• Welcome to Phoenix Rising!

    Created in 2008, Phoenix Rising is the largest and oldest forum dedicated to furthering the understanding of and finding treatments for complex chronic illnesses such as chronic fatigue syndrome (ME/CFS), fibromyalgia (FM), long COVID, postural orthostatic tachycardia syndrome (POTS), mast cell activation syndrome (MCAS), and allied diseases.

    To become a member, simply click the Register button at the top right.

Negative publicity on PWME - the motive?

SilverbladeTE

Senior Member
Messages
3,043
Location
Somewhere near Glasgow, Scotland
ALex
*nods*, as I keep saying, it's not a New World Order/super power type conspiracy that runs things :p
it's diffuse: many folk, many agendas, sometimes overlap, all burying issues in bullshit, and they are happy to play "follow the leader" ie go with the trends to help hide something, as often it will be their turn to "lead the dance"
Idealogy of greed, utter mysanthropy, uncaring of what harm they bring etc
 

Jarod

Senior Member
Messages
784
Location
planet earth
Just started reading the bible. I'm just scratching the surface, but many things are beginning to make more sense about the why for me.

First thing that becomes apparent whether one views the bible as prophecy or history(or both); This kind of evil stuff has been going on thousands of years.

Strange things start to happen when one compares the real world, bible, and conspiracy interpretations. One example is the current mid-east war kind of looks like biblical prophecy. I'm starting to wonder if the current mid-east events are a bunch of power hungry leaders trying to force prophecy.

The scary thing is; I think many Christians have been deceived about interpretation of the bible and hence the world is in the position it finds itself today.

Just thought I would point that out to those looking for the why, because i wish somebody would have mentioned it to me earlier.

Jarod
 

Jarod

Senior Member
Messages
784
Location
planet earth
As a result when someone says "its this" or "its that" that causes these issues, others can say oh no, look at these examples, the argument doesn't apply here. This makes the person talking about reasons sound crazy, as in selected instances they have been disproved.

Yep. You got a good point Alex.

Medical community has to work in a totally different box than other scientific communities. In other scientific communities, I've always been rewarded for taking a unique out of the box approach to problem solving. This medical world is a whole different game.

It's unfortunate the psychiatrists and media extremists got everybody jumping to their tune. But they got the gold, and make all the rules.....and news....
 

GhostGum

Senior Member
Messages
316
Location
Vic, AU
First thing that becomes apparent whether one views the bible as prophecy or history(or both); This kind of evil stuff has been going on thousands of years.

Strange things start to happen when one compares the real world, bible, and conspiracy interpretations. One example is the current mid-east war kind of looks like biblical prophecy. I'm starting to wonder if the current mid-east events are a bunch of power hungry leaders trying to force prophecy.

The scary thing is; I think many Christians have been deceived about interpretation of the bible and hence the world is in the position it finds itself today.

Just thought I would point that out to those looking for the why, because i wish somebody would have mentioned it to me earlier.

Jarod

Jarod this reminds me of some of the stuff we talked about in the Robert Anton thread I made, about whatever the thinker thinks the prover proves. Religion, especially historically is a prime example of how people become consumed and embedded into a belief system then filter and interpret pretty much everything through this system; wars, natural disasters, disease and illness, that your strange neighbour must be a heretic or witch.

The more I look at it the more it becomes obvious how consumed so many are by the psychiatric model, their complete avoidance of other experts opinions, ignoring evidence of potential bio markers, viral links, dismissal of any research or treatment that automatically contradicts their own model; almost all comes across more as religious zealotry to me. I can not for the life of me still see how anyone who has spent many years studying medicine could continently ignore so many factors and not in the least accept that it might be possible there is another explanation than their own; but as soon as they do I guess they are admitting defeat on some level, not ideal to their survival.

Anyway I am rambling off topic a bit but it does make me curious how it all translates into the reporting in the media, other than that some reporters are vague and just churning out what has been fed to them, we certainly know it is rare any journalist actually goes to any lengths to investigate the subject.

How a story about patients harassing researches keeps getting churned over and into things like the XMRV stuff is a little more unusual, maybe it is just something that seems more attractive and juicy to the average reader, than just a news release on some scientific study; sadly they might also simply be completely clueless as to the seriousness of the subject they are writing about, along with a large majority of the world.

