How mental health law discriminates against people with mental illness - Professor George Szmuckler

Mental health legislation in most jurisdictions (including England and Wales) discriminates against people with a mental illness. When it comes to involuntary treatment, it fails to respect - without adequate justification - the 'autonomy' of people with a mental illness, in stark contrast to the treatment of people with a physical illness. It further discriminates against persons with a mental disorder by allowing a form of preventive detention on the basis of 'risk', without any offence having been committed.
Mental health legislation thus carries underlying assumptions that people with mental disorders are not fully self-determining and that they are inherently dangerous. It is possible to frame a law based on impaired decision-making capacity, from whatever cause (whether due to a mental or physical disorder), that would counter such discrimination.
The transcript and downloadable versions of the lecture are available from the Gresham College website:
www.gresham.ac.uk/lectures-and...
Gresham College has been giving free public lectures since 1597. This tradition continues today with all of our five or so public lectures a week being made available for free download from our website.
www.gresham.ac.uk

[@paulyarrow9857]

I must compliment Professor Szmuckler for this lecture. I wished that he had written the UK legislation on mental health instead of unqualified ministers in parliament

[@hemispherectomy4140]

This issue is horribly under represented. Share this everyone!

[@laurastokes4777]

many drugs are very dangerous that are used in these places

[@deirdrestewart4394]

A logical perpesective on the violation of human rights that are breeched within the mental health system!!!

[@thetruthisoutthere32]

You hit the nail right on the head. Your comments here show such wisdom. So much so, that I'm surprised that you are actually able to make such sensible remarks and haven't been committed for "involuntarily treatment" to prevent your common sense from spreading. After all, this system is currently being used to attack political enemies and truth tellers inside the United States. I am being attacked by it now with the complicity of members of the legal community who know the truth.

[@pikaluv43]

its false imprisonment disabled need to protected from this evil law as well

[@user-tq2ve2du4i]

I WAS DIAGNOSED BY MY PRIVATE PSYCHIATRIST MY PARENTS TOOK ME INTO AS A YOUNG BOY AND BECAUSE I DIDNT COOPERATE SHE DIAGNOSED ME WITH SCHIZOPHRENIA EVEN I NEVER HAD ANY HALLUCINATIONS AND I NEVER HEARD VOICES BUT MY PARENTS USED THE LAW AGAINST ME AND I WAS DEPRIVED OF FREEDOM AND BASIC HUMAN RIGHTS WITHOUT A TRIAL AND THEY DID EXPERIMENTS ON ME AND CONSTRAINED ME FOR NOT DOING ANYTHING I WAS COMMITTED FOR 14 TIMES UNJUSTLY IN A PLACE WHERE YOUR DEGREE GIVES YOU MORE CREDIT AS A HUMAN BEING RATHER THAN THE CONTENT OF YOUR CHARACTER!

[@dreamgirl23]

i loe this lecture.. love feeling back to uni again. learning is great

[@brendanperry6429]

JasonStrongMA.com tells quite the story. Adding a few sentences to Will v Michigan would make a BIG difference in how the mentally MUST BE TREATED in the UNITED STATES.

[@cynthmcgpoet]

I wonder how many people leaving comments here have actually listened to the entire address. My intuitive sense tells me that not very many have done this. I am typing this as the video reaches the 36 minute mark, so yes...I am implicating myself in this comment. It would help if we self-disclosed just where we are in the progress of this video when we make our opinions known.

[@n136h]

Mad, bad or both?