Reign of Error: Psychiatry, Authority and Law
If society is ever to deal effectively with crime, violence, and mental disorder, it must strip psychiatry of its legal "authority," maintains noted psychiatrist Lee Coleman. Denouncing the "reign of error" brought on by the vast unchecked power that society grants to psychiatry in courts, mental hospitals, and prisons, he argues persuasively that "psychiatrists have no valid scientific tools or expertise to justify their legal power." The information is more relevant than ever as our prisons are becoming mental institutions, our child "protective" services legalized child drugging outlets and mental hospitals nothing but warehouses for people too drugged to even know the damage the drugs are causing. In this provocative work, Dr. Coleman makes a persuasive plea for stripping psychiatry of its state-authorized power and limiting its use to helping voluntary patients. He offers concrete alternatives to our present reliance on psychiatric pronouncements, that are not based on any science, but still used in courts, mental hospitals and prisons.