This is the mission statement of the Heritage Foundation,
http://www.heritage.org/about
"Founded in 1973, The Heritage Foundation is a research and educational institution—a think tank—whose mission is to formulate and promote conservative public policies based on the principles of free enterprise, limited government, individual freedom, traditional American values, and a strong national defense.
We believe the principles and ideas of the American Founding are worth conserving and renewing. As policy entrepreneurs, we believe the most effective solutions are consistent with those ideas and principles. Our vision is to build an America where freedom, opportunity, prosperity, and civil society flourish."
On July 18, 2012 the Heritage Foundation sponsored a lecture by E. Fuller Torrey, who is promoting his book, The Insanity Offense: How America’s Failure to Treat the Seriously Mentally Ill Endangers Its Citizens, which [according to Jim Gottstein, Attorney and Founder of Psychrights.org says] advocates making it even easier to lock citizens up, label and stigmatize them without legal justification, and forcibly drug them against their will ("forced treatment"). In a prior book, Torrey explicitly advocates committing perjury to accomplish these aims, noting with approval, “It would probably be difficult to find any American psychiatrist working with the mentally ill who has not, at a minimum, exaggerated the dangerousness of a mentally ill person's behavior to obtain a judicial order for commitment.”
Torrey notoriously promotes the unverified claim that mental illness causes violence. There is no causal connection between mental illness and crime or violence. Nonetheless the psychiatric industry tries to criminalize mental illness to increase its client base and to extend psychiatry into the criminal justice system. That will further corrupt the system removing any protections from government abuses from the arbitrary opinions of psychiatrists who are not held accountable for their errors in judgment or their criminal abuses.
How is that compatible with their mission statement regarding individual freedom and limited government? Psychiatry criminalizes constitutionally protected speech and behavior, which psychiatrists do not like or do not understand. They force individuals using the police power of government to take psychiatric drugs. How is that compatible with limited government, the Fourth and the Ninth Amendments? Psychiatry is the only alleged medical discipline that requires police powers to enforce diagnoses. It is the only alleged medical discipline which can force treatment without consent.
The psychiatric industry conducted a multi year PR campaign promoting the false notion of "chemical imbalance of the brain." The goal was to give psychiatry a basis in science. They alleged that pictures of brain activity were evidence of mental illness. But there is no standard for a chemical balance of the brain to measure against. It was a fantasy. When confronted by civil rights and disability rights activists the American Psychiatric Association was unable to present any evidence of their claim of a chemical imbalance of the brain. Nonetheless among the minds of civilians there are still many who believe this psychiatric fantasy.
In order to maintain a rational approach to limiting psychiatric abuse The Heritage Foundation should extend an invitation to Robert Whitaker who writes about the evils of psychiatry and its irrational public policy abominations. http://robertwhitaker.org/robertwhitaker.org/Home.html
How is that compatible with their mission statement regarding individual freedom and limited government? Psychiatry criminalizes constitutionally protected speech and behavior, which psychiatrists do not like or do not understand. They force individuals using the police power of government to take psychiatric drugs. How is that compatible with limited government, the Fourth and the Ninth Amendments? Psychiatry is the only alleged medical discipline that requires police powers to enforce diagnoses. It is the only alleged medical discipline which can force treatment without consent.
The psychiatric industry conducted a multi year PR campaign promoting the false notion of "chemical imbalance of the brain." The goal was to give psychiatry a basis in science. They alleged that pictures of brain activity were evidence of mental illness. But there is no standard for a chemical balance of the brain to measure against. It was a fantasy. When confronted by civil rights and disability rights activists the American Psychiatric Association was unable to present any evidence of their claim of a chemical imbalance of the brain. Nonetheless among the minds of civilians there are still many who believe this psychiatric fantasy.
Psychiatry uses state and US courts to deny persons accused of mental illness the basic rights guaranteed to others under the constitution. Court rules deny to persons accused of mental illness the protections afforded other parties in court proceedings. Yet the Heritage Foundation allows this self interested and self promoting psychiatrist with a history of promoting denial of rights and restricting freedom of vulnerable citizens, a forum without any opposition. Has the Heritage Foundation like the American Civil Liberties Union become an oppressive organization in the name of freedom? How shameful that psychiatrists use scholarly organizations to promote taking freedom from individuals in the name of health. Psychiatry is a system of social control with no due process protections. Nazi doctors used psychiatry to resolve what they said were public health problems. They said Jews were vermin. Nazis medicalized social problems. There is no appeal from medical diagnoses.
Psychiatry is a system of personal opinion masquerading as science. Mental illnesses are created by consensus not science. Yet judges allow their testimony in courts contrary to the requirements of case law, (KUMHO TIRE CO. V. CARMICHAEL (97-1709) 526 U.S. 137 (1999), 131 F.3d 1433, reversed.) which limits expert testimony to experts using knowledge with a high reliability factor. Personal opinion is not reliable knowledge. This is easily seen with regard to the lack of accountability of psychiatrists who err in their opinions. For every psychiatric opinion in court there is an equal and opposite opinion.
Psychiatry is a system of personal opinion masquerading as science. Mental illnesses are created by consensus not science. Yet judges allow their testimony in courts contrary to the requirements of case law, (KUMHO TIRE CO. V. CARMICHAEL (97-1709) 526 U.S. 137 (1999), 131 F.3d 1433, reversed.) which limits expert testimony to experts using knowledge with a high reliability factor. Personal opinion is not reliable knowledge. This is easily seen with regard to the lack of accountability of psychiatrists who err in their opinions. For every psychiatric opinion in court there is an equal and opposite opinion.
In order to maintain a rational approach to limiting psychiatric abuse The Heritage Foundation should extend an invitation to Robert Whitaker who writes about the evils of psychiatry and its irrational public policy abominations. http://robertwhitaker.org/robertwhitaker.org/Home.html
