Mad In America

Mad In America Science, Psychiatry, and Social Justice
News, Blogs, and Advocacy
http://madinamerica.com Keep comments civil. Honor differing viewpoints.

The site is designed to serve as a resource and a community for those interested in rethinking psychiatric care in the United States and abroad. We want to provide readers with news, personal stories, access to source documents, and the informed writings of bloggers that will further this enterprise. The bloggers on this site include people with lived experience, peer specialists, psychiatrists, p

sychologists, social workers, program managers, social activists, attorneys, and journalists. While their opinions naturally vary, they share a belief that our current system of psychiatric care needs to be vastly improved, and, many would argue, transformed. We welcome feedback and op-ed submissions from our readers.

–Robert Whitaker

********************************

Community Standards

At Mad in America, we are committed to maintaining a space for dialogue about rethinking psychiatric care that is rich with a diversity of voices and experiences. For this reason, we have an in-depth comment moderation policy on our website (see here: https://www.madinamerica.com/posting-guidelines/). We realize that many conversations happen off our website and occur in comments on our page. Consistent with best practices for non-profit social media management, we are now actively extending our commitment to moderate discussion occurring on our page. This means that comments on Facebook posts by and on our page will now be deleted or hidden if they are not consistent with our posting guidelines. In particular, we will, to the best of our ability, remove all forms of hate speech that make disparaging assertions based on a person’s identities or occupation, and calls for violence against any people. *Comments violating hate speech policies will be immediately deleted and user may be banned.*

When commenting on Mad in America's page please keep these guidelines in mind. This includes refraining from posting personal attacks, threats, spamming, misrepresentations of oneself or others, illegal material, profanity, hate speech, disparaging assertions about a person’s character, discrimination based on a person’s identity or occupation, and calls for violence against any people. We ask for good faith and the benefit of the doubt in our effort to allow anybody who wants to join the dialogue to do so without fear of abuse. Please respond to and criticize ideas, not character. This website intentionally brings together individuals with varying backgrounds and values. We believe civil, inclusive dialogue to be crucial to finding solutions to our current paradigm of mental health care. Remain relevant to the present article/topic. Off-topic comments are disruptive and derail the discussion. These may be removed by the moderator. Please see https://www.madinamerica.com/posting-guidelines/ for all guidelines.

From Mad in Puerto Rico: This investigative report by Tobi Thomas for The Guardian presents the findings of a study tha...
09/10/2026

From Mad in Puerto Rico: This investigative report by Tobi Thomas for The Guardian presents the findings of a study that identified neuroanatomical differences between people living in areas where inequality is prevalent. These differences were present regardless of socioeconomic status. This likely affects people's neurological development throughout their lives, including their socio-emotional and cognitive development.

More Evidence That Anti-Amyloid Alzheimer’s Drugs Are a Bustby Peter Simons on the Mad in America SubstackA new study sh...
09/09/2026

More Evidence That Anti-Amyloid Alzheimer’s Drugs Are a Bust
by Peter Simons on the Mad in America Substack

A new study shows that those who got the drug experienced a steeper cognitive decline after the trial than those who didn’t get the drug. In the end, their cognitive decline ended up being the same as that for the placebo group.

The researchers write that their finding “raises doubts about the true clinical utility of these drugs” and “questions whether brain amyloid reduction can meaningfully alter the long-term clinical trajectories of patients with early AD.”

Link in comments.

Dory Previn was an American lyricist, singer-songwriter, and poet whose deeply personal work explored her struggles with...
09/09/2026

Dory Previn was an American lyricist, singer-songwriter, and poet whose deeply personal work explored her struggles with mental health, including experiences of psychosis.

In October 1974, she met with neuroscientist Peter Sterling for a candid conversation about her psychiatric treatment. That interview has never been aired—until now.

A remarkable, previously unheard glimpse into Dory Previn’s life and work.



Find the link to the conversation in the comments...

From Locura en Argentina: After a tremendous emotional toll of navigating bureaucratic hurdles, I finally obtained a sum...
09/08/2026

From Locura en Argentina: After a tremendous emotional toll of navigating bureaucratic hurdles, I finally obtained a summary of my medical record from my first involuntary psychiatric hospitalization. Once I read it in full, I decided to invent a birthday for myself. September 1st is my neurodivergent birthday, because on that date, in 1994, I experienced my first delusions and hallucinations. I was just 16 years old and was admitted to a psychiatric hospital for the first time, involuntarily, as documented in my medical summary. This attitude of curiosity and questioning is a first step toward resilience.