Whether some news outlets would deliberately prevent a journalist of theirs from doing an opposing investigative piece who knows but it is not uncommon on endless different issues is it? Maybe the UK press system really is just THAT BAD; this is not news hey? :D
 

natasa778

Senior Member
Messages
1,774
The more I look at it the more it becomes obvious how consumed so many are by the psychiatric model, their complete avoidance of other experts opinions, ignoring evidence of potential bio markers, viral links, dismissal of any research or treatment that automatically contradicts their own model; almost all comes across more as religious zealotry to me. I can not for the life of me still see how anyone who has spent many years studying medicine could continently ignore so many factors and not in the least accept that it might be possible there is another explanation than their own; but as soon as they do I guess they are admitting defeat on some level, not ideal to their survival.

Isn't psychiatry but a modern day religion?

Psychiatrists as high priests explaing the Unexplained through mythical fantastical stories ... The whole narrative of modern-day psychiatry is built on hot air. To possibility of explaining away ME or autism or any 'psychiatric' illness as basically a biologica/organic one is making the High Priests and their heards of believers very jittery.
 
Messages
646
Isn't psychiatry but a modern day religion?

Psychiatrists as high priests explaing the Unexplained through mythical fantastical stories ... The whole narrative of modern-day psychiatry is built on hot air. To possibility of explaining away ME or autism or any 'psychiatric' illness as basically a biologica/organic one is making the High Priests and their heards of believers very jittery.
It might be part of the narrative of psychiatry in the 21st century, but it certainly isn't the whole narrative. Psychiatric services (at least in the UK) are an essential part not only of the NHS but also the Criminal Justice system. To suggest that every UK professional with the title 'psychiatrist' aspires to the high priest role is absurd, and many are no doubt genuinely concerned with the wellbeing of their patients. That doesn't mean that current psychiatric practice is above criticism, but casting a whole preofession as 'the enemy' is neither reasonable nor is it conducive to developing a positin from which one can effectively advocate for change in psychiatric approach.

As far as contributions to the 'narrative of modern-day psychiatry', I think the most interesting is that coming from outside psychiatry, seemingly from a somewhat right leaning perspective. Perhaps lacking the purchase of the 'religious moralism' that was once available (and despite being wholly self contradictory), the notion of personal culpability for lack of psychological strength is being contended as demanding 'tough love' from patrician governments. This may find favour with some psychiatrists but the generation of the notion seems quite divorced from any actual delivery of mental health care and harks back to a differnt era in which those 'failing' through ill health were stigmatised through 'lack of moral fibre'.

IVI
 

alex3619

Senior Member
Messages
13,810
Location
Logan, Queensland, Australia
Isn't psychiatry but a modern day religion?

Psychiatrists as high priests explaing the Unexplained through mythical fantastical stories ... The whole narrative of modern-day psychiatry is built on hot air. To possibility of explaining away ME or autism or any 'psychiatric' illness as basically a biologica/organic one is making the High Priests and their heards of believers very jittery.

They even have their "cult" figures. When somebodies name is mentioned as a "School", thats a worry.

The theory of psychiatry is a house of cards. Its mostly unproven. Its treatments are highly speculative. This does not imply that everyone is a believer. Many are simply trying to do their best in a difficult and complex situation. Most of the opposition for DSM-V appears to be psychiatrists, which I applaud. They are aware of the issues. They know things need to be improved. So they are not all blind followers of this or that psychiatric cult.

Freudian psychiatry was very much a cult at one point, it had many of the issues found in cults. However, lots of people broke off and founded splinter views. Furthermore, it has largely been rejected. Psychiatry is trying to find a better path, its just for the most part they are not very successful. In part I think this is due to an over-reliance on reductionist view. Reductionism is great at identifying the pieces of a puzzle, not so good at telling you how complex puzzles fit together.

One of the problems with the biopsychosocial view, in my opinion, is that it isn't really BPS as we have discussed elsewhere. Its just psychiatry rebranded. If they were serious they would really embrace the systems viewpoint, but they only pay lip service to it.

In counter point I think they fit the definition of pseudoscience, using nonscientific claims backed up by scientific sounding data from which they make reasonable sounding but unprovable conclusions. This has to change. Its possible to change it, I think, and I will be focussing on this in a year or three. The problem is there is no accepted and developed way to do science on such a topic: its not easy. There have been psychological movements that tried to be just scientific (in the sense of reductionist science), but they were resoundingly rejected in the main: there is only so much you can do.

Medical culture, and especially psychiatric culture, is resistant to change. Many are progressive, but attack something and many become very defensive. This is because, I suspect, the science and the art and the profession are confused - all jumbled up. Similar problems occur as cover-ups in medical mistakes. A culture of cover-up creates many more failures, it prevents things being fixed, but it happens anyway. Part of the driving force for that though is the culture of blame - if we want to tar and feather some doc for a surgical mistake, is it any surprise they cover things up? Medical culture needs to change, and in part it has to be self driven, there is only a limited amount it can be forced.

