us:” What do Toronto psychiatric survivors think about mental health recovery?”
As the creators of this blog we want to take special care to approach the topics and information from an anti-oppressive perspective. We do not want to create a power dynamic of us as supposed "experts" informing a presumably "neutral audience". We know those categories are completely inaccurate. The Mad Movement encompasses a diverse and wide-reaching population so we know that many people reading this blog will have very relevant, personal experiences and expertise. Although we have not self-disclosed our personal experiences, together as a group we acknowledge our different social locations and points of intersection and so strive to present this movement as multi-faceted and fluid, experienced differently by different people. It is our aim to make this an open forum that values every voice and encourages discussion, comments and critiques.
Labeling
Psychiatric survivors, consumer survivors, users, crazies, mad. These are all self-describing terms used by people with mental health experiences. People may change their language depending on the context and the audience they are speaking to. Sometimes they reclaim stigmatized labels as a form of empowerment. Some agree and some don't, but whatever language people use to describe themselves it is most important that they have choice. To be an anti-oppressive advocate you must first learn and use the language of those for whom you are advocating, never approach with labels.
"Our language (and therefore our discourses) will be an expression of a particular attempt to make (or impose) meaning in a situation. Language is therefore about much more that words - it is about power" (Fook, 2002).
Here is a great short film by Ryerson professor David Reville: Self Labelling and Identity
David Reville says:
"Mental illness carries with it such a powerful stigma that most people who have psychiatric diagnoses keep it to themselves. However, starting in the late 1960s, some people who had been diagnosed as mentally ill started to “talk back” to psychiatry."
"Recovery" and Resistance:
Several professors from Ryerson participated in a mental health "recovery" study group and helped published a report, Mental Health "Recovery": Users and Refusers, in 2009 with a focus on Toronto.
Professor Ken Moffatt writes about "recovery" in the context of the new global market relations and their emphasis on individualism and flexibility. This trend influences "recovery" and can make it oppressive because it places the burden of change on the individual and ignores or makes invisible the existing structural inequalities. Moffatt highlights four types of resistance to this kind of "recovery":
1. The understanding of structural factors associated with marginalization
2. The use of the pronoun of we to counter the individualizing forces of the discourses
3. Making concepts of productivity problematic
4. Most importantly, the disdain of many participants to the idea of being fixed
Organization Spotlight: Ontario Peer Development Initiative
"The Ontario Peer Development Initiative (OPDI) is a membership-based organization, which represents Ontario’s consumer/survivor initiatives and organizations that work within the mental health system" (OPDI brochure).
- OPDI advocates on behalf of its members – consumer/survivor initiatives – to ensure that their rights are protected and their concerns heard.
- OPDI promotes the experiential expertise of consumer/survivors to help shape Ontario’s mental health system.
- OPDI works collaboratively with government and supportive organizations to promote positive changes for its members across Ontario.
- OPDI works in partnership with other consumer/survivor organizations to share knowledge and strengthen our community as a whole.
(OPDI brochure, http://www.opdi.org/images/uploads/OPDI_Brochure.pdf, retrieved November 2010)
Systemic Advocacy
Systemic advocacy involves targeting the systemic or structural problems of an issue. A critical analyses is required of all levels of government and institutions involved in the current mental health system. In order to be a systemic advocate these are some of things you must consider; what discourse used in the current mental health system, how intersectionality is considered, the current policies in place and how they were created, and the different relations of power.
The Psychiatric Patient Advocate Office has information on advocacy categorized by topic on their website in InfoGuides.
"Power, Knowledge and Michel Foucault" (Roberts, 2005)
Foucault believed that power and knowledge were inextricably linked and so outlined two concepts of Psychiatric Power and Psychiatric Knowledge that recreate human beings as 'psychiatric subjects.'
Psychiatric Power:
The different methods, theories and therapies employed in the mental health system all form a Panopticon by creating and maintaining "within a client ‘a state of conscious and permanent visibility’" (Roberts, 2005). This consciousness and visibility can then create a power relation that causes the client to self-regulate their behaviour, thoughts and feelings. Due to the dominance of the mental health system the influence of psychiatric power and psychiatric discourse pervades the public and private sphere so that a client's family or social network also monitor them.
Psychiatric Knowledge
Central to psychiatric discourses is the practice of diagnoses. Once a client has been diagnosed and labelled, their identity is recreated as a 'psychiatric subject.' Their thoughts, feelings and behaviour are categorized and understood by their label. This label and diagnoses then legitimizes the use of of psychiatric power to submit clients to "control and dependence" (Roberts, 2005).
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