NEWS: Mind Your Freedom - 12 July 2004

http://www.MindFreedom.org

 

Loren Mosher -- Psychiatrist and

Human Rights Activist -- Has Died,

But He's Still Fighting His Profession.

As Loren Died, His Newest Book Goes to Press

statement by David Oaks, Director, MindFreedom

Loren Mosher was like a Schindler of

psychiatry, as in the film "Schindler's List."

One of our Schindlers has died.

Loren Mosher was a psychiatrist who fought

his own profession's oppression, who was a tremendous

ally to survivors of psychiatric human rights

violations. He died this weekend in Berlin after

struggling with a liver disease.

This is just a brief note to let people who

care about human rights in the mental health

system know about this loss of a real hero.

If you did not know about Loren's contribution

to this area, I've put just a little bit at the

bottom of this that I encourage you to read,

such as his famous letter of resignation from

the American Psychiatric Association.

I'm lucky that Loren was also a personal

friend of mine, and on the board of MindFreedom.

He did so many things to support me, our group,

so many groups, and our entire social change movement.

Loren was also superb at encouraging other mental

health professionals to have the simple courage and

decency to speak out, such as in his work with

the International Center for the Study of Psychiatry

and Psychology.

He knew how to enjoy life, too. Loren knew how to

overthrow psychiatric oppression and have a nice day,

such as in his world travels.

Loren would be delighted to know that even death is not

stopping him from challenging his psychiatric profession!

Loren has worked for many years on a book he co-authored

entitled "Soteria: Through Madness to Deliverance." Final

details for the book's publishing were being prepared at

about the time Loren died.

A colleague of Loren told me today the book will be out by

September, and perhaps even by the time a memorial is planned

for Loren in August. Soteria tells the story of his successful

fight to create a commonsense alternative that worked,

an alternative to the mental health system that did not use

the bizarre bullying and poisoning with massive amounts

of drugs that has captured the current mental health system.

Soteria was just a house, with regular people (not mental

health professionals) trained to take care of people

not by pouring toxic concoctions of psychiatric drugs

down these clients throats... not by pushing these

clients around... but instead by building relationships.

Soteria clients did better, of course, than those who were pushed

through the strangling ringer of the current mental health

system. But that data threatened the mental health system, and

the profession has done much to try to suppress the "evidenced

based" humane, empowering model that Soteria championed.

How many people's lives and minds were saved because Loren

helped them escape psychiatry's systemic abuse, both in

Soteria and in many other ways, internationally?

Well, Loren is still winning. He is winning out with his new

book. And he's winning out with the thousands of psychiatric

survivors and allies his life has touched, who will carry

on his struggle, with, hopefully, the same good humor,

intelligence, and persistence that I always saw in Loren.

Psychiatric survivor Peter Lehmann announced the news

that Loren had died in the Anthroposophic Clinic

Havelhoehe in Berlin, Germany during his last ditch

effort to fight his liver disease. Loren lived in

San Diego, California, USA.

There will be more to say about Loren's legacy for the

movement to change psychiatry. I will personally speak

about him this Bastille Day, July 14, which for 24 years has

been a day of protest of human rights abuse in the mental

health system (see http://wwww.MindFreedom.org ).

Also, I am sure many of us will join me in remembering Loren

at ICSPP's conference http://wwww.icspp.org and at

Alternatives 2004. Poignantly, we psychiatric survivors

were planning an award for Loren at ICSPP; thankfully, he knew

about our often-too-slow but loving efforts to appreciate him.

Below you'll find some biographical information, articles,

and a blurb I submitted about Loren's latest book.

Thank you Loren Mosher, for fighting the good fight with

such style, cunning, wit and care. We mourn you, we

remember you, and we will redouble our efforts to

stop the violations you hated, and promote the humane

alternatives you dearly loved.

May Loren's life encourage many more Schindlers

in the psychiatric profession to have the wisdom

and bravery and love and decency to speak out about

the nightmarishly horrible abuse that is inherent

in the psychiatric system, to confront it, to even

laugh in its face, and to build loving alternatives

to it.

~~~~~~~~~~~~

bio:

http://www.moshersoteria.com/bio.htm

Loren's work:

http://www.moshersoteria.com/

Info about Soteria:

http://www.moshersoteria.com/soteri.htm

Psychology Today article:

http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1175/is_5_32/ai_55625499

Letter of resignation from American Psychiatric Association

http://adhd-report.com/biopsychiatry/bio_12.html

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

_Soteria: Through Madness to Deliverance_ [blurb by David Oaks]

> As a psychiatric survivor, I hope Soteria stories will be told and

> retold, again and again, because together they illuminate an

> exhilarating path toward deliverance from a mental health "system" gone

> mad. In this book, Soteria's stories about how people can support and

> help others experiencing extreme mental and emotional crises emerge in

> loving (and sometimes humorous) detail. Here, the authors detail how

> dissident mental health workers, professionals, and researchers

> heroically championed an historic project in the face of a tidal wave of

> repression from the arrogant, tradition-bound psychiatric profession.

> These stories teach us how to survive a confused, drug-addicted,

> authoritarian, and, at times, deadly mental health establishment. For

> all those who—when confronted with psychiatry's crimes—ask, "But what's

> the alternative?" Soteria offers an elegant reply. It tells the inside

> story of an effective, hopeful, commonsense, empowering alternative to

> mainstream mental health practices.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

 

David Oaks, Executive Director

MindFreedom Support Coalition International

454 Willamette, Suite 216 - POB 11284

Eugene, OR 97440-3484 USA

http://www.mindfreedom.org

email: oaks@mindfreedom.org  fax: (541) 345-3737

phone: (541) 345-9106 toll free in USA: 1-877-MAD-PRIDE

MIND YOUR FREEDOM: United Action for Human Rights.

join here: http://www.mindfreedom.org/join.shtml

MindFreedom Support Coalition International is an

independent non-profit uniting 100 sponsor groups

to win human rights & alternatives in mental health.

Accredited by the United Nations as a

Non-Governmental Organization (NGO) with

Consultative Roster Status.

~~~~~~~~~

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