Manufacturing Victims: What the Psychology Industry is Doing to People

Written by AbleChild on October 8, 2021. Posted in Essential Books.

This provocative expose of the psychology, and in particular the psychotherapy industry was first published in 1996 and was written by Tara Dineen, who has been referred to as a “dissident psychologist” with 30 years of experience. In Manufacturing Victims: What the Psychology Industry is Doing to People, a wildly popular book which has been cited in both Time magazine and The New York Times, Dineen makes solid, well-founded arguments that focus in on the rise of “victim culture” in the world of professional psychotherapy.

“Victim culture” is basically the idea that these psychotherapists prey on people who may not even need counselling, by convincing them they are a victim of some person, situation or affliction from their past. Then they position themselves to be right there to heal the victim.

By 1995, 46% of the U.S. population had seen a mental health professional – this is one of the interesting statistics which Dineen gives to readers to show the sharp increase in the amount of people influenced by psychotherapy. And there is a glaring lack of scientific evidence to support many of these theories that create these so-called “victims.”

Some of the topics covered throughout the book include Victim-Making, Fabricated Victims, Selling Psychology as a Science, The Business of Psychology, The Technology of Victim-Making, The Rise to Power of the Psychology Industry, and Living in the Shadow of the Psychology Industry. The book shines light on the question of who should be able to determine if a person has suffered enough to require psychological counselling, and when it should be necessary to intervene.

About the Author

Dr. Tana Dineen is a former practicing psychologist who graduated in 1969 with her Honours Bachelor of Science degree from McGill University, and received her Masters (1971) and Doctoral degree (1975) from the University of Saskatchewan. She also worked as a Treatment Director of a large psychiatric hospital for four years, where she established specialized programs that won her an American Psychiatric Association prize for Innovative Programming. Dineen is a Full Member of the American Psychological Association and the Canadian Psychological Association.

Dr. Dineen began to notice that psychology, which was originally a science dedicated to the curing of serious pathology, had been watered-down into a broad range of pseudo-science and pseudo-therapy. After a period of time, she could no longer stomach the profession, and believed that psychology could no longer reform itself from the inside, which led her to leave her clinical practice. Now she runs a B&B in Victoria, British Columbia. She also writes several monthly columns for Canadian newspapers on various topics.

Reviews

Mark Sauer, San Diego Union-Tribune:

“Renegade psychologist dukes it out with feelings folks.”

LA Daily Journal:

“This gun is not for hire! Clinician slams the expert-witness racket.”

Lynn McAuley, Ottawa Citizen:

“Tana Dineen…the woman who put psychology on the couch.”

Michael Roberts, Denver Westword:

“Tana Dineen…arguably the planet’s preeminent psychotherapy critic.”

The Mail on Sunday (London):

“…argues that psychology has changed from a respectable academic discipline into an industry eager to sell its products…”

The Myth of the Hyperactive Child: And Other Means of Child Control

Written by AbleChild on September 30, 2021. Posted in Essential Books.

Though this book was published back in 1975, it was ahead of it’s time. Authors Peter Schrag and Diane Divoky produced a very well-researched book that is backed up by bold and insightful arguments. Schrag and Divoky examine the landscape of mental health profession, the public school system, and how they are shifting into a more authoritarian role, and are no longer advocates for our children. The authors expose the loose haphazard research done on “disorders” such as MBD (minimal brain dysfunction) and the lack of evidence of the effectiveness of psychiatric drugs like Ritalin, as well as the dangerous side effects of these drugs. The book also gives an in-depth analysis of the increased implementation of practices such as psychological testing, data banks, “predelinquency screenings” and behavior modification, to “fix” our children, many of whom are perfectly healthy and normal.

