| What can we do
to protect ourselves and others from the powerful and well-financed
agents of social control striving to label, incarcerate, electroshock
and medicate those of us society finds difficult to deal with? Alone
and with others, I have tried to work towards this goal in various
ways, including helping to found, and then coordinating, a provincial
antipsychiatry organization; editing a national antipsychiatry magazine;
travelling around the country speaking to and with, and interviewing,
psychiatric survivors; discussing the issue of what's wrong with psychiatric
"treatment" on radio and television, in newsletters, newspapers
and magazines; and writing a book about my own and other people's
activism in the mad movement. I feel that all of these endeavours
were effective in raising consciousness about psychiatry. It is extremely
important that our voices be heard, as a counter to the pro-psychiatry
propaganda informing the mainstream media. Systemic abuse must be
exposed. But as I grow older and more experienced, I feel increasingly
that the very most important thing I can do is explore and promote
alternatives to psychiatry - which are exciting, wonderful, and as
infinite in scope and number as the other side's fake diagnoses. Exposing
the outrages perpetrated upon us in the name of treatment is vinegar.
Finding out - and letting people know - about kinder, gentler and
far more effective ways of dealing with emotional and mental problems
is honey. I am not alone in liking honey a lot better. The basic stance
of being against something - of trying to destroy something - can
be bad for the digestion and the disposition. Certainly I can present,
and have presented myself as a person who wants to bring down psychiatry.
But for me it's important to remember that many people value psychiatry
and are certain that it has saved their lives. I have nothing against
these people and don't want to make them feel stupid or angry. And
I believe that, by helping to make it known that there are choices
other than the ones they've encountered so far, I might be able to
affect their beliefs and practices. Better yet, I feel confident that
I can be of use people like my younger self, who have had their spirits
crushed by psychiatric "help" and don't yet know that real
help exists. |