Anti-psychiatry

Deinstitulization I this essay I will be talking about deinstitutlization of people with mental illness that took place in the United States in the 1960’s, and also talk about causes of this movement and its consequences. First I will talk about what Deinstitulization means, the definition for it is “Deinstitutionalization was a government policy that moved mental health patients out of state-run "insane asylums" into federally-funded community mental health centers. It began in the 1960s as a…

“It Runs in the Family” by Siddhartha Mukherjee chronicles the author’s research and own personal experiences with mental illness, particularly schizophrenia which runs in his family. While Siddhartha does not exhibit any signs of the disease himself at least none that he discloses to the reader, he has witnessed the debilitating effects of the disease through his uncles Rajesh and Jagu and also his cousin Moni. Perhaps such close familial contact with the disease stimulated the authors interest…

T yler Durden, Raymond Babbitt and Arnie Grape. If our blockbuster and critically acclaimed movies such as Fight Club, Rain Man and What’s Eating Gilbert Grape can understand and accurately portray characters with mental health problems, then isn’t it time that society caught up? “Ahh I’m so depressed”, “you must be crazy”, “she’s a psycho”… if you are guilty of using any of these phrases, then are you aware of the facts behind your words? In an age where mental illnesses are becoming…

Finally, months have passed since our media have published a chilling inside story of the life in the Sonoma County jail (Main Adult Detention Facility) that remained unsolved by experts for years. The most important subject publicized from this magnificent source, was that this immoral county jail has lacked the quality of serious attention for prisoners with mental health disabilities. There are mental health resources in the Sonoma County jail. These programs are available for ordinary…

The sleep-walking scene is not mentioned in Holinshed and it must therefore be looked upon as an original effort of Shakespeare's creative imagination. Lady Macbeth had none of the usual phenomena of sleep, but she did show with a startling degree of accuracy all the symptoms of hysterical somnambulism. Somnambulism is not sleep, but a special mental state arising out of sleep through a definite mechanism. The sleep-walking scene is a perfectly logical outcome of the previous mental state. From…

With “Defining Mental Disability”, Margaret Price explores the complications with bringing order to the titles and beliefs used to define the realm of disabilities considered mental. For one, there is the issue of what terms are appropriate to label mental disorders. Price points out the trouble that comes from singularly identifying a very diverse group of conditions, as well as the differences in connotations found from region to region (298-299). Then there is the problem of how to perceive…

In the recent fictional movie Split, that came out January 2017, the main character suffers from DID with 23 distinct personalities (James, 2017). Split, has gotten the attention of many health professionals and their patients who suffer from DID (James, 2017). While there is truth in the movie, health professionals say that Split got some things wrong regarding DID. According to a report by CNN, one mental health professional received a letter from a patient (suffering from DID) who had seen…

During her journey through depression, a recorded history on her brother would allow Clink to deal with her depression, which seemingly controls any aspect of her life. For instance, depression seeming controls Clink in her comparison of the future being “erased, replaced with a dark gray fog of uncertainty, and we clung to the few things we could control” (17). Clearly, Clink feels a sense of sadness in this instance in which the comparison she uses depicts how depression seemingly controls her…

Drills, Pills, and Ginger-Nuts “Bartleby, the Scrivener” by Herman Melville and “The Fall of the House of Usher” by Edgar Allen Poe both use isolated characters in a main role. These stories deal with how the isolation of man leads to the death of humanity. Herman Melville was a writer during the 1850s American Renaissance. His father showed symptoms of mental illness and suffered delusions until his death, while Melville was still a young boy. Melville was successful with some of his first…

In the case of Andrea Yates, she is a Christian, home-schooling teacher who committed filicide on June 20, 2001. She took the kids in, one by one, into the bathroom of her home and drowned them. After killing the five children, she confessed her crimes to 911 dispatchers. When news of the story came to the public, it came as a surprise to those who only thought of her as one who could do no evil. In the perspective of others, this sin created a basis for judgment and questioning everything she…