Many people who suffer from mental illnesses often find it difficult, or outright refuse, to get therapy. Now imagine being one of these people who finally decide to get the help they need and find any therapist to take you on as a new client (which is becoming increasingly challenging into itself) and they turn out to be one of these quacks.
Articles like this are what make The Free Press a must-read. Many doctors have abandoned the Hippocratic Oath for CRT, trans, and COVID hysteria. The ones in my family compare their jobs to car mechanics, which is why they refuse to answer basic questions like "What is a woman?" and defer to corrupted specialist "experts" about child castration, masking, and jabs. Here is an e-mail exchange I had with them: https://yuribezmenov.substack.com/p/how-to-do-no-harm-part-3
Loyalty oaths or else you get expelled. What does that remind me of? Still thinking.
I could not help but think of the recent Jonathan Haidt piece in which he described Woke hysteria as essentially Anti-CBT, and thus inherently productive of psychological maladjustment, and everything that goes with it: helplessness, anxiety, rage and anger, depression, and failures in work and relationships.
To my mind, the psychological benefits of personal empowerment have been obvious for a long time. Frederick Douglass--who I will remind everyone was ACTUALLY a slave--said after the slaves were freed, in effect "don't worry about us. Let us make our own way. If we fail we fail as individuals, which means that when we succeed we also succeed as individuals. Leave us alone. Don't "do" anything with us. Get away." This is healthy.
Everything I see from horizon to horizon being foisted on our young by nearly every authority, from schools to shrinks to governments--is working to shrink and infantilize our young, to justify fear and helplessness and lack of responsibility, and thus working to build a worse society, filled with losers and whiners incapable of basic respect to one another, and thus ripe for mass failure in every possible way.
There is nothing guaranteed about American freedom. We were special once, but we are leading the world right now in a race to the bottom.
It’s the same story, over and over again. Wokeness destroys everything it touches. It’s not enough to simply notice it, or empathetically understand it. Sane people must loudly and publicly fight against it, like a war.
There were once a bunch of Democrats who thought that they were better than everyone else. And they never, ever stopped fucking believing this shit because the New York Times, the Washington Post, CNN and all of their professors said they were right and that the rest of world was ignorant. And so, they kept being well-meaning Democrats who think that "they" can save the world... messianic weirdos... you know the type!
And the people who run the Free Press used to be in that really cool club. And now, they're not. And they just can't figure out why. Because when they were in the club, they weren't judgmental at all. They were really cool. They elected Obama and everything was better! Something must have been lost in translation because when they were in the club, the club was righteous and good...but now, the club isn't as good. But they don't know why. They can't imagine the possibility that 100% of all of the people in this story are Democrats. Nope... that just CAN'T be the connection at all!
The only good part of this story is that at least these therapists are wrecking the lives of people who can afford their services: whiny, white, liberal women.
Why not do a piece about the history of HOW these fucking institutions got this way and the role that Democrats like you people played in pushing these agendas with such reckless glee for the past 40 fucking years?
Or is this a "new phenomenon" that the New York-cool-elite jet-set is finally fucking figuring out?
I am increasingly convinced that issues like the ones described in this article are, at their core, a result of the decline of religion. This is ironic because it is partially the work of prominent psychologists that helped to drive religion’s decline. But, as engagement with religion declined, people (myself included) brought forth more and more complex questions about their own identity, the world’s problems, politics, etc. and sought answers from non-religious modern sources that are “fact-based” or “proven.” These questions require our institutions to build themselves on the go and spin up more and more answers and somehow that led us down the path of eugenics to CSJ. Personally, I spent a good amount of time seeking answers in books and therapists to no avail. I am early on in rediscovering my faith, but have found that, much to the disdain of $150/hr therapists, anyone who spends an hour reading The Bible will find that the questions they have about their lives have been answered for about 2000 years and you’ll get them for a fraction of the cost!
