Szasz, Thomas 1920- (Thomas Stephen Szasz)

PERSONAL:

Surname is pronounced "Sass"; born April 15, 1920, in Budapest, Hungary; came to United States in 1938, naturalized in 1944; son of Julius (a businessman) and Lily Szasz; married Rosine Loshkajian, October 19, 1951 (divorced, 1970); children: Margot, Susan. Education: University of Cincinnati, A.B. (with honors), 1941, M.D., 1944; Chicago Institute for Psychoanalysis, certificate, 1950.

ADDRESSES:

Home—Manlius, NY. Office—Upstate Medical Center, 750 East Adams St., Syracuse, NY 13210. Agent—McIntosh & Otis, Inc., 475 Fifth Ave., New York, NY 10017.

CAREER:

Diplomate, National Board of Medical Examiners, 1945, American Board of Psychiatry and Neurology, 1951; Boston City Hospital, Boston, Mass., intern, 1944-45; Cincinnati General Hospital, Cincinnati, Ohio, assistant resident, 1945-46, clinician, 1946; University of Chicago Clinics, Chicago, IL, assistant resident in psychiatry, 1946-48; Chicago Institute for Psychoanalysis, Chicago, IL, staff member, 1951-56; State University of New York, Upstate Medical Center, Syracuse, professor of psychiatry, 1956—; private practice of psychology and psychiatry in Chicago, IL, 1949-54, Bethesda, MD, 1954-56, Syracuse, NY, 1956—. Fellow, Postgraduate Center for Mental Health, 1962; visiting professor, University of Wisconsin—Madison, 1962, Marquette University, 1968, University of New Mexico, 1981; senior scholar, Eli Lilly Foundation, 1966—; Civil Liberties Carey Lecturer, Cornell University Law School, 1968; C.P. Snow Lecturer, Ithaca University, 1970; Root Tilden Lecturer, New York University School of Law, 1971; Noel Buxton Lectureship, University of Essex, 1975; Robert S. Marx Lectureship, University of Cincinnati College of Law, 1976; Hardy Chair Lectureship, Hartwick College, 1976; E.S. Meyer Memorial Lecturer, University of Queensland Medical School, 1977; delivered Lambie-Dew Oration, Sydney University, 1977. Honorary president, International Commission for Human Rights, London, 1974. Member of board of directors, National Council on Crime and Delinquency; member of research advisory panel, Institute for the Study of Drug Addiction; member of national advisory committee, Living Libraries, Inc.; member of advisory board, corporation for Economic Education, 1977—. Military service: U.S. Naval Reserve, 1954-56, became commander.

MEMBER:

International Psychoanalytic Association, International Academy of Forensic Psychology (fellow), American Psychiatric Association (fellow), American Psychoanalytic Association, Mark Twain Society (honorary member), Alpha Omega Alpha.

AWARDS, HONORS:

Ralph Kharas Award, Central New York Chapter, American Civil Liberties Union, 1967; Holmes-Munsterberg Award from International Acad- emy of Forensic Psychology, 1969; Wisdom Award of Honor, 1970; Academy Prize from Institutum atque Academia Auctorum Internationalis, 1972; Humanist of the Year Award from American Humanist Association, 1973; Second Annual Independence Day Award for the Greatest Public Service Benefiting the Disadvantaged from American Institute for Public Service, 1974; Martin Buber Award, Midway Counseling Center, 1974; honorary doctorate, Allegheny College, 1975, and Universidad Francisco Marroquin, 1979; Mencken Award, 1981; Humaniest Laureate, 1984; Statue of Liberty, Ellis Island Foundation Archives Roster, 1986; George Washington Award, American Hungarian Foundation, 2003.

WRITINGS:

Pain and Pleasure: A Study of Bodily Feelings, Basic Books (New York, NY), 1957.

The Myth of Mental Illness: Foundations of a Theory of Personal Conduct, Harper (New York, NY), 1961, revised edition, 1974.

Law, Liberty, and Psychiatry: An Inquiry into the Social Uses of Mental Health Practices, Macmillan (New York, NY), 1963.

Psychiatric Justice, Macmillan (New York, NY), 1965.

The Ethics of Psychoanalysis: The Theory and Method of Autonomous Psychotherapy, Basic Books (New York, NY), 1965, reprinted with a new preface, 1974.

Ideology and Insanity: Essays on the Psychiatric Dehumanization of Man, Anchor Books (Garden City, NY), 1970.

The Manufacture of Madness: A Comparative Study of the Inquisition and the Mental Health Movement, Harper (New York, NY), 1970.

The Second Sin, Anchor Books (Garden City, NY), 1973.

(Editor) The Age of Madness: The History of Involuntary Mental Hospitalization Presented in Selected Texts, Anchor Books (Garden City, NY), 1973.

