Heard from our first NAMI defender today in a comment too fuckwadity to dissect though it’s befitting of due ridicule in what I hope to be the first in a protracted and honorable sword-crossing with our authoritarian rightwing mental health overlords. Participatory dialogue between consumers and families is so very long overdue it was with bated breath I opened the email only to discover that I’m fat lazy ugly self-absorbed and write a shitty blog, do nothing to improve the world while the good people of NAMI, who are VOLUNTEERS, freely volunteer their time and energy to advocate for the mentally ill. O yes compared to them my own perfidy knows no bounds, even poor, helpless diabetic Angelbait is not laid low with chronic disease in the prime of her nine lives, but is an attention-seeking feline who is clearly neurotic and her butt stinks and she likes to smell her own butt. The fact that I would blog about a sick cat is further proof I have no idea how the Internets work.
All this to say my first comment by a NAMI defender was everything I hoped it would be — senseless, textbook character assassination, unsurprising unless you consider it remarkable that an organization founded on the denial of interpersonal abuse should be defended by an ally who spews an onslaught of personalized abuse, which I don’t find remarkable at all, and is in fact central to the case we are making against the pharma-funded family advocate wrecking crew.
Let me be clear — NAMI is comprised of standard emotional abusers, who take their page from the standard how-to-abuse manual, whether targeting kids, women, animals, immigrants or bloggers, up to and including the part where they project their own twisted hatred onto their prey, deny their own antisocial tendencies which are deployed for nothing but the rush of sheer pleasure that results from humiliating their would-be victims, a pleasure they also don’t understand, and know only that the target clearly asked for it by being fat, old, proud, self-referential, caring for shitty sick cats, and as any rapist will tell you, running around with her tits hanging out.
No, my first family troll did not surprise or disappoint in the least, I will simply note the momentous occasion by highlighting a classic NAMI intervention in their ongoing mission to “eradicate the stigma of mental illness and improve the quality of life of those affected by brain diseases.” First, a digression if I may; many critics of NAMI focus on their “brain disease” mantra as a scientifically unsupportable mis-attribution and it is that. But evil wears many hats, and I submit that all of NAMI’s rhetoric is carefully groomed and thoroughly vetted before it’s introduced, and by the time we hear it the users have been schooled to speak solely within that frame in order to seize the discourse and ignore alternative conceptual frames as if they don’t exist. This is what they do. NAMI is a lobby group engaged in all the tactics of political hardball. As such the term brain disease serves a dual purpose, as the final word on psychiatric phenomena, which most educated and enlightened people are affronted by, and so we concentrate on arguing with the sophistry and hubris demonstrated up-front. But wait, there’s more! The implicit purpose of promulgating the concept of brain disease is in securing the complete dehumanization of the victim, required by abusers in order for them to justify interpersonal violence. That too is part of the inflicter’s handbook, as criminologists discovered in their early studies of serial killers, nobody wants to feel like a monster. So you divest your target of their basic humanity.
Brain disorder is NAMI’s ruling trope, giving them license to inflict, which is why they repeat it incessantly in every publication, and why it needs to be attacked on grounds that it totally dehumanizes. How can you abuse a brain disease? Neat, isn’t it. So is their vulnerability. We’ll come back to this, meanwhile what say we get on with it and strap all our chairs to the floor.
SOURCE: Sheldon Richman, Editor, Ideas on Liberty, quoted by Szasz, T. Mental illness: From shame to pride:
The NAMI rhetoric conceals that the organization is composed of, and controlled by, principally the relatives of so-called mentally ill persons and that its main purpose is to justify depriving such persons of liberty in the name of mental health. So convinced is NAMI of the nobility of its cause, that its web site offers this scenario:
Sometime, during the course of your loved one’s illness, you may need the police. By preparing now, before you need help, you can make the day you need help go much more smoothly. … It is often difficult to get 911 to respond to your calls if you need someone to come & take your MI relation to a hospital emergency room (ER). They may not believe that you really need help. And if they do send the police, the police are often reluctant to take someone for involuntary commitment. That is because cops are concerned about liability. … When calling 911, the best way to get quick action is to say, “Violent EDP,” or “Suicidal EDP.” EDP stands for Emotionally Disturbed Person. This shows the operator that you know what you’re talking about. Describe the danger very specifically. “He’s a danger to himself “is not as good as “This morning my son said he was going to jump off the roof.” … Also, give past history of violence. This is especially important if the person is not acting up. … When the police come, they need compelling evidence that the person is a danger to self or others before they can involuntarily take him or her to the ER for evaluation. … Realize that you & the cops are at cross purposes. You want them to take someone to the hospital. They don’t want to do it. Say, “Officer, I understand your reluctance. Let me spell out for you the problems & the danger. …While NAMI is not suggesting you do this, the fact is that some families have learned to “turn over the furniture” before calling the police. Many police require individuals with neurobiological disorders to be imminently dangerous before treating the person against their will. If the police see furniture disturbed they will usually conclude that the person is imminently dangerous.
