When civil rights advocacy groups began organizing in the US and began getting recognized for affecting governmental policy, the legitimacy of their concerns was not so dependent on the political policy maker's descriptions of who they (the advocates) were and what their role was as it today.
Especially recently when advocates for mental health began demanding change, the government quickly took steps to fund their efforts and organize the advocates in large groups. This way the advocates could be taught how the policy makers would allow them to see the policies they make in a strict way in order to limit individual and independent views.
This especially discourages people who are abused the most in public programs from using their voice in order to influence the needed changes in the public policies that affect them more than anyone else. These policy makers demand that personal experience must only be validated when it comes from someone who can meet their high standards that include being articulate, personable, and approved by a community that is judged to be important. Fewer people are being employed and the quality of education along with the number of people who have an opportunity to be educated is lowering. The population who is given fewer opportunities pursuant to this are the most vulnerable to economic fluctuation and therefore more likely to be placed in public programs. The diagnoses based on the DSM are increasing at an alarmingly faster rate than the accommodations needed for this group are being provided. While there can be benefits to the increasing number of diagnoses, if the accommodations don't accompany the diagnosis at a similar rate, the diagnosis becomes more of a hindrance to people based on the negative connotations people associate with it . The increased dominance of the psychology industry has greatly influenced our culture. Unfortunately, it is still an industry that is designed to serve the general public rather than those whom they label. Autism advocacy that doesn't reflect the importance of these issues can't be trusted any more than the untrustworthy policy makers that they claim to be trying to influence.
The policy makers know very well the cycle of misbehavior that is caused by the lack of radical changes in policy, and yet they still insist on the validity of small and incremental policy changes.Public agencies must adjust to this reality even though it's rarely mentioned:"To determine how many prison beds will be
needed in future years, some states are actually
basing part of their projection on how well
current elementary students are performing on
reading tests."Public systems in the US are very motivated to resist change, and they work very hard at narrowing the focus of the public so the people who seem to them to be least important don't speak up about by how they are mistreated. I appreciate and agree with what a representative of the National Alliance of Mental Illness (NAMI) has written here:
Current Barriers in Federal Law, Policy and Programs That Limit Community Integration:
"Today, there are more than four times the number of people with severe mental illness residing in our nation's jails and prisons as in psychiatric hospitals. In most major cities, people with severe mental illnesses comprise as much as 40% of the homeless population. These are tragic outgrowths of deinstitutionalization without adequate community services and supports." AND:"In NAMI's view, the social experiment of deinstitutionalization of people with severe and persistent mental illness, while well intentioned, failed hundreds of thousands of consumers and their families over the last four decades. The reasons for this failure are complex. However, in NAMI's view some of the factors have led to the breakdown of public mental systems in many states include:
*failure to properly invest in community-based housing and services,
*lack of accountability in ensuring that public mental health agencies focused limited resources on people with the most severe illnesses
*inability of states and communities to follow and adopt best evidence-based practices in their public mental health systems, and
bullet legal barriers that prevent the most severely ill individuals from accessing needed treatment."
However,unfortunately, society treats atypical behavior with punishment. The illusion that normal behavior can be defined and achieved is a way of stimulating economy and protecting government decisions from being suspected of corruption.While ABA treatments are sold as a way to protect autistics from self-injury,the goals of ABA programs are geared toward encouraging and protecting standards of appropriate social behavior.Not only is bogus science being used to describe autistics as monsters, which lead to them being treated with all kinds of dangerous drugs but the penal system and the public education system are holding autistics hostage to meet their political goals of more governmental control.To gain this control the autism spectrum is defined as a spectrum of people whose behavior ranges from bad to worst.A society that demands typical behavior for the benefit of their economy and the control of misfits cannot define a spectrum of bad behavior without treating the people who are categorized in this way as morally unfit and attacking those people's characters. Once the government labels people with having a bad character, they can justify all sorts of punishment.One product that the US government is proposing in order to attain this type of control is Applied Behavioral Analysis. They need to be able to sell the idea that their product is safe and effective, but they have no way of hiding the fact that it will further malign the character of autistic people as well as many others diagnosed by the DSM.It is very dangerous to have a commercial product that is designed to enforce a standard of behavior, which defines social misfits as dangerous. There is no proof that autistics are more violent than anyone else but once there is a standard behavioral treatment which is widely accepted for autism, it will be very difficult to prove otherwise whether it's. true or not.Professional politicians have learned that advocacy groups often pose a threat to their agenda. In order for those groups to gain acceptance into the political arena which the professional politicians control, they will demand compromise from those groups. The mental Health system has always been mainly a method used to protect the public rather than serve the client. However, as public mental health programs have expanded their services to include more treatment for drug addiction and rehabilitation for criminals more people than ever with a diagnosis of mental illness are treated with the same moral assumptions that have traditionally been attributed to addicts and criminals.
