[DENDRITE] Psychiatry Captures MindFreedom Canada Artist/Activist

[Guest guest]

> " David Oaks - www.MindFreedom.org "

> <oaks

> Fri, 13 Aug 2004 17:05:38 -0700

 

> [DENDRITE] Psychiatry Captures MindFreedom

> Canada Artist/Activist

>

>

> MindFreedom Shield Alert - 13 August 2004

> http://www.MindFreedom.org - please forward

>

> FREE SARA!

>

> Sara Arenson, 25-year-old artist & activist,

> has been captured by a Canadian psychiatric

> institution where she is coercively drugged.

>

> Sara is a member of MindFreedom International,

> which is issuing this MindFreedom Shield Alert.

>

> ACTION: Please forward below statement. At BOTTOM

> find 3 e-mail addresses of Canadian officials

> you are encouraged to e-mail, plus more info.

>

> A photo of Sara and this alert are also on web:

>

> http://www.livejournal.com/users/laan.

>

> -----------------

>

> Statement from Network to Free Sara Arenson

>

> August 13, 2004 - FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

>

> ST. BONIFACE HOSPITAL, WINNIPEG, MANITOBA, CANADA

>

> On the evening of Wed., August 4, 2004 Sara Arenson,

> a

> twenty-five year old performing artist, student and

> activist, was involuntarily detained in the

> psychiatric

> ward of the St. Boniface General Hospital in

> Winnipeg.

>

> Sara was supposedly suffering a " mixed manic "

> episode,

> according to an examining psychiatrist, although she

> believes that " mental illness " is simply a label for

> spontaneous personal expression that those in power

> in our society find disturbing.

>

> At the time of her confinement, Sara had been out

> walking in downtown Winnipeg dreaming up unusual

> ideas about science and spirituality, asking

> questions of everyone she met, and laughing,

> crying, and chatting with the hungry and the poor.

>

> Because she is a naturally spontaneous, frank,

> emotionally expressive and articulate person, and

> had decided that evening to start asserting herself

> in ways she never had before, friends and a

> psychiatrist thought she was in trouble and in

> need of " treatment " .

>

> The " treatment " that Sara has received has consisted

> of incarceration in a psychiatric facility, where

> she is being coercively drugged with Risperidone,

> a powerful " atypical antipsychotic " whose common

> side effects include weight gain, dizziness,

> sleeplessness, racing heartbeat, restlessness,

> and anxiety.

>

> Sara is afraid to refuse this " medication, " despite

> the fact that when she was brought in no blood

> tests were performed indicating any sort of

> biochemical abnormality in her brain or elsewhere

> (since then, blood work has been performed and she

> has been deemed physically healthy except for

> some systemic yeast).

>

> Sara is afraid to refuse " medication " because after

> her initial psychiatric interview, she was not

> allowed to go home, but forcibly restrained with

> an injection and brought into the psychiatric ward.

>

> Now she does not want to risk being injected with

> slower releasing forms of antipsychotic drugs,

> because

> she has a fear of needles and wants to minimize the

> amount of drug in her bloodstream.

>

> WHO IS SARA?

>

> Sara is a highly intelligent, charming, high-energy,

> by turns sweet and sarcastic, sometimes sad and

> sometimes happy person -- in other words, just like

> everyone else on this planet.

>

> She is a writer with a Winnipeg Arts Council Grant

> and her first amateur production contract under

> her belt, an actor studying theatre at the

> University

> of Winnipeg, a vocal and vociferous vegan, an

> occasional gardener, and she is interested in yoga,

> meditation, science, music, natural healing, and

> anti-capitalist social activism.

>

> Although she is young and her arts career is only

> beginning, she is willing to risk her good name by

> publicly announcing the conditions of her detainment

> if this is the only way that she can end a practice

> that she finds absolutely immoral and unjustifiable

> in a democracy.

>

> Sara is not an atypical psychiatric patient. Many

> are emotionally expressive and intelligent, with a

> belief in a spiritual realm that our dominant

> " rationalistic " society dismisses as fantasy and

> delusion.

>

> In fact, this is the second time that Sara has been

> locked up in the past two and a half years,

> indicating

> just how easy it is for this kind of situation to

> arise.

>

> The first time, March/April 2002, she was under

> extreme

> stress because her father was in hospital dying from

> congestive heart failure, and the doctors failed to

> recognize her father's illness as a precipitating

> factor

> in her desperate journey for meaning.