Ceremonial Chemistry: The Ritual Persecution of Drugs, Addicts, and Pushers, Anchor Books (Garden City, NY), 1974.

Heresies, Anchor Books (Garden City, NY), 1976.

Karl Kraus and the Soul-Doctors: A Pioneer Critic and His Criticism of Psychiatry and Psychoanalysis, Louisiana State University Press (Baton Rouge, LA), 1976.

Schizophrenia: The Sacred Symbol of Psychiatry, Basic Books (New York, NY), 1976.

Paresis and Plunder: The Models of Madness in Psychiatry and Anti-psychiatry, University of Essex (Colchester, England), 1977.

Psychiatric Slavery: When Confinement and Coercion Masquerade as Cure, Free Press (New York, NY), 1977.

The Theology of Medicine: The Political-Philosophical Foundations of Medical Ethics, Louisiana State University Press (Baton Rouge, LA), 1977.

The Myth of Psychotherapy: Mental Healing as Religion, Rhetoric, and Repression, Doubleday (Garden City, NY), 1978.

Sex by Prescription, Doubleday (Garden City, NY), 1980 (published in the United Kingdom as Sex: Facts, Frauds, and Follies, Blackwell, 1981).

The Therapeutic State: Psychiatry in the Mirror of Current Events, Prometheus Books (Buffalo, NY), 1984.

Insanity: The Idea and Its Consequences, Wiley, 1987.

Law, Liberty, and Psychiatry: An Inquiry into the Social Uses of Mental Health Practices, Syracuse University Press (Syracuse, NY), 1989.

Anti-Freud: Karl Kraus's Criticism of Psychoanalysis and Psychiatry, Syracuse University Press (Syracuse, NY), 1990.

The Untamed Tongue: A Dissenting Dictionary, Open Court (La Salle, IL), 1990.

Our Right to Drugs: The Case for a Free Market, Praeger (New York, NY), 1992.

Friedman & Szasz on Liberty and Drugs: Essays on the Free Market and Prohibition, Drug Policy Foundation Press (Washington, DC), 1992.

A Lexicon of Lunacy: Metaphoric Malady, Moral Responsibility, and Psychiatry, Transaction Publishers (New Brunswick, NJ), 1993.

Cruel Compassion: Psychiatric Control of Society's Unwanted, Wiley (New York, NY), 1994.

The Meaning of Mind: Language, Morality, and Neuroscience, Praeger (Westport, CN), 1996.

Fatal Freedom: The Ethics and Politics of Suicide, Praeger (Westport, CN), 1999.

Pharmacracy: Medicine and Politics in America, Praeger (Westport, CN), 2001.

Liberation by Oppression: A Comparative Study of Slavery and Psychiatry, Transaction Publishers (New Brunswick, NJ), 2002.

Faith in Freedom: Libertarian Principles and Psychiatric Practices, Transaction (New Brunswick, NJ), 2004.

Words to the Wise: A Medical-philosophical Dictionary, Transaction Publishers (New Brunswick, NJ), 2004.

"My Madness Saved Me": The Madness and Marriage of Virginia Woolf, Transaction Publishers (New Brunswick, NJ), 2006.

Coercion as Cure: A Critical History of Psychiatry, Transaction Publishers (New Brunswick, NJ), 2007.

The Medicalization of Everyday Life: Selected Essays, Syracuse University Press (Syracuse, NY), 2007.

Contributor to professional journals and to popular publications, including Harper's, New Republic, and New York Times. Member of editorial board, Contemporary Psychoanalysis, Earth, Free Inquiry, Psychotherapy, Journal of Forensic Psychology, Journal of Humanistic Psychology, Journal of Law and Human Behavior, Psychoanalytic Review, Science Digest, Journal of Libertarian Studies, Children and Youth Services Review, Journal of Mind and Behavior. Contributing editor, Reason, Inquiry.

SIDELIGHTS:

Several critics believe that Thomas Szasz has, in effect, started a war on psychiatry as it is currently practiced in the United States. In his book The Myth of Mental Illness: Foundations of a Theory of Personal Conduct, Szasz argues, according to Edwin M. Schur in Atlantic, "that both our uses of the term ‘mental illness’ and the activities of the psychiatric profession are often scientifically untenable and morally and socially indefensible." Szasz believes that mental illness differs from organic illness, and he calls the former "problems of living." He believes psychiatrists have glossed over these differences and continue to treat mental disturbances as medical problems. They impose the definition "mentally ill" on a person instead of treating the illness as an objective fact.