I recall watching in amused horror, one Sunday morning working out in a hotel gym that forced me to watch CNN as a comedic dwarf was interviewing two prominent "mental health experts," Drs. Li of Yale and Frances of Duke, who claimed that Trump had killed more people than Hitler, Mao and Stalin combined. It encapsulated the insanity of the entire "woke" movement for me in a way that nothing else has done before or since.
I specifically subscribed so I could comment on this article. It was infuriating but also affirming to see The FP write this piece. It was frustrating in my CMHC program to become a therapist to see these ideologies taught and used to frame the experience of clients as experiencing aspects of society as oppressive. That isn't to say bigotry and discrimination do not exist; they certainly do, and clients attest to it in certain ways. Of all the clients I have had in my short-time as a resident therapist and an intern at training sites, my clients didn't come with a primary focus on oppression. Their concerns were related to sexual assault histories, experiences of domestic violence, unemployment, long-term mental illness, dealing with the mental illness of family members, anxiety, depression, professional stagnation and dissatisfaction, divorce, to name a few. None of the theories mentioned in this article ever worked or could capture the profound difficulties my clients experienced. They just didn't apply.
I'm probably throwing myself under the bus here in making this comment as a professional, but I can't in good conscious use a method that is unhelpful and narrowly categorizes my clients into boxes they sure don't ask to be put in.
I'm finding it hard to relate or get any beneficial information from the articles lately. I didn't fall for any of this BS and have a hard time finding empathy for people who did and now are trying to climb back to reality. Get out in nature, interact with animals (horses being my favorite) and pay attention. We are not man-made, we are created by something far more perfect and purposeful.
I’m a therapist with a degree in social work and can confirm that every word of this article is true. I remember professors offering deadline extensions during the 2020 election season, citing students’ need for self-care; I remember a heated conversation with a classmate where I said it wasn’t my job to tell my clients how to vote -- she was appalled. Throughout my time in grad school I was increasingly concerned about ideological creep, to the point that I almost withdrew several times. The problem is, social workers in particular should be pointing their attention at the conditions (internal and external) people need to live in in order to function well, but social work in practice winds up causing people to become mouthpieces and apologists for the very systems they’re supposed to question. Asking questions is no longer acceptable in my field.
I’m lucky enough to be able to practice with a group that’s committed to providing good therapy, but I’m well aware of how rare that is becoming. In the future I plan to vet potential colleagues VERY carefully, or practice solo. It’s good to know about these growing groups of heterodox thinkers, though -- we really need it.
"Cooney wanted to share her newfound realizations, but feared being canceled and ostracized—by her friends, fellow activists, perhaps even her girlfriend. The burden weighed on her, and therapy seemed the place to address it." Sounds like a cult, doesn't it?
In 2018 I enrolled in a masters of counseling program. I withdrew after the first 2 courses, one of which was on culture and identity. I wanted to work with and help individuals struggling with the human condition. I did not want to be trained as a social worker, social justice warrior, or political activist. I did not want to believe or pretend to believe a 40 year old, 6’2 biological male in an ill fitting dress and wig was more of a victim than his wife and 3 children. I did not want to believe or pretend to believe that because I am white, straight, and Christian I could not understand the suffering of others who were different. I did not want to believe or pretend to believe that because I am a woman I am victimized by the patriarchy. One evening in class we had a “self care night” we colored in coloring books, carved pumpkins, did a group meditation, sang and danced. It was ridiculous and I could not take the program seriously.
Thank you for writing this. As a psychologist, as much as I find this to be the heartbreaking reality of our current moment- I am simultaneously encouraged by thoughtful coverage of the issue in posts like these. When this ideological encroachment first began to take hold, I felt alone in the midst of insanity. Now, this is at the very least a problem that is better understood by people outside the field and I will hold out hope that we can build better, properly informed and educated alternative institutions. Our most immediate imperative is helping the public connect with real therapists (we are out here) who can see past the thin veneer of this morally vacuous religion and are interested n helping people honestly contend with their suffering - no matter what their “identities” may be.
