Stanislaus County Radical Mental Health

What is “radical” mental health?

2012-02-05T21:20:00.000-08:00

Taking care of each other is a radical act. In the mental health profession, the help is one-sided and the main reward for the helper is monetary. For us to help one another is so completely devoid of monetary value, but so very full of personal and spiritual growth and worth. Nothing can take away our ability for community support, but one paycut could take us away from our therapists.

So, what is radical mental health? It is a number of things.

Radical mental health means conceiving of, and engaging with, “mental health” and “mental illness” from a new perspective. There are many ways to understand our emotional states, flows, and differences, and there is a rich tradition of groups and individuals that have been exploring the boundaries of these experiences for many years. What follows is a list of key principles that we find woven through this diverse movement; it is not intended to be exhaustive or universal, but more to offer an overall sense of who we are, what we do, and why.

Radical mental health is about grass-roots and diversity. For so long, our psychic differences have been defined by authority figures intent on fitting us into narrow versions of “normality.” Radical mental health is a dynamic, creative term; one which empowers us to come up with our own understandings for how our psyches, souls, and hearts experience the world, rather than pour them into conventional medical frameworks. For example, the Icarus Project understands people’s capacities for altered states as, “dangerous gifts” to be cultivated and taken care of, rather than a disease or disorder to be cured or eliminated. Indeed, by joining together as a community, they believe that, “the intertwined threads of madness and creativity can inspire hope and transformation in a repressed and damaged world.” It follows that any realistic approach to well-being has to begin by accepting and valuing diversity. There is no single model for a “healthy mind,” no matter how many years of drug treatment, schooling, or behavior modification programs we’ve been put through. And without differences, there can be no movement.

Radical mental health is about interconnectedness. While mainstream conceptions of mental health and illness by-and-large reduce people’s experiences into brain chemicals or personal histories, radical mental health sees human experience as a holistic convergence of social, emotional, cultural, physical, spiritual, historical, and environmental elements. This interconnectedness also spirals outwards with the idea that we all share this planet together — humans, animals, insects, and plants — what happens in one world affects all other worlds. We don’t have to see ourselves as separate beings, but rather in terms of relationships: a part of myself “overlaps” with a part of you; if you’re hurt I can be hurt too. No matter how alienated we are by the world around us, no matter how out-of-step, depressed, and disconnected we might feel, We Are Not Alone. Our lives are supported by the lives of countless other beings, from the microbes in our eyelashes to the people who plant our strawberries. The world is so much more complicated and beautiful than it appears on the surface. A premise of radical mental health then, is not only that we are not left to deal with everything on our own, but that things that support our well-being can come in many different forms (they do not just have to be psychological or pharmaceutical.)

The growth and strength of individuals and communities comes from our interconnectedness – we struggle and celebrate together, always.

Radical mental health is about emotional/embodied expertise. Although careful to not overly romanticize suffering or different mental states (obviously, some can be very painful and disruptive, or even fatal) we see the beauty and expertise in all of our feelings. Radical mental health is about survival – not “survival of the fittest” or survival through teeth-gritting, but survival through chaos and exploration. It means observing how others support themselves – things which might seem self-destructive from afar – with compassion and understanding. Radical mental health is about opening up doors for conversation; about taking shame out of the equation. It is not about trying to fit into narrow definitions of “normal,” which are always wrong anyway, because every culture, every group, every place might have its own normal. Radical mental health is about using your lifetime to learn about yourself, your loved ones, and strangers too, and envisioning and moving towards societies and ways of living which better support us all. It is about making worlds that recognize “breaking down” as a meaningful, important, part of life, that must be attended to, tended to, and not necessarily fended off. Radical mental health is about listening to and learning from the expertise of our feelings and bodies.

Radical mental health is about new languages and cultures. Language is powerful. It can open the world up like sunrise and it can block out the sky like prison walls. We have other people’s language in our heads and on our tongues. The medical authorities offer us all kinds of words to talk about ourselves and the troubles we have, like “depression” and “psychosis.” Sometimes these words help us look back on our lives with a new way of understanding what was going on, but too often these words end up putting us in sad, separate boxes where we feel like there’s something wrong with us and we can’t connect to anyone else. Words like “disorder” and “disease” offer us one set of metaphors for understanding the way we experience our lives through our unique minds and souls, but it is such a limited view. We think in language, constantly filtering all our perceptions through the available structures of words and metaphors in our brain — in many senses the available metaphors create our reality. If we can change the metaphors that shape our minds, we can change the reality around us. We need to get together and find language for our stories that make sense to us; to unlearn social conditioning about what it means to be “sick” and “healthy.” We should feel empowered to create words that better reflect our personal experiences. Some of us have reclaimed the term “mad” or “madness” as no longer negative, but rather, as a proud statement of survival.

Radical mental health is about challenging the dominance of biopsychiatry. The biomedical model of psychiatry, or “biopsychiatry,” rests on the belief that mental health issues are the result of chemical imbalances in the brain. It is an idea that is wrapped up in the same ideology of the marketplace that has cut our social safety nets and fragmented our communities — that is, that the problems and solutions of our lives are located solely in the individual. More and more, the belief that our dis-ease is in our brains has desensitized us to the idea that our feelings and experiences often have their roots in social and political issues. If we are going to do anything to change the mental health system (along with the decaying economic system!) we need to begin by simply acknowledging how fundamentally flawed the current, medicalized model is –- how it privileges “specialists,” “professionals,” and “scientists” in such a way that can undermine the expertise of personal experiences, local communities, and alternative models of well-being. In addition, a clearer distinction must be drawn between the usefulness of some modern psychiatric drugs for some people at some times, and the biopsychiatric program that shrinks our minds into brains, and our feelings into chemical reactions. Above all, radical mental health urges us to talk publicly about the relationship between social and economic injustice, the pharmaceutical industry, and our psychic well-being. As such, it is about redefining what it actually means to be “mentally healthy” not just on an individual level, but on community and global levels.