Deliberately giving false information to the police is a felony. Except, it seems, when the falsehood serves the avowed aim of providing mental health treatment for a “loved one.”
First, I’m sorry your cat is sick. I lost a beloved cat in April but he lived a long life. Hope yours does to. And now to the point. Sorry about the NAMI attack. I would imagine that you can be commited for “letting your tits hang out” and caring for sick cats. NAMI folks are likely not cat people and disagreements with their “mentally ill” relatives about pets are plenty of reason to ship “us.”
Your post reminded me of a quote from an article in Slate that I read yesterday, not directly on point but eerily similar to folks like me who once considered the brain disease model to be helpful and benificial to those of us labeled mentally ill, “The reduction of homosexuality to neurobiology doesn’t mean your sexual orientation can’t be controlled. It just means the person controlling it won’t be you.” http://www.slate.com/id/2193841/
And also of yesterday’s terrifying Supreme Court decision giving judges the complete and utter discretion to deny someone with a psych label the right to self representation not because the accused is mentally incompetent but because the accused has a psych label. And the decision doesn’t specify any hoops the judge must jump through to deny this right other than just feeling like the guy is “mentally ill.” The ramifications of this decision are enormous and lead me to argue that the biggest threat to those of us with psych labels comes from the left not the right as Scalia and Thomas, the heart of the right on the Court, dissented.
Here’s a few choice quotes from Scalia’s dissent (cribbed from the NYTimes): “Justice Scalia said the treatment Mr. Edwards received in being denied to present the defense of his choice “seems to me the epitome of both actual and apparent unfairness.”
The only reason the court has previously accepted as valid for denying self-representation, Justice Scalia said, was a threat to the orderliness of the trial. But Mr. Edwards was “respectful and compliant” and did not even have the chance to try representing himself, Justice Scalia continued, adding, “The dignity at issue is the supreme human dignity of being master of one’s fate rather than a ward of the state — the dignity of individual choice.”
Justice Scalia said that “trial judges will have every incentive to make their lives easier” by appointing lawyers rather than giving mentally ill defendants a chance to proceed on their own.
“In singling out mentally ill defendants for this treatment,” he said, “the court’s opinion does not even have the questionable virtue of being politically correct.”http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/20/washington/20legal.html?_r=1&ref=health&oref=slogin
Was it this guy? Bill Howard
http://NAMIVIRGINIA | mail5billh@verizon.net | 71.191.146.200
Attempting to remain calm while I type; I just can NOT believe the over-turned furniture suggestion, and of course reading that at the end of your great post–thank you for this post. Because I have batted away NAMI’s for years–keep away from me, very, very far away. I did receive a consolation hate mail this last week though telling me I need to be medicated and so should my daughter, and well my paws are filthy, and apparently keeping the person from their medication by speaking out about pharma.
I send daily good thoughts to you and you cat.
I don’t think so hymes, the handle was a woman’s name. I don’t know if she was a player or someone who knows NAMI only as a support group. The hugs and cookies support groups members are a whole different entity than the NAMI leadership, I wish more people would understand that.
I understand that, it was the bit about being a volunteer that sounded so familiar to me, this guy is on NAMI Virginia’s board and made a big point about how the NAMI board is all volunteer–which is actually the law in Virginia, non-profit boards have to be all volunteer. He also made a crack about blogs being a dime a dozen, anyway, just sounded vaguely familiar.
I know you understand! It’s the people who think we’re trashing sincere and well-meaning neighborhood folks that get their panties in a wad because they don’t know the difference between the rank and file and NAMI leadership.
Sally, I just read up on the Supremes ruling denying the right of people with mental illness to represent themselves in criminal court. . As far as I’m concerned no one should have the right to cross-examine their traumatized and terrified victims on the stand, and while it sucks as usual that mentally ill are being segregated etc, I don’t really care. For me, victims rights prevail, always.
