INHUMAN BEINGS - The Chemicalized Personality

A mother murders her five children. High school students massacre their classmates. An Iraq vet stabs his wife 71 times. How can this happen?

A common thread in these occurrences is the fact that the killers have been taking psychiatric medications.

But that is too simple. So we hear about “post-partum depression” and “combat stress.” In the case of the teens, it's “the breakdown of the family" or it’s the music, the movies, the video games.

The real answer is the dehumanizing effect of drugs.

A human being has more than one aspect. There is a definite electro-chemical component. The body physically functions via electro-chemical processes.

Then there is that aspect which perceives and reasons and creates. This is not electro-chemical. When people communicate with each other, it is not chemical molecules that are exchanging ideas. This is the spiritual aspect; the conscious, aware individual.

There is also a mental component—a mind—which is an interactive link between the reasoning factor and the physical.

A healthy mind (motivated by the spirit) is analytical.

A less healthy mind is less analytical and more and more reactive. It operates on a stimulus/response basis, motivated by random factors. A troubled, unhealthy mind doesn't reason. It doesn't perceive well. It reacts to stimuli.

For a long time now, the mental health establishment has been telling us that we are chemical in nature. They would have us believe that they can solve our problems with mood-altering drugs—a little dash of this and a little dash of that.

That approach may work at the purely physical level, as in taking antibiotics to handle infection, but it is not the physical component that gives us our rationality, our humanity. It is not the molecules in the brain that are thinking and perceiving, loving and caring, creating great music and poetry.

No, the physical component is comprised of cells and electrical impulses, which are as reasoning and creative as an avocado or the electric current that powers your toaster.

When a person is troubled, he is already sliding in the direction of the reactive, unthinking, physical impulse side of his nature. To then give him chemical, mood-altering drugs, pushes him further in that direction. While the sedative effect may appear to calm him down, he is becoming, more and more chemicalized.

So is it any wonder that these killers seem less than human? They ARE less than human. Though they can appear bright and calculating at times, real judgment is gone. They are completely reactive; alienated.

Their minds bubble and boil like the mass of chemicals they have become. The analytical capacity is gone. The spirit is gone. Their humanity is gone. They respond randomly and literally to stimuli (enter music, movies and video games).

Then, in the extreme, they lash out with violence at the imagined demons and enemies in their own unreal world. They have been mentally short-circuited by the drugs that are supposed to be helping them. It is the ultimate betrayal.

And when their bizarre, chemically induced, nightmare world collides with the world of OUR reality—which consists of living people, loving families, children, teachers, learning, accomplishment—a slaughter ensues and we are left to wonder "WHY?" "WHAT HAPPENED?"

The answer: psychiatry happened. And why would anyone perpetrate such a crime as to drug children and adults, driving them insane, all in the name of help? It's too horribly simple. It’s a multi-billion dollar business. They do it for money.

The good news is that when society wakes up to these facts, we will cease to allow these evils to occur.

It's time.

Tom Solari
tom@tomsolari.com

Tom Solari is a professional writer and video producer, living and working in Los Angeles. He is concerned about a culture that promotes chemical dependency as a solution to problems, when logic and the evidence shows that this approach deepens the problem by numbing the brain, muddling the mind and undermining the human spirit.

FDA Puts New Warning On Prozac And Other SSRIs

According to an article in Web MD, the FDA is warning us that taking certain migraine drugs with some types of antidepressants may create a life-threatening condition. The FDA's warning focuses on migraine medications called triptans when taken together with selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs), or with serotonin and norepinephrine reuptake inhibitors (SNRIs).

SSRIs and SNRIs are used to treat depression and mood disorders. SSRIs include Zoloft, Paxil, Celexa, and Prozac. SNRIs include Cymbalta and Effexor.

"A life-threatening condition called serotonin syndrome may occur when triptans are used together with an SSRI or a SNRI," states an FDA news release.

An interesting side-issue here is that the triptan drugs are related to the natural remedy once available at health food stores, tryptophan. The FDA seized upon a contaminated batch of tryptophan to ban it from the market. But the back story seems to be that tryptophan was hysterically opposed by Big Pharma, because of its reaction when used with Prozac and the other SSRIs. It is more than interesting to note that the cheap health food product was simply banned, while the proven incompatibility with the profitable triptan drugs was solved with warning labels. In the meantime, there have been many more deaths from suicide attributable to SSRIs than ever occurred from sickness caused by the batch of contaminated tryptophan.

The question I've always pondered is; why did they ban the trytophan instead of banning the SSRIs? That question is more-or-less rhetorical, but the injustice is nevertheless manifest. I support the free market economy and I don't like bashing big corporations just because they are successful and doing well. But in the case of the Big Pharma drug companies, there is a constant undertow of amoral and corrupt manipulation, as well as distribution of drugs that cause harm rather than help. Without batting an eye, Big Pharma seems to be focused primarily on its profits, and the welfare of the public be damned.