If you admit this theory or that theory in psychiatry is not substantiated, you admit to flaws in the profession. Moreover many other theories may then be seen to be wrong. They fear the domino effect I think. Yet its well known in psychiatric academia that at least some think psychiatry is a web of interlocking beliefs with not much science. Let me quote something:

Freud and the Post-Freudians, J.A.C. Brown, Free Association Books, 1961, 2004 edition. p. 15
"For although all schools of psychology dealing with the total personality claim to be wholly scientific and to have based their theories solely on hard facts and the results of experiments or dispassionate observation, this is not in fact true, since they inevitably begin with a belief about man's essential nature which forms the implicit frame of reference into which their facts and the results of their observations are fitted rather than the reverse, as they would have us believe."

Bye, Alex
 

GhostGum

Senior Member
Messages
316
Location
Vic, AU
Isn't psychiatry but a modern day religion?

Psychiatrists as high priests explaing the Unexplained through mythical fantastical stories ... The whole narrative of modern-day psychiatry is built on hot air. To possibility of explaining away ME or autism or any 'psychiatric' illness as basically a biologica/organic one is making the High Priests and their heards of believers very jittery.

In the case of ME I would wholly agree but I am not going to dismiss the whole profession because of these diabolical circumstances, are we really proposing here that mental disorders do not exist? That they can be rationalised, broken down in scientific terms or as biological processes and then discarded? I would however suggest that psychiatry seems to drift around in some grey area between psychology and science and while the science moves on many of their so called disorders turn out to have clear underlying physiological causes.

Personally I am a believer in psychoanalysis from my own journey in life, albeit finding and then affording someone skilled in the area is near to non-existent. This is something that really could help people but instead we can be left with trivial diagnosis, questionable treatments, professionals who have no therapeutic or personal skills whatsoever and rather than actually digging and providing self awareness and development to people they are left with in this grey area which I guess is masquerading as medical science. Of course it has little relevance to ME.

I guess maybe psychiatry is slowly being torn from the middle by psychology on one hand and science on the other, it also does not appear to know which way it wants to go half the time.
 

Jarod

Senior Member
Messages
784
Location
planet earth
In the case of ME I would wholly agree but I am not going to dismiss the whole profession because of these diabolical circumstances, are we really proposing here that mental disorders do not exist? That they can be rationalised, broken down in scientific terms or as biological processes and then discarded? I would however suggest that psychiatry seems to drift around in some grey area between psychology and science and while the science moves on many of their so called disorders turn out to have clear underlying physiological causes.

Personally I am a believer in psychoanalysis from my own journey in life, albeit finding and then affording someone skilled in the area is near to non-existent. This is something that really could help people but instead we can be left with trivial diagnosis, questionable treatments, professionals who have no therapeutic or personal skills whatsoever and rather than actually digging and providing self awareness and development to people they are left with in this grey area which I guess is masquerading as medical science. Of course it has little relevance to ME.

I guess maybe psychiatry is slowly being torn from the middle by psychology on one hand and science on the other, it also does not appear to know which way it wants to go half the time.

Psychiatry/Psychology is real allright. Think everyone would agree on that. The issue is whether or not it is being used to help advance medicine in general.

As you point out, psychiatrists can't consistantly/reliably treat anybody. That in itself makes it extremely questionable as "science" advanced enough to try and practice.

In Autism, CFS/ME, Lyme, whatever.. the question comes up again. Are they truthfully using psychiatry to help sick people? Or is psychiatry kind of a "soap on a rope" approach to dodging the real issues and selling medicines. Looks mostly like plausible deniability from my personal experience.

I went trough about 25 years of searching for answers to ME/CFS. I have seen over 30 doctors looking for answers, and never had a family physician or psychologist suggest anything but drugs which made my symptoms worse. Not only that, they just run tests, and send you packing. That still happens today.

We all know the routine, but we have been in a trance because of all the garbage we are fed daily, and all the truths that are omitted.

If this whole psyhiatry thing gets pushed aside, then we have accountability. That would get rid of the soap on a rope approach we have now.
 

PhoenixDown

Senior Member
Messages
455
Location
UK
It might be part of the narrative of psychiatry in the 21st century, but it certainly isn't the whole narrative. Psychiatric services (at least in the UK) are an essential part not only of the NHS but also the Criminal Justice system. To suggest that every UK professional with the title 'psychiatrist' aspires to the high priest role is absurd, and many are no doubt genuinely concerned with the wellbeing of their patients. That doesn't mean that current psychiatric practice is above criticism, but casting a whole preofession as 'the enemy' is neither reasonable nor is it conducive to developing a positin from which one can effectively advocate for change in psychiatric approach
IVI, will you at least admit there is much mainstream quackery or at least irresponsible beliefs surrounding CFS/ME, Fibromyalgia, MCS, and other diseases thought of as "unexplained", "Psychosomatic", and "Psychosocial" by psychiatrists and whoever else who push the "illness beliefs / behavioural / deconditioning by default, don't test them for everything" view of these illnesses?

