SOWK 2035; Group N, Mad Movement Presentation.

1. Website
Comparison
Group N: Jamie Paterson,
Jennifer Daechsel, & Laura
Eichhorn

2. Statement of Purpose
 This
presentation will address the way in
which several websites active in the MAD
Movement have succeeded in
advocating for the liberalization of mental
health patient care and increased
patient freedom.

3. Mad Movement: What is it?
 Movement
led largely by former
psychiatric in-patients (those formerly
institutionalized in asylums) pushing for
reforms to the psychiatric system as a
result of abuses they had endured, the
stigmas they faced, and their lack of self
control (failure to cede decision making
power to stakeholders).1

4. MAD Movement: Support
 Feminist
movement
 Radical professionals
 Gay liberation movement
 Revitalization of the self help doctrine
 Mental hygiene movement

5. MAD Movement Support:
Feminist Movement
 In
the late 19th century the early feminist
movement combatted the medical
establishment with regard to its then
treatment of women’s medical
conditions.
 This criticism made the feminist movement
natural allies of other organizations critical
of the established medical community.1

6. MAD Movement Support:
Radical Professionals



RD Laing led the charge of radical
professionals in reinterpreting schizophrenia as
“an altered mode of consciousness rather
than as a pathological condition.”
These critiques were usually tied to a critique
of society from a politically theoretical
perspective. These critiques were Marxist,
existentialist, anything but medical.
Even though these professionals generally
ignored patient perspectives, they still
advocated for priorities in line with the desires
of the MAD Movement as a whole.1

7. MAD Movement Support: Gay
Liberation Movement
 As
homosexuality was seen for a long time
as a psychiatric illness, those attempting
to recategorize homosexuality found
themselves as natural allies to the MAD
movement.
 This forceful opposition to the
homosexuality as a mental illness led
others to question the validity of their own
affliction’s designations.1

8. MAD Movement Support: Self
Help Doctrine



A general trend re-emerged, in the United States
especially, for individuals to wrest control back
from professionals.
There was a trend toward specialization across a
multitude of disciplines. This led to discourse
between professionals and the general public to
become increasingly difficult.
As a reaction, the general public, and
psychiatrized individuals in particular, took their
treatment into their own hands, often opting to
avoid professional advice or intervention.1

9. MAD Movement Support:
Mental Hygiene Movement


The idea of the mental hygiene movement
ran counter to the prevailing medical ideas.
The belief was that mental illness could be
prevented, and that prevention should be the
focus rather than treatment.
Although somewhat tangential to the
movement itself, the efforts of the mental
hygiene movement put pressure on the
psychiatric community to alter its approach
to mental illness in general.1

10. Modern Manifestation of the
MAD Movement
 With
the introduction of the internet, it has
become much easier for smaller groups
with lower capital to advocate for the
MAD Movement.
 This diversification has its benefits (more
topics covered, easier dissemination of
ideas, lower startup costs, etc.). It also has
its drawbacks (reduced oversight,
overstretching human resources, potential
inconsistency, etc.)

11. Going Forward
 Every
movement has its pros and cons,
and every advocate for a cause also has
its strengths and weaknesses. We will
highlight these for three websites,
comparing the effectiveness of the
campaigns, while recognizing the
differing scopes and mission statements of
the websites.

12. Psychrights: Mission
 Psychrights.org
is a non-profit website
dedicated to The Law Project for Psychiatric
Rights. Their goal is to provide individual legal
counsel in an attempt to reduce the abuses
endured by people who have been
diagnosed with a mental illness.

13. Psychrights: Position


One area of focus is that court ordered
psychiatric drugging is problematic, as
psychiatric drugs and other treatments such
as ECT may have damaging side effects to
the brain and body.
Psychrights aims to educate the public on
alternatives to the use of psychoactive drugs.
It is their position that such drugs are often
unnecessary, especially when administered to
youth and the underprivileged.

14. Psychrights: Pros
 Contains
articles from peer reviewed
journals and lists events and topics
relevant to those advocating for the
mentally ill.
 This lends credibility to the site and
distinguishes it from organizations that are
less rigorous. (It is important to note that
there still may be biases reflected in the
organizations choice of what resources to
present to the general public.)

