One Boring Old Man tells it like it is

If you’ve not yet read 1 Boring Old Man, it’s time that you be introduced. He’s been on my blogroll a while but I’ve not linked directly to his blog before. He is a retired psychiatrist who critiques his profession with brilliance. (not boring at all!)

Today I’m excerpting from his latest post where he concludes:

I willingly signed the APA [American Psychological Association] petition Dr. Frances endorses, but my real wish is that they’d table the whole DSM-5 enterprise and let us regroup and figure out who the hell we are before proceeding. The reason that I’m seeming to write less lately is not that I’m writing less lately. It’s that I’m only posting part of what I’m writing. For the moment, I get too angry, and I can’t easily separate how much of the “big picture” is my anger at how all of this business affected my own life, or what it’s done to my medical specialty, or how it affected the patients we treat. Back when I naively thought that the changes in psychiatry over my career were mostly due to economic forces or the rise and fall of scientific paradigms, I almost never thought about it. But I’m now painfully aware that’s not close to all that happened. There was a deus ex machina, an elephant in the room, a hidden ponzi scheme – whatever way one describes an unacknowledged guiding force that carries the story [that shouldn’t be there]. I suppose, like everyone since the dawn of time looking at such a situation, it now seems so obvious and I feel like an idiot to have not seen it, or at least to have not seen the extent of it. At times like this when objectivity seems so elusive, one can only turn to the wisdom of Heller’s Yossarian in Catch-22 to explain the feeling:

Yossarian: Those bastards are trying to kill me.
Milo Minderbinder: No one is trying to kill you sweetheart. Now eat your dessert like a good boy.
Yossarian: Oh yeah? Then why are they shooting at me Milo?
Dobbs: They’re shooting at everyone Yossarian.
Yossarian: And what difference does that make?
Dobbs: Look Yossarian, suppose, I mean just suppose everyone thought the same way you do.
Yossarian: Then I’d be a damn fool to think any different. read the rest of this article

I do highly recommend clicking through and reading the rest of this article and checking out the rest of his blog.

You can sign the petition he mentions here, if you’ve not already done so. I have to say I’m in agreement with 1Boring Old Man though. The DSM needs tabling. I would say it needs permanent tabling.

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GENERAL DISCLAIMER: I often publish authors whose articles I appreciate while maybe not agreeing with everything. My pieces, also, cannot stand alone. Some of my work contains ideas that may sometimes seem to contradict other pieces because all cannot be said in short essays. It's wise to avoid assumptions based on a few posts. Attitudes have also not remained stagnant over time and the archives reflect the passage of of many years. Some articles contain links to other resources on the Internet. Links are provided as citations to help identify more information and are not intended to state or imply that this site recommends, endorses, supports, sponsors, or is in any way affiliated or associated with any person or entity associated with the linked material. Use your judgment in all things. Nothing on these pages should be construed as medical advice.

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