Bruce Levine
The Wave of Evil: New Report on ADHD Drugs Blowback
The wave of evil washes all our institutions alike.” -Ralph Waldo Emerson The wave of evil washes not only the financial-industrial complex, the military-industrial complex, the energy-industrial complex, and predatory executives at AIG, Citibank, Halliburton, Blackwater/Xe, Enron, and Exxon. The pharmaceutical-industrial complex has virtually annexed the mental health profession, whose all-star opportunist team is captained […]
Suicide Spike for U.S. Soldiers
Psychiatric or Political Solution?
In February 2009, Americans heard about a dramatic rise in suicides among U.S. soldiers. While treatment for emotionally troubled soldiers increasingly consists of antidepressants such as Prozac, Paxil, and Zoloft, recent investigations show that these drugs are no more effective than placebos and can actually increase suicidality. In order to prevent even more suicides, both the research and basic common sense instruct us that we need less psychiatric drugs and more political courage.
Revolutionary Road, A Beautiful Mind and Truthfulness
The films Revolutionary Road and A Beautiful Mind both portray mathematicians turned mental patients who create havoc for their families. But the similarity ends there. In director Ron Howard’s A Beautiful Mind (2001), the facts of the real-life recovery of Nobel prize winner John Nash are fabricated to create a politically-correct version of mental illness […]
The Case for Giving Eli Lilly the Corporate Death Penalty
At this point, the pharmaceutical company Eli Lilly is basically a public menace.
Eli Lilly & Company’s rap sheet as a public menace is so long that for Lilly watchers to overcome the “banality-of-Lilly-sleaziness” phenomenon, the drug company must break some type of record measuring egregiousness. Lilly obliged earlier this year, receiving the largest criminal fine ever imposed on a corporation.
Psychiatry’s ‘Shock Doctrine’: Are We Really OK With Electroshocking Toddlers?
Many Americans think electroconvulsive therapy has been abandoned. But American psychiatry still regards it as a respected treatment, even for kids.
Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. — C.S. Lewis
Psychiatry’s “shock doctrine” is quite literally electroshock, and its latest victims are – I’m not kidding – young children.
Fundamentalist Consumerism and an Insane Society
At a giant Ikea store in Saudi Arabia in 2004, three people were killed by a stampede of shoppers fighting for one of a limited number of $150 credit vouchers. Similarly, in November 2008, a worker at a New York Wal-Mart was trampled to death by shoppers intent on buying one of a limited number of 50-inch plasma HDTVs.
Are We Really Okay with Electroshocking Toddlers?
“Of all tyrannies a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive.” — C.S. Lewis Psychiatry’s “shock doctrine” is quite literally electroshock, and its latest victims are – I’m not kidding – young children. On January 25, 2009, the Herald Sun, based in Melbourne, Australia, reported, “Children younger than […]
What’s It Going to Take to Lock Up Drug Company Execs?
A recent article in the New England Journal of Medicine reveals the shocking extent of how corrupt drug companies are.
“Laws are like cobwebs, which may catch small flies, but let wasps and hornets break through.” – Jonathan Swift
After reading “The Neurontin Legacy — Marketing through Misinformation and Manipulation” in the January 8, 2009 issue of the New England Journal of Medicine, one may conclude that (1) America’s prisons would be put to better use incarcerating drug company executives instead of pot smokers, and (2) society may need a return of public scorn via the pillory for those doctors who are essentially drug-company shills.
Just How Corrupted Has American Medicine Become?
“Laws are like cobwebs, which may catch small flies, but let wasps and hornets break through.” – Jonathan Swift After reading “The Neurontin Legacy — Marketing through Misinformation and Manipulation” in the January 8, 2009 issue of the New England Journal of Medicine, one may conclude that (1) America’s prisons would be put to better […]
“Fundamentalist Consumerism” Kills Us Quickly and Slowly
While fundamentalist Jews, Christians, and Moslems are singularly attached to their literal interpretations of particular texts, fundamentalist consumerists are singularly attached to cheap stuff. All fundamentalists decry, deny, or ignore the multiple dimensions of life that fall outside their particular theologies and ideologies. Fundamentalist consumerists could not care less about workers’ rights, human-scale business, environmental […]
