Against Therapy [Paperback]

Jeffrey Moussaieff Masson (Author)

Product Details

• Paperback: 340 pages
• Publisher: Common Courage Press; Revised edition (June 1993)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1567510221
• ISBN-13: 978-1567510225
• Product Dimensions: 7.6 x 5 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 13.9 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (13 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,327,732 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

51 of 55 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Great insights, great criticism, important questions, December 17, 2000

By 

Vera Britto (MD USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Against Therapy (Paperback)

Against Therapy is an elaborate critique of the concept and practice of "therapy." The greatest praise, in my view, goes to the fact that Masson has in this book, along with others that he's written, denounced several very serious issues with therapeutic practices, specially the harm and abuse that are carried out against defenseless human beings in many cases to a lethal point or one that condemns a human being to a life of sanctioned torture. Using very poignant historical examples, Masson clearly shows how terrible but sanctioned diagnoses and therapeutic practices have been used to torture people into submissive roles society ascribes to them, or to make their mental health seriously deteriorate as a result of their so-called "treatment." His examples are especially focused on how a patriarchal society uses a variety of violent techniques to punish, torture, and/or make women submissive. While all his examples and points are well taken, he elaborates more on the male/female power war to the exclusion of others.

Another point of praise, is that Masson has also given a big focus to the issue of sexual abuse of children and its gross denial in society. But while he does give examples of children that were grossly mistreated, he does not elaborate on how similar structural forms of oppression that women have faced from a patriarchal society are present in society's structure regarding adults v. children. He also highlights much more male abuse of female children and ignores other forms of sexual abuse, a format that does a disservice to other victims by continuing the silence about it. We know today that the number of male children abused is immense and has been continuously overlooked. We also know that issue of girls abused by women is still at a tip of the iceberg stage. But overall, his wonderful empathy with the deeply unjust suffering of so many children, women, and men is also another poignant mark of his work.

Masson goes further than just examining and denouncing barbaric practices, all carried out in the name of science or therapy or for the good of the patient, and usually carried out with total impunity, and he takes the next important step to ask if the fundamental premises and model of psychoanalysis, psychiatry, and psycotherapy are not where the roots of such a vast and disturbing problem lie. This is a tremendously important question to ask and he does a fine job in elaborating on various intrinsic power, greed, corruption, and oppressive social structure issues involved in making therapy relationships harmful. It's not only on the greatly abusive relationships level that he asks these questions, but also regarding how the very notion of "the therapist:" falsely constructed as one person who knows it all, who is "sane, without any problems," who is "adult," who is "ethical," v. the "patient" construct of being "crazy," more infantile, therefore incapable of knowing anything (specially about him or herself), or whose external reality where the root of many problems may lie is readily dismissed and the patient and the patient's internal world blamed for any and all suffering, problems, etc. Masson zeroes in to critique definitions of who is "crazy," and what is considered "crazy," and who has the power to create such definitions and stigmatize and torture people with them.

Masson also does a great job in describing how corrupt and collusive mental health institutions (and academia) are, a problem hardly ever tackled specially in the public light. His related book "Final Analysis" does a great job of exposing the corrupt psychoanalytic industry and further buttresses his points in "Against Therapy."

I disagree with his conclusion that all forms of therapy are to be thrown out the window as a solution to the mass scale abuse, lack of accountability, or quality in therapeutic practices. What are the people in need of help supposed to do? Who do they turn to? Masson's answer to "just have better friends" is really impractical and highly demeaning to millions of people facing serious problems. However, given that the mental health industry is so corrupt in terms of ethics and controlling even mild forms of incompetence, plus the greed and stupidity, or in seriously addressing in public any of these issues, even his drastic proposed solution is refreshing to read. It's inspiring to see his courage in breaking the collusive silence that so many academics and professionals prefer to engage in. I highly recommend his books for anyone in general, but specially for people considering or engaged in therapy or in becoming therapists, or those interested in having a less corrupt and abusive society.