Radical mental health is about options. Some may assume that radical mental health is simply “anti-psychiatry.” However, most of us take far more complicated, diverse, and nuanced viewpoints. Radical mental health may mean accepting some of the things that mainstream, medicalized models suggest for our well-being, while discarding some of the things we may not find useful, helpful, or positive. In practice, this means supporting people’s self-determination for personal, ongoing decision-making, including whether to take psychiatric drugs or not, and whether to use diagnostic categories or not. Importantly, this support is done with an acknowledgement that the pressure to make more medicalized choices is significant in our society, and as such that these carry considerably more influence than, and often shout over, alternatives. In addition, while medical tools may sometimes be useful in the short-term, some diagnoses turn our experiences into chronic incurable sickness, and their treatments come with their own problems that cannot be ignored. As such, radical mental health often includes taking a “harm-reduction” approach (promoting strategies to reduce harmful consequences) with regard to people’s use of psychiatric diagnoses and drugs. Radical alternatives to mainstream approaches celebrate multiple options and diverse forms of expertise. They value, for example, peer support, listening, dialogue, mutual aid, activism, counseling, spirituality, creative activity, community engagement, politicization, and access to more marginalized healing methods.

Radical mental health is about politics and social justice. Radical mental health understands how the tools of psychiatric intervention are embedded in broader relations of power. People in power benefit from controlling and silencing how our psyches/bodies/souls speak about an unjust world. They also see these tools as part of a powerful, global medico-industrial complex that profits from framing our experiences as chronic illnesses that require lifelong treatment. Participating in radical mental health activism might include denouncing how the pharmaceutical industry gains from creating new diagnostic categories, and agitating on major scales for changes among mental health institutions, professionals, government policies, and insurance companies. A radical mental health lens could also mean looking at the history of psychology with a skeptical eye; researching how definitions of madness vary across time and space, and as such are socially-produced and have political (as well as personal) consequences. For example, the psychiatric establishment has a history of diagnosing entire groups of people who were queer, black, women, poor, gender-variant and/or trans, sick and abnormal, therefore justifying forms of violence and exclusion that maintained the dominance of whiteness, patriarchy, and heternormativity.

>Radical mental health then, is about returning the pathologizing gaze to our crazy-making world. Our struggles for mad justice intersect with others challenging oppressive social relations, including anti-racist, feminist, queer, decolonization, disability, anti-war, decarceration, anti-corporate, public education, and other grassroots community movements.

Radical mental health is about questioning and imagination. Radical mental health questions authorities and critiques accepted knowledge. It draws attention to the ways that diagnostic categories and treatment regimes can be based on assumptions about science and expertise that deny the subjective and political nature of all knowledges, especially those that are embedded in a powerful social and corporate structures that have a vested interest in pushing illness models of madness. Radical mental health, then, might mean critiquing some of the assumptions underpinning mainstream approaches to our psyches. For example, the concept that being a “productive member of society” means the production of certain goods, or of performing certain types of jobs, even though these may serve our unjust economic structure, over individual or community well-being.

In addition, radical mental health is about imagining what could be. Our psychic experiences are seen as an important source of desire and possibility; a (sometimes distressing, sometimes delightful) place of learning and revolution that can be squashed or hardened when approached solely through a medical lens of fear, risk, or danger.

We need to reclaim our dreams and scheme up ways to make them happen. We need to share everything we’ve figured out about how to be a human being. We need to love ourselves as we are — crooked and intense, powerful and frightening, unruly and prone to mess around in the dirt — and understand that weeds are simply plants who refuse to be domesticated and displayed. We need to write new maps of the universes we share in common and find ways to heal together.

Radical mental health is about working within, and without, the bigger mental health systems. Radical mental health activists have a diversity of perspectives towards hospitalization, medication, and diagnoses. Most of us are not dogmatic about these issues, although we make a critical distinction between an individual’s informed consent and a critique of the psychiatric establishment and the pharmaceutical industry. Perhaps the most radical aspect of radical mental health has to do with questioning authority and the production of knowledge. We challenge the exclusive voice of formal expertise, and demand that our stories and experiences be considered alongside the voices of professional mental health service providers, profiteers, and institutions. Along with the disability rights movement, we insist: Nothing about us without us.

We recognize that there are many people who work in mainstream mental health settings who are deeply committed to anti-oppressive practices, who are end-users of mental health care, who are traumatized by working in profoundly unjust and under-resourced systems, and who aim to share hope and support with the people most victimized by those systems. As such, while being in some ways “cogs” in a highly flawed system, they (we) are also allies in any systemic change. We need each other. For radical shifts to a monstrous, complex structure can only occur through dialogue and movement across multiple forms, people, and sites.

- Put together by Mindful Liberation Project: http://mindfulliberation.wordpress.com/

Nation Wide Peer Support Crises Line (for emotional support)

2012-01-06T23:13:00.000-08:00

RVA Peer Support Crisis Line
(804) 631-3134
24 hours a day / 7 days a week
Anonymous & confidential support in times of emotional crisis

From the wonderful folks at Mindful Liberation Project: http://mindfulliberation.wordpress.com/

SCRMH is Tabling at Modesto Junior College

2011-10-25T22:36:00.000-07:00

What: Feminist & Religion in the 21'st Century Presentation

When: Tues. Nov. 8th 2011

Where: Modesto Junior College West Campus (off Bluegum & Carpenter) in Sierra Hall # 137, Modesto Ca

Time: 6-9pm (between 7:30 & 8:30 will be an hour to "meet & greet" everyone)

Brought to you by: World of Women is a collective of individuals interested in creating a safe place to support and empower mothers, sisters and daughters. We will celebrate and shar

e global indigenous wisdom, renew the bonds of sisterhood and work for our common future.

We will collaborate to promote social, political, economical and educational opportunities and enhance physical, emotional and spiritual wellness through support group, peer-mentoring, book club, workshops, teach-ins and more.We will resist the modern misogyny and militarization while spreading hope and courage to those neglected and abused by power-fools as we work with grass root organizations to create and support a respectful community.