15. Psychrights: Pros




This website attempts to help individuals as
well as the MAD Movement as a whole.
On the front page there is a link to
MADinamerica.com
The CEO of psychrights Jim Gottstein has
written articles for MADinamerica.com
Articles on psychrights also published on MAD
in America. (This focus on MAD in America
indicates a recognition of MAD in America as
a hub for information related to the MAD
Movement)

16. Psychrights: Pros
 The
finances of the organization are
publically posted on the site, which shows
exactly where all the donations have
been allocated.
 This is important for accountability. The
transparency allows donors and
stakeholders to place increased faith in
the quality of the work the organization
performs.

17. Psychrights: Cons
 The
site has a rather boring appearance
that doesn’t intrigue the reader.
 The interface of the site is outdated,
demonstrating a lack of professionalism.
This can lead to a reduction of both user
interest and trust.

18. Psychrights: Cons
 The
site has a great deal of information,
however, no new information has been
added since the third quarter of last year.
As such, users are unlikely to encounter
current information on new developments
in this field.

19. Psychrights: Cons
 This
site has failed to maximally utilize
social media as evidenced by the low
number of followers on both Facebook
and Twitter.
 This trend is likely to be exacerbated by
the failure of the site to remain up to date.

20. NARPA: Mission
 “NARPA’s
mission is to promote polices
and pursue strategies that result in
individuals with psychiatric diagnose
making their own choices regarding
treatment. We educate and mentor those
individuals to enable them to exercise
their legal and human rights with a goal of
abolition of all forced treatment”(2014)2.

21. NARPA: Position


The NARPA organization is a non-governmental
organization and is solely supported by its
members. This organization is run by a
combination of individuals that have either
survived or worked in the psychiatric system. These
include, but are not limited to, lawyers, mental
health workers and civil right activists. The
common goal is the liberalization of individuals to
self-determination with regards to psychiatric
treatment.
The diversity of the composition of their
membership is comparable to the membership of
the MAD movement at its inception.

22. NARPA: Pros
 NARPA
has received awards for public
service and has information about
workshops and presentations.
 This suggests both an interest in
community involvement and an interest
from the community to be involved.

23. NARPA: Pros
 This
site maintains up to date information
and draws its resources from a national
and global community.
 This demonstrates a breadth of both
geographical and topical diversity. As
such, members of numerous communities
have access to current and relevant
information.

24. NARPA: Pros
 The
website supports subsidized
memberships, which makes participation
more accessible to marginalized
individuals, especially those in lower
income brackets.
 It also has an easy to use donation
system, to allow more affluent and
capable members to support and
maintain the organization’s operations.

25. NARPA: Cons
 By
not having either an onsite chat
feature or forum, the site misses an
opportunity for easy community
involvement.
 It prevents people from actively engaging
with the material and removing an
avenue for critique and discussion. This
omission also decreases the likelihood of
attracting new membership.

26. NARPA: Cons
 The
lack of information on the board of
directors leads to a lack of transparency.
 This is generally a poor decision for a nonprofit organization. It decreases willingness
to donate and engage, as there is a lack
of accountability for the utilization of
resources. It also masks what future path
the site is likely to take, or what external
unknown affiliations may exist.

27. NARPA: Cons
 The
layout of the site makes it almost
unusable. Although style can be
superfluous, this site borrows its structure
from amateurish sites reminiscent of the
1990s.
 This overt lack of professionalism is a
powerful detractor and will likely dissuade,
even intent users, from reading site
content almost immediately.

28. Video

The following is a short
video on why NARPA is
important to the
consumers of the
psychiatric system. Robert
Whitaker speaks about
how people are
oppressed and their rights
are taken away from
them in the system. As
well about how this needs
to be changed and a
great start to this are
organizations like NARPA.
This organization tries to
counter the psychiatric
system and protect
people’s rights.

Robert Whitaker is a
medical writer and is
associated with the MAD
movement. He wrote the
book Mad in America
and is well educated in
the field. He talks about
NARPA as a very
important part of the
MAD movement.
 http://www.youtub
e.com/watch?v=itF
eEUTdQd4

29. MAD in America: Mission


The MAD in America organization, through its
website and other projects, aims to become
a forum for rethinking psychiatry and building
a community of people interested in that
topic.
This project is being run by bloggers on that
include people with lived experience, peer
specialists, psychiatrists, psychologists, social
workers, program managers, social activists,
attorneys, and journalists.

30. MAD in America: Position
Mad in America was founded to alter the
current paradigm of mental health care by
addressing three central questions:
 Why are long term outcomes so poor for
psychiatric patients in the US and other
affluent countries?
 Why is the literature on treatment and its
effectiveness so different from the information
generally disseminated to the public?
 Why is the voice of the patients themselves so
frequently absent from the discussion?