The authors warn parents of the psychiatric labels and psychotropic drugs that could be forced on their kids, who have no defense. And much of this psychiatric treatment, under the guise of “helping” the child, is likely to in fact cause further psychological damage. This begins a vicious cycle that leaves your child a slave to the government system, with various psychiatric labels that follow them around for their lifetime. The Myth of the Hyperactive Child is written from a unique perspective that explains the big picture of the mental health industry (and society in general) that was taking place in 1975, and is still taking place now in 2021. Specifically the book puts the focus on the increasing power of institutions over individuals, and their interference with human liberties. The book also points out that while the safety of psychotropic drugs is a concern, there is a bigger issue we are facing that threatens our children and society at large: the “ideology of drugging” and early intervention.

About the Author

Peter Schrag is an American writer, editor and scholar of California politics and political history. Schrag was a columnist and page editor at the daily newspaper the Sacramento Bee for nineteen years. He wrote for the weekly magazine The Nation for nearly a half century. Schrag is also a former visiting scholar at the Institute of Government Studies at the University of California.

A notable honor Schrag received during his career was being listed as a notable editor and writer by Marquis Who’s Who. He was a Guggenheim fellow from 1971072, and a National Endowment of the Arts fellow from 1976-77. He was born in Germany, and received his Bachelor of Arts from Amherst College in Massachusetts. Some of the other books Schrag has published include When Europe Was a Prison Camp: Father and Son Memoirs, 1940-41 (Indiana University Press, 2015), Paradise Lost: California’s Experience, America’s Future, and Final Test: The Battle for Adequacy in America’s Schools.

Reviews

Aryeh Neier, Executive Director of the American Civil Liberties Union:

“For the last half century, Americans have been responding to real and imagined social problems by pinning derogatory labels on people, excluding them from opportunities available to others, and then bemoaning the worsening of the problems. Some of the newest and most dangerous labels stigmatize young children. They are called ‘hyperactive,’ ‘predelinquent,’ or are said to suffer from ‘learning disabilities.’ In their fine book, Diane Divoky and Peter Schrag give us an absorbing account of what is going on. The information they gather and the insights they share with us give us a chance to save our children from the awful things done to them in the guise of helping them.”

The New York Times:

“Schrag and Divoky present us with fine polemical writing in a well‐researched and thoughtfully argued brief intended to stimulate informed action against the widespread use of drugs, psychological testing, data banks, “predelinquency” screening, [and] behavior modification[.]”

Coping with Children’s Temperament: A Guide for Professionals

Written by AbleChild on September 21, 2021. Posted in Essential Books.

Pediatrician William B. Carey, and the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, brought us this insightful must-have guide to temperaments in children. Instead of constantly growing frustrated with their child’s temper tantrums, impatience, irritability, self-centeredness and combativeness, Coping with Children’s Temperament: A Guide for Professionals gives parents, doctors, nurses, teachers, etc. an in-depth examination of temperament in children, what factors affects it, how it is affected, and how it develops over time. And while these behaviors are normal in children, incorrectly responding to and managing them can put the child at odds with their caregiver, which can lead to clinical problems over time.

Once we understand what is causing these behaviors, the book provides specific techniques for managing and preventing these behaviors in the future. Because while discipline may stop the behavior temporarily, it often does not solve the underlying problem. You will also learn the ways that your child’s temperament may be affecting you, which parents are often unaware of. Dr. Carey provides a wealth of research and helpful case studies to support his narrative. In the foreword to the book, former Surgeon General C. Everett Koop states that this book “should revolutionize parenting for many readers.”

About the Author

William B. Carey is a pediatrician who graduated from Harvard Medical School and did his specialty training at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia. He then remained in Pennsylvania for 3 years of primary pediatrics care. In his solo practice, Carey specialized in child development and behavior, with a focus on the differences in temperaments of children. He is well-known for a series of five temperament questionnaires he created with a team of psychologists, for children ages one month to twelve years old. These questionnaires are commonly used as a reference across the world, and have been translated into many different languages. Some of Dr. Carey’s other books include Development-Behavioral Pediatrics: Expert Consult and Prevention and Early Intervention.

They Say You’re Crazy: How the World’s Most Powerful Psychiatrists Decide Who’s Normal

Written by AbleChild on September 13, 2021. Posted in Essential Books.