If i had truly decided to die, with no ambiguity, and was prevented from carrying that wish out by a member of my family calling the police on me, then, if i ever got out, i would very probably kill that family member and myself.
Something to consider for any family members thinking about taking that advice.
I’m so appalled and shocked by the right wing ideology of “tough love” and the evil it seems to justify in the eyes of the perpetuators.
Jennifer, NAMI is a left wing organization.
FP, I hadn’t meant to respond and mean no disrespect, but the NAMI thing grows more out of the victims rights movement than it does out of the tough love movement. NAMI’s all about we have a right to be protected from our crazy relative. Look at the aftermath of the VA Tech massacre, the loss of civil rights to protect the rest of society from the “mentally ill.” Look at Homeland Security.
As a rape survivor, I certainly don’t like the idea of victims being humiliated on the witness stand. I’m pretty sure that is less likely to happen with an accused criminal represents himself than when he has a lawyer and all accused are entitled to a trial.
However, the tough love movement is as Jennifer states a pretty terrible right wing ideology. And the two ideologies/movements converge at the point of the dreaded teen treatment centers.
Tough Love started as a hysterical anti drug movement.
Here’s a Mother Jones article about it: http://www.motherjones.com/news/feature/2007/09/how_a_cult_spawned_the_tough_love_teen_industry.html
NAMI was founded in 1979 in Madison, Wisconsin by very progressive people. It’s roots are well-meaning. In fact I know a couple of NAMI members who really are wonderful advocates. Unfortunately however, FP’s explanation of NAMI is on target. And as I posted previously, NAMI’s adopting of the biological model of mental illness reminds me of the gay rights movement adopting the gay is a gene theory, both ideas sound so humane in the beginning but they’re not.
It’s a tough world with the left embraces the biopsych model and thus is moving in a way that oppresses people with psych labels and yet, the right is anti woman.
Sally, you’re all over the map here. You read the Authoritarians yet? That should provide clarity as to what constitutes a right wing mindset, which is what we’re talking about wrt to NAMI. The link’s on my blogroll, under the Delicious heading.
My local NAMI chapter seems composed of those who are well intentioned (even heipful) and those who are on a power trip with their intentions of assistance and community warped into unrecognizable forms of petty control. When NAMI changed their name to National Alliance on Mental Illness (from national allliance for the mentally ill) they should have adopted the slogan: take your drugs and shut the hell up. and that’s a shame because dialogue that includes “the MI” is sorley needed to elucidate some very dark roads. also, wonderful blog, wonderful.
Hi! Great blog.
Study after study has shown that when nutrition is improved, prison and school behavior problems are reduced. Imagine what life will be like when when we understand and value nutrition for ourselves as much as we do for our pets – and our cars.
For a start, check out Safe Harbor
http://alternativementalhealth.com
for their great articles – especially The Extraordinary Walker Exam and an analysis of the 29 Causes of Schizophrenia.
“For a start”? Really, a start? How offensive is that? Gosh, maybe now we’ll start to cover the issues and learn how to use the google and everything.
I am glad you think this is a “great blog”, but what part of “no prescriptivism of any sort” don’t you understand?
Tip for the clueless: Ignoring the About page on a blog you praise as if to suggest familiarity with its contents only to prove you don’t get the fundamentals means yr doing it rong.
Prescriptivism is not a word.
McMan reacts to nutrition info the very same way you do.
But he does it on ideological grounds, whereas I am aesthetically offended, this being a “great blog” and all.
What’s that about not a word you say?
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/prescriptivism
i can hz dikshonary?
Shit, this is even better, via Encyc. Britannica, philosophy/ethics: (my bolds)
…the history of Western ethics from the time of the Sophists to the end of the 19th century shows three constant themes. First, there is the disagreement about whether ethical judgments are truths about the world or only reflections of the wishes of those who make them. Second, there is the attempt to show, in the face of considerable skepticism, either that it is in one’s own interest to do what is good or that, even if it is not necessarily in one’s own interest, it is the rational thing to do. And third, there is the debate about the nature of goodness and the standard of right and wrong. Since the beginning of the 20th century these themes have been developed in novel ways, and much attention has also been given to the application of ethics to practical problems. The history of ethics from 1900 to the present will be considered below under the headings metaethics, normative ethics, and applied ethics.