This is an excerpt from the congressional record in 1963, which is apparently a prophetic document, outlining “current communist goals”:
38. Transfer some of the powers of arrest
from the police to social agencies. Treat all behavioral problems as psychiatric disorders which no one but psychiatrists can understand or treat.
39. Dominate the psychiatric profession
and use mental health laws as a means of
gaining coercive control over those who oppose Communist goals.
Along with other prescient nuggets:
15. Capture one or both of the political
parties In the United States.
17. Get control of the schools. Use them
as transmission belts for socialism and current Communist propaganda. Soften the curriculum. Get control of teachers’ associations. Put the party line In textbooks.
18. Gain control of all student newspapers.
19. Use student riots to foment public
protests against programs or organizations which are under Communist attack.
22. Continue discrediting American culture by degrading all forms of artistic expression. An American Communist cell was told to “eliminate all good sculpture from parks and buildings, substitute shapeless, awkward and meaningless forms.”
Yeah, anyway, it’s nice to see these critical, potentially fatal national struggles as someone else’s desired end state as expressed 50 years ago. The assumption that this is all “just happening” may not be valid.
I live in SF where it’s hard to have even a mildly dissenting opinion. I feel incredibly alienated and stressed after reading news articles, social media timelines/posts, and having conversations with my peers where my opinion doesn’t align perfectly with the prevailing narrative. I want so badly to talk to my therapist (also in SF) about it but I don’t feel comfortable with how she’d react, perceive me, or try to “correct” me.
It’s sad when even the places we go to feel “safe and free of judgment” cannot meet our needs. I know I’m not alone in my feelings completely, but what does it do to a society when individuals are scared into silence or submission?
Anyway, I was happy to see this article and see I’m not 100% alone.
Many people who suffer from mental illnesses often find it difficult, or outright refuse, to get therapy. Now imagine being one of these people who finally decide to get the help they need and find any therapist to take you on as a new client (which is becoming increasingly challenging into itself) and they turn out to be one of these quacks.
This is so profoundly sad.
Articles like this are what make The Free Press a must-read. Many doctors have abandoned the Hippocratic Oath for CRT, trans, and COVID hysteria. The ones in my family compare their jobs to car mechanics, which is why they refuse to answer basic questions like "What is a woman?" and defer to corrupted specialist "experts" about child castration, masking, and jabs. Here is an e-mail exchange I had with them: https://yuribezmenov.substack.com/p/how-to-do-no-harm-part-3
Loyalty oaths or else you get expelled. What does that remind me of? Still thinking.
I could not help but think of the recent Jonathan Haidt piece in which he described Woke hysteria as essentially Anti-CBT, and thus inherently productive of psychological maladjustment, and everything that goes with it: helplessness, anxiety, rage and anger, depression, and failures in work and relationships.
To my mind, the psychological benefits of personal empowerment have been obvious for a long time. Frederick Douglass--who I will remind everyone was ACTUALLY a slave--said after the slaves were freed, in effect "don't worry about us. Let us make our own way. If we fail we fail as individuals, which means that when we succeed we also succeed as individuals. Leave us alone. Don't "do" anything with us. Get away." This is healthy.
Everything I see from horizon to horizon being foisted on our young by nearly every authority, from schools to shrinks to governments--is working to shrink and infantilize our young, to justify fear and helplessness and lack of responsibility, and thus working to build a worse society, filled with losers and whiners incapable of basic respect to one another, and thus ripe for mass failure in every possible way.
There is nothing guaranteed about American freedom. We were special once, but we are leading the world right now in a race to the bottom.
It’s the same story, over and over again. Wokeness destroys everything it touches. It’s not enough to simply notice it, or empathetically understand it. Sane people must loudly and publicly fight against it, like a war.
Hi Free Press...!