In the same way a crystal-healer who wants to re-align your chakras may have good intentions but believe in their own quackery. Pro psychosocial professionals are not enemies in the malicious sense, but enemies of reason, who need to either change or be replaced by more competent individuals, individuals who apply better logic and are more willing to stand up against counter-productive guidelines.

I want to actually see you say it, if you could just point to one of your posts where you've stated this, I'll be really pleased.
 
Messages
646
IVI, will you at least admit there is much mainstream quackery or at least irresponsible beliefs surrounding CFS/ME, Fibromyalgia, MCS, and other diseases thought of as "unexplained", "Psychosomatic", and "Psychosocial" by psychiatrists and whoever else who push the "illness beliefs / behavioural / deconditioning by default, don't test them for everything" view of these illnesses?
In the same way a crystal-healer who wants to re-align your chakras may have good intentions but believe in their own quackery. Pro psychosocial professionals are not enemies in the malicious sense, but enemies of reason, who need to either change or be replaced by more competent individuals, individuals who apply better logic and are more willing to stand up against counter-productive guidelines.
I want to actually see you say it, if you could just point to one of your posts where you've stated this, I'll be really pleased.

I’m afraid I can’t oblige you. What you ask me to agree to, seems to me to be based on a number of logical errors. However the fact I don’t agree with your assessment does not mean I consider psychiatry (or any other area of medicine) to be above criticism – in fact the best medical practice entails regular review and reassessment of procedures and treatments. I do occasionally engage in critical discussion about psychiatry – I posted one set of exchanges that I thought was pertinent to M.E/CFS, here http://forums.phoenixrising.me/index.php?entries/psychiatric-peregrinations.1286/

Comparing crystal healers to psychiatrists is a false equivalence. Crystal healing is patently nothing more than a belief system and those who ‘sell’ this practice as a health benefit are rightly described as ‘quacks’. In contrast psychiatry has a demonstrable capacity to effect alleviation of distress in a wide range of clinical settings – without any necessity of ‘belief’. The primary (and very reasonable) complaint from M.E/CFS patients, is not that psychiatry is ‘quackery’, but that the role of psychiatry in M.E/CFS is a misapplication of interventions which in other circumstances are wholly valid. Realigning chakras, drinking nostrums that consist of nothing more than dilutions exceeding Avogadro’s number, Buddhistic vitalism or any of the other of the numerous belief driven quackisms available, have no value in any context other than providing dubious delivery of placebo benefits.

Identifying psychiatry as ‘quackery’ creates a conflict between patient groups that seems to be unique to the case of Mental Health versus M.E/CFS (FM hasn’t produced the same levels of energetic patient response, while MCS has no agreed diagnostic basis and it’s not clear what the patient group might constitute). I can’t think of any other situation where the doctors treating (in many cases very effectively) patients with severe and troubling conditions, are vilified because another set of patients are unhappy with the attentions of those same doctors. This is especially peculiar in the light of the widespread development of Liaison Psychiatry and the demonstrable benefits that has had in a range of physical illnesses.

Of course I agree with the proposition that there is a very significant problem of erroneous ‘psychologising’ of M.E/CFS, but I do not see that as a process of ‘quackery’ but of two distinct health delivery issues which can be broadly categorised as, on the one hand the UK problem, and on the other, the US problem.

In the UK, a combination of administrative desire for containment of unmeetable M.E/CFS patient demand (unmeetable because there is no cure), coupled with the ideologically driven development of ‘internal marketisation’ in the NHS, has produced by default, (and instead of what should have been supportive Liaison Psychiatry delivered in a predominantly neurological context), an aggressive marketing strategy for a narrowly referenced core psychiatric approach. Arguments about the biopsychosocial model or characterising psychiatrists as ‘enemies of reason’, entirely miss the point – there is no failure of psychiatric ‘theory’, such ‘theory’ actually does deliver useful contexts for the effective support of people suffering psychological distress. The point is that medicine can’t presently provide cure or significant ameliorative interventions for M.E/CFS and the NHS is responding in a way predicated on administrative structures.

In the US, the market led model is mature and the commanding influence is in the hands of the producers – in this case the psychiatric profession as represented by the APA. The lack of cure or ameliorative intervention for M.E/CFS simply equates to a lack of competition – there are no other producers with an interest in defining the market, so psychiatry is free to circumscribe its customer base with exceptional breadth. Lack of regulation of the market allows the producer to be cavalier in the terms it sets for contractual hierarchy, and consequently the interests of the end user (patient) are poorly protected relative to the interests of commissioning agencies (insurers).