6 points: Activism and Empowerment

· Economic

o Employment opportunities, Equal Pay, Workplace harassment and Glass ceiling

o Exercise the purchasing power of women

o Promoting smart, eco-friendly, and socially responsible consumption

o Support and Promote women-owned and operated businesses

o Encourage and sustain feminist art and women artists

· Educational

o Mentoring and peer to peer support

o Introduce and host feminist leaders and role models

o Tutoring- Basic Skills

o Pen- pal relation with women in local prison

o Book club/ Study group- Global feminism by indigenous feminist writers and author

· Technological

o Strategic creation and use of technology by women

o On- line social networking, blog, and more

o Teach-in, Work shop, Speakers, Seminars, panel discussion

o Engage in dialogue with the feminists of the Global South

· Political

o Grass root organizing

o Public speaking, Voter registration, Phone banking, Letter writing, and more

o Engage and participate in political processes and elections

o Place progressive women’s issues on political agendas

o Addressing Militarization and the culture of violence and domination

· Social

o Support at-risk girls, young and aging women and women with disabilities

o Advocate for the rights of immigrant women

o Identify and address various forms of misogyny

o Collaboration with local grass root community organization

o Net work with state, national, regional and global feminist groups

· Physical and Emotional

o Promotes mental and emotional health caused by gender-based violence and abuse

o Provide a safe zone for women’s support groups

o Positive and healthy self-image and self-esteem

o Address women’s Health Issues including Reproductive, Life stages and Aging

o Safe and affordable place for physical activities

Stanislaus County Radical Mental Health tabling Unity Fest.

2011-08-15T22:07:00.000-07:00

This event was created with the purpose of reaching-out to and uniting young Chican@s in the Central Valley who may become, or are involved with gangs. We aim to enlighten young gang members as to who the real enemy is, because it is definitely NOT each other. We will also be discussing the following issues affecting our communities: Police brutality/ICE raids/prison industrial complex, environmental racism/classism (pollution in our communities), learning our REAL history and culture that is not taught in schools, fighting for liberation and Self-determination for our people.

Musical Performances by: Shining Soul (PHX), Sacrifice (LA), Mentes Diferentes (Sac), Cobalt & Nikfuq (Modesto), Sont Himself (Modesto), Tha Thurd & Looney209 (Merced), DJ 5on5 (Modesto) and more to be announced…

Guest Speakers will include: Tomas Alejo (Watsonville Brown Berets), Nane Alejandrez (Barrios Unidos), Xicano Vince (Brown Berets de Aztlan), Angie Abeyta (former gang member), Gerald Smith (New York Black Panthers), Emiliano Mataka (Grayson Neighborhood Council/Green Action), and more to be announced…

Groups and Organizations tabling: Brown Berets, Modesto CopWatch, Black Berets, Modesto Anarcho, Green Action, Stanislaus County Radical Mental Health, and more to be announced…

Also featuring: Danza Azteca, Graffiti Walls, Know Your Rights/Know Your History workshops, Legal/Immigration Resources, Breakdancers, raffle prizes, food, bounce house for kids, and more to be announced…

When: Saturday, September 10th 2011

Where: Costa Alegre Carniceria Parking Lot

1238 Crows Landing Rd.

Modesto, CA

Time: 12:00pm - 6:00pm

FREE ENTRY!

Caught on tape: Police beat and taser 'gentle' "mentally-ill" homeless man to death July 5th 2011

2011-07-27T17:44:00.000-07:00

A shocking video has been released allegedly showing police officers tasering and beating a homeless man to death who they claim was resisting arrest.

Though the video is not clear, eye witnesses say the homeless man - Kelly Thomas, 37 - was unable to put up any resistance and was lying on the ground on his front when the attack took place on July 5.

His screams and cries for his father can be heard amid the tasering noises.

The video was shot by a student in Fullerton, California. Kelly Thomas was beaten so badly he died in hospital several days later.

According to Gawker, Thomas - who suffered from schizophrenia - caught the attention of the police after someone reported that a burglar was breaking into cars parked near a Fullerton bus station.

When officers approached Thomas in the depot parking lot and tried to arrest him, he resisted

After that reports diverge.

Police will not issue a statement saying the issue is under investigation but they did say that six officers were involved and two 'suffered broken bones in the fight'.

However, they recently retracted that statement saying that it was only 'soft tissue damage'.

Eye witnesses at the scene claim the six officers tasered him five times and beat him beyond recognition, which the disturbing photo of him in hospital shows.

Mark Turgeon, who was there, said: 'They kept beating him and tasering him. I could hear zapping, and he wasn't even moving.

'He had one arm in front of him like this, he wasn't resisting. And they kept telling him, "He's resisting, quit resisting", and he wasn't resisting.'

Many members of the Fullerton community described Thomas as a passive, peaceful person.

'The only thing we have left of our son is the blood in the gutter, that's all we have left'

On the website Fullerton Stories, several people have shared their experiences interacting with Thomas, describing him as 'very quiet and polite', 'gentle and childlike', 'sweet', and 'never a threat'.

Thomas has a previous conviction for assault with a deadly weapon 16 years ago, according to Gawker, which has been attributed to the onset of his illness.

Since his death, his family and members of the community have held protests outside the police department headquarters, looking for answers.

Two officers were suspended shortly after the attack but police will not confirm if it was related to the 37-year-old's death.

Speaking about his son's death, Thomas's dad, Ron Thomas, a former sheriff's deputy, said: 'His death was gang-involved, the way I see it. A gang of rogue officers who brutally beat my son to death.'

He said he now feels ashamed for having ever been a law enforcement officer.

He has been in the area his son was attacked handing out flyers and asking people for help.

He said: 'The only thing we have left of our son is the blood in the gutter, that's all we have left.'

Local city council member Bruce Whitaker has called for a 'clear, factual and complete explanation of events which led to the death of Kelly J. Thomas.'

He also wants the D.A. to release a police video that apparently shows the actual beating taking place.

Fullerton police Sgt Andrew Goodrich said that Thomas began to fight officers as they tried to search him.

He said: 'We don't know why he was so combative and resistant to the officers, but it took upwards of five to six officers to subdue him.

'Sometimes when we take people into custody who don't want to go into custody, we have to use force. It is never the preferred way of doing things.'

He said police are conducting an internal investigation into the officers' actions and the District Attorney's Office is conducting a criminal investigation.

The DA's office said they cannot comment on details of cases until they are completed.

Source: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2019225/Police-beat-taser-gentle-mentally-ill-homeless-man-Kelly-Thomas-37-death.html#ixzz1TMSruVSl

Video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=1ljYNgLnpxM

Great new article from Al Jeezera - Mass Psychosis in the U.S.!

2011-07-21T13:15:00.000-07:00

How Big Pharma got Americans hooked on anti-psychotic drugs.

James Ridgeway Last Modified: 12 Jul 2011 06:20

Has America become a nation of psychotics? You would certainly think so, based on the explosion in the use of antipsychotic medications. In 2008, with over $14 billion in sales, antipsychotics became the single top-selling therapeutic class of prescription drugs in the United States, surpassing drugs used to treat high cholesterol and acid reflux.