As mentioned earlier, metaethics deals not with the substantive content of ethical theories or moral judgments but rather with questions about their nature, such as the question whether moral judgments are objective or subjective. Among contemporary philosophers in English-speaking countries, those defending the objectivity of moral judgments have most often been intuitionists or naturalists; those taking a different view have held a variety of different positions, including subjectivism, relativism, emotivism, prescriptivism, expressivism, and projectivism.
The American philosopher Ralph Barton Perry (1876–1957), for example, argued (in his General Theory of Value [1926]) that there is no such thing as value until a being desires something, and nothing can have intrinsic value considered apart from all desiring beings. A novel, for example, has no value at all unless there is a being who desires to read it or to use it for some other purpose, such as starting a fire on a cold night. Thus, Perry was a naturalist, for he defined value in terms of the natural quality of being desired—or, as he put it, being an “object of an interest.”
In The Language of Morals (1952), the British philosopher R.M. Hare (1919–2002) supported some elements of emotivism but rejected others. He agreed that moral judgments are not primarily descriptions of anything; but neither, he said, are they simply expressions of attitudes. Instead, he suggested that moral judgments are prescriptions—that is, they are a form of imperative sentence. Hume’s rule about not deriving an “is” from an “ought” can best be explained, according to Hare, in terms of the impossibility of deriving any prescription from a set of descriptive sentences. Even the description “There is an enraged bull charging straight toward you” does not necessarily entail the prescription “Run!,” because one may have intentionally put oneself in the bull’s path as a way of committing suicide. Only the individual can choose whether the prescription fits what he wants. Herein, therefore, lies moral freedom: because the choice of prescription is individual, no one can tell another what is right or wrong.
That’s it, basically. Here.
FP, I finally found “the Authoritarians.” Certainly there is a right wing mind set that is bad, but it ain’t that one problem that’s the root of everything. It’s just a branch. NAMI, beloved of Oprah, the Kennedys, Kay Jamison, and Tipper Gore is certainly supported by those nominally on the Left. Treatment not punishment, the NAMI excuse merged with Tough Love’s punishment is treatment so that we end up back at control.
And some people are frauds, or confused, or want to get laid so they call themselves this and that but it turns out their behavior is inconsistent with the theory and principles they want to be known for. The names you trot out as representative of liberalism are not representative of liberalism and you know it. Tipper Gore founded the PMRC for fucks sake. Why you get into one strawman argument after another with people on the Internet is beyond me Sally. These disagreements are so predictable and you know, invented; there’s no there there. Hot air.
Fantastic commentary.
I did find my other self saying, “Now Steven, remember, people aren’t black-and-white and there are good people working for NAMI.” Yes, they do exist, and I know some of them. But the overall mentality of NAMI is somewhat antithetical to what many psychiatric survivors are trying to put forth. And of course, I’ve also met NAMI parents who within minutes, I could feel their intense rigidness, and geeee, I had to wonder, “Did their kids get this too?” It’s interesting to tell those people that chemical imbalances are unproven and too simple a description, and even they do exist, they cannot be separated from a person’s experiences. But overall, fuck brain disease ideology; I’m not an anti-psychiatrist, and I know that “schizophrenia” as a set of torturous mental structures actually exists, but I also know that the vast majority of people who develop it have histories of trauma and abuse. For those folks, the disease is the abuse, and now the folks carry it within their bodies. Like your George Carlin commentary suggests, let’s start cutting the bullshit and saying exactly what’s happening here…
FP, I didn’t call those folks liberal, I said they were on the left, which they are. It’s sad as the true left is far left of Tipper. Left = Liberalism (not), you know better. Gotta go restuff myself as you got my hay in a wad. Peace.
This is a great post. I agree 100+%… especially this:
“The implicit purpose of promulgating the concept of brain disease is in securing the complete dehumanization of the victim, required by abusers in order for them to justify interpersonal violence.”
Exactly. My family exactly. My mother was a NAMI group facilitator. Which is a fact, considering my family and personal narrative, that is out- and- right frightening.