Clearly the two positions are open to convergence and psychiatry in the US and UK is subject to cross ‘fertilisation’ – whether that is characterised as conspiracy or just ‘business as usual’, is a matter of perspective. We can all want medical professionals to meet a mythical Hippocratic standard – but medicine happens within economic and social structures which fundamentally affect what individuals are prescribed to do and proscribed from, doing. Career structure, individual income, research income, specialism hierarchy, departmental empire building etc, all play a part. Expecting psychiatrists to be somehow different from their colleagues in other specialisms is naive and attacking psychiatrists in isolation only produces a bunker response which does nothing to further the cause of M.E/CFS patients.

IVI
 

natasa778

Senior Member
Messages
1,774
The point is that medicine can’t presently provide cure or significant ameliorative interventions for M.E/CFS and the NHS is responding in a way predicated on administrative structures.

If that is meant as an excuse then it is very poor indeed.

If psychos in question had any human decency and professional integrity they would admit they don't know their asses from the foreheads when it comes to ME/CFS and shut up for good. That would leave patients at square zero, a place million times better than the current one of abuse and denial.
 

alex3619

Senior Member
Messages
13,810
Location
Logan, Queensland, Australia
red-flag-and-bull.png

;)

"Arguments about the biopsychosocial model or characterising psychiatrists as ‘enemies of reason’, entirely miss the point – there is no failure of psychiatric ‘theory’, such ‘theory’ actually does deliver useful contexts for the effective support of people suffering psychological distress. The point is that medicine can’t presently provide cure or significant ameliorative interventions for M.E/CFS and the NHS is responding in a way predicated on administrative structures.

In the US, the market led model is mature and the commanding influence is in the hands of the producers – in this case the psychiatric profession as represented by the APA. The lack of cure or ameliorative intervention for M.E/CFS simply equates to a lack of competition – there are no other producers with an interest in defining the market, so psychiatry is free to circumscribe its customer base with exceptional breadth. Lack of regulation of the market allows the producer to be cavalier in the terms it sets for contractual hierarchy, and consequently the interests of the end user (patient) are poorly protected relative to the interests of commissioning agencies (insurers).

Expecting psychiatrists to be somehow different from their colleagues in other specialisms is naive and attacking psychiatrists in isolation only produces a bunker response which does nothing to further the cause of M.E/CFS patients.

IVI " [the bolding added by me]


When I read the above sections I almost started laughing. Then I realized you were serious.

"... there is no failure of psychiatric 'theory'..." Not according to huge numbers of psychologists and psychiatrists. Psychiatry is in a crisis ... and thats not ME or CFS patients saying it. When academics are talking about half of all published psychological and psychiatric papers being false, that has to be a worry.

"Arguments about the biopsychosocial model or characterising psychiatrists as ‘enemies of reason’, entirely miss the point..." What point? Sure, they are not intending (at least the vast majority are not) to operate outside of acceptable standards of reasoning in science. There are systemic problems pervading all of psychiatry. Surely though you don't mean to suggest that Freudian psychiatry has reasonable validity, to take one example? Its been largely discredited. Indeed given the different competing theories, its a lot like religion. Different religions, different sects and the rise of cults where individuals are associated with schools of psychiatry like Freud was.

In the case of psychosomatic medicine, it necessarily requires for its acceptance in its current form (biopyschosocial causation of disease, where BPS = mind to the exclusion of almost anything else) that we unquestioningly accept arguments based not on a singular logical fallacy, but a whole tangle of interlocking fallacies. Let me name a few. The big one of course is the psychogenic fallacy as published by Sykes. They also routinely make the psychologists fallacy. These two are peculiar to psychiatry and psychology. In addition they rely on variations of begging the question and circular reasoning (similar but not quite the same fallacies); post hoc fallacies and various fallacies associated with verificationism. These combined with poor scientific practices leads to a systemic combination of biases that distort the science.

As I have pointed out many times, the kind of reasoning used has been described as non-science and pseudo-science many many times in academia. I hope nobody is suggesting that Karl Popper had ME? The arguments were usually marshalled against Freudian psychiatry, but modern BPS concepts of dysfunctional belief systems closely parallel Freudian arguments though are transformed by reference to more modern theories such as cognitive behavioural ones.

Indeed I am writing a book detailing these issues in depth. I have hundreds of pages of notes, references and examples so far.