Serotonin syndrome occurs when the body has too much serotonin, a chemical found in the nervous system. Triptans, SSRIs, and SNRIs all raise serotonin levels. As with tryptophan, the higher seratonin levels caused by triptans are an aid to helping with migraine headaches, as well as insomnia.

Big Pharma (Drug Companies) Control Psychiatry

Ever wonder how much control the drug industry exerts on psychiatry? Here's a good one:

As reported in the San Jose Mercury News, Juy 10, 2006:

Dr. Alan F. Schatzberg, Stanford's long-time chair of the department of psychiatry, has reported financial interests with a number of companies that make psychiatric pills and devices, including:

Abbott Laboratories Inc.: consultant or scientific advisory board
Bristol-Myers Squibb: consultant or scientific advisory board; grant support
Corcept Therapeutics: scientific advisory board chairman; board of directors; stock
Elan Pharmaceuticals: stock or options
Eli Lilly and Co.: consultant or scientific advisory board; grant support
Forest Laboratories: consultant or scientific advisory board
GlaxoSmithKline: consultant or scientific advisory board; grant support
Janssen Pharmaceutica Products: consultant or scientific advisory board
Merck: stock or options
Neuronetics: consultant or scientific advisory board
Organon Pharmaceuticals: consultant or scientific advisory board
Pathway Diagnostics: stock or options
Pfizer: consultant or scientific advisory board; stock or options
Sanofi-Aventis: consultant or scientific advisory board
Somaxon Pharmaceuticals: consultant or scientific advisory board; stock or options
Somerset Pharmaceuticals: consultant or scientific advisory board; grant support
Wyeth Pharmaceuticals: consultant or scientific advisory board; grant support

Source: American Psychiatric Association; Corcept Therapeutics

Ethics Are Put In On Another Psych School Counselor

This article is from the Patriot Ledger, a Boston area newspaper:

Read it at http://ledger.southofboston.com/articles/2006/07/08/news/news10.txt

State reprimands counselor; School worker pressured parent, allowed ADHD evaluation of student without parental consent

By JACK ENCARNACAO
The Patriot Ledger

WEYMOUTH - A state department of education investigation concluded that a veteran adjustment counselor at the Thomas Hamilton Primary School violated federal law when she allowed a special education evaluation of a student without parental consent.

The mother pulled her children out of the school over the incident, said Andre Afonso, deputy director of the Massachusetts Citizens Commission on Human Rights, where the mother initially brought her complaints.

The commission on Human Rights was established in 1969 by the Church of Scientology to investigate psychiatric violations of human rights.

‘‘This is a big issue right now with us,’’ Afonoso said. ‘‘Bypassing the written consent law ... it can lead to (unnecessary) drugging in the schools.’’

Under a law enacted in 1998 called the Protection of Pupil Rights Amendment, a student can not be required to submit to an evaluation of mental or psychological problems without prior written consent of a parent.

The state board of education also has a similar regulation about parental consent.

The state’s investigation followed complaints from the student’s mother that for three years the adjustment counselor pressured her to medicate her daughter for Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder.

The student’s mother, who was not named in documents about the case and did not respond to a call for comment, did not give verbal or written permission for a mental evaluation, only for an academic evaluation.

‘‘The district acknowledged parental consent was not obtained for the administration of this test,’’ reads a letter from the department of education to the Weymouth school district.

In an affidavit filed with the commission, the mother said the counselor, Cora Hall, acted ‘‘outside of the scope of her job description and her unrelenting harassment over these past three years (have been) outside the legal barrier.’’

The mother was studying to become a nurse, and sensed something was wrong with the way her daughter was evaluated.

‘‘She knew her rights,’’ Afonso said of the mother.

The state investigation concluded that Hall, a 30-year veteran of school counseling, administered a test called the Connors’ Teacher Rating Scale in April 2005 to detect signs of Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder in the student, a first grader who was enrolled in a special education class due to a speech delay.

‘‘I do think I rushed,’’ Hall said. ‘‘I regret that because we don’t want to alienate parents, we don't want to upset anybody.’’

Hall said a teacher, not her, conducted the evaluation with her direction.

The state concluded that no punishment is necessary. But officials did require the school district to hold review and training sessions on the issue, which were held in March.

‘‘The penalty is more corrective action to address whatever violations were in place,’’ said Nate Mackinnon, a spokesman for the state Department of Education. ‘‘If a district were to decide not to comply (with corrective action), then we'd take additional steps. But typically with situations like this, the law tends to be rather complex, and it’s more about ensuring that it doesn't happen in the future.’’

Copyright 2006 The Patriot Ledger