NAMI is primarily a parent run organization for family members of the mentally ill who had recently been shown to have 75% of their funding coming from the pharmaceutical industry. They have declared their political ambitions and defined their organization by supporting Kendra's Law.Something I believe is VERY important to remember about this law is:"According to OMH’s Final Report on Kendra’s Law, 63% of people being court-mandated under Kendra’s Law are identified as Black and Hispanic (OMH Final Report on Kendra’s Law 3/1/05). The OMH Report opens up with the following introduction: “Kendra’s Law was named in memory of Kendra Webdale, a young woman who died in January, 1999 after being pushed in front of a New York City subway train by Andrew Goldstein, a man with a history of mental illness and hospitalizations.”THIS IS VERY IMPORTANT!!!!"The implication here is obvious. The question of violence and mental illness is as old as psychiatry itself. What most people don’t know is that Kendra’s Law is merely the culmination of old policies and old laws, which have been re-packaged under a new name. (None Dare Call it Treason, John A. Stormer, Chapter IX, Mental Health, 1964; the Tragedy of Sane People Who Get Put Away, Albert Q. Maisel, Reader’s Digest, February 1962)
At one time these laws were passed - allegedly - to protect “the mentally-ill” from themselves, today they are passed - allegedly - to protect society from “the mentally-ill.” All of which, by the way, have never worked. Which is why we are sitting here today!
The reason why these laws had to be repackaged was because the constitutional rights of the person made it difficult to apply them. So in order to eliminate this roadblock, the advocates of forced treatment latched onto Kendra Webdale’s tragedy to convince the public that this was not an isolated incident, but the beginning of a terrifying new wave of crime - knowing full well that fear and emotion all too often override reason and rationale."Also:"Ironically, in 1999 - the very same year Kendra’s Law was passed - the Surgeon General’s Report on Mental Health concluded that minorities:
• have less access to, and availability of, mental health services
• and are less likely to receive mental health services when needed"irony?Also there's this:
"In fact, in August of 2003, Nicholas Regush, former producer of ABC's Nightline and World
News Tonight with Peter Jennings, queried in his online column, Second Opinion:
"Where is the science that supports the need to use coercion so often when it comes to the treatment of patients, as opposed to, say, offering a wide range of community-based services? In all my research on violence for a book published several years ago, I had not seen one credible study showing that society has more to fear from patients labeled "mentally ill" than other people in the community. For example, there has never been any appropriate follow-up of patients that has determined whether the absence of treatment leads to violence. The very foundation of forced treatment is ideology and fear-mongering and not science."AND NAMI openly admits:
"Interestingly enough, nowhere throughout their 23-page report on Kendra’s Law does NAMI quote any independent research. They openly admit that their research is based solely on discussions with a selected group of 20 families and 40 local NAMI leaders. They make no attempt to conceal their bias and their report is full of lead-in statements such as “OUR research found… and “WE found overwhelming evidence…" Sound familiar? It does to me!This argument that is made for the encourage Kendra's law is very similar to the arguments to encourage statewide PBS.# 2 on NAMI's Ten Best Practices for Schools list:"Train school professionals in effective and research-based teaching methods and behavioral interventions, including positive behavior interventions and supports (PBIS – as described at www.pbis.org)."