Once upon a time, antipsychotics were reserved for a relatively small number of patients with hard-core psychiatric diagnoses - primarily schizophrenia and bipolar disorder - to treat such symptoms as delusions, hallucinations, or formal thought disorder. Today, it seems, everyone is taking antipsychotics. Parents are told that their unruly kids are in fact bipolar, and in need of anti-psychotics, while old people with dementia are dosed, in large numbers, with drugs once reserved largely for schizophrenics. Americans with symptoms ranging from chronic depression to anxiety to insomnia are now being prescribed anti-psychotics at rates that seem to indicate a national mass psychosis.

It is anything but a coincidence that the explosion in antipsychotic use coincides with the pharmaceutical industry's development of a new class of medications known as "atypical antipsychotics." Beginning with Zyprexa, Risperdal, and Seroquel in the 1990s, followed by Abilify in the early 2000s, these drugs were touted as being more effective than older antipsychotics like Haldol and Thorazine. More importantly, they lacked the most noxious side effects of the older drugs - in particular, the tremors and other motor control problems.

The atypical anti-psychotics were the bright new stars in the pharmaceutical industry's roster of psychotropic drugs - costly, patented medications that made people feel and behave better without any shaking or drooling. Sales grew steadily, until by 2009 Seroquel and Abilify numbered fifth and sixth in annual drug sales, and prescriptions written for the top three atypical antipsychotics totaled more than 20 million. Suddenly, antipsychotics weren't just for psychotics any more.

Not just for psychotics anymore

By now, just about everyone knows how the drug industry works to influence the minds of American doctors, plying them with gifts, junkets, ego-tripping awards, and research funding in exchange for endorsing or prescribing the latest and most lucrative drugs. "Psychiatrists are particularly targeted by Big Pharma because psychiatric diagnoses are very subjective," says Dr. Adriane Fugh-Berman, whose PharmedOut project tracks the industry's influence on American medicine, and who last month hosted a conference on the subject at Georgetown. A shrink can't give you a blood test or an MRI to figure out precisely what's wrong with you. So it's often a case of diagnosis by prescription. (If you feel better after you take an anti-depressant, it's assumed that you were depressed.) As the researchers in one study of the drug industry's influence put it, "the lack of biological tests for mental disorders renders psychiatry especially vulnerable to industry influence." For this reason, they argue, it's particularly important that the guidelines for diagnosing and treating mental illness be compiled "on the basis of an objective review of the scientific evidence" - and not on whether the doctors writing them got a big grant from Merck or own stock in AstraZeneca.

Marcia Angell, former editor of the New England Journal of Medicine and a leading critic of the Big Pharma, puts it more bluntly: "Psychiatrists are in the pocket of industry." Angell has pointed out that most of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM), the bible of mental health clinicians, have ties to the drug industry. Likewise, a 2009 study showed that 18 out of 20 of the shrinks who wrote the American Psychiatric Association's most recent clinical guidelines for treating depression, bipolar disorders, and schizophrenia had financial ties to drug companies.

"The use of psychoactive drugs - including both antidepressants and antipsychotics - has exploded...[yet] 'the tally of those who are disabled...increased nearly two and a half times."

Marcia Angell, former editor of the New England Journal of Medicine

In a recent article in The New York Review of Books, Angell deconstructs what she calls an apparent "raging epidemic of mental illness" among Americans. The use of psychoactive drugs—including both antidepressants and antipsychotics—has exploded, and if the new drugs are so effective, Angell points out, we should "expect the prevalence of mental illness to be declining, not rising." Instead, "the tally of those who are so disabled by mental disorders that they qualify for Supplemental Security Income (SSI) or Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI) increased nearly two and a half times between 1987 and 2007 - from one in 184 Americans to one in seventy-six. For children, the rise is even more startling - a thirty-five-fold increase in the same two decades. Mental illness is now the leading cause of disability in children." Under the tutelage of Big Pharma, we are "simply expanding the criteria for mental illness so that nearly everyone has one." Fugh-Berman agrees: In the age of aggressive drug marketing, she says, "Psychiatric diagnoses have expanded to include many perfectly normal people."

Cost benefit analysis

What's especially troubling about the over-prescription of the new antipsychotics is its prevalence among the very young and the very old - vulnerable groups who often do not make their own choices when it comes to what medications they take. Investigations into antipsychotic use suggests that their purpose, in these cases, may be to subdue and tranquilize rather than to treat any genuine psychosis.

Carl Elliott reports in Mother Jones magazine: "Once bipolar disorder could be treated with atypicals, rates of diagnoses rose dramatically, especially in children. According to a recent Columbia University study, the number of children and adolescents treated for bipolar disorder rose 40-fold between 1994 and 2003." And according to another study, "one in five children who visited a psychiatrist came away with a prescription for an antipsychotic drug."

A remarkable series published in the Palm Beach Post in May true revealed that the state of Florida's juvenile justice department has literally been pouring these drugs into juvenile facilities, "routinely" doling them out "for reasons that never were approved by federal regulators." The numbers are staggering: "In 2007, for example, the Department of Juvenile Justice bought more than twice as much Seroquel as ibuprofen. Overall, in 24 months, the department bought 326,081 tablets of Seroquel, Abilify, Risperdal and other antipsychotic drugs for use in state-operated jails and homes for children…That's enough to hand out 446 pills a day, seven days a week, for two years in a row, to kids in jails and programs that can hold no more than 2,300 boys and girls on a given day." Further, the paper discovered that "One in three of the psychiatrists who have contracted with the state Department of Juvenile Justice in the past five years has taken speaker fees or gifts from companies that make antipsychotic medications."

In addition to expanding the diagnoses of serious mental illness, drug companies have encouraged doctors to prescribe atypical anti-psychotics for a host of off-label uses. In one particularly notorious episode, the drugmaker Eli Lilly pushed Zyprexa on the caregivers of old people with Alzheimer's and other forms of dementia, as well as agitation, anxiety, and insomnia. In selling to nursing home doctors, sales reps reportedly used the slogan "five at five"—meaning that five milligrams of Zyprexa at 5 pm would sedate their more difficult charges. The practice persisted even after FDA had warned Lilly that the drug was not approved for such uses, and that it could lead to obesity and even diabetes in elderly patients.