Now however I am beginning to understand where some disagreement with Angela Kennedy is coming from. Her new book, at least in the section I have read so far, is in part a collection of well referenced arguments of logical fallacy and other issues that are already published in the peer reviewed literature. Do all these academics, many of whom are psychiatrists, have ME or CFS too?

Historically the anger toward psychiatrists with regard to ME and CFS comes from being lied to in my opinion. That the lies are still perpetuated only reinforces this. Please read up on the history if anyone doubts this. Once the ME and CFS community spotted a whitewash, a railroading of the science, the rest is human nature.

So, crystal therapy is quackery. OK, I will grant that one, as defined by science and medicine. Its a religious belief system. So is belief in flying saucers. Practicing medicine using a religious belief is quackery.

Yet the logical structure underpinning the psychogenic fallacy can be applied to crystals and flying saucers. If the logical argument (do look up the psychogenic fallacy) is applied to crystals or UFOs then it can be inferred, by the same logical structure, that crystal healing and flying saucers are valid ... or even truth. Its a belief system, just like psychogenic psychiatry. If you want to read more on this, wait till I blog on it or for my book.

I have outlined six major definitions of non-science and pseudoscience in my book so far. The dysfunctional belief model of CFS fits all six very closely. While I have yet to do similar investigation for definitions of quackery, its not looking good for them so far.

"Expecting psychiatrists to be somehow different from their colleagues in other specialisms is naive and attacking psychiatrists in isolation only produces a bunker response which does nothing to further the cause of M.E/CFS patients." Oh, my. Do you know who is leading the charge against psychiatrists? Other psychiatrists, doctors and researchers, mostly. They recognize the over-psychologization that is occuring in psychiatry. This argument also implies that psychiatry, as an entire discipline with no exceptions for subgroups, deserves its privileged status as part of medicine. The evidence is mounting, and I believe overwhelming, that most of psychosomatic medicine (no matter how much they dress up mutton as lamb) does not deserve the status that most medical disciplines have. The same goes with a lot of psychiatry, though by no means all.

Historically psychiatry gave us surgical removal of all teeth or the colon, insulin therapy, shock therapy and lobotomies. Its a history of horrors that are always considered justified at the time and rarely receive proper scrutiny until after huge numbers of people are harmed. I don't think this has changed. We have learnt from past mistakes but failed to apply that learning to new ones.

The issue raised about markets is false analogy. It is however a basis for systemic distortion of the science. Hmmm ...

Privileging unproved and dubious therapies and theories as accepted medical norms is bad science. Arguing it is good bureaucracy is just an argument against bureaucratization of science. That is discussed in part of my next blog.

These are just some quick thoughts off the top of my head shortly after I woke up.
 

SilverbladeTE

Senior Member
Messages
3,043
Location
Somewhere near Glasgow, Scotland
yeah, IVI, you are great with facts, but you seem miles from applying them to, or understanding hard reality! :p

Not fair or nice to single you out but your route, as it were, has lead NOWHERE for 30 years.
Regarding the "advert's are best if they are remembered" issue
I'd rather be an annoying asshole and ALIVE than, meek and dead! :thumbsup:

I actually respect Neville Chamberlian's attempt at peace, most folk don't get the full ramifications,easy to blame him in hidnsight
but logic and being reasonable, don't get you anywhere in a dirty fight for your life, which is what this is.
*which is a way of offering an olive branch, while utterly rejecting your standpoint*

I dont bloody like it, but have learnd all my life, the HARD painful way, you can't argue resonably with scum, you smash them if they attack you, drive them out of your neighbourhood when the ruin it, if the law doesn't do it's job and prevent such escalations as it should...because often enought he law is corrupt/stupid/lazy or the sucmbags are manipulative sly vermin.
in my locale, local gangster family had the place terrorized, people had enough, street protests tore the rug out from under their feet. their intimidation couldn't work. Ended up with them all getting jailed or killed by fellow scum (because the vermin are each other's own worst enemies, always eager to stick the knife in eahc other's back, always fun to see them turn on each other and provide the evidence in court for each other's trials, lol)

ie, if we could somehow, all ALL of the folk with ME refuse to deal with the psychobabblers and protest loudly about this, do annoying crap but legal/reasonable stuff (especially lampooning them , peoplelove seeing authority figures lampooned)
then it would scupper the bastards, because without OUR PERMITTING OURSELVES OT BE THEIR VICTIMS, their patients, their fat pay packet, then, they are screwed.

