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Madness, Heresy, and the Rumor of Angels: The Revolt Against the Mental Health System

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If you have ever seen any of Albrecht Durer's woodcuts on the Apocalypse or have read the works of Swedenborg and can relate to the central figures, then perhaps this book is one you might find helpful. If you have experienced what is colloquially called "madness" or frequently undergo mystical experiences which a doctor has told you constitute a psychotic disorder, then I believe that reading this book may be profitable to you. The book relates several tales of individuals and their experience with the mental health establishment. The book is written from an "anti-psychiatry" perspective and includes commentary by Seth Farber and Thomas Szasz (famous libertarian) on the dangers of the mental health system, the harm it has done to many sensitive souls, and the psychiatric survivor's organizations and mental health liberation leagues which have fought coercive treatment. (I generally tend to be somewhat sympathetic to the point of view of the author, although I'm not sure that it would hold true for all individuals and I do believe that medicines and drugs can sometimes be helpful. Afterall, it is very painful to be truly "awake", wakefulness takes energy and thus drains the body, so if you are fully awake all the time you probably will need a medication to sedate you.) If you have ever experienced hallucinations, paranoia, or delusions, and believed they have been improperly handled by a psychiatrist or in a mental health facility then perhaps you can recognize some of what is discussed in this book. My personal experience is this. I went to a very select and intensive math and science academy for undergraduate school and many individuals and friends of mine underwent severe crises and breakdowns as a result of the stress. I have undergone several breakdowns myself or existential crises and have had my fair share of otherwise "mystical experiences". I believe that this sort of thing is not adequately understood by modern science which is biased in a materialistic, scientistic manner. In particular, for example, I believe that the soul can be severed from the body and the body can become a mere "puppet" or "robot" during extreme stress. A psychiatrist has described this experience as "psychotic"; however, a quick perusal of most ancient religious sources will show it to be a fairly common one. If you have these sorts of experiences, believe you have ESP for example, or feel that you can communicate with angels, that the television may speak directly to you, or that God talks to you, then you are not "abnormal" as a psychiatrist or mainstream society may say. Rather, you may merely be a particularly sensitive individual who picks up cues from his environment and perhaps has access to higher levels of being, other dimensions (read for example the book _Flatland_ by Edwin Abbot), or even parallel universes. I believe that the brain is like an antenna that can be tuned to different radio stations (a spike on the energy graph which is "you") and may occassionally pick up some static. Unlike the author however, I disagree with him about the role of psychiatric medications. While it is true that many of these medications do have certain harmful side effects they can be helpful in certain ways. For example, speaking for myself I know that without the drug depakote I am nervous as a cat, paranoid, believe that people are talking about me, have ideas of reference, cannot sleep, do not want to eat, and sometimes cannot even leave the house. With it I have the side effect of cotton mouth and feel sluggish, but otherwise I believe the drug does calm my nerves. So in this sense I feel it may be good for me, despite its long term side effects (a chance I am willing to take, for the peace of mind it seems to offer me now). The choice of course is entirely up to you as far as medications go and they do not work for all people. Otherwise, this book offers an excellent opportunity to examine the role of mystical experience in the lives of those deemed mentally ill and looks at some individuals who are at the higher functioning level of mental illness. Mental illness I believe may ultimately be a disease of civilization. The pressures of social conformity work their way into the minds of people and ultimately cause them to undergo breakdowns, breakthroughs, or transformations. Afterall, civilization has certain cracks.

Also of interest: If you are interested I suggest you consult the book _Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind_ by the late Professor Julian Jaynes, which is one of the most mind-shattering books I have ever read in explaining consciousness.

This book brilliantly illustrates the ethical and moral dangers of biological reductionism. The mental health system has adopted a philosophy of biological reductionism. They see human beings as clockwork oranges. They consider the psyche to be an outdated myth. They don't consider psychotherapy to be a valid treatment option for any form of emotional distress. They don't even subscribe to basic psychology anymore. The mental health system has reduced all forms of human behavior to brain chemistry and they define mental illness as a chemical imbalance in the brain which MUST be treated with drug therapy. The mental health system has become a mindless, soulless menace to humanity. Mindless because they are anti-intellectual and soulless because they have no respect for spirituality.

I was intrigued by a vague hint of "intimations of a spiritual reality" mentioned in the blurb but the book does not elaborate on that topic.

I would also recommend the play "Equus" by Peter Shaffer, a now forgotten critique of psychiatry and the threat it poses to spirituality and our humanity.

This work is a relatively easy-to-read, liberating exploration of what it means to be human in the fullest sense -- outside of the catastrophic, life-killing employment of psychiatry, mental wards, and psychotropic drugs.