In a video interview conducted in 2006, Sharham Ahari, who sold Zyprexa for two years at the beginning of the decade, described to me how the sales people would wangle the doctors into prescribing it. At the time, he recalled, his doctor clients were giving him a lot of grief over patients who were "flipping out" over the weight gain associated with the drug, along with the diabetes. "We were instructed to downplay side effects and focus on the efficacy of drug…to recommend the patient drink a glass a water before taking a pill before the meal and then after the meal in hopes the stomach would expand" and provide an easy way out of this obstacle to increased sales. When docs complained, he recalled, "I told them, ‘Our drug is state of the art. What's more important? You want them to get better or do you want them to stay the same--a thin psychotic patient or a fat stable patient.'"

For the drug companies, Shahrman says, the decision to continue pushing the drug despite side effects is matter of cost benefit analysis: Whether you will make more money by continuing to market the drug for off-label use, and perhaps defending against lawsuits, than you would otherwise. In the case of Zyprexa, in January 2009, Lilly settled a lawsuit brought by with the US Justice Department, agreeing to pay $1.4 billion, including "a criminal fine of $515 million, the largest ever in a health care case, and the largest criminal fine for an individual corporation ever imposed in a United States criminal prosecution of any kind,''the Department of Justice said in announcing the settlement." But Lilly's sale of Zyprexa in that year alone were over $1.8 billion.

Turning people into zombies

As it turns out, the atypical antipsychotics may not even be the best choice for people with genuine, undisputed psychosis.

A growing number of health professionals have come to think these drugs are not really as effective as older less expensive medicines which they have replaced, that they themselves produce side effects that cause other sorts of diseases such as diabetes and plunge the patient deeper into the gloomy world of serious mental disorder. Along with stories of success comes reports of people turned into virtual zombies.

Elliott reports in Mother Jones: "After another large analysis in The Lancet found that most atypicals actually performed worse than older drugs, two senior British psychiatrists penned a damning editorial that ran in the same issue. Dr. Peter Tyrer, the editor of the British Journal of Psychiatry, and Dr. Tim Kendall of the Royal College of Psychiatrists wrote: "The spurious invention of the atypicals can now be regarded as invention only, cleverly manipulated by the drug industry for marketing purposes and only now being exposed."

Source from Al Jazeera: http://english.aljazeera.net/indepth/opinion/2011/07/20117313948379987.html (video at link)

The rise of the brain-self: how pharmaceutical companies hijacked our brains

2011-05-28T13:00:00.000-07:00

By Samara Steele

A few years ago, I was given a prescription for Serotonin Reuptake Inhibitors (SRIs) for my epilepsy. Like cocaine (which is technically an SRI), pharmaceutical-grade SRIs prevent your brain from reabsorbing serotonin ("the happy chemical"), causing old serotonin to float around with nowhere to go, creating a sort of pleasant "hazy" feeling. SRIs are usually used to treat depressive disorder, but my neurologist explained that they sometimes prevent seizures.

For my first year on the drug, it seemed to be helping my epilepsy. But after two years, I started having problems. My thinking got fuzzy, it became difficult to use language, and for the first time in my life, I found it nearly impossible to make new friends.

I spent another year feeling like a zombie before I realized the SRIs were to blame. I stopped taking them, and after a painful period of withdrawal, I started feeling like I could think again. Recovery has been slow, though, and in the two years since I've been clean, I've had to gradually rebuild the skills I lost. Everything from my balance to my body-awareness to my short-term memory is still screwed up.

Sadly, I am not the only one who has been royally fucked over by psychiatric medication.

In his latest book, Anatomy of an Epidemic: Magic Bullets, Psychiatric Drugs and the Rise of Mental Illness (2010), journalist Robert Whitaker shows how each type of psycho-pharmaceutical drug has its own unique way of damaging and debilitating its user. According to Whitaker, before psychiatric drugs came into mainstream use, 85% of people diagnosed with bipolar disorder could return to their jobs within a year of diagnosis, and suffered no long-term brain damage. But now - with drugs being prescribed to a majority of bipolar patients - less than 30% can return to work, and most of them suffer from long-term cognitive impairment!

Whitaker's book contains a bounty of scientific studies that show how the drugs used to treat "anxiety," "depression," "bipolar disorder," and "schizophrenia" cause more harm than good. The author has made these studies free to the public at: http://madinamerica.com/madinamerica.com/Anatomy%20of%20an%20Epidemic.html.

The bottom line is: Psycho-pharmaceutical drugs are not safe. They prolong the illnesses they are supposed to treat and cause long-term brain damage. (Not to mention the "official" side effects: liver damage, sexual dysfunction, weight gain, kidney failure, birth defects, increased risk of suicide among children - the list goes on and on!) Yet, today, 1 in 8 Americans is on a psychotropic medication, with these dangerous drugs being prescribed to children less than two years old!

This creates a bit of a mystery: if these drugs are so bad, why are people taking them?

The foremost cause is the rise of the idea/practice of the brain-self: treating yourself as if you are nothing more than a passive brain.

For the last two decades, pop-science writers and have been working relentlessly to convince people that they are their brains. The goal of these writers is to dismantle religion. They think that, by convincing people they are simply brains, the idea of the soul will disappear and religion will vanish.

A good example of this kind of writing can be found in The Astonishing Hypothesis: The Scientific Search for the Soul (1994) by geneticist Francis Crick. On the opening page of the book, Crick writes: "you, your joys and your sorrows, your memories and your ambitions, your sense of personal identity and free will are in fact no more than the behavior of a vast assembly of nerve cells and their associated molecules." The book goes on for several hundred more pages, promoting the idea that the "self" is completely isolated to the brain.

In contrast, cognitive theorist Alva Noë is an adamant opponent of the idea of the brain-self, and in his book, Out of Our Heads: Why You are Not Your Brain (2009), he explains, "Consciousness is not something the brain achieves on its own. Consciousness requires the joint operation of brain, body, and world. ….consciousness is the achievement of the whole animal in its environmental context." Alva also says that the idea of the brain-self is dangerous to individuals who use it.

But Alva's words often fall on deaf ears. For decades we have been conditioned by "educational" magazine articles, books, and TV programs to think of ourselves as our brains. This leads us to believe that our thoughts, feelings, and urges are the results of "brain chemistry" over which we have no control.