Szasz further believes that anyone brought to trial for a criminal offense should be allowed to stand trial instead of, as sometimes happens, being submitted to a pretrial psychiatric examination and then being committed to a mental institution. In fact, he would have the plea of insanity abolished. Nor does he accept dangerousness to oneself as a legitimate basis for institutionalization. He writes: "In a free society, a person must have the right to injure or kill himself." As for dangerousness to others, Schur noted that Szasz expounds on those not incarcerated who are equally as dangerous to others, and cites drunken drivers as one example. Schur wrote: "A person's ‘dangerousness’ becomes a matter for legitimate public control, Szasz argues, only when he actually commits a dangerous act. Then he can be dealt with in accordance with regular criminal law."

Other psychiatrists have called his work "reckless iconoclasm," "reprehensible," and "dangerous." Lawyers, including Arthur Goldberg, have praised him. His sole concern, said Schur, is the protection of the individual. Szasz believes that "the poor need jobs and money, not psychoanalysis. The uneducated need knowledge and skills, not psychoanalysis." Though his arguments are often stated in their extreme forms, Schur wrote that Szasz "quite probably … has done more than any other man to alert the American public to the potential dangers of an excessively psychiatrized society."

Of his own work, Szasz wrote: "I have tried to make two separate and yet connected points. The first point is that not only is mental illness not ‘like any other illness,’ as conventional wisdom now has it, but that mental illness does not exist: the term is a metaphor and belief in it and its implications is a mythology—indeed, it is the central mythology of psychiatry. The second point is that as a profession and as a social enterprise, psychiatry is neither a science nor a healing art but is rather a powerful arm of the modern nation state. The paradigmatic functions of the psychiatrist are inculpating and imprisoning innocent persons, called ‘civil commitment,’ and exculpating guilty persons and then often imprisoning them too (ostensibly for the ‘treatment’ of the illness that ‘caused’ their criminal conduct), called the ‘insanity defense’ and ‘insanity verdict.’

"On conceptual, moral and political grounds I oppose these and all other coercive uses of psychiatry. Involuntary psychiatry is an enemy of liberty and responsibility. Morally and legally the only sexual relations we now regard as legitimate are those between consenting adults. Similarly, we should regard only psychiatric relations between consenting adults as morally and legally legitimate."

In Cruel Compassion: Psychiatric Control of Society's Unwanted, Szasz critiques the policy of putting those diagnosed as mentally ill into care facilities. In his view, this is a coercive policy that incarcerates people for the offense of being embarrassing or awkward; it is not done for therapeutic reasons, but simply removes difficult people from among the rest of society. Szasz's argument in this book builds on the central theses of his many earlier works about the abuses of psychiatry: that mental illness, as construed by the psychiatric profession, does not exist; and that treatment of the mentally ill is not a medical intervention but an exercise in social control. For British Medical Journal contributor John S. Callender, this view disregards the real pain and anguish that the mentally ill and their families suffer. Szasz's argument, Callender concluded, "invites only ignorance and neglect in the guise of respect for individual liberty." Writing in New Statesman & Society, however, David Cohen called Cruel Compassion a "passionate and important" book that is "sharp, convincing and up-to-date." Szasz explained in an interview with Reason contributor Jacob Sullum: "People should not be protected from themselves by involuntary psychiatric interventions. Psychiatrists should play no more of a role in this than priests do." If a person breaks a law, he or she should be jailed. Those who want psychotherapy should receive it voluntarily, not under court order.

Indeed, Szasz clarified in the interview, therapy can be beneficial, but he sees it as a "contractual conversation about a person's problems and how to resolve them." It is vital, in this conversation, that the therapist not assume that he or she knows more about the patient's condition than the patient does. The therapist's role, Szasz emphasized, is as a "catalyst. You are making suggestions and exploring alternatives—helping the person change himself. The idea that the person remains entirely in charge of himself is a fundamental premise."

Szasz's views on drugs, too, have elicited extreme controversy. In Ceremonial Chemistry: The Ritual Persecution of Drugs, Addicts, and Pushers he proposes that the government bans the use of some drugs, but not others, not on pharmacological grounds but for reasons that include religion, politics, and economic control. He goes on to argue in Our Right to Drugs: The Case for a Free Market that drugs should be considered like any other type of property, and that access to them should not be subjected to legal restrictions. Furthermore, he states that the government war on drugs is not just hypocritical, but racist, because black drug users are arrested far more often than are white drug users. Szasz makes it clear that he is not suggesting that drugs are harmless—only that drug use should be decriminalized. What's more, he believes that patients should be able to obtain some drugs, such as antidepressants, on the free market. This way, he explained to Sullum, the patient "can compare them to opium, marijuana, or other drugs. There is no competition now between the prescription drugs and the traditional drugs which people took when they felt bad. After all, people have medicated themselves since time immemorial. I suspect that opium in small doses is safer over a long period of time than these complicated organic compounds."

