(no paper is attached to this workshop)

Psychiatric torture is real. For centuries, it has persisted with occasional periods of being put in check with no lasting systemic end to organized psychiatry (Davis, 1855, 1860; Minkowitz, 2007; Trull, 1891; Weitz, 2008). People who may not otherwise have had the intention to torture people they are in power over do more often than was once thought (Milgram, 1963, 1973, 1974, 1981; Zimbardo, 2007). This imbalance of power can be cunning. We like to think that as humans we rise above undesirable behavior and misuse of power (Becker, 1973). Asch's (1955) conformity studies have indicated just how much power even a small group of people can have over an otherwise ‘rational’ individual. There are parallels of the Psychiatric Survivor Movement and Cross (1971) Black Liberation Psychology. Cross outlines in a five-stage theory that liberation begins to come when one enters the Commitment phase, which often includes pursuing higher education. Many psychiatric survivors, including myself, have found ourselves in this exact location. It has developed a specialty Survivor Research, to which, (De)Voiced adds.