So, when a believer in the brain-self has behavioral problems, unwanted thoughts, or uncomfortable moods, she observes herself passively and does not feel empowered to change. She is locked out of her own internality. Furthermore, traditional aspects of human nature like "love" and "free will" come into doubt. "If these things exist," the logic goes, "they must already be hard-wired into my brain." So the individual stops working to cultivate these things - she stops developing her personality. And she begins to feel miserable. Then she sees an advertisement...

The 40-billion-dollar psycho-pharmaceutical industry has hired a small army of advertisers and lobbyists to manipulate people into believing that their drugs will provide happiness, completeness, and a quick fix to all of one's problems. And when someone believes they are their brain, these drugs seem like their only hope.

Many drug ads are also designed to make people think they have a mental illness when they don't. For example, in one early ad for Zoloft, the criteria for depression seems to be having dishes pilling up in the sink. But who doesn't have dishes in their sink?!

So the individual makes an appointment with a "psychiatrist" (they really should just be called "dealers" now…or maybe "priests" would be a better term).

Just as the Catholic Church stole the Platonic soul by claiming that their priests were the only ones with access to it, the institution of brain-based psychology has co-opted Freudian terms, (the word "psychology," for example) and claimed that their agents are the only ones who can access an individual's internality. Just as the Catholic priests held souls hostage, these new psychiatrists hold brains hostage.

Unlike Freudian psychiatrists of the past, these new brain-based psychiatrists do not talk to patients about their thoughts and feelings. Instead, like a Catholic priest in a confessional, a brain-based psychiatrist asks for a list of "symptoms" (sins) for which she administers a "medication" (absolution/communion). And, like medieval peasants on communion, patients fetishize these drugs ("These pills are saving me from my brain disorder!"), developing a deep emotional attachment. But unlike communion wafers, these drugs alter a person's basic ability to think, express emotion, and feel desire - making it even more difficult to get away.

So, instead of dismantling religion, the idea of the "brain-self" has given rise to the Cult of the Psycho-pharmaceutical, with both patients and psychiatrists sucked into this oppressive structure of beliefs and rituals.

That's right, the psychiatrists are believers themselves. One reason for this is that many "trusted" leaders in the field have sold out. For example, Dr. Joseph Biederman, a full Professor of Psychiatry at Harvard Medical School, received 1.6 million dollars from drug companies from 2000 to 2007. In exchange, Dr. Jo authored dozens of "scientific" papers promoting the use of ADHD medications. Countless other field leaders let the drug companies buy them out, creating a sea of mis-information disguised as science.

On top of this, drug companies market directly to psychiatric practitioners, using even more intense propaganda than what the public sees. Additionally, a majority of psychology professors have been converted to pharmaceutical psychiatry, so most psychology students are only exposed to the doctrine of medication.

And it's hard watching someone suffer. Who can blame psychiatrists for wanting there to be a quick fix for their patients' problems? In their desire to help patients, they are led by their emotions to believe that the drugs work. The neurologist who put me on SRIs, for example, was also using them herself.

But the reality is, we have problems no pill can fix.

The global economy has entered a phase of Late Capitalism in which individuals are becoming increasingly isolated, environmental conditions are disintegrating, and the majority of the populace is working harder and harder for the benefit of a handful of elites. Then, when people are unhappy in this shitty situation, they are told they have a "brain disorder."

By blaming our emotional problems on our own biology, we fail to look outside ourselves for alternative causes. Reality disorders - problems with the environment, social order, and workplace - go ignored while people obsessively drug their brains into oblivion.

Thanks to the idea/practice of the brain-self, the capitalist mode of production has infiltrated our bodies and penetrated our core beings. Our moods, thoughts, and emotions have been transformed into commodities to be sold back to us. And, as Late Capitalism slouches towards Neo-feudalism, we are stripped of our revolutionary potential.

Michel Foucault once wrote, "The body is the prisoner of the soul," but more than ever, the body is becoming prisoner of the brain.

Lately, I've started seeing an acupuncturist once a week. Besides the needlework, she prescribes herbs and helps me plan my diet. My epilepsy has gotten much better, even though she isn't specifically treating it: she and I are working together to take care of my whole body.

In the meantime, I've been obsessively reading real scientific articles about the brain, trying to get a better idea of what it actually is.

One thing I've learned is that the brain doesn't just "stop learning" at some stage in development. The brain can actually stay "plastic" throughout adulthood, meaning you have the ability to learn new things your whole life. No matter how old you are, your brain isn't written yet. You always have the power to change.

The brain is just part of the nervous system, which is just part of the whole body. Whatever you do with your body is going to have a direct effect on your brain. If your body receives healthy levels of exercise, wholesome food, sunlight, fresh air, and frequent human interaction, the brain remains healthy and "plastic." But if the body doesn't receive these things, the brain becomes "depressed," impairing the brain's ability to make new connections. This makes it harder for the person to learn new things, and can lead to other disorders.

Our Late Capitalist system keeps most people too busy to engage in the healthy lifestyle needed to keep the brain "plastic." If, as a culture, we had time to prepare and eat healthy food, exercise at least three times a week, hang out in the sun, breathe fresh air, and actively socialize for an hour or two a day, most of the "illnesses" psycho-pharmaceutical drugs treat would be cured.

Ultimately, the brain is the tool of the spirit. Whatever we strive to become, the brain will re-wire itself to support us. If we practice love, our brains become better at loving. If we cultivate free-will and practice making educated decisions, our brains will become better at that. The active-brain is a reminder that all of our thoughts and actions matter in this huge task of forming our identities as liberated human beings.

The Slow Mood Movement

It is not enough to merely reject the brain-self. New ideas of the self must develop to take its place. The Slow Mood Movement is all about re-thinking the way we think of ourselves. Inspired by the Slow Food Movement's rejection of fast food, Slow Mood aims to resist the buying and selling of "fast moods."

Here's an excerpt of their manifesto: "We are taking it slow. Slowly learning to feel our inner states. Slowly developing the cognitive tools needed to make healthy decisions for ourselves, our communities, and our world. Slowly learning to expand our emotions to connect with other people as people, not functions. We know these things can't be given to us instantly. We have to build these things ourselves, over time."