Then there's this that tells about the US psychiatric system:
"Sadly, these abuses are merely the tail end of psychiatry's long history of patient abuse and failure. A large book could easily be written on the continual state hospital abuses committed, investigated, prosecuted and documented. Here are just a few from the last 60 years to show that, psychiatrically speaking, times have not changed:
*
In the early part of last century, both public and government concern over deteriorating conditions inside U.S. mental institutions caused the American Medical Association to act. In 1931, the AMA hired a physician named John Grimes to conduct an investigation. He came back with an unexpectedly disturbing portrait of overcrowding and woefully inadequate patient diet. Facility attendants were found to conduct themselves like prison guards rather than facilitators of rehabilitation. Dr. Grimes concluded that the primary purpose of state hospitals was not medical but "legal."8
*
In 1944, an Ohio grand jury investigating conditions at Cleveland State Hospital, where several patients had died after being beaten with belts, key rings, and metal-plated shoes, summed up the state of affairs: "The atmosphere reeks with the false notion that the mentally ill are criminals and subhumans who should be denied all human rights…"9
*
In May 1969, then-Illinois State Attorney Edward Hanrahan issued a report at the request of then-Governor Richard Ogilvie, on conditions at the Chicago State Hospital and the Tinley Park Mental Health Facility that found that “All varieties of crime were discovered at both institutions…. Patients were assaulted, murdered and raped by fellow inmates and employees.”10
*
In April 1987, Pennsylvania State Public Welfare Secretary John F. White, Jr. formed a special task force to investigate Byberry State Hospital, a now-closed state institution with one of the most horrifying records of patient death and abuse. In September of that year, the group issued their report in which it said that patients were being neglected, beaten and sexually abused. The report called for “immediate and drastic action to reverse the history of neglect, poor management, absence of treatment and rampant abuse.”Another thing to keep in mind regarding this population is this:
"Research and advertising sponsored by the pharmaceutical industry led to the widespread belief that the newer medications were indisputably safer, more effective and well worth additional billions of dollars in taxpayer money. Pharmaceutical profits soared.
Since the n, the life expectancy of those treated in community mental health centers has plunged to an appalling 25 years less than average.(1) Life expectancy may have fallen by as much as 15 years since 1986.(2) Indications are that the death rate continues to accelerate (3) in what must be ranked as one of the worst public health disasters in U.S. history." My question is this; How much do you think changes to the system will occur in the next 60 years if radical demands are not made?
Look at all the other advances we've made in so many areas in the last 60 years. Now we have so many more people being diagnosed with mental and psychological problems than before. Can we really trust the government that has done nothing more than this for the past 60 years to make decisions about the welfare of this population without radically challenging their motives? "
So, who are the Protection and Advovacy and what role do they play in protecting the traditional typical standards for how this population is treated?
This report by Protection and Advocacy (P&A)says:"Whenever we open a newspaper, turn on the television, or go on the Internet these days, we hear about another child dying or being injured in school while being restrained or secluded. Some may think these are isolated incidents, but, when Protection and Advocacy (P&A) agencies across this country report that school children have been killed, confined, tied up, pinned down, and battered, this is clearly more than an isolated issue - it is one of national concern.
P&As have been advocating for students and their families on education issues for over thirty years, a period of unprecedented change and opportunity for children with disabilities as fewer and fewer are relegated to institutions or special facilities. After years of struggle by parents and advocates, the educational rights of children with disabilities was, at least by law, firm established in 1978 with implementation of the Education for the Handicapped Act (EHA), the precursor to the Individuals with
Disabilities Education Act (IDEA). This promise of a free, appropriate, and public education has expanded the opportunities for full inclusion of students with disabilities. Yet today, many parents still face major challenges in obtaining full access to the education system their children are entitled to."
