Canadian Mindscape Monitor

Sorry, dear readers, that we’ve been delinquent in our posts. Too much work, too little pay for this blogging (i.e. none!) etc etc… But we do feel it’s important to follow up on an earlier story.  When asked by CMM if he could provide even one scientific reference for his grandiose claims to the media [...]

A U.S. News and World Report commentator rightly raises questions about a much bally-hooed “blood test” that supposedly helps screen women who “might” eventually get post-partum depression.
Ya gotta love how psychiatry, unsatisfied with its failed struggles to develop tests that can identify mental illnesses, is increasingly resorting to developing tests that identify mental illnesses that [...]

Various and sundry Canadian media covered with relatively little fanfare or controversy the recent decision of sitting “independent” Senator Lillian Dyck to become a Liberal.  Along the way, they casually described her background, which includes a PhD in Biological Psychiatry and studies into antidepressants and antipsychotics. She’s also patented some mental health drugs herself.  So [...]

With the release of Tom Cruise’s latest movie, Cruise has been prompted to apologize for the upbraiding of Matt Lauer he did in 2005 (watch the video here) while discussing Brooke Shields’ advocating of psychiatric drugs. Cruise was widely attacked and ridiculed along with his religion, Scientology, for questioning the scientific underpinnings of psychiatry. Yet [...]

U.S. National Public Radio has finally fired its psychiatrist talkshow host, Dr.  Frederick Goodwin of “The Infinite Mind”. The New York Times reports he potted $1.3 million in kickbacks from pharmaceutical companies — much more than NPR ever paid him to host the show no doubt — during his 7-year tenure. “The fact that he [...]

CMM nearly died of a zap attack waking up this morning to an editorial in the Province, one of Vancouver’s two major daily newspapers.  Time to Zap the Taser flatly attacks police for committing “executions” on innocent people with the infamous pain-compliance mechanisms. Congratulations to the Province for its honesty and forthrightness, but they won’t [...]

An article in Ontario’s Mississauga News reports on a nurse winning a $5,000 award from pharmaceutical giant Bayer’s “Bayer Dream Fund“, given “to support the dream of a Canadian who is effectively managing their diabetes”. That nurse’s dream? She is “creating a local exercise program for people with diabetes who also experience mental illness”.
It’s a [...]

A new short video on YouTube discusses the dangers of a lawsuit that’s been launched by CanWest Global, Canada’s biggest media empire, to strike down Canada’s laws against prescription drug advertising. Written and produced by Rob Wipond, sometimes rumoured to be the main person behind our very own Canadian Mindscape Monitor, the lawsuit is a [...]

A recent Globe and Mail article is a dazzling example of how facts and logic are routinely twisted around to make room for more drugs. Evidently oblivious to the recent raft of medical journal studies showing a rampant over-diagnosing and over-drugging of seniors with psychotropics in long term care facilities, journalist Andre Picard announces that [...]

The chair of Canada’s Mental Health Commission keeps preaching his “anti-stigma” campaign to the public, and most journalists keep gobbling it up uncritically. Michael Kirby, who previously chaired the Senate Committee that issued the federal report on Canada’s mental health system, “Out of the Shadows at Last”, constantly complains about the “negative opinions” many people [...]

School Avoidance, School Refusal or School Phobia is the latest normal child behaviour to be turned into a capital-letter worthy “Disorder” by psychiatrists and psychologists, and the start of the school year is bringing out lots of Great Wonderful Articles in our ever-gullible media, like this tear-jeaker story in the Kitchener-Waterloo Record about a guy [...]

Using an access to information request, the Toronto Star reports it has obtained a copy of a recent independent internal review of the RCMP’s use of tasers. According to the Star (and much to their credit, the Star has so far done much of Canada’s most incisive and critical writing on Tasers and manufacturer Taser [...]

CBC reports that a medical ethicist at the Canadian Psychiatric Association conference is arguing BC’s Mental Health Act is the way to go for the future of psychiatric treatment in Canada. Not surprising, since BC has long been applauded by mainstream psychiatrists around North America for its “pioneering” Mental Health Act, which gives doctors essentially [...]

A new article in the British Journal of Psychiatry argues that psychiatrists are already helping to improve people’s “moral character” with their drugs, not just their mental health, and therefore should embrace this role. The Wired Science blog discusses the topic with stunning obliviousness to the horrors underlying the real question being asked: Since many [...]