From Helplessness to Power: Collective Phantasy and Politics in Contemporary IranBy Mohammad Hadi Forouzesh NiaWhat happ...
09/08/2026

From Helplessness to Power: Collective Phantasy and Politics in Contemporary Iran
By Mohammad Hadi Forouzesh Nia

What happens to a group’s collective internal world when it experiences itself as deeply helpless and lacking any power to affect its fate? Collective life might generate phantasies that transform the vague and fragmented experience of vulnerability into a more graspable psychic scene: someone is harmed, someone is responsible for his harm, and consequently, someone must restore justice.

During this process, some historical, religious, or mythical figures are invested with meanings and affects appropriate to the group’s current psychic narrative, so that a group’s suffering, injustice, need for protection, need for revenge, or restoration of its lost power are condensed into a more graspable scene through which a group is then able to symbolically articulate the affects that are difficult to organize and tolerate.

Link in comments.

Coercive Practices in Psychiatry Are Being Systematically Underreported, Study SuggestsBy Richard SearsA global survey o...
09/07/2026

Coercive Practices in Psychiatry Are Being Systematically Underreported, Study Suggests
By Richard Sears

A global survey of mental-health professionals reveals substantial gaps between the use, recognition and reporting of coercive practices.

Link in comments.

Song of the Week: Instigator by Inpatient (Ren Gill and Chris Webby)This week’s Song of the Week was suggested by Ivy Wi...
09/07/2026

Song of the Week: Instigator by Inpatient (Ren Gill and Chris Webby)

This week’s Song of the Week was suggested by Ivy Wilson:

“Ren Gill has lots of songs that would be great for Mad in America’s song of the week, like Sic Boi, Madhouse, Neurodivergent, Hi Ren and so many more. Ren is a UK artist who just put out the Inpatient Album. It champions freedom and escaping the darkness and suffering from iatrogenic trauma caused by psychiatric treatment and abuse. The song Instigator is uplifting and focuses on raising people’s spirits. He is a hero gathering other artists who are different or Neurodivergent, who know what it’s like to have gone through the system medically and what it’s like coming out the other side. Ren himself got misdiagnosed after getting Lyme’s disease and was put on psych meds that made his condition nearly fatal. Now, mentally well and physically improving his passion lies not only in his music, but in spreading awareness and a message of hope. This may be the most beautiful thing about him. Although I highly suggest you see his theatrical performance on his YouTube channel and on stage at RenMakesMusic. He definitely lifted my spirits and inspired me in dark times, and I’m creating my own work as well. Xo Ivy”

Link in the comments.

Poem of the Week: Marvel by Miro Sulkumäki To see the darkness,to hear the silence,to taste the water,to smell the air,a...
09/07/2026

Poem of the Week: Marvel by Miro Sulkumäki

To see the darkness,
to hear the silence,
to taste the water,
to smell the air,
and to touch the wind

Just some of the daily miracles

Links to this and other poems will be in the comments.

Featured Artwork: Step Inside and Live Freely by Pachi Aavi Pachi Aavi is an Indian American woman who believes a better...
09/07/2026

Featured Artwork: Step Inside and Live Freely by Pachi Aavi

Pachi Aavi is an Indian American woman who believes a better world is possible. She writes:

"I took a 5-week printmaking workshop at The Center for Mad Culture in Chicago, Illinois where instructor Matt Bodett gave us the option to make prints with adapted designs the 1494 German text, Ship of Fools, by Sebastian Brant. The book Madness and Civilization by Michel Foucault discusses the Ship of Fools as a commentary about people deemed 'mad' in European society. I took images from a couple of different pages, centering on a 'fool in love,' but what I did was subvert the image by making the woman actually be a victim of a broken heart, trauma, loss of financial stability."

Link in comments.

From Mad in South Asia: Sangji uses one woman's story to show that emotional distress in Pakistan is shaped by patriarch...
09/06/2026

From Mad in South Asia: Sangji uses one woman's story to show that emotional distress in Pakistan is shaped by patriarchy, poverty, trauma, and history, challenging individualised psychiatric diagnoses while advocating culturally grounded, systemic understandings of mental health. Laila’s Story: ‘I don’t know what’s wrong with me.’ She was in her late thirties, neatly dressed, her posture careful in the chair in my therapy room. Laila did not say she was depressed. She did not tell me that she thought she had anxiety. She did not use any psychological language at all. Funny, given that she was in a psychologist’s office.

Address

Cambridge, MA
02139

Website

Alerts

Be the first to know and let us send you an email when Mad In America posts news and promotions. Your email address will not be used for any other purpose, and you can unsubscribe at any time.

Contact The Business

Send a message to Mad In America:

Shortcuts

Share

Category