AND:
In
2001, 31 State P&A systems reported 1250 deaths, of which 410 were
investigated. In 2002, 27 State P&A systems reported 1,777 deaths,
of which 972 were investigated. P&A systems efforts to investigate
these incidents were affected by such factors as challenges by public
and private facilities to P&A access to clients, facilities, and
records, which had to be resolved by the court; inadequate information
from the reporting facility; and lag time between the fatality and the
notice to the P&A systems. Investigations conducted by State
P&A systems included highly publicized deaths, often brought to
their attention by the media (many States had no mandatory death
reporting requirements to cover residential care and treatment
facilities in effect). Findings substantiated that residential facility
staff either used excessive physical restraint or provided inadequate
medical care.
This is P&A:
P&A Programs
• PADD (Protection and Advocacy for People with Developmental Disabilities)
• CAP (Client Assistance Program)
• PAIMI (Protection and Advocacy for Individuals with Mental Illness)
• PAIR (Protection and Advocacy for Individual Rights)
• PAAT (Protection and Advocacy for Assistive Technology)
• PABSS (Protection and Advocacy for Beneficiaries of Social Security)
• PATBI (Protection and Advocacy for Individuals with Traumatic Brain Injury)
• PAVA (Protection and Advocacy for Voting Accessibility)
"Going to trial is not the only tool P&As use to enforce disability rights against abuse and neglect. A public report may be made giving findings and recommending action, they may work with facilities for cooperative monitoring, or they may provide training and technical assistance to people with disabilities and institutions.
P&A Funding
Federal monies provide the base of financial support for the programs, most of which are non-profits with typical board management. Funds are allotted based on population, although the smallest states are guaranteed a minimum amount for most programs. While some P&As operate on these federal funds alone, others supplement with other federal or state resources, or even conduct private fundraising.
The number of inconsistancies in the goals of all these agencies that are alloted funding under this same umbrella are too vast to comprehend. To have any real power they must employ independant investigators who report their findings to the public."
As an agency that takes the place of a regulatory agency, P&A perpetuates government standards that require all abuse cases to be resolved through litigation. Just as any law firm will do, they will tell you which agencies that are supposedly within their jurisdiction that they, in reality have no influence with at all. For the few people who even make it to their office whom they aren't able to ignore, they have a multitude of methods for discouraging their clients. One common method (which is of course used by all bureaucratic agencies) is endless discussions and letter writing filled with useless bureaucratic speech.
Also,the P&A program operates as 50 state agencies with with $34 million a year from Substance Abuse and Mental Health Association (SAMHSA), or about one-tenth of the agency's discretionary mental health budget.Purpose and Method of Operation: "The program primarily supports SAMHSA's Capacity goal by expanding the availability of protection and advocacy services. The program directly supports the Mental Health System Transformation priority area and the Seclusion and Restraint priority area."Today the group TASH is following in the footstep's of NAMI by claiming that "better" restraints and seclusion performed by ABA specialists are the answer to how restraints and seclusion are being abused by people who are untrained by PBIS (Positive Behavioral Interventions and Supports) The Alliance to Prevent Restraint, Aversive Interventions, and Seclusion (APRAIS) is led by TASH (formerly The Association for Persons with Severe Handicaps). Positive Behavioral Interventions and Supports (PBIS) says:"The TA Center on Positive Behavioral Interventions and Supports has been established by the Office of Special Education Programs, US Department of Education to give schools capacity-building information and technical assistance for identifying, adapting, and sustaining effective school-wide disciplinary practices."While P&A was established in 1986 to provide the public with more independent investigations, today it is not only inadequate and mischaracterized as a method for independent investigations but it is also preventing the radical changes that are needed by the corruptive influence they receive from government funding.Those who are able or even feel empowered enough to apply for their services are typically those with the most education and ability to meet their high standards. Those who are in the most need are typically not a part of this population. This is how the status quo is protected and the radical changes that are needed are not heard by the general public.Those who are classified as having high risk behavior by the behavioral specialists (which of course would include autistics since autism is seen by ABA specialists to be a behavior disorder) includes the need for emergency restraints and police officers if deemed necessary by the staff. This is how some who use Florida's PBS project describe at risk behavior (5 % of this 20 % are considered high risk and are treated more severely than the others).At risk students (estimated 20%): At Risk:
Disruptive
Talks out
Unprepared
Talks back to teacher
Uses inappropriate language
Tardy
Defiant
Refuses to do work
Difficulty taking turns
Refuses to share
Out of seat
Aggressive
Not dangerous or violent (my note: they estimate that only 5% of this top 20% will be determined dangerous or violent) May have low academic achievementThis says also:
Generally these students
Poor peer relations
Low academic achievement
Difficulty adjusting to school environment
Chaotic home environment
Low self-esteem
There is no way to constantly emphasize to the rest of the world that typical eye contact is synonymous with honesty and at the same time not relay the message to those who respond atypically that they are dishonest. People being put in a behavioral program will reach that negative conclusion about themselves, especially when they are reminded consistently that typical responses are imperative.The same is true for typical methods of showing empathy and the ways that theory of mind declares their responses to mean that they are empathetic.
