There's a certain irony in psychiatrists' treatment of ME/CFS patients given that both groups are, in their own way, fighting for recognition and legitimacy.
Psychiatrists have been in a constant battle, since the 1950's, against eroding public perception of their profession. They fight the stimga of being "shrinks," "quacks," and "not real doctors." They of course, desperately want to be thought of as "real doctors." In an effort to gain legitimacy, they advocate integrative medicine, where the mind and body are thought of as a continuum and all medical issues are considered to have a psychological component worthy of treatment. Of course we all know that's a bunch of crap. But from the psychologists' standpoint, ME/CFS is the perfect place for their integrative medicine theories to gain a foothold because ME/CFS's causes and etiology are so poorly understood. They couldn't care less if they have to step all over us in the process.
Psychiatrists, as a group, are not unlike a 4th grade school boy who's been bullied by a 6th grader, so he turns around and finds a 2nd grader that he can, in turn, bully. The abuse victim becomes an abuser -- a classic psychological phenomenon. As any psychiatrist will tell you, abusers often describe themselves as victims (see Wessley's constant references to death threats and supposedly being forced to leave the country).
It's just amazing how the people who seem least capable of basic empathy end up being psychiatrists & psychologists. Honestly, how many times have you heard of a family therapist whose own marriage is in shambles, or a child psychiatrist who's own child is a delinquent. I don't mean to denigrate the whole profession--there are some very good therapists--but it's pretty remarkable how often this ^ happens.
Their profession loses legitimacy each and every year, as more discoveries are made about the human body, neurology, the immune system, etc. They are holding on by a very thin thread, and unfortunately, that thread is all too often ME/CFS.
Not for long...