Had Seth Farber written such a book for me to read when I was young, as are many of the "lunatics, lovers and poets" described in Part I of this book, I might have been able to be more self-reliant more quickly and to be far less trusting of these so-called "doctors of the psyche" who thwart spiritual and psychological growth by drugging and institutionalizing these people they call "patients," people, whom the author vividly shows, are under tremendous stress but who also are only having problems living life successfully and on their own terms. Thus, with this book, I might, as a young gay man, have avoided a whole world of hurt and saved huge sums of money paying fees for thousands of wasteful, 50-minute hours (because homosexuality (in my day) was regarded as a psychiatric illness, an utterly warped and criminal deviancy, requiring brainwashing techniques and shock treatments). I highly recommend this book to young people especially, although it's a book that is beneficial to everyone.

The Foreword is written by Thomas Szasz and in it there's a bit of cautionary advice: be responsible for your choice to "seek help" via psychiatry, psychotherapy or medication. Most of the drama (and harm) in the stories found in Part I have to do people being too trusting of psychiatrists and the psychiatric institutions they work in, once they found themselves emotionally troubled or experiencing unusual states of mind.

In Part II, "Heretics, Apostates, and Infidels," especially the two large interviews Seth Farber conducts with Ron Leifer, a psychiatrist who was a student of Thomas Szasz, directly address the harm deliberately done to individuals who are seeking to understand their inner confusion and turmoil.

Part II can also be read as an attempt at self-help as well. Perhaps suprisingly to some, and wholly unsurprising to others, becoming adept and skillful at not irritating others and learning when to shut up just might save you a trip to the looney-bin -- or getting pushed into one by your parents, your siblings or your lover!

With Part III,"Revolt Against the System," there's another interview conducted in 1991 by Seth Farber, although much more extended and more narrow in range. It is a discussion with Leonard Frank who co-founded an organization known as the Network Against Psychiatric Assault and is the editor of "The History of Shock Treatment." Largely, the subject under discussion between Farber and Frank is electro-convulsive treatment or electric shock "therapy." The sad irony of the interview shows up in the fact that while Leonard made huge efforts to get rid of such a barbaric and harmful "treatment," Frank's "revolt against the system," Langley-Porter Institute in San Francisco, where Leonard Frank himself lives, still employs this primitive procedure to this very day. In fact, a close friend of mine underwent ECT at Langley-Porter and came out a completely altered individual, a stranger to me and a stranger with fewer memories of himself as well.

Underneath all the interviews, discussions, and other small essays found within the book, the reader can hear the author unmistakably argue the positive, creative and spiritual aspects and impetus of manic-depression, schizophrenia, and other altered states of consciousness the psychoanalytic/psychiatric institutions want to label as "mental illness." In the first Appendix, there is a wonderful list of books to be read for "revolters," including spiritual writers such as Solovyov ("The Meaning of Love"), Rabbi Heschel ("The Prophets: An Introduction") and Sri Aurobindo ("The Essential Aurobindo"), a list that also includes the standard rebels or revolters against the psychiatric system, R.D. Laing, Peter Breggin, and Thomas Szasz.

Although Robert Robbins makes insightful comments about psychiatry in his review,his comments would lead someone who read MHRA to conclude that he did not read (or not read very carefully) the book he is ostensibly commenting upon. The focus of Madness, Heresy and the Rumor of Angels is not biological reductionism--which has become the well-deserved target of many authors--most prominently Dr Peter Breggin. But Farber's focus is reductionism in the broader sense--that is, the refusal to recognize--in fact the determination to suppress--the spiritual dimension of human existence. Thus what lies outside the ordinary schemata that determines consensually-validated "reality" (or one might say the consensually validated delusional system) is "reduced" by mental health professionals to pathology, to "mental illness." The (true) stories of "schizophrenics" in this book reveal that "schizophrenia" is not only a breakdown but also a breakthrough (as R D Laing said long ago) to the realm of the extra-ordinary.This book, contrary to Robbins, does indeed elaborate on the idea of a spiritual dimension. Like Laing, Farber attributes the typical unhappy outcome IN OUR SOCIETY of the schizophrenic experience --to the practices of the mental death system--to sins of commission--e.g. zombifying "anti-psychotic medication" and degrading psychiatric labeling, i.e. "diagnosis") and perhaps more importantly the the primary sin of omission
--- the failure of "mental health professionals" to act--as they would if they were genuinely committed to helping their fellow human beings-- as companions (not as jailers and judges) to persons who are typically lost and frightened, having found themselves thrown into the unfamiliar spiritual domain of life.
While the spiritual world --alien to the age of "reason" as Max Weber pointed out--is being re-discovered lately in various circles (eg "new age"), in the mental health system it is still regarded as pathology to be stamped out--along alas with the "patient."