Editor's Pick

Ayurdhi Dhar interviews sociologist Owen Whooley about psychiatry's stubborn perseverance in the face of recent DSM embarrassments and the failures of the biomedical model.

How did that young Puerto Rican girl who very much disliked seeing a therapist when locked up in the juvenile system end up working in the mental health field as an adult?

Now I’m under attack, with threats of violence flung at me alongside threats of lawsuits. And all because I shared the large body of peer-reviewed research that contradicts the mainstream assumptions of psychiatry.

"Psychiatric practice is too often violating human rights, too often incapable of understanding the suffering of people, too often unable to provide help to people who need housing, work, money, respect, inclusion and instead are receiving psychotropic drugs, electroshock, physical restraint, isolation."

Founder and Executive Director Stefanie Lyn Kaufman-Mthimkhulu talks about the organization's work to support struggling students and end discrimination against them.

We interview Ole Andreas Underland, Director of the Hurdalsjøen Recovery Center in Norway which provides “medication-free” care for those who want such treatment or who want to taper from their psychiatric drugs. Ole Andreas explains why the success of this pioneering approach might threaten its future.

A roundup of Mad in America's most read blogs and personal stories of 2022 as chosen by our readers.

Continuing our 200th podcast, staff members join us to discuss reinvigorating MIA continuing education, science writing and blogs, personal stories, community commenting and family resources.

Celia Brown, a psychiatric survivor and activist who was revered — even beloved — for her foundational and ongoing efforts in mental health advocacy and the peer movement, has died after a battle with cancer.

For our 200th podcast interview, we are joined by members of MIA staff to reflect on Mad in America's mission and work over the last decade.

Mayor Adams' plan to "involuntarily remove" unhoused people has met with backlash from activists and the unhoused, who say it violates their rights and further entrenches systemic racism.

When people seeking help are relegated to “the Other,” how can they ever form a “therapeutic alliance”? Without collaboration, treatment devolves into coercion and oppression. We must change our language and relationships so new narratives can be born.

Reviews of three recent books reflecting various perspectives on the mental health system.

On the MIA Podcast, Dr David Healy discusses World Tapering Day, antidepressant treatment and sensory neuropathy and the difficulties that can be encountered when trying to deprescribe.

The Nurtured Heart Approach represents a massive shift in thinking—about schooling, about children and how to raise them, about how we regard those with intensity, and about the medical model pathologizing them.

Despite new claims that their study provides "clear evidence" linking serotonin and depression, their data actually supports the opposite conclusion: serotonin levels did not correlate with depression.

Anders Sørenson is a Danish clinical psychologist with a special interest in psychiatric drug withdrawal. He has undertaken research which assesses the state of guidance on psychiatric drug withdrawal and paid close attention to tapering methods with the aim of identifying approaches which might make withdrawal more tolerable for people.

When comparing kids with the same symptoms who were either diagnosed with ADHD or not, those who received the diagnosis had worse outcomes.

Current evidence does not support a biological hypothesis of depression. It is far better predicted by levels of childhood trauma, life stress, and lack of social supports.

Justin Karter discusses his journey to Mad in America, competing models of mental health, and how we navigate these stories in psychotherapy.

Is marijuana to blame for my mental health issues? Strange things started happening in my mind once I started using the medical-grade weed.

Psychiatry's defenders are open to criticism of psychiatry as long as it stops short of acknowledging the increasingly well-documented reality that psychiatry lacks any scientific merit.

A study finds that commonly prescribed antidepressants are associated with the development of diabetes, hypertension, and other diseases.

I was prescribed a “baby dose” of diazepam for pain management. Over the following months, everything got progressively worse.

Anyone detained and then formally committed under Wisconsin’s civil mental health laws can initially be held and forcibly drugged for six long months. Yet, for years, not a single person has been able to appeal the six-month commitments in court.