>

> Since then, her father has passed away, and she has

> had to come to terms with his loss while coping with

> the trauma inflicted by her initial " treatment " at

> the Health Sciences Centre. Yoga, meditation,

> healthful

> eating, close friendships, acting classes, a writing

> mentorship and intensive journal-writing have saved

> her from the terrible loss of hope and self-esteem

> that

> followed her first incarceration.

>

> " I absolutely, positively did not feel helped by

> that experience, " says Sara. " I was bullied as a

> child,

> and it was actually reminiscent of the same process,

> basically being called a name -- 'bipolar' -- just

> means that someone else thinks that you get too

> happy and too sad. Well, my emotions are my

> emotions, and I have every right to feel and

> express them in all their intensity! " Sara is

> a passionate person who refuses to give up the

> full spectrum of feeling, from joy to agony.

>

> Involuntary psychiatric detainment is a form of

> incarceration. Sara is not allowed to leave the

> psychiatric facility and its outdoor patio unless

> accompanied by a member of staff or her family,

> and she has had to be " well-behaved, " i.e. not

> to argue too vehemently, not to be rude or say

> swear words to staff members, and not to threaten

> violence, in order to earn this " pass " time. She is

> unable to concentrate on her playwriting due to

> duress and the effects of the psychotropic drugs

> she is taking.

>

> Sara does not feel that she deserves the type of

> " treatment " she is receiving. Although doctors

> and nurses continually argue with her that she

> is mentally ill and that her denial of her illness

> indicates a " lack of insight " , she has thoroughly

> researched the subject of mental illness in the

> past two years and believes it to be an elaborate

> myth or social ritual (see, for example, books by

> Eliott Valenstein and Peter Breggin).

>

> She believes that her sin is simply daring to be

> herself in public, and that she is being called

> medically deviant because our society no longer

> condones the concept of treatment for moral

> deviance.

>

> According to the Manitoba Mental Health Act, a

> person may legally be treated against his or her

> will in a psychiatric ward for up to three weeks,

> for the simple crime of being strange around others.

>

> No psychiatrist can predict with any certainty

> who will be dangerous and who won't be. Studies

> have shown how ineffective such predictions have

> proven in the past. Furthermore, it does not

> seem constitutional to lock someone up for a

> potential crime; we know that we are living in a

> sham democracy when dissidents are medicalized for

> speaking their minds, or, in Sara's case, laughing

> and crying their minds without the aid of illegal

> drugs or alcohol.

>

> Since when has creative emotional expression and

> getting to know people constituted mental disease?

>

> For as long as the medical establishment has been

> in cahoots with the powers of oppression and

> injustice.

>

> EVERY HUMAN RIGHTS ACTIVIST MUST TAKE AN IMMEDIATE

> INTEREST IN SARA'S CASE, BECAUSE IT AFFECTS US ALL.

>

> Remember what happened in the Second World War to

> the insane and disabled, and recall that the first

> step in extermination of differences is isolating

> and marginalizing certain people for their skin

> color, beliefs or behaviour.

>

> Sara is also Jewish, and as a child she used to

> spend time imagining what she would have said to

> the SS to try to convince them that she was a

> human being before they shot her. Her present

> situation is not entirely dissimilar to that

> terrible fantasy.

>

> Evil is evil, even when cloaked in the

> shiniest rhetoric of health and fitness.

>

> What does Sara have to say about her situation?

>

> SARA SPEAKS OUT!

>

> " It's hard for me to not feel personally persecuted

> right now, but I'm just trying to persevere, trying

> to be myself as best I can with the drugs and

> confinement and everything, " said Sara.

>

> " These aren't bad people. They honestly think that

> they're helping me and the other patients, who,

> I've discovered, are awfully hurt, sensitive, and

> perceptive people who are being turned into

> zombies by all the drugs that are being forced into

> them.

>

> " Several men have even told me about dizziness and

> fainting from the so-called 'medications,' and one

> slightly overweight woman said she was taunted for

> wanting a second piece of veal for dinner.

>

> " Is this the right way to help people in trouble?

> We need to let the rest of society know that the

> mental health system is rife with such human rights

> abuses, they are just built right into the system

> that defines people as either 'normal' or 'sick'? "

>

> Sara does not know when she will be leaving the

> St. Boniface General Hospital, since she will not

> admit under any circumstances to having a " mental

> illness " , although she does tell us that she is

> being treated well enough considering the situation.