To get involved, see their website: http://slowmoodmovement.wordpress.com

From Slingshot, issue #106: http://slingshot.tao.ca/displaybi.php?0106010

Interview with Ethan Watters on the DSM & his book "Crazy Like Us"

2011-03-24T10:01:00.000-07:00

Last week (Thu, 12/23/2010) in San Francisco, local author Ethan Watters spoke to a packed room of Icaristas and friends at the California Institute of Integral Studies about his most recent book: Crazy Like Us: The Globalization of the American Psyche. Ethan's book has been a really successful mainstream critique of the Biopsychiatric model and it was a pleasure having him step into the cultural underground of the Icarus Project for the evening to share ideas. It was a lively discussion which you can listen to here (you might have to download Quicktime 7 if it doesn't work -- sorry for the technical difficulties!)

The event was the second in our speaker series, the first being a discussion in October with Robert Whittaker about his book Anatomy of An Epidemic. Bay Area Icarus is rockin these days with weekly meetings and the organizers group CARIOC (California Icarus Regional Organizing Collective) an anti-oppression training this past Saturday, periodic screenings and community discussions of Crooked Beauty and an upcoming retreat to strategize about the coming year.

More here: http://theicarusproject.net/bay-area-icarus-hosts-ethan-watters-a-discussion-about-dsm-gone-global

19 yr old man murdered by the hands of law enforcement over mental health complications.

2011-03-22T12:35:00.000-07:00

Modesto man fatally shot ID'd as ex-Enochs, current Stanislaus State student
Family that helped care for Ricky Miranda say he was despondent Saturday and called for help

By Kerry McCray
kmccray@modbee.comand Kevin Valine
kvaline@modbee.com

MODESTO -- When Enochs High School wrestling coach and his wife tried to get help for a troubled teen they never imagined officers would knock on their door hours later to tell them the young man was dead.

Duane and Julie Brooks identified the 19-year-old man shot and killed by an off-duty California Highway Patrol officer Saturday afternoon as Ricky Miranda, a former standout Enochs’ wrestler and California State University, Stanislaus, freshman.

The Brooks said officers broke the news that evening to them at their rural Oakdale home. The Brooks were longtime friends of Miranda and took him into their home when he was in high school.

Note ~ this is the 5th law enforcement in Modesto, involved killing over mental health complications since 2009......

Read more: http://www.modbee.com/2011/03/20/1608468/modesto-shooting-victim-idd-as.html#ixzz1HH4nW9zH

More: http://www.modbee.com/2011/03/19/1607298/off-duty-chp-officer-shoots-behavioral.html#storylink=omni_popular

http://www.modbee.com/2011/03/21/1610166/teens-sad-end-mental-anguish-rapidly.html

http://www.modestopress.com/off-duty-chp-officer-shoots-twice-kills-psychiatric-mentally-unstable-patient/1383/

Dr. Mercola article on Depression

2011-03-07T08:32:00.000-08:00

Every year, 230 million prescriptions for antidepressants are filled, making them one of the most prescribed drugs in the United States. The psychiatric industry itself is a $330 billion industry—not bad for an enterprise that offers little in the way of cures.

Despite all of these prescriptions, more than one in 20 Americans are depressed, according to the most recent statistics from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Of those depressed Americans, 80 percent say they have some level of functional impairment, and 27 percent say their condition makes it extremely difficult to do everyday tasks like work, activities of daily living, and getting along with others.

The use of antidepressant drugs—medicine's answer for depression—doubled in just one decade, from 13.3 million in 1996 to 27 million in 2005.

Read rest of story: http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2011/03/07/reversing-depression-without-antidepressants.aspx

Calling Bullshit on Addiction Treatment Bullies!

2011-03-04T08:43:00.000-08:00

Calling bull%&@$ on addiction treatment bullies

The "my way or the highway" version of addiction treatment is simply wrong

Published on February 8, 2011

About three years ago, I was attending a national conference on public health (American Public Health Association) and presenting my posters on the relationship between drug use and violence, and sexually transmitted infections and injecting drugs. As I walked the aisles I ran into a woman who runs a Florida addiction "treatment" facility. We talked for a bit about my work, her facility, and then we shared some of our personal stories. Mine included meth addiction, jail, recovery, and now graduate school studying addictions. Everything was great until I mentioned that I now drink alcohol socially... "We'll save a seat for you" she told me as she handed me her business card. Idiot.

Recovery bullies and addiction treatment

As soon as my version of recovery from addiction didn't match her expectations, it was an immediate failure. Forget the 6 years I'd spent free from crystal meth use, the excellent graduate school career that was producing real results I was there to present. Forget the fact that my family, my bosses, and my girlfriend at the time thought I was doing amazingly well - As far as this woman was concerned it was her way, or her way. Well I call bullshit on that thinking once and for all.

Unfortunately for her, the research evidence, as well as the actual human evidence that I've seen, shows that recovery from addiction comes in many colors and flavors, like pretty much everything else in life. We've covered research on all about addiction before showing that the best evidence to date actually calls into question the idea that relapse is the necessary disaster so many paint it as. The fact that the majority of those who meet criteria for drug dependence at some point in their life actually recover on their won is also there, and although this does nothing to reduce the impact of addiction on all those who have an incredibly difficult time quitting, it's there and can't be ignored. Drug dependence is almost certainly not a one size problem and the solution is probably far from a one-size-fits-all, no matter how much you like your own solution.

So there's cognitive behavioral therapy, peer support solutions (like SMART Recovery, Rational Recovery, Life Ring, 12 Step groups like Alcoholics Anonymous, and more), medication-supported recovery (like Suboxone, Methadone, Vivitrol and more), Motivational interviewing and other Motivational Enhancement techniques, as well as a whole host of psychotheraputic approaches that are more eclectic. No research we have to date indicates that any of these approaches is necessarily more effective than others, which means that they are all essentially equally effective. We've already talked about some combinations that work very well together, like PHP programs for physicians, but there is absolutely nothing to indicate that the 12-steps (for examples) are somehow superior to CBT, or Rational Recovery, when it comes to treating addiction.

If you get better, you're a success in my book

When it comes down to it, whether this Florida 12-stepper likes it or not, I am still a social drinker and I still don't believe that this nullifies any of my other achievements or my successful recovery. More importantly, it doesn't nullify the success of millions of others, no matter how poorly it fits with some people's notions. When a life gets overrun by drug use or another addiction, a successful outcome to me means recapturing a functional life that is no longer dictated by the pursuit of that addictive behavior. Anything more or less is a personal preference sort of thing. The problem with these idiots who will absolutely ignore success because it doesn't conform to their expectations is that they drive people out of treatment and away from success and that is not okay. I'll continue to call them out for their narrow mindedness and hopefully eventually, their voice will be far from the dominant one.

http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/all-about-addiction/201102/calling-bull-addiction-treatment-bullies

Harm Reduction, Addiction, & the Drug War on Democracy Now!

