Schizophrenia:
The Sacred Symbol of Psychiatry
by Thomas
Szasz
Szasz once again lampoons his fellow psychiatrists
in Schizophrenia: The Sacred Symbol of Psychiatry. He first details
psychiatric history at the turn of the century and how the discovery of
paresis as a true disease lead them to use it as the paradigm for all "mental
illness." He then challenges the hypocritical views of "anti-psychiatrists"
Laing and Cooper, showing how their values represent collectivism and communism
rather than individualism and liberty.
In the chapter entitled Schizophrenia: Psychiatric
Syndrome or Scientific Scandle, He sarcastically demonstrates the conflicting
hypothesis, treatments, statistics, and research that are normally used
to prove the seriousness of Schizophrenia. He concludes powerfully by comparing
psychiatry and other social sciences to religion and theology, both whose
purpose is to control the mind and heart of man. The book will certainly
make those who have a stake in the medical model of schizophrenia cringe
when the truth about their pseudoscientific enterprise wins out.
THOMAS SZASZ, M.D., is considered a brilliant
revolutionary thinker by some - a dangerous renegade by others. In either
case, the author of The Manufacture
of Madness, and Sex by
Prescription is one of the most important writers in present-day
psychiatry.
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