I looked at this blog post and it mentions a UN report which seems to be quite critical of modern psychiatry.

The doctor who made the report seems to be saying that drugging people is not a great approach, and really we should recognise that poor mental health is a result of social and psychological pressures:

Public policies continue to neglect the importance of the preconditions of poor mental health, such as violence, disempowerment, social exclusion and isolation and the breakdown of communities, systemic socioeconomic disadvantage and harmful conditions at work and in schools... Reductive biomedical approaches to treatment that do not adequately address contexts and relationships can no longer be considered compliant with the right to health.

Thoughts on this? Is the medical model of psychiatry just created by money-hungry pharma companies? Of course some people think they cannot function without their meds, and I sympathise with that view. But perhaps this belief is reinforced by strong withdrawal effects of these drugs, which are well-known. So somebody who has been on the drug for a while tries coming off, they have strong withdrawal symptoms, and they think "I can't cope without this drug, I must go back on it". Perhaps this is where tapering can help, because it helps people come off drugs (if they choose to do so) while reducing withdrawal effects.

Edit: The report was from 2017 but I still find it interesting. More info about it can be seen here: https://www.ohchr.org/en/documents/thematic-reports/ahrc3521-report-special-rapporteur-right-everyone-enjoyment-highest

I found this article interesting.

The website is known for its critical view of psychiatry, which I think is good. Any field with as much power as psychiatry (being allowed to lock people up and drug them) should be approached from a critical perspective.

Psychiatrists would argue that their methods are well-intentioned, but are their methods helpful? The author of the article thinks some of the methods are not helpful.

Obviously I don't want to diminish the suffering of Ukraine in any way at all. Ukraine has it much worse in many ways. But there are still people suffering in every country.

What are your thoughts on psych drugs, such as antidepressants, antipsychotics, mood stabilisers, etc?

Doctors love to prescribe these drugs. But they have very bad side effects, based on what I've read. And they can give you strong withdrawals when you try to come off them. Also, should we really be medicalising emotions and taking drugs to emotionally cope with the world? Maybe we need things like friends, family, social connections, to make the world more enjoyable.

What do you think?