2011-02-18T11:18:00.000-08:00

Interview with Canadian Harm Reductionist Gabor Mate' & his book In the Realm of Hungry Ghosts

Democracy Now! (9 am) - February 18, 2011 at 9:00am

Click to listen (or download)

Segment on Democracy Now starts around 27:42

Cool Segment on a Psychiatric Survivor & more on KPFA - East Bay this morning

2011-01-25T13:21:00.000-08:00

About 25:50 seconds into the segment is Mental Health part....

The Morning Mix - January 25, 2011 at 8:00am

Click to listen (or download)

Napa Pigs Murder Alternative Mental Health Advocate!

2010-12-07T10:40:00.000-08:00

The family of a Napa nurse shot to death by police last week in front of his home say law enforcement officers overreacted to the 60-year-old's actions and want access to documents so they can conduct their own investigation.

Richard Poccia was shot outside his home on the 1400 block of Meek Avenue about 3:15 p.m. Sunday. Napa police opened fire on him after he pulled a knife from his waistband, according to a preliminary investigation conducted by the Napa County Sheriff's Department.

Napa County Sheriff's Capt. Tracey Stuart declined further comment Friday.

But that knife was not mentioned in early reports of the incident, said John Runfola, a San Francisco attorney who held a news conference with Poccia's widow, daughter and friends Friday. They want to see the coroner's preliminary report, any 911 calls and any communications among law enforcement.

"This was not the way to take care of this incident," Runfola said. "They (law enforcement officers) overreacted."

"He was dedicated to helping people who were sick and, in the end, when he needed help, the authorities came in and did not give him help and he wound up dead," said his daughter, Gabrielle Poccia.

Poccia, a nurse who worked in AIDS wards, psychiatric hospitals and intensive care units in the Bay Area for 24 years, had been suffering from post-traumatic stress syndrome and was on disability, Runfola said, adding that he had been particularly distraught last weekend.

On Sunday morning, Poccia's wife, Samanda Dorger, visited a neighbor who was concerned about Poccia. A retired Napa law enforcement officer and an active officer joined them, though Dorger said she did not invite them.

She asked the officers not to go to her house and they agreed. Dorger said she left to go shopping and run errands.

But someone called police after Dorger left.

According to the preliminary Napa sheriff's report, police were told that Poccia had weapons in the house and was proficient in martial arts.

Police went to the house and asked him to come outside.

He emerged with his hands in the air and began talking with officers, but his demeanor suddenly changed, the police report said. He reached into his waistband and took out a knife and was shot by one officer with a Taser and by another with a rifle.

RICHARD POCCIA's Website:

http://beyondanonymous.com/

All latest articles here:

http://interceder.net/list/Richard-Poccia

SCRMH are also firm Harm Reductionists!

2010-10-23T17:51:00.000-07:00

WHAT IS HARM REDUCTION?

Harm reduction is a set of practical strategies intended to reduce the negative consequences of high risk behaviors such as over-drinking or drug use. Harm reduction is a nonjudgmental approach that attempts to meet people "where they are at" with their drinking or drug use. Instead of demanding perfect abstinence, this pragmatic approach is supportive of anyone who wishes to minimize the harm associated with a high risk behavior such as drinking or drug use. Harm reduction accepts that high risk behaviors such as recreational alcohol intoxication are part of our world and works to minimize their harmful effects rather than simply ignore or condemn them. Harm reduction does not attempt to force people to change in ways which they do not choose for themselves. Harm reduction is a compassionate approach whose primary concern is the increased well-being of its constituency. Moreover an overwhelming body of scientific evidence shows that harm reduction works!!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harm_reduction

Join the New Tactics dialogue on self-care ONLINE from Sept. 22nd - 28th 2010

2010-09-23T16:57:00.000-07:00

Join the New Tactics dialogue on self-care - NOW OPEN

Join New Tactics and Jane Barry for an online Tactical Dialogue on Self-Care for Activists: Sustaining Your Most Valuable Resource from September 22 to 28, 2010.

Human rights work is a powerful and fulfilling vocation. And it is equally hugely challenging for human rights practitioners. These practitioners are often exposed to distressing situations directly and indirectly. From those working directly with survivors of human rights abuses to those working indirectly on human rights abuse issues, the need for taking care of one’s self is extremely important. We all know that the work is precious and valuable, and yes, we need to be strong, healthy and balanced to do it well -- but we take care of ourselves first and foremost because we are valuable.

This online dialogue will address and define the risks of human rights work: compassion fatigue, burnout, secondary and vicarious trauma, and stress. These risks can harm ourselves, our partners and our families, and those that we work to protect. This dialogue will be a space to share resources, approaches and ideas for how to address these risks.

Our featured resource practitioners helping to lead this dialogue include:

* Jane Barry (co-facilitator) - author of What’s the Point of the Revolution if We Can’t Dance? (with Jelena Djordjevic, 2007), United States
* Amber Gray - longtime practitioner of body centered arts and sciences, and human rights advocate, United States
* Holly Hammond - a facilitator and trainer with the Change Agency, Australia
* Marcio Gagliato and Erin Morgan of the Center for Victims of Torture , Zimbabwe and the United States
* Deborah Rozelle on the Leadership Council for the Initiative for Transforming Trauma , United States
* Mike Grenville - trainer on avoiding burnout, United Kingdom
* Nina Jusuf - advisor and trainer for Capacitar International, Indonesia
* Pattrice Jones - writer, professor, activist and author of Aftershock
* David Gangsei - trainer on trauma, vicariouis trauma, vicarious resilience & self-care, United States
* Lin Chew of the Institute for Women's Empowerment (IWE), Hong Kong
* Kris Abrams of the Urgent Action Fund for Women's Human Rights, United States

http://www.newtactics.org/en/blog/new-tactics/self-care

Kristin Antin

Online Community Builder

New Tactics in Human Rights Project

http://www.newtactics.org

Phone: +1-612-436-4885

Fax: +1-612-436-2606

Skype: kjantin

CVT, Restoring the Dignity of the Human Spirit