The DSM (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders) IV is the official diagnostic “bible” used by the American Psychiatric Association and mental health professionals. But so much of the general population doesn’t know how these “illnesses” are determined, since they are not the same as medical diagnoses, which can be determined with the clear-cut scientific method. That is where psychologist and author Paula J. Caplan comes in with her book, They Say You’re Crazy: How the World’s Most Powerful Psychiatrists Decide Who’s Normal. Caplan is a former consultant to the DSM, and has served as an adviser to various related APA committees.

In total, there are 400 mental illness labels listed in the DSM IV. This includes everything from “self-defeating personality disorder” to “nicotine dependence” to “premenstrual dysphoric disorder”. “Homosexuality” was once listed in an earlier publication of the DSM as a mental illness, but not in the current DSM IV. This should be a cause for widespread concern, because since when can a disease stop being a disease?

Caplan gives an eye-opening look into the lack of scientific methods and evidence, bias and close-mindedness that was involved in the process of developing the DSM IV handbook. She questions whether the creators of the book have the authority to determine what is “normal” and “not normal.” She cuts through the mental health industry jargon to expose to the everyday laymen the danger of these official labels that are being put on people and dramatically impacting the course of their lives. She also points out how the book is very thorough in listing symptoms of these illnesses, but not treatments or solutions.

About the Author

Paula J. Caplan is a clinical and research psychologist, as well as an award-winning nonfiction author, playwright, actor, activist, advocate and director. She grew up in Springfield, Missouri, and then went on to graduate from the Radcliffe College of Harvard University. Following that, she attended Duke University, where she received her M.A. and Ph.D. in psychology.

Caplan is currently an Associate at the Dubois Research Institute of the Hutchins Center at Harvard University, where she works on their Voices of Diversity Project. She is also a past fellow at the Women and Public Policy Program of the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard. She is a former Full Professor of Applied Psychology and Head of the Centre for Women’s Studies in Education at the Ontario Institute for studies in Education. She was also a former Assistant Professor of Psychiatry, and former Lecturer in Women’s Studies at the University of Toronto.

Caplan has published a total of twelve books so far, which include Lifting a Ton of Feathers: A Woman’s Guide to Surviving in the Academic World, Bias in Psychiatric Diagnosis, Don’t Blame Mother: Mending the Mother-Daughter Relationship, and her most recent publication, Johnny and Jane Come Marching Home: How All of Us Can Help Veterans.

Reviews

Psychotherapist Bryan Knight, from Ezinearticles.com:

“Read Dr. Caplan’s book and weep for the thousands of people (mostly women, of course) whose lives have been damaged by being labelled with the stigma of a mental illness, when in reality their only problem was that, like [like psychiatrist and author] Dr. Siebert, they dared to be different. Or human.”

Your Drug May Be Your Problem: How and Why to Stop Taking Psychiatric Medications

Written by AbleChild on September 1, 2021. Posted in Essential Books.

The withdrawal and long-term side effects of many psychiatric medications can cause symptoms that are similar or worse than the symptoms for which the patient is being medicated in the first place. Author Peter R. Breggin, along with David Cohen, Ph.D., were among the first to address these major issues, in this spectacular book which was way ahead of it’s time. Since the book’s first publication in 1999, there have been numerous studies confirming the harmful side effects and withdrawal symptoms of these drugs, and even the FDA acknowledges these problems.

Your Drug May Be Your Problem: How and Why to Stop Taking Psychiatric Medications goes into great detail, backed by thorough research, about the particular side effects and withdrawal symptoms for all different kinds of psychiatric medications; from antidepressants to mood stabilizers to stimulants. The book explains how doctor’s often do not take enough time to examine the patient, misdiagnose the patient, and as a result prescribe psychiatric drugs that are not needed, and often do more harm than good. This quick decision made by the doctor can impact years or even decades of a patient’s life. Your Drug May Be Your Problem educates patients and doctors about the correct way to gradually stop taking psychiatric drugs, and outlines the process for withdrawing from the medications. The book has also been fully updated to include new research studies and medications 0n the market.