Do not engage them, tell them to F*CK OFF and threaten them with legal action! Cause with scientific proof against biosocial bullshit, death certificates, pronouncements in government etc, comes a ramrod we can shove right up their arses.
they have inveigled (damn had ot look that word up, losing os much memory) their way into positions of power and trust and have abused them, have abused innocent people including kids.
the Public really does not like those who abuse the helpless and kids., especially smug MTFers who also make a fortune off of it

See US psychiatrists corruption
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Psychiatric_Association#Drug_company_ties

Drug company ties
In his book Anatomy of an Epidemic (2010), Robert Whitaker described the partnership that has developed between the APA and pharmaceutical companies since the 1980s.[14] APA has come to depend on pharmaceutical money.[14] The drug companies endowed continuing education and psychiatric "grand rounds" at hospitals. They funded a political action committee (PAC) in 1982 to lobby Congress.[14] The industry helped to pay for the APA's media training workshops.[14] It was able to turn psychiatrists at top schools into speakers, and although the doctors felt they were independents, they rehearsed their speeches and likely would not be invited back if they discussed drug side effects.[14] "Thought leaders" became the experts quoted in the media.[14] As Marcia Angell wrote in The New England Journal of Medicine (2000), "thought leaders" could agree to be listed as an author of ghostwritten articles,[15] and she cites Thomas Bodenheimer and David Rothman who describe the extent of the drug industry's involvement with doctors.[16][17] The New York Times published a summary about antipsychotic medications in October 2010.[18]
[edit] Controversies

Controversies have related to anti-psychiatry and disability rights campaigners, who regularly protest at American Psychiatric Association offices or meetings. In 1971, members of the Gay Liberation Front organization sabotaged an APA conference in San Francisco. In 2003 activists from MindFreedom International staged a 21-day hunger strike, protesting at a perceived unjustified biomedical focus and challenging APA to provide evidence of the widespread claim that mental disorders are due to chemical imbalances in the brain. APA published a position statement in response[19] and the two organizations exchanged views on the evidence.
There was controversy when it emerged that US psychologists and psychiatrists were helping interrogators in Guantanamo and other US facilities. The American Psychiatric Association released a policy statement that psychiatrists should not take a direct part in interrogation of particular prisoners [20] but could "offer general advice on the possible medical and psychological effects of particular techniques and conditions of interrogation, and on other areas within their professional expertise."
After previous controversy over APA's classification of homosexuality as a mental illness, there is also controversy regarding the remaining category of "sexual disorder not otherwise specified" which can include a state of distress about one's sexual orientation, as well as the diagnosis of "gender identity disorder" or gender dysphoria.[21]
The APA's Standard Diagnostic Manual came under criticism from autism specialists Tony Attwood and Simon Baron-Cohen for proposing the elimination of Asperger's syndrome as a disorder and replacing it with an autism severity scale. Professor Roy Richard Grinker wrote a controversial editorial for the New York Times expressing support for the proposal.
The APA president in 2005, Steven Sharfstein, caused controversy when, although praising the pharmaceutical industry, he argued that American psychiatry had "allowed the biopsychosocial model to become the bio-bio-bio model" and accepted "kickbacks and bribes" from pharmaceutical companies leading to the over-use of medication and neglect of other approaches.[22] In 2008 APA became a focus of congressional investigations regarding the way that money from the pharmaceutical industry can shape the practices of nonprofit organizations that purport to be independent in their viewpoints and actions. The drug industry accounted in 2006 for about 30 percent of the association’s $62.5 million in financing, half through drug advertisements in its journals and meeting exhibits, and the other half sponsoring fellowships, conferences and industry symposiums at its annual meeting. APA is considering its response to increasingly intense scrutiny and questions about conflicts of interest.[23] The APA president of 2009-2010, Alan Schatzberg, has also come under fire after it came to light that he was principal investigator on a federal study into a drug being developed by Corcept Therapeutics, a company Schatzberg had himself set up and in which he had several millions of dollars’ worth of stock.[


Again, think outside the box, destroy them (legally!) for they are *ENEMIES*,doesn't matter whether they are "well meaning" or not, they are causing unbelievable suffering and death
expose their evils, refute them utterly, do not engage them.
wish we had money to hire *respected* private investigators (especially ex-cops/FBI who like hunting down corruption), and set them out to find evidence of wrongdoing.

this is NOT jsut a fight on "science" as said, science hasn't affected these bozoes for decades. science will merely pull the rug from udedr their feet, without solid support or hopefully driven out into the cold by gutless gocernment worriedof exposure, we then need some good old fashioned knockouts delivered with subpoenas etc.
 