>

> The staff are kind within the limits of their

> orders,

> and she is receiving proper vegan meals and her B12

> supplements. Sara does not intend to give up her

> battle against forced psychiatric treatment,

> although she would never dream of taking psychiatric

> drugs away from those who genuinely do feel helped

> by them. Her battle is solely against coercive and

> forced " treatment " such as the kind she is enduring.

>

> " This is a political struggle, and it's on the level

> of the law and administration, not individuals, "

> says

> Sara, whose father Murray, now-deceased, was a

> lawyer

> who prided himself on helping working class people

> get the kind of legal assistance they needed.

>

> " It's the draconian nature of the Manitoba Mental

> Health Act that we must challenge here. That's the

> law that allows a person to be detained without

> trial or consent for up to three weeks in a

> psychiatric facility, just on the word of doctors

> who are unfamiliar with the individual's

> personality or temperament. " She reminds us once

> again that she is only taking her drugs under

> coercion, and that they impair her thinking in

> a small but perceptible way (she is on a low dose

> of Risperidone, once in the morning and once before

> bed).

>

> We ask that all concerned activists contact the

> people below to demand that the Manitoba Mental

> Health Act be radically revised.

>

> Help Sara in her battle for freedom from

> psychiatric oppression!

>

> If you would like to contact Sara, please call

> Michael Nerman at (204) 775-2684. He will forward

> all messages to her.

>

> ~~~~~~~~~~~

>

> * ACTION * ACTION * ACTION * ACTION

>

> 1) Please forward this alert to potentially

> interested people, media, etc.

>

> 2) Please e-mail to these three Canadian officials'

> e-mail addresses with a civil message to let them

> know

> exactly how you feel about this situation:

>

> premier, minhlt,

> lperrin

>

> Also, please copy your e-mail message to the Network

> to

> Free Sara, and they will try to get that to Sara,

> here:

>

> reality_namer

>

> 3) If you are able to do more, please also

> write, fax or phone the three Canadian officials

> with a civil message:

>

> The Hon. Gary Doer

> Premier of Manitoba

> Room 204, Legislature Building

> 450 Broadway

> Winnipeg, MB R3C 0V8 CANADA

> Phone: (204) 945-3714

>

> Fax: (204) 949-1484

>

> E-mail: premier

>

> ~~~~~~~~~~~

>

> Hon. David Chomiuk

> Minister of Health

> Province of Manitoba

> Room 302, Legislature Building

> 450 Broadway

> Winnipeg, MB R3C 0V8 CANADA

>

> Telephone: (204) 945-3731

>

> Fax: (204) 945-0441

>

> E-mail: minhlt

>

> ~~~~~~~~~~~

>

> Patient Relations Officer

> Room A1153

> St. Boniface General Hospital

> 409 Tache Ave.

> Winnipeg, MB R2H 2A6 CANADA

>

> Telephone: (204) 237-2306

>

> E-mail: lperrin

>

> ~~~~~~~~~~~

>

> - end of alert -

>

> Forwarded by:

>

> MindFreedom Shield

> MindFreedom Support Coalition International

> 454 Willamette, Suite 216 - POB 11284

> Eugene, OR 97440-3484 USA

>

> http://www.mindfreedom.org

> email: office fax: (541) 345-3737

> phone: (541) 345-9106 toll free in USA:

> 1-877-MAD-PRIDE

>

> MIND YOUR FREEDOM: United Action for Human Rights.

>

> join here: http://www.mindfreedom.org/join.shtml

>

> MindFreedom Support Coalition International is an

> independent non-profit uniting 100 sponsor groups

> to win human rights & alternatives in mental health.

> Accredited by the United Nations as a

> Non-Governmental Organization (NGO) with

> Consultative Roster Status.

>

>

> David Oaks, Executive Director

> MindFreedom Support Coalition International

> 454 Willamette, Suite 216 - POB 11284

> Eugene, OR 97440-3484 USA

>

> http://www.mindfreedom.org

> email: oaks fax: (541) 345-3737

> phone: (541) 345-9106 toll free in USA:

> 1-877-MAD-PRIDE

>

> MIND YOUR FREEDOM: United Action for Human Rights.

>

> join here: http://www.mindfreedom.org/join.shtml

>

> MindFreedom Support Coalition International is an

> independent non-profit uniting 100 sponsor groups

> to win human rights & alternatives in mental health.

> Accredited by the United Nations as a

> Non-Governmental Organization (NGO) with

> Consultative Roster Status.

>