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Given his relationship to Scientology, I believe you are underselling what he ends up promoting, even if what he says is something different. People often dress up their stated opinions to make them more palatable before going on to the next level, and I personally believe that's what he's doing. I have no proof positive of that, but that's what I think is happening.


Well, I have no idea what anyone actually intends, including Szasz. Isn't it a foundation of the scientific method and rationality that a person's claim should be evaluated based what they actually say rather than who they are or what their motivation is? I can't comment on what Szasz or anyone else's hidden agenda might be, but I can certainly read "what he says" and see if it stands up to rational and moral scrutiny.

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In short, I believe that the types of cases that you describe are despicable, but also much more rare and less legal than you imply.


I'm happy that we agree they are despicable. Unfortunately, I think they still happen, and are happening more often, not less. The fact that they occur at all is a problem, and I think many of the more extreme statements Szasz makes refer to this extreme situation and need to be understood in that context.

According to the New York Office of Mental Health (OMH),

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Of the 134 individuals in OMH psychiatric centers receiving ECT in 2000, 35 (26%) were court ordered. The number of court ordered ECT procedures has increased by 52% since 1998, when 23 individuals received court ordered ECT.


Whether they are anesthetized or not is surely a minor point compared to giving someone a series of "brain seizures" against their will!

I disagree that putting people in asylums against their will is a long gone practice. We've changed their name to "treatment centers", but we still do it. By saying that someone has the option of prison time or being a "patient" in an asylum called a "treatment center", surely you are not saying that this "treatment" is voluntary? It may be expedient, but if it were truly voluntary, couldn't one just go home instead of spending the tax payer's money?

ECT is a particularly extreme example. Courts forcing people to take drugs, through a process called Involuntary Outpatient Commitment is much more common. From that report:
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We argue that outpatient commitment is needed because many individuals with severe psychiatric illnesses lack awareness of their illness.

HUH?!?!?!??? WTF was that????

And,

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In the United States, individuals with medical illnesses such as active tuberculosis who refuse to take medication are regularly hospitalized involuntarily and treated. In New York City alone, an average of 100 such involuntarily hospitalizations take place each year, and many more such patients agree to take medication only after being threatened with involuntary treatment (46). We do not suggest that severe mental illness is analogous to a communicable disease; however, the rationale is similar: medically needed treatment should be provided in the best interest of both the individual and society.


The "rationale" is NOT similar. Treating someone for tuberculosis prevents infection in OTHERS. Tuberculosis is also demonstrably caused by a pathogen that the administered medicine targets. No pathogen has ever been discovered for the so-called "mental illnesses". Being depressed is not like having tuberculosis. Thinking they are the same is a result of literalization of a metaphor.

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We argue that the real liberty question regarding individuals with severe psychiatric disorders is whether they are in fact free when ill.


If someone doesn't even know they are "ill", this statement is just ridiculous.

All of this stuff is a slippery slope, and its all related. These kind of abuses will occur any time that individual liberty is not the highest possible priority. We used to "treat" homosexual people against their will. It is finally (becoming) common sense that this is inhumane. I would submit that many of the persecuted homosexual peole "lack[ed] awareness of their illness."

It is just not OK to say that individual liberty is great, except for in these few cases. Too often, those few cases are just reflections of current fashion and what I've called heresies. Civil liberties exist to protect these small persecuted groups. The majority has no need of protection from itself. Again, its the homos, druggies, crazies, and gambling degenerates that need the protection from the moral busybodies and the bullying majority.