About the Author

Peter R. Bregg, M.D., is a a psychiatrist who is very well known for helping set the stage for modern criticism of psychiatric treatments and psychotropic drugging. He has promoted so much success in the field of mental health that he has acquired the nickname “conscience of psychiatry.” HIs reform efforts began in the 1970s, and resulted in almost a complete cease in the use of procedures like lobotomy and psychosurgery in the Western World. Then in the 1990s, he and his wife Ginger were able to stop a federal eugenics project that was planned on America’s inner-city children. You can find more details about this in the book he co-authored with Ginger, The War Against Children of Color.

Breggin has been a full-time consultant at NIMH, as well as for the FAA. He has published over 20 books and numerous scientific articles. Some of his books include Toxic Psychiatry, The Antidepressant Factbook, and Talking Back to Prozac. His latest book is Covid-19 and the Global Predators: We are the Prey. Dr. Breggin is also the founder and director of The Center for the Study of Emphatic Therapy, Education and Living. He attended Harvard, and currently resides in Ithaca, NY. Find out more on his website, www.breggin.com.

Reclaiming our Children: A Healing Solution for a Nation in Crisis

Written by AbleChild on August 20, 2021. Posted in Essential Books.

This is another groundbreaking and insightful book from psychiatrist Peter R. Breggin. In Reclaiming our Children: A Healing Solution for a Nation in Crisis, Breggin makes the case that society has, over time, begun to invest less and less in the support and attention that is given to children. Parents have become too busy, and as a result less involved in their children’s lives. Then children begin to seek that support they are longing for through behaviors such as violence, frustration, humiliation and anger.

Breggin felt moved to write this book after the events surrounding the shootings at Columbine High School in Littleton, Colorado. He was disturbed by the response of government, which used biological psychiatry as an explanation for mental states that lead to these events, and subsequently pushed psychiatric drugs as a solution. Biological psychiatry attributes a chemical imbalance in the brain as the cause of rebellion, violence and misbehavior in children, as opposed to what is going on in their environment and how they are responding.

Breggin does an excellent job of presenting evidence, through his own counseling experiences, that psychiatric drugs can lead to aggression, and potentially even be the cause, not the solution, to events like Columbine. He says that you cannot fix all these behaviors by trying to fix a child’s brain. Often, aggressive, violent and other unruly behaviors are often a response by the child to being mistreated, by their parents or others in society.

About the Author

Reviews

Douglas A. Smith, from the organization Antipsychiatry.org:

“By giving the reader an understanding of children’s thinking, he illustrates the stupidity of the underlying assumption of biological psychiatry, namely, that children’s (and adult’s) problems are caused by abnormalities of their brains, which in turn, to the ignorant, justifies the use of psychiatric drugs.”

Gwen Broude, in the article Scatterbrained Child Rearing from Reason.com:

“It is trivially true that all of a person’s thoughts, emotions, and behavior are a product of what is going on in the brain. But when people begin to see every inconvenient behavior as a disorder, and when they then propose, on the basis of the so-called new brain science, that we fix the child by fixing his brain, we have got a problem. Breggin targets this recent tendency on the part of educators, psychiatrists, and policy makers to view children’s behaviors as dysfunctions when they depart from the norm and then to advocate medical treatments for those supposed dysfunctions.”

The Ritalin Fact Book: What Your Doctor Won’t Tell You

Written by AbleChild on July 30, 2021. Posted in Essential Books.

Peter R. Breggin, M.D. is an accomplished zealot for the overprescribing and misuse of psychotropic medications, that come as a result of the misdiagnosis of Attention Deficit Disorder (ADD) in children. In the book, Breggin makes a strong case, which he backs up with pharmaceutical research and correspondence files that he has gained access to over the years due to being a medical expert in so many civil and criminal cases involving the drug. His reputation as a go-to medical expert has pegged Breggin as the “Ralph Nader of Psychiatry.”

