Suicide Prohibition: The Shame of MedicineSyracuse University Press, 12.10.2011 - 154 Seiten In Western thought, suicide has evolved from sin to sin-and-crime, to crime, to mental illness, and to semilegal act. A legal act is one we are free to think and speak about and plan and perform, without penalty by agents of the state. While dying voluntarily is ostensibly legal, suicide attempts and even suicidal thoughts are routinely punished by incarceration in a psychiatric institution. Although many people believe the prevention of suicide is one of the duties the modern state owes its citizens, Szasz argues that suicide is a basic human right and that the lengths to which the medical industry goes to prevent it represent a deprivation of that right. Drawing on his general theory of the myth of mental illness, Szasz makes a compelling case that the voluntary termination of one’s own life is the result of a decision, not a disease. He presents an in-depth examination and critique of contemporary antisuicide policies, which are based on the notion that voluntary death is a mental health problem, and systematically lays out the dehumanizing consequences of psychiatrizing suicide prevention. If suicide be deemed a problem, it is not a medical problem. Managing it as if it were a disease, or the result of a disease, will succeed only in debasing medicine and corrupting the law. Pretending to be the pride of medicine, psychiatry is its shame. |
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AFSP American Appellant assisted suicide Auschwitz autohomicide called Centers Church of Euthanasia cide civil commitment coercion coercive commit suicide concentration camp contract court criminal danger declared depressed deprive despotism disease doctors Donaldson drugs Emergency Psychiatry emphasis added Fatal Freedom Frankl human Ibid idea Imperfect Endings incarceration individuals insane involuntary commitment Jean Améry Jefferson Jewish Jews killing oneself liberty Linde lives Maier Man’s Search medicine mental hospitals mental illness mental patient modern moral morphine mother Myth Myth of Sisyphus National Nazis newsgroup person physician political prevent suicide problem professional psychiatrists punished Pytell R. D. Laing responsibility Royal Humane Society Schnipper Search for Meaning secession self-killer self-murder Services severely mentally disabled social society Steven student suicidal ideation suicide prevention suicide prohibition Szasz taboo term therapeutic Thomas Szasz tion titled Today Viktor Frankl voluntary death Wollstonecraft York