26 of 32 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Review of "Against Therapy", December 17, 2005

By 

A reader (London, GB) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Against Therapy (Paperback)

The basic argument of this book is that psychotherapy is wrong and should be abolished. Any thesis can be legitimately supported, provided that the arguments used are logical. Unfortunately, this book is a bizarre patchwork of unrelated facts and illogical arguments. It reads like an angry statement "against", with no constructive goal in sight.

Masson sees abuse and injustice everywhere in psychotherapy. In his description of psychotherapy, the author is like somebody who is looking at the world through a pair of glasses that filter out all colours, except for the black. Seeing only shades of black in the world, he complains of how awful and oppressive this view is. And it certainly is, because he set himself up for this experience from the very beginning. Adopting his viewpoint, one could say exactly the same about most aspects of life, for example school, family, work, the judicial system, the political system. And is the solution to just dismantle all these institutions, like the author suggests to do with psychotherapy? One quickly realises how far removed from reality this proposition is.

Masson states that psychotherapy is inherently bad. This statement raises a number of questions: Can emotional distress be studied? Can it be managed? Can people help one another, and how? These are very interesting questions, but unfortunately Masson doesn't seem interested in them. He simply states that psychotherapy should cease to exist. "It can and should be replaced by open and searching criticism of the very foundation of our society" (p.295) This is such an idealistic statement. Is this all he would suggest to somebody who is looking for help? The only attempt he makes to offer a practical idea is about "self-help groups that are leaderless and avoid authoritarian structures, in which no money is exchanged, that are not grounded on religious principles [...], and in which all participants have experienced the problem they come to discuss". When this is all he has to offer in a book of 300 pages, you quickly realise that his work lacks a constructive intent.

Another problem with the book is that Masson's highly biased approach when describing different orientations to therapy makes his work lack credibility. For example, the chapter on Gestalt consists of a series of judgments about Fritz Perls as a person; only a few words are spent on his method. Reading the section on Ericksonian hypnotherapy, you have the impression that Masson skimmed through various books about Erickson, found some case histories that shocked him, and that he cut and pasted portions of such case histories into his book. This is a very poor representation of the Ericksonian approach. Such lack of objectivity discredits Masson's work. Not knowing anything about some of the therapists described in the book, I am inclined to think that Masson has misrepresented them just as much as he has misrepresented Erickson, and therefore the credibility of the whole book drops low.

However, I believe that there is some good to be found in "Against therapy". Even if its main contention is unreasonable and poorly supported, the fact that Masson's ideas are so extreme provokes the reader into taking a stand and making her/his own judgment about what is right, what is wrong and what you're not sure of.

One other important theme underlying most of the book's arguments is that psychotherapy reflects and expresses the social and political environment where therapy lies. However Masson does not attempt to develop this theme. People like Wilhelm Reich have written extensively about the social and political implications of therapy. The book makes no mention of these writings, which is a huge omission.

It would have made more justice to its work if Masson had titled the book something like "Abuses and violence in psychotherapy and psychiatry." If you are looking for examples of such situations, the book offers interesting materials and is food for thought. If you are looking for an objective and logical discussion of psychotherapy, look elsewhere.

18 of 22 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Brings up crucial issues, but is too superficial, October 12, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Against Therapy (Paperback)

Finally! Someone actually writes about the fact that therapy does not work much of the time, and that many therapists just cannot do therapy (many are too screwed up themselves). With that said, however, Masson, unfortunately, is very Angry throughout this book; he is just not distanced enough in many of the chapters. I suspect that he is upset that he had to leave his "chosen career".In addition, he is too superficial about many of the points he raises; there doesn't seem to be much analysis. He just states his opinion; and that's about it. This is a true shame. He raises an important issue; there is a real need for someone to write a good, deep analysis about why therapy doesn't work for so many people, why so many therapists are disturbed themselves, and where consumers who are suffering mentally can seek real help.