This book will give you the most accurate and detailed information about psychotropic drugs prescribed for ADHD, and the information is presented in an easy-to-understand and straightforward manner. The drugs Breggin addresses that are being overprescribed and misused are Ritalin SR, Adderall XR, Dexedrine, Focalin, Concerta, Metadate ER and Cylert. Nearly 6 million children are taking one of these drugs, supposedly for ADHD. Breggin gives details about all the possible side effects and withdrawal symptoms of these medications. He says that not only do these drugs not help children with their learning and concentration issues, but they can cause other serious physical problems in children. Breggin also lays out different alternative approaches for treating children with hyperactivity or concentration problems that do not involve psychotropic drugs.

About the Author

Talking Back to Ritalin: What Doctors Aren’t Telling You About Stimulants and ADHD

Written by AbleChild on July 22, 2021. Posted in Essential Books.

In this book, author Peter Breggin, M.D., cuts through the shiny propaganda of the psychiatric and pharamaceutical industries, which tell parents that Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) is an epidemic that can be easily solved with the use of psychotropic drugs such as Ritalin and Concerta. The reality is, many of these medications are molecularly similar to drugs such as amphetamines and cocaine. Breggin exposes the harmful side effects that can result from the medications, such as behavioral disorders, growth suppression, neurological tics, agitation, addiction, and psychosis. He also argues that withdrawal from some of these medications can actually create these supposed chemical “imbalances” and insubordinate behaviors these drugs are prescribed to treat. Basically, this book is an overall “red pill” to Americans about the true motivations in the psychiatric community behind the diagnosis of ADHD and prescription of psychotropic drugs.

In Talking Back to Ritalin: What Doctors Aren’t Telling You About Stimulants and ADHD, Breggin goes into great detail explaining the condition of ADHD, how it is diagnosed, and gives a corporate and economic background on who financially profits from these diagnoses and the prescription of psych0tropic drugs. The author explains the interactions that take place between the body, mind and environment, that are largely ignored by medical and mental health professionals, which can explain many of the behaviors and symptoms that are misdiagnosed as ADHD.

Breggin calls out the incompetence of medical professionals to properly diagnose physical issues that can cause concentration struggles, such as poor nutrition, neurological impairment and allergies. He also addresses the myth that mental illness is biologically determined. The author discusses non-drug alternatives and improvements in school and family life that may instead address these issues more effectively.

About the Author

Reviews

Psychiatrist Sharon A. Collins, M.D.:

“I am a mother first and a doctor second… The principles in this book help us as parents to empower our children to be successful in life.”

The Necessity of Madness and Unproductivity: Psychiatric Oppression or Human Transformation

Written by AbleChild on July 9, 2021. Posted in Essential Books.

This is a book that will really make you think outside the box. In The Necessity of Madness: Psychiatric Oppression or Human Transformation, author John Breeding takes a very different view of psychiatry; one that is seen by many as controversial. Society has certain expectations for human behavior, and one of those basic expectations is that we should be productive no matter what is going on with us mentally, emotionally, spiritually or physically. But Breeding believes that a certain amount of unproductivity is actually necessary for optimal spiritual growth. So the very thing most psychiatrists are trying to suppress, is what is often needed the most. Madness refers to spiritual maturity. Every one of us is born with a set of cultural values, beliefs, customs, behaviors. When we begin to explore other values and behaviors that are unfamiliar to our culture, many see this as madness. Basically, Breeding’s book helps us learn to make our own decisions on how we think our children, or any person, should act through different stages in life, as opposed to what society thinks is “normal” or “productive.” This book is an excellent resource for individuals to better understand themselves, parents to more effectively help their children, and for psychiatrists to begin expanding on their ideas about their work and possible solutions for their patients.