There were once a bunch of Democrats who thought that they were better than everyone else. And they never, ever stopped fucking believing this shit because the New York Times, the Washington Post, CNN and all of their professors said they were right and that the rest of world was ignorant. And so, they kept being well-meaning Democrats who think that "they" can save the world... messianic weirdos... you know the type!
And the people who run the Free Press used to be in that really cool club. And now, they're not. And they just can't figure out why. Because when they were in the club, they weren't judgmental at all. They were really cool. They elected Obama and everything was better! Something must have been lost in translation because when they were in the club, the club was righteous and good...but now, the club isn't as good. But they don't know why. They can't imagine the possibility that 100% of all of the people in this story are Democrats. Nope... that just CAN'T be the connection at all!
The only good part of this story is that at least these therapists are wrecking the lives of people who can afford their services: whiny, white, liberal women.
Why not do a piece about the history of HOW these fucking institutions got this way and the role that Democrats like you people played in pushing these agendas with such reckless glee for the past 40 fucking years?
Or is this a "new phenomenon" that the New York-cool-elite jet-set is finally fucking figuring out?
I am increasingly convinced that issues like the ones described in this article are, at their core, a result of the decline of religion. This is ironic because it is partially the work of prominent psychologists that helped to drive religion’s decline. But, as engagement with religion declined, people (myself included) brought forth more and more complex questions about their own identity, the world’s problems, politics, etc. and sought answers from non-religious modern sources that are “fact-based” or “proven.” These questions require our institutions to build themselves on the go and spin up more and more answers and somehow that led us down the path of eugenics to CSJ. Personally, I spent a good amount of time seeking answers in books and therapists to no avail. I am early on in rediscovering my faith, but have found that, much to the disdain of $150/hr therapists, anyone who spends an hour reading The Bible will find that the questions they have about their lives have been answered for about 2000 years and you’ll get them for a fraction of the cost!
Or, in other words, lunatics treating lunatics.
What could possibly go wrong?
I recall watching in amused horror, one Sunday morning working out in a hotel gym that forced me to watch CNN as a comedic dwarf was interviewing two prominent "mental health experts," Drs. Li of Yale and Frances of Duke, who claimed that Trump had killed more people than Hitler, Mao and Stalin combined. It encapsulated the insanity of the entire "woke" movement for me in a way that nothing else has done before or since.
I specifically subscribed so I could comment on this article. It was infuriating but also affirming to see The FP write this piece. It was frustrating in my CMHC program to become a therapist to see these ideologies taught and used to frame the experience of clients as experiencing aspects of society as oppressive. That isn't to say bigotry and discrimination do not exist; they certainly do, and clients attest to it in certain ways. Of all the clients I have had in my short-time as a resident therapist and an intern at training sites, my clients didn't come with a primary focus on oppression. Their concerns were related to sexual assault histories, experiences of domestic violence, unemployment, long-term mental illness, dealing with the mental illness of family members, anxiety, depression, professional stagnation and dissatisfaction, divorce, to name a few. None of the theories mentioned in this article ever worked or could capture the profound difficulties my clients experienced. They just didn't apply.
I'm probably throwing myself under the bus here in making this comment as a professional, but I can't in good conscious use a method that is unhelpful and narrowly categorizes my clients into boxes they sure don't ask to be put in.
I'm finding it hard to relate or get any beneficial information from the articles lately. I didn't fall for any of this BS and have a hard time finding empathy for people who did and now are trying to climb back to reality. Get out in nature, interact with animals (horses being my favorite) and pay attention. We are not man-made, we are created by something far more perfect and purposeful.
I’m a therapist with a degree in social work and can confirm that every word of this article is true. I remember professors offering deadline extensions during the 2020 election season, citing students’ need for self-care; I remember a heated conversation with a classmate where I said it wasn’t my job to tell my clients how to vote -- she was appalled. Throughout my time in grad school I was increasingly concerned about ideological creep, to the point that I almost withdrew several times. The problem is, social workers in particular should be pointing their attention at the conditions (internal and external) people need to live in in order to function well, but social work in practice winds up causing people to become mouthpieces and apologists for the very systems they’re supposed to question. Asking questions is no longer acceptable in my field.
