One reason for the limited advocacy efforts on behalf of individuals with severe psychiatric disorders in the United States is the presence of countervailing forces--a small but vocal coalition of Scientologists, antipsychiatrists, and "consumer survivors." These disparate and often interdependent groups are united by their hatred of psychiatry in general and their opposition to any form of assisted treatment in particular. Many of their members are intellectual descendents of Thomas Szasz, who taught that mental illnesses do not really exist, and Ronald Laing, who claimed that psychosis is a growth experience. These groups often attempt to intimidate individuals and organizations that provide advocacy for individuals with manic-depressive illness, schizophrenia and other severe psychiatric disorders.

by Martha Hellander

Peter Breggin, M.D., author of "Toxic Psychiatry," "Talking Back to Prozac," and the new "Talking Back to Ritalin: What Doctors Aren't Telling You about Stimulants for Children," is a spokesperson for those who believe that brain disorders such as schizophrenia, bipolar disorder and ADHD were invented by the drug industry and the American Psychiatric Association to rake in profits at the expense of innocent people. I wish Breggin were right. It would be much easier to point the finger at drug companies and the APA than accept the reality of a genetic biological vulnerability in one's child that, when coupled with environmental "triggers" known and unknown, can cause a child's brain to malfunction and subject them to such fits of despair and suffering as to drive even five and six-year-olds to attempt suicide.