About the Author

John Breeding, Ph.D., is a psychologist with over 25 years of experience who counsels adults children and families out of his private practice in Austin, Texas, and also around the world. He is the director of the non-profit organization Wildest Colts Resources, which focuses on helping adults working with young people having a hard time to offer non-drug treatment alternatives. He is also the director of Texans for Safe Education, a citizens group dedicated to fighting the growing role of psychiatry and psychiatric drugs in schools today.

Dr. Breeding is also experienced in other aspects of psychiatric oppression, including electroshock and psychiatric drugging of elders in nursing homes. He received his doctorate from the University of Texas. He has published several other books: Eyes Wide Open: Parenting and Life Mainfestos for the 21st Century, The Wildest Colts Make the Best Horses, and True Nature and Great Misunderstandings (On How We Care for Our Children According to Our Understanding).

Reviews

The Washington Post:

“A work of genius! Breeding has a unique understanding of the damage that psychiatry causes society.”

The Wildest Colts Make the Best Horses

Written by AbleChild on June 22, 2021. Posted in Essential Books.

The Wildest Colts Make the Best Horses, is, as the title implies, a work that encourages the spirits of our young people and shines a more positive light on them. The book also has two subtitles. The first subtitle, The Truth About Ritalin, ADHD, and other “Disruptive Behavior Disorders” signals that the book really brings a lot of attention to the phenomenon of unrealistically high numbers of children being labeled with these kind of diagnoses, and prescribed potentially dangerous psychiatric medication. The second subtitle is What to Do When Your Child is Labeled By the Schools. The book offers a great deal of support for any adult that is caring for and looking to help a child in this type of situation.

This book is divided into three major sections:

Part 1: Recognition and Remembrance

Since society distorts the reality regarding the experience of children and schools, we need to recognize this and create a realistic picture of the situation to respond effectively.
Addresses the “Biopsychiatry” approach, which has led to the overmedicating of children with psychiatric drugs like Ritalin in the United States.
This section works to focus on ideas of who the child truly is and see the schools for what they really are.
Remembrance refers to training ourselves to be able to remember who our child truly is, which can be easy to forget in times of heightened stress and when the child is having a hard time emotionally or behaviorally.

Part 2: Information and Action

This section focuses on solutions – what action parents can take to help their child.
In our flawed society where no one tells us how to be parents, this book guides us on how to respond to these sensitive situations.

Part 3: On Counseling Children

This section is the heart of the book.
Does a great job of outlining and unpacking all of the conditioned thinking that has led our society astray.
Our society lacks support for both parents and children, and helping your children the way that is outlined in this book is very challenging in our culture today.
This section thoroughly examines important topics like fear, shame, crying and anger.
The author shares his own personal experiences as a parent.

About the Author

Dr. Breeding is also experienced in other aspects of psychiatric oppression, including electroshock and psychiatric drugging of elders in nursing homes. He received his doctorate from the University of Texas. He has published several other books: Eyes Wide Open: Parenting and Life Mainfestos for the 21st Century, True Nature and Great Misunderstandings (On How We Care for Our Children According to Our Understanding, and Necessity of Madness and Unproductivity: Psychiatric Oppression or Human Transformation.

Reviews

Moira Dolan, M.D. The West News, Fall 1996:

“Are you the parent of a ‘wild colt’? Is your darling child identified as a ‘problem’ in school, or been the target of kindly professionals suggesting Ritalin? If so, you will discover your child in John Breeding’s new book….”

Chris Mercogliano, author of Making it Up as We Go Along, the Story of the Albany Free School and Co-Director of the Free School:

“Authors die for the perfect titles for their work. Well, John Breeding has come up with a doozy here. I wholeheartedly agree with Breeding and share his horror at what we are doing to our society’s wild colts. Breeding elects to focus mainly on today’s most popular designer label for children who don’t fit the mold, “Attention Deficit Disorder.” He emphatically repudiates any and every psychopharmaceutical approach to the behavioral management of children… Breeding knows what he’s talking about. So, parents out there, if the “psychiatric police” show up at your door, there is another way.”