Messages
646
If that is meant as an excuse then it is very poor indeed.
If psychos in question had any human decency and professional integrity they would admit they don't know their asses from the foreheads when it comes to ME/CFS and shut up for good. That would leave patients at square zero, a place million times better than the current one of abuse and denial.
Excuse for what ? You are of course entitled to your perspective on psychiatry/psychiatrists - but it not a perspective that is usefully communicable in the context of M.E/CFS advocacy. Most health professionals will see such a perspective as an attack on 'health professionals' not just those working in psychiatry, so not only are you adopting an antagonistic position toward psychiatry, you are adopting a stance that alienates large swathes of the very people M.E/CFS advocacy needs to be supported by if it is to be successful.

Liaison Psychiatry is a fact of all modern health services, in the context of LP and in the context of the likely 25 - 40% of M.E/CFS patients who will experience co-morbid psychiatric illness (life time incidence at 25% population average increased by chronic illness exposure), Psychiatry is going to continue to be part of M.E/CFS management. One may or may not like this - but it is how it is, and the only way to make progress is by negotiating appropriate intervention of psychiatric focussed staff/interventions in the support of M.E/CFS patients. Perpetually slagging off psychiatrists only perpetuates an unnecessary sectarian divide and communicates far more about M.E/CFS advocacy than it does about psychiatry.

IVI
 
Messages
646
When I read the above sections I almost started laughing. Then I realized you were serious.
"... there is no failure of psychiatric 'theory'..." Not according to huge numbers of psychologists and psychiatrists. Psychiatry is in a crisis ... and thats not ME or CFS patients saying it. When academics are talking about half of all published psychological and psychiatric papers being false, that has to be a worry..
Are you claiming that psychiatry as delivered in modern health services does not provide any amelioration or cure of symptoms ? The 'theory' (inverted comma's !) that underlies this delivery may well be profoundlly suspect in terms of scientific validity, but unlike a belief in crystals or UFOs, the delivery of psychiatric interventions is prompted primarily by in extremis need. If someone is hearing threatening voices, if they are driven to self harm or violence to others, if are depriving themselves of nutrition to the point of death, or undertaking risky behaviours that are making their own or the lives of those around them a misery, then society seeks interventions. The imperfect state we are at, sees psychiatry having some success. This is not some academic argument, it is the reality of how the most distresssing health impairments demand intervention and how a frequently poorly resourced specialism contends with the challenges mental ill health raises.

I'm sure your book will be very interesting, although if you are stooping to horror stories of the past I'm afraid your authorship is going to be in very poor company. But in any event - the problems of M.E/CFS are not solely or even majorly wrapped up with the failings of psychiatry, nor will these problems be in any abeyance were there really to be an iminent apocalypse in psychiatry.

The issue raised about markets is false analogy.
It's not an analogy. Health is provided on a wholly market based system in the US with a limited NFP input providing some moderation, and regulation of practioners and certain types of medication and equipment serving as cursory extraneous controls on quality. In the UK although delivery of health is primarily socialised with a small private sector,market based systems operate within the socialised structures, often creating perverse service models where integral controls on quality are effectively bypassed.

Privileging unproved and dubious therapies and theories as accepted medical norms is bad science. Arguing it is good bureaucracy is just an argument against bureaucratization of science.
I don't know why you would conclude I was arguing that such a thing was 'good bureacracy'. My argument is that the bureacracy of health care, 'privaleges' that which becomes a medical norm. Science isn't involved - which is precisely why I would argue for every health care system to be predicated on the application of the principles of Science Based Medicine. The very nature of psychiatric illness presents a challenge to SBM and as with this blog post by Harriet Hall (Psychiatry Bashing) I can't see any option but to pursue a pragmatic approach to improvement to the science of mental health and the delivery of psychiatric services.

IVI
 
Messages
646
Not fair or nice to single you out but your route, as it were, has lead NOWHERE for 30 years.
Criticism is fine and entire fair as far as I'm concerned. What I don't understand is what basis you would define as "leading SOMEwhere" ? There is this idea that if only things were/had been different or were/had been done differently that somehow the position of M.E/CFS patients would be materially different. But what is it that would have guaranteed this exceptional difference ?

I actually do not accept that no advances have been mae in 30 years - and I've got 30 years (almost) of personal observation to inform my perspective. Of course we haven't got what we all want - perfect health. But we have no idea what it is that will turn out to provide that, and no one can say with any certainty that any particular research direction that could have been taken in the last 30 years would have yielded any useful result, given that technology and medical knowledge was by definition more limited in the past. What we have now, is a vast array of science that simply wasn't available even ten years ago, and technology that most certainly wasn't available 30 years ago. What did or did not work in the last 30 years is actually irrelevant - what matters is what will work now given that the opportunities are far greater than they have ever been. Setting the argument in terms of psychiatry is in my view pointless, unnecessary and wholly counterproductive - indeed the most effective way to bury M.E/CFS advocacy is to make it equivalent to anti-psychiatry.

IVI