31. MAD in America: Pros
 Has
a large database of professional and
lived-experience editorials reflecting the
current and ongoing debate about
psychiatric care.
 This diversity of writers gives a vast
knowledge base from experts in this
area, be it professional or personal
expertise.

32. MAD in America: Pros
 The
primary contributors to the site all
have detailed biographies, allowing the
users to assess the validity of the
information.
 This transparency about content
contribution allows for several positive
outcomes: increased user engagement,
accountability, and assurance of the true
diversity of opinions.

33. MAD in America: Pros


The website currently sees a visitor rate of
85,000 users per month, and that frequency is
increasing. Additionally, more than 20% of
users are outside of the United States.
This broad reach is significant for both
community involvement, and an ability to
disseminate information. Consequently, this
broader reach has the potential to pressure
the psychiatric community into some form of
action (or reaction).

34. MAD in America: Cons



While there is a vast array of material on the
site, the search feature makes it difficult to
access.
Searches for one topic are likely to bring up
papers on another, unrelated topic. Often the
topic that does appear is actually based on
the topic’s popularity, rather than its
relevance.
This reinforces a redundancy on the
homepage, that already emphasizes certain
articles and topics.

35. MAD in America: Cons
 The
contact feature limits users’ ability to
communicate with a central site
administrator. All questions must be
directed to a particular author.
 This limitation means that many functional
questions may remain either unanswered,
or perhaps even unasked.

36. MAD in America: Cons
 There
is a lack of peer reviewed
information. Although the format of the
website is one of blogs, as it relies heavily
on professional expertise. It thus has the
potential to misrepresent disseminated
evidence as if I were supported by
evidence based research.

37. PsychRights & NAPRA
PsychRights does well in providing
information on the rights of people with
mental illness through their various articles
and videos. However, NAPRA has similar
information but goes the extra step by
providing information through conferences,
as well as providing allowing people to
volunteer and donate easily. Although
there is a lot of things PsychRights does well,
NAPRA simply does it better.

38. PsychRights & NAPRA
That being said, the information provided on
this site still assists in the MAD movement
through providing even more information on
this detailed subject to the general public. If
the con’s of this site were to be corrected,
the site could have the potential to help
thousands of people gain information on
mental illness, as well as give people with
mental illnesses more rights, and give children
a fighting chance to not be forced to take
potentially harmful psychoactive drugs.

39. NAPRA & MAD in America
Both MAD and NARPA are put together by former
patients or people that were involved in the
psychiatric system. Both of these movements and
organizations are about helping those that are in
the system now as well as those that have had to
experience the system. Both missions are about
helping those that are struggling through the
systems but each focusing on a different part of the
system, one being forced treatment the other being
about the abuse and stigmas people have to
endure. These two sites really come together on
their outlook on letting consumers make their own
decisions about treatment and medications instead
of being forced against their will.

40. MAD & PsychRights
Although the two sites are closely affiliated, their focuses are
different. While PsychRights primarily emphasizes the legal
options available to the mentally ill, MAD in America
functions as a resource for the community at large to
educate itself about alternatives to mainstream psychiatry.
Despite the obvious disparity in purpose, the two sites
operate under a simple singular shared premise. Both sites
are intended as a resource for the general public,
especially the disenfranchised and marginalized members
of society. In this capacity, both sites provide the general
public access to professionally administered information
and assistance. However, MAD in America, due in part to its
format, also allows for and encourages active community
involvement on top of the professional contributions.

41. Conclusion
Clearly the online MAD Movement is still in its infancy. There
are positive signs in terms of the number of websites that exist,
and the willingness of both professionals and the mentally ill
community to engage with these new platforms. However,
the way in which the sites are managed is endemic of a
group somewhat unfamiliar with the internet as a medium, as
well as one limited in its resources.
Despite these shortcomings, the increasing interest in the
topic, the continuous fundraising efforts, and the
accumulating experience of having a powerful internet
presence will allow this movement to transform itself into an
effective platform for the dissemination of information with
regards to alternatives for the mentally ill.

42. Works Cited
 1.
Menzies, Robert J.. Mad matters: a
critical reader in Canadian mad studies.
Toronto: Canadian Scholars' Press, 2013.
Print.
 2. About NARPA." About NARPA. N.p., n.d.
Web. 2 Mar. 2013.
<http://www.narpa.org/webdoc4.htm>.
 3. PsychRights.
“http://psychrights.org/index.htm”