Caricature of psychiatry
Your readers should be aware that the Citizens Commission on Human Rights (UK), on behalf of which Brian Daniels writes (Letters, 27 December), was created by the so-called Church of Scientology.
L Ron Hubbard, the founder of scientology, had a violent prejudice against psychiatry, and his followers have retained it.
Mr Daniels presents a caricature of the views of psychiatrists, according to which the overriding cause of mental affliction is "a brain-based chemical imbalance" and the sole remedy is treatment with drugs.
All psychiatrists, on the contrary, recognise the immense complexity of the problem of mental illness. Many of them, I have no doubt, believe that a society characterised by inequality, stress, perverse ideals and unattainable aspirations is one which encourages it – just as, I would add, a rather similar set of social evils encourages the spread of absurd cults like scientology.
PAUL FLETCHER
Baronald Drive
Glasgow
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