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AND THEY CALL IT HELP

THE PSYCHIATRIC POLICING OF AMERICA'S CHILDREN

An eye-opening journey into the world of children in residential treatment centers, psychiatric hospitals, and other therapeutic institutional settings. Outspoken and outraged, Armstrong continues the victim-as- perpetrator theme she explored earlier in her work on domestic violence (The Home Front, 1983) and incest (Kiss Daddy Goodnight- -not reviewed). Here, she attacks psychiatry as a form of ideological imperialism that claims an ever-growing list of behaviors, feelings, and thoughts as problems that require treatment. According to Armstrong, society's acceptance of the labeling of ordinary human problems as ``mental illnesses'' has meant that children who are unwanted or whose behavior troubles their parents, teachers, or guardians are increasingly being treated with incarceration and drugs. The author looks at the marketing of psychiatric services and interviews those who operate treatment centers, as well as the kids who have spent time in them. Abuses are apparent, and Armstrong makes clear her exasperation with the system she's examining. But what really makes her blood boil is the jargon she finds in The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, the standard reference by which psychiatry defines the conditions that it treats. Since the 1950's, the list has grown from some 60 types of mental illness to hundreds of ``mental disorders'' like tobacco dependence and school-learning problems. When such conditions become labeled as illnesses, insurance companies reimburse therapists for treating them, and the mental-health industry thrives. Armstrong rails at society's acceptance of this process and the harm it's inflicting on children—whom she views as often the innocent victims of society's ills in the first place. In the tradition of old-fashioned muckraking journalism- -clear in its anger and in its call for change—and sure to evoke heated responses from psychiatrists and their allies.

Pub Date: May 1, 1993

ISBN: 0-201-57794-1

Page Count: 320

Publisher: Addison-Wesley

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 1993

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MASTERY

Readers unfamiliar with the anecdotal material Greene presents may find interesting avenues to pursue, but they should...

Greene (The 33 Strategies of War, 2007, etc.) believes that genius can be learned if we pay attention and reject social conformity.

The author suggests that our emergence as a species with stereoscopic, frontal vision and sophisticated hand-eye coordination gave us an advantage over earlier humans and primates because it allowed us to contemplate a situation and ponder alternatives for action. This, along with the advantages conferred by mirror neurons, which allow us to intuit what others may be thinking, contributed to our ability to learn, pass on inventions to future generations and improve our problem-solving ability. Throughout most of human history, we were hunter-gatherers, and our brains are engineered accordingly. The author has a jaundiced view of our modern technological society, which, he writes, encourages quick, rash judgments. We fail to spend the time needed to develop thorough mastery of a subject. Greene writes that every human is “born unique,” with specific potential that we can develop if we listen to our inner voice. He offers many interesting but tendentious examples to illustrate his theory, including Einstein, Darwin, Mozart and Temple Grandin. In the case of Darwin, Greene ignores the formative intellectual influences that shaped his thought, including the discovery of geological evolution with which he was familiar before his famous voyage. The author uses Grandin's struggle to overcome autistic social handicaps as a model for the necessity for everyone to create a deceptive social mask.

Readers unfamiliar with the anecdotal material Greene presents may find interesting avenues to pursue, but they should beware of the author's quirky, sometimes misleading brush-stroke characterizations.

Pub Date: Nov. 13, 2012

ISBN: 978-0-670-02496-4

Page Count: 320

Publisher: Viking

Review Posted Online: Sept. 12, 2012

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2012

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THE 48 LAWS OF POWER

If the authors are serious, this is a silly, distasteful book. If they are not, it’s a brilliant satire.

The authors have created a sort of anti-Book of Virtues in this encyclopedic compendium of the ways and means of power.

Everyone wants power and everyone is in a constant duplicitous game to gain more power at the expense of others, according to Greene, a screenwriter and former editor at Esquire (Elffers, a book packager, designed the volume, with its attractive marginalia). We live today as courtiers once did in royal courts: we must appear civil while attempting to crush all those around us. This power game can be played well or poorly, and in these 48 laws culled from the history and wisdom of the world’s greatest power players are the rules that must be followed to win. These laws boil down to being as ruthless, selfish, manipulative, and deceitful as possible. Each law, however, gets its own chapter: “Conceal Your Intentions,” “Always Say Less Than Necessary,” “Pose as a Friend, Work as a Spy,” and so on. Each chapter is conveniently broken down into sections on what happened to those who transgressed or observed the particular law, the key elements in this law, and ways to defensively reverse this law when it’s used against you. Quotations in the margins amplify the lesson being taught. While compelling in the way an auto accident might be, the book is simply nonsense. Rules often contradict each other. We are told, for instance, to “be conspicuous at all cost,” then told to “behave like others.” More seriously, Greene never really defines “power,” and he merely asserts, rather than offers evidence for, the Hobbesian world of all against all in which he insists we live. The world may be like this at times, but often it isn’t. To ask why this is so would be a far more useful project.

If the authors are serious, this is a silly, distasteful book. If they are not, it’s a brilliant satire.

Pub Date: Sept. 1, 1998

ISBN: 0-670-88146-5

Page Count: 430

Publisher: Viking

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 1998

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