What an eloquent post. You have a lot of well thought out and carefully reasoned ideas. NAMI should be outed for exactly what it is and not what it claims to be — because they are two very different things. I have too much to say, haha, so I’ll leave it there. Great post!
http://dylandimmigrantshelter.yuku.com/forums/7
Robin-sorry 2 go off topic but wanted you too know my great news-Iam helping help in a play starting in 3-4 weeks-its about disassociation–its a huge break 4 me and follow da link and you will see why-Iam hoping your cats are both healing–if thats the right way 2 put it-what-ever-its wrapped up in love-
Love Louise-xoxoxoxo
PS–Hope life is flowing good 4 you-xoxoxo
Yes my dear flowing in streams of sweat and tears in the Texas heat. I read the thread and left a note, it’s your time and you’re a natural artist. Let me know when your bits in the play are uploaded on youtube, and take care of yourself, the show must go on!
Hi Flawed,
How does insulting a visitor help you, or help the ill, or help bring down NAMI? Nutrition and proper diagnosis are good things for all, and the comment was polite. Perhaps you can’t handle people commenting.
Prescriptivism does not mean what you think it does, and anyway in the context of advancing mental health it doesn’t matter.
Nothing matters, and what if it did?
So, prescriptivism doesn’t mean what I think it does, and that’s your argument. Fail.
And if you think “being polite” is going to sway me you’re at the wrong place. Motherfucking politeness is a cause for banning. Now re-read your own comment and guess why I say that.
Robin,
I have been reading your site all day-and I am sending this to you but please don’t publish. Personally I don’t care if you do or don’t but I have a very nasty troll following me right now who I strongly think was sent by my ex. (He is pretty well known as a mental health advocate and writer too but he does it for different reasons than you and I and others do).
I am one of those people who would always find the good in something horrible. It is the one thing that keeps me from going totally off the deep end.
I have done some volunteer work with the local NAMI. I got a directive done right before I was hospitalized in October and I am grateful. They did it pro bono. I did a WRAP program they paid for.
They helped my mother years ago when she was struggling to accept my diagnosis.
That said, I’ve really hit a brick wall with them and DBSA.
Yes on the national level, but now on the local level. When I went back to my support group, (which I felt I had to because my ex started it), they DID not want to hear about my 3 month hospitalization which I almost died because of an anti depressant and a bad pdoc.
They told me to shut up. I tried to get a group of people to protest the senseless death a month or two ago of the poor woman in NYC who died in a mental hospital.
They weren’t interested, even when I said I would drive and pay for the gas and tolls.
I handed in my resignation this week, effective January 1.
They want to use it as a social club. That is a good thing, but after what I went through from March til June, it’s not me anymore.
I am considered one of the best activists in NJ, and do do a lot of good work. I know I have saved lives working on a hotline for DBSA and 1-800-Suicide.
I am going to be going into the psychiatric hospitals after Labor Day for the State DBSA for a report which we will be presenting to Gov Corzine.
I am so glad to find your site. I am really learning a lot from you.
And yes I had a paper published on women in Dickensian Lit back in school, and I love Carver. I did my thesis on him.
I hope your cat is doing better. I don’t know what I would do if I didn’t have my fuzz ball.
Sincerely,
Susan
Such a great contribution to this thread, I’d like to keep it, but will delete or edit as you see fit. Is it the ex-boyfriend? I understand, as a magnet for craxy men myself.
I could talk about NAMI all night but I’m more excited about the Ray Carver reference. So glad to meet someone with my interests, I worship Ray Carver and can use his book of essays and interviews (No Heroics, Please) as a spiritual guide. His mentor, John Gardner is another story though, one time I came thisclose to killing myself after reading The Art of Fiction, since it was clear to me I don’t have what it takes, wah. But I’m over that.
Also, can I read your thesis?
Oh my. My thesis.
One word of advice to anyone who is an English major-never ever do a thesis on a living person. Pick someone who is dead, and preferably dead at least half a century. It’s safer.
I had originally wanted to do Hardy or Joyce, but was avidly reading Carver to help me get out of the stream of consciousness from too many nights with Molly Bloom. I decided I would save Molly for the PhD. I handed in the thesis back when Carver was still alive. It was rejected for that reason. You don’t do thesis on living writers!
A year later I re submitted it to get my degree- with the NY Times Obit. It took a few more years for the department to OK it due to some nasty school politics. When I finally got my diploma I pulled a Kafka and burnt both thesis and diploma and my first novel.
Unfortunately it was typewritten so I have no copy, I destroyed the only copy. But it was based on the idea that Carver was a Romantic based on several of his poems, and short stories. I honestly believe he got the whole Romantic Spots of Time theory correct and is one of the few writers from the 20th century who got that.
And now I hav e bored all your readers….