Your Kid Is Sick. Not.

Here is a lovely video, less than two minutes long, that anyone with a admirable child should see. It has a link at the end, which is useful.  If your kid has ADD, he is not ill, he is important.  If you want to get a solid consumer's guide to psychiatry, read Szasz, anything by him, but Coercion As Cure is a good start.

Keep in mind, when you read of some horror committed by some deranged individual, you'll hear "he was off his meds."  The problem is never he was off his meds.  Meds only work for a short period, and then they are no good.  So everyone put on meds is at some point "off his meds."  The problem is they put someone on meds to begin with.  Of course, many peoples introduction to meds is as kids with illegal substance abuse, but then again, those drugs were designed by highly trained, highly motivated scientists, to have an effect in the market. Read Szasz for real medicine and mental illness.

Szasz is hard to take: we excuse behavior, we deny personal responsibility.  But he can be funny too:  So what if your dog tells you to kill the president?  Would you do it if I told you to?  No?  Then why would you do it if your dog told you to?

Brilliant:  he does not get into whether your dog spoke to your or not, he gets into your responsibility given what circumstances you find yourself.  So what if your dog talks to you?  You are still responsible for your actions.

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