Author Archives: Will Hall

Beyond Belief: Tamasin Knight

How do we respond to bizarre beliefs like CIA brain chips, abduction by aliens, hearing voices, spirit possession, or telepathy? Is respect for a different reality “colluding” with a delusion? Or is there meaning in madness?

Medical doctor Tamasin Knight was hospitalized for delusions, and went on to write the practical guidebook Beyond Belief: Alternative Ways of Working with Delusions, Obsessions and Unusual Experiences, available as a free download at http://www.peter-lehmann-publishing.com/books/beyond-belief.pdf (PDF).

World Hearing Voices Congress in Holland (with audio incl. Coming Off Meds talk)

Hearing Voices Network Hi everyone, happy World Hearing Voices Day. I’m terribly jet lagged but just arrived in Valkenburg Holland for the World Hearing Voices Congress. (also check out the audio)

Staying in a bungalow with Rufus May and some other great UK dissident mental health professionals, long conversations over forced treatment, suicide, addiction, shamanism, Voice Dialog, Theater of the Oppressed… I’m giving a workshop on coming off medications this thursday.

A great honor to be invited, and a wonderful chance to meet others and allies in the mad movement — and learn more. You can follow things at my Portland Hearing Voices twitter feed here: http://twitter.com/pdxvoices and the tag #hearingvoices.

Congress photos on my flickr feed here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/willflickr/sets/72157622396976958/show/

Audio clips – unedited and variable quality.

Listen to the talk on Psychiatry at War With Itself – including replacing ‘schizophrenia’ with a new diagnosis – by J Van Os of the Netherlands — the talk is highly recommended: 09HearingVoicesCongress-JVanOsPsychiatryAtWarWithItself.mp3

Leading UK advocate Ron Coleman’s talk: 09HearingVoicesCongress-RonColeman.mp3

Excerpt of UK Hearing Voices Network Director Jacqui Dillon’s talk 09HearingVoicesCongress-JacquiDillon(excerpt).mp3

Brendan George on working with dual diagnosis: BrendanGeorgesonDualDiagnosis.mp3

Voice Hearer Eleanor Longden: 09HearingVoicesCongress-EleanorLongden.mp3

Voice Hearer Peter Bullimore on voices and trauma 09HearingVoicesCongress-PeterBullimore.mp3

Will Hall workshop on Coming Off Medications 09HearingVoicesCongress-WillHallComingOffMedications.mp3

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (30.5MB)

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Paxil On Trial: Alison Bass

When GlaxoSmithKline was caught lying about the risks of its blockbuster anti-depressant Paxil, it set off ongoing investigations. How did New York state take on one of the world’s most powerful companies? Was NY Governor Eliot Spitzer driven out by his corporate enemies?

Pulitzer-nominated Boston Globe journalist Alison Bass, author of Side Effects: A Prosecutor, A Whistleblower, And A Bestselling Antidepressant On Trial, discusses legal battles to clean up drug company corruption, including pay-offs to the National Alliance for the Mentally Ill.

http://www.alison-bass.com/

Mad Science Mad Pride: Bradley Lewis

What is the mad movement’s best response to science? How is mad pride different from gay pride? Do we want to become equal with “normal” people — or challenge the idea of normal itself? What about suffering and the risk of romanticizing madness?

Icarus Project organizer, psychiatrist, and theorist Bradley Lewis, author of Moving Beyond Prozac, DSM, and the New Psychiatry: Birth of Postpsychiatry, discusses the identity politics of madness.

http://www.theicarusproject.net
http://www.nyu.edu/gallatin/about/bios/bradley_lewis.html

Our Daily Meds: Melody Petersen

More than 100,000 people die in the US each year from prescription drugs — used as directed by their doctor. How did aggressive marketing make our health care system a cause of widespread sickness? Why haven’t government regulation or medical research been able to protect the public?

New York Times health reporter Melody Petersen discusses her new book, Our Daily Meds: How the Pharmaceutical Companies Transformed Themselves into Slick Marketing Machines and Hooked the Nation on Prescription Drugs.

http://www.ourdailymedsthebook.com

Great Barrington Massachusetts Airing Madness Radio

Just got word the WBCR-LP, a community station in Great Barrington Massachusetts, is now airing Madness Radio weekly.