I’m lucky enough to be able to practice with a group that’s committed to providing good therapy, but I’m well aware of how rare that is becoming. In the future I plan to vet potential colleagues VERY carefully, or practice solo. It’s good to know about these growing groups of heterodox thinkers, though -- we really need it.
"Cooney wanted to share her newfound realizations, but feared being canceled and ostracized—by her friends, fellow activists, perhaps even her girlfriend. The burden weighed on her, and therapy seemed the place to address it." Sounds like a cult, doesn't it?
In 2018 I enrolled in a masters of counseling program. I withdrew after the first 2 courses, one of which was on culture and identity. I wanted to work with and help individuals struggling with the human condition. I did not want to be trained as a social worker, social justice warrior, or political activist. I did not want to believe or pretend to believe a 40 year old, 6’2 biological male in an ill fitting dress and wig was more of a victim than his wife and 3 children. I did not want to believe or pretend to believe that because I am white, straight, and Christian I could not understand the suffering of others who were different. I did not want to believe or pretend to believe that because I am a woman I am victimized by the patriarchy. One evening in class we had a “self care night” we colored in coloring books, carved pumpkins, did a group meditation, sang and danced. It was ridiculous and I could not take the program seriously.
Thank you for writing this. As a psychologist, as much as I find this to be the heartbreaking reality of our current moment- I am simultaneously encouraged by thoughtful coverage of the issue in posts like these. When this ideological encroachment first began to take hold, I felt alone in the midst of insanity. Now, this is at the very least a problem that is better understood by people outside the field and I will hold out hope that we can build better, properly informed and educated alternative institutions. Our most immediate imperative is helping the public connect with real therapists (we are out here) who can see past the thin veneer of this morally vacuous religion and are interested n helping people honestly contend with their suffering - no matter what their “identities” may be.
This is an excerpt from the congressional record in 1963, which is apparently a prophetic document, outlining “current communist goals”:
38. Transfer some of the powers of arrest
from the police to social agencies. Treat all behavioral problems as psychiatric disorders which no one but psychiatrists can understand or treat.
39. Dominate the psychiatric profession
and use mental health laws as a means of
gaining coercive control over those who oppose Communist goals.
Along with other prescient nuggets:
15. Capture one or both of the political
parties In the United States.
17. Get control of the schools. Use them
as transmission belts for socialism and current Communist propaganda. Soften the curriculum. Get control of teachers’ associations. Put the party line In textbooks.
18. Gain control of all student newspapers.
19. Use student riots to foment public
protests against programs or organizations which are under Communist attack.
20. Infiltrate the press. Get control of
book-review assignments, editorial writing, policymaking positions.
21. Gain control of key positions' In radio,
TV, and motion pictures.
22. Continue discrediting American culture by degrading all forms of artistic expression. An American Communist cell was told to “eliminate all good sculpture from parks and buildings, substitute shapeless, awkward and meaningless forms.”
Yeah, anyway, it’s nice to see these critical, potentially fatal national struggles as someone else’s desired end state as expressed 50 years ago. The assumption that this is all “just happening” may not be valid.
Therapy for white guilt? Why not a priest for some exorcism too? It's the same delusion
A refreshing/worrisome article to read.
I live in SF where it’s hard to have even a mildly dissenting opinion. I feel incredibly alienated and stressed after reading news articles, social media timelines/posts, and having conversations with my peers where my opinion doesn’t align perfectly with the prevailing narrative. I want so badly to talk to my therapist (also in SF) about it but I don’t feel comfortable with how she’d react, perceive me, or try to “correct” me.
It’s sad when even the places we go to feel “safe and free of judgment” cannot meet our needs. I know I’m not alone in my feelings completely, but what does it do to a society when individuals are scared into silence or submission?
Anyway, I was happy to see this article and see I’m not 100% alone.