cover story, reported that:
For decades, scientists believed the main cause of depression was low
levels of the neurotransmitters serotonin and norepinephrine. Newer
research, however, focuses [on something else]. . . . A depressed brain
is not necessarily underproducing something, says Dr. Thomas Insel, head
of the National Institute of Mental Health—it’s doing too much. . . .
Instead of focusing on boosting neurotransmitters. . . scientists are
developing medications that block the production of excess stress
chemicals.
Stress can stimulate the release of cortisol, which can negatively
affect both body and mind. And many other medical conditions can also
result in symptoms of depression. However, as noted, the DSM states that
a patient should not be diagnosed with the psychiatric disorder
depression when the symptoms of depression are due to the “direct
physiological effects of a substance (e.g., a drug of abuse, a
medication) or a general medical condition (e.g., hypothyroidism).” If
hypothyroidism is considered a medical condition, it’s unclear why the
overproduction of cortisol would not also be considered a medical
condition.
Thus, rather than a specific psychiatric brain disorder causing
depression, we are simply talking about the uncontroversial reality that
certain physical, familial, and societal pains can trigger depression.
While individuals vary in their belief about the benefits and costs
of continuing to view depression as a psychiatric disorder caused by a
brain defect, as long as depression is considered a psychiatric disorder
caused by a brain defect, Americans are unlikely to ever elect another
pained depressive such as Abraham Lincoln as president. I can’t help but
wonder what American political leadership would be like if Americans
had been led to believe that it’s actually the insipidly upbeat who have
a brain defect.
====================
