Where Psychiatry is and how it got there

I am a Psychiatrist. Indeed I have just returned from a meeting of various professionals concerned with the practical use of mental health legislation in Ireland. As I arrived, I completed this audiobook.

One of the speaker was the author and several speakers referenced the book in glowing terms. In main, I am in full agreement.

I was prompted to submit this review having read the review already published… not sure what professional background that person has, but I’m guessing they are not a practicing psychiatrist.

Of the criticisms made, I agree that the narrator was iffy and that some of the accents were not great. That said, that is common in audiobooks in my experience. I’m not sure it detracted from the text though the accents were distracting. I also was unsure about the ‘travelogue’ element of the book.

What did shine through was the humanity and authenticity of the voice of the author. He has much to say and in my view, nearly all is correct.

Well done Brendan. It’s a ballsy thing to write such a book and your book is a credit to you and might make a difference

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Show me where the Neuroscientist touched you.

It starts with a disclaimer that none of personal stories are true then is littered with personal stories of the mentally ill used to back up the points made. Ask permission to use the stories or don't. You can't just make up evidence. That's not how evidence works.

Then the accents. Oh my lord the accents. Why do the accents. They added literally nothing and were hillariously bad. I LOLed when the Guardian was portrayed as an 18th century member of the House of Lords.

The book is an ahistorical mess. The moral treatment is blamed for asylums, murderous treatments that killed thousands are blithely explained as enthusiasm in the psychiatric community. Eugenics is written off as a bit of a mistake. Lobotomy was terrible but hey it did work a couple of times.

The travelogue stuff is just dull. The book is a car crash and this subject has been covered by dozens of authors much, much more skilfully. My favourite parts were: the rant against cannabis out of nowhere backed up by zero evidence of any sort. The dozens of assertions that medicines work. Backed up by virtually no evidence. The feeling the author has had his heart broken by a neuroscientist and will never forgive the whole community.

SPOILER ALERT: the manifesto at the end is 'we need to spend more money on mental health but not neuroscience! Nothing for them fellas'.

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