Check out the station and their other great programming at the WBCR website here: www.berkshireradio.org/

Art and Schizophrenia: Louis Sass

Does modern art, such as Artaud, Beckett, and Duchamp, parallel the mad frames of mind that get labeled “schizophrenia?” Is extreme sensitivity and inner self-consciousness behind artistic innovation and breaks with reality?

Rutgers University psychologist Louis Sass, author of Madness And Modernism: Insanity in the Light of Modern Art, Literature, and Thought, discusses art as an insight into the subjective inner world of madness.

lsass@rci.rutgers.edu

Hearing Voices Movement: Jacqui Dillon

What is it like to hear voices? How do people learn to live with their voices, and are voices sometimes positive and helpful? What is the connection between voices and trauma?

Jacqui Dillon, voice hearer and director of the UK Hearing Voices Network, discusses how the movement of people who hear voices is creating self-help alternatives to traditional and often abusive mental health care.

http://www.intervoiceonline.org
http://www.caslcampaign.com

School Bullying: Dawn Menken

What are the lasting impacts of taunting, teasing, and physical harassment between children? Why are kids who are different singled out and picked on? What can parents do if their children are victims of bullies?

Psychotherapist, parent, and process worker Dawn Menken, author of Speak Out! Talking About Love, Sex & Eternity, discusses her work with public schools and families to break the cycle of bullying.

dmenken(at)igc(dot)org

Electroshock Deception: Linda Andre

Why is ECT, electroconvulsive therapy or electroshock, so widely used today? How is the ECT industry manipulating research and public perceptions the way tobacco companies did about cigarettes? What are the real dangers of this lobotomy-era treatment?

ECT survivor Linda Andre discusses her groundbreaking new Rutgers University Press book, Doctors of Deception: What They Don’t Want You To Know About Shock Treatment.

http://www.doctorsofdeception.com
http://www.ect.org

“Listening To Madness” — Coverage in Newsweek Magazine

Newsweek magazine just did a big story on Mad Pride and The Icarus Project, which profiled me.

It’s a mainstream magazine, but considering the limitations the coverage is pretty sympathetic and alot of important ideas get across: writer Alissa Quart did a great job.

Check it out on the Newsweek site here: http://www.newsweek.com/id/195694; you can also take a look at the art gallery they put together here: http://www.newsweek.com/id/195476.

And feel free to leave comments and join the discussion on the Newsweek site.

Alcohol Alternatives: Anne Fletcher

How can people recover from serious drinking problems? Are 12-step and Alcoholics Anonymous programs right for everyone?

Anne Fletcher, author of Sober for Good: New Solutions for Drinking Problems, discusses how people successfully overcome alcohol abuse and regain control of their lives.

http://www.annemfletcher.com
http://www.parl.gc.ca/Content/SEN/Committee/371/ille/presentation/alexender-e.htm

Olympia WA Icarus Listener Shares Feedback

Here’s some glowing feedback from Washington State. Thanks for the inspiration folks!

Will, You are a Gift and Gifted!

Will Hall blows me away with his gentle, humble, human ability to validate everyone’s unique, personal experience around mental health while translating their experience to the public in a way that can be easily digested, if not embraced, by the pre-dominant reality and the current paradigm that so desperately needs eyes and senses lit open to new ways of perceiving and understanding the world and our visionaries in all their varied forms. Will is a bridge-builder – between the spiritual realm and human realm – between pre-dominant reality and alternate realities.

Thank you, Will, and thank you, Madness Radio, for educating the mainstream and nourishing/fueling all the mad souls out there!!!

Mad Love and Pride,
Laura from The Icarus Project in Olympia

Sane Medication Policy: Robert Whitaker

Has society’s embrace of psychiatric medications led to recovery — or chronic disability? What would honest medical policy and treatment standards be if they were free of pharmaceutical company corruption?

Pulitzer Prize finalist Robert Whitaker, author of Mad In America: Bad Science, Bad Medicine, and the Enduring Mistreatment of the Mentally Ill, discusses medications as a failed paradigm of care, and imagines what a sane alternative would look like.

http://www.madinamerica.com

Is Shyness a Disease? Christopher Lane

Do pharmaceutical companies control the social definition of normal? Can advertising and public relations campaigns turn acceptable personality differences into unacceptable disorders?

British-American literary critic and historian Christopher Lane discusses his book Shyness: How Normal Behavior Became a Sickness, including the way politics and profits drive the bible of mental health treatment, the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual.

http://www.christopherlane.org
http://blogs.psychologytoday.com/blog/side-effects