Societal norms that declare a short attention span as the sign for a person who is undisciplined, aberrant, and lazy, is not going to make an exception because someone has a diagnosis that describes them as having difficulty due to executive functioning deficits.
ABA and Positive Behavioral Supports will not distinguish someone's behavior due to a diagnosis as separate or different than someone else with similar behavior who is instead seen as lazy and aberrant. The assessment and the treatment will both be the same.There has never been anything accomplished resembling the goals that are expressed by statewide PBS programs. The claim that such a program will reduce restraints and seclusion is very misleading at best. All similar ways that human rights has been sought in the past have not only failed but have reinforced old, harmful, and unjust public control that has always led to more abuse rather than less.The demands of industry define intelligence and competency and therefore, the public programs and schools where intelligence and competency are evaluated often use their power and control to determine people's character. This determination of people's character becomes more arbitrary as the demands of industry need to remain fleeting in order for them to maintain power and control. This leads to the corruption of power and control so that arbitrary rules can be used to justify exclusion and abuse. We can't be expected to trust behavior modification standards until or, unless the modificationists show that their own behavior is subject to modification when what they do is inappropriate for serving our needs. Instead of reducing the abuses of restraint and seclusion in the way that it is being advertised, the goal of this legislation is to demand that the ABA/PBS industry be contracted to create more control within public educational systems, which are already too often seen as daycare centers, which more closely resemble a penal system than somewhere the majority of the public can attain an education. If this industry secures such an all-inclusive contract to assert their brand of control,more people who are already disenfranchised will become even more that way and be subjected to even more abuse. This turns teachers into stock brokers that only invest time and energy in the ones they believe to be the most likely to succeed. This creates an even stricter policy where assumptions are even more encouraged simply for the sake of convenience and expediency. If a government is already known for only seeking incremental and temporary solutions to problems that are obviously the result of a larger problem that they don't want to admit responsibility for, what do you think will happen when they find more diversity in those within their behavioral based public programs that don't respond in the ways they predict? Will they expand their understanding and become more inclusive of the more motivations they had not understood?
Any radical change would require them to admit the first plan they had was a bad one. I think they would be more likely to narrow their standards and tighten their control. In turn they would ultimately label even more people as trouble makers and in turn limit their options for being more productive. This would make their solutions seem even more necessary and the cycle of dependence and shame would be perpetuated.
When behavior is demanded in overly strict ways, mainly for the purpose of control the chances of that causing a negative reaction are greatly increased. The potential for such demands to cause a worse situation rather than a better one is increased if the person receiving the demands can't trust the one making them.
If a government gets overly demanding of a strict set of standards, which includes too many innocent behaviors that can just as easily be seen as different, more behaviors will need to be classified in fewer ways and more motivations for those misunderstood behaviors must be assumed. This means that more people will be seen as threats, more people get punished, and we become an even more violent society and even more prone to fewer liberties for everyone.
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