Lancet reviewer Robert West rejected Szasz's thesis in Our Right to Drugs, stating that the book's emphasis on individual rights is not an appropriate basis from which to create drug policy. Drug-related violence, West pointed out, affects countless innocent victims whose rights must also be considered, and "surely these wider effects on society must be the ultimate arbiters of public policy."

The Medicalization of Everyday Life: Selected Essays found some sympathetic readers. In this collection of essays, Szasz argues that the medical and legal establishments have created a "pharmacracy" that increasingly deprives individuals of their rights and that sees a wide range of difficult behaviors as pathologies, rather than differences. A reviewer for Publishers Weekly hailed it as a "wonderful, impassioned book that is … a welcome investigation of the social ramifications" of the contemporary over-medicalized society.

Usually writing on general medical and social themes, Szasz takes a different approach in "My Madness Saved Me": The Madness and Marriage of Virginia Woolf. In this work, he examines Woolf's life and writing to conclude that she did not, as is widely believed, suffer from madness but instead used the idea of being mentally ill to manipulate her life and literary reputation. As Szasz puts it, Woolf was an "intelligent and assertive person, a moral agent who used mental illness, psychiatry, and her husband to fashion for herself a life of her own choosing." The feminist writer, Szasz argues, took her own life not because of debilitating mental illness but "to enhance her fame" and escape her fears for a bleak future.

Times Literary Supplement contributor Andrew Scull, dismissed "My Madness Saved Me" as "a thorough demolition job" that takes no account of the nuances and inconsistencies that are an inevitable part of any person's character. Scull considered Szasz's analysis of Leonard and Virginia Woolf to be "crude" and one-dimensional portraits that reveal his deep bias against his subject. Psychiatric Times reviewer Abraham L. Halpern, however, found Szasz's thesis convincing, insightful, and well-founded. Halpern especially appreciated Szasz's critique of the psychiatrists who treated Woolf, who, in Halpern's words, "indeed merit condemnation."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

Atlantic, June 1, 1966, Edwin M. Schur, review of The Myth of Mental Illness: Foundations of a Theory of Personal Conduct.

Booklist, May 1, 1992, William Beatty, review of Our Right to Drugs: The Case for a Free Market, p. 1572; April 1, 2001, William Beatty, review of Pharmacracy: Medicine and Politics in America, p. 1435.

British Medical Journal, December 10, 1994, John S. Callender, review of Cruel Compassion: Psychiatric Control of Society's Unwanted, p. 1590.

Choice: Current Reviews for Academic Libraries, November, 1992, R.L. Jones, review of Our Right to Drugs, p. 504; July 1, 1993, "A Lexicon of Lunacy: Metaphoric Malady, Moral Responsibility, and Psychiatry," p. 1844; November, 1994, R.J. Howell, review of Cruel Compassion, p. 540; January, 2003, R.L. Jones, review of Liberation by Oppression: A Comparative Study of Slavery and Psychiatry, p. 857; March, 2004, R.L. Jones, review of Pharmacracy, p. 1327.

Community Care, August 18, 1994, Alison Cobb, review of Cruel Compassion, p. 35.

Dialogue: Canadian Philosophical Review, spring, 1999, Susan Dwyer, review of The Meaning of Mind: Language, Morality, and Neuroscience.

Federal Bar News & Journal, July, 1992, Henry Cohen, review of Our Right to Drugs, p. 394.

Florida Bar Journal, June, 1983, "Thomas Szasz: Primary Values and Major Contentions," p. 409.

Humanist in Canada, spring, 2000, review of The Meaning of Mind.

Insight on the News, July 31, 2000, "Is Mental Illness All in Your Head?," p. 35.

Journal of Humanistic Psychology, summer, 2005, "Psychiatric Fraud and Force: A Reply to Szsaz."

Lancet, September 12, 1992, Robert West, review of Our Right to Drugs, p. 659.

Library Journal, November 1, 1980, review of Sex by Prescription, p. 2333; April 1, 1984, review of The Therapeutic State: Psychiatry in the Mirror of Current Events, p. 726; May 1, 1987, Paul Hymowitz, review of Insanity: The Idea and Its Consequences, p. 73; December, 1996, E. James Lieberman, review of The Meaning of Mind, p. 126.

Los Angeles Daily Journal, March 20, 1987, Dava Sobel, review of Insanity, p. 16.

New Statesman & Society, July 8, 1994, David Cohen, review of Cruel Compassion, p. 23.

New York, November 3, 1980, Andrew Hacker, review of Sex by Prescription, p. 101.

New York Times Book Review, March 15, 1987, Dava Sobel, review of Insanity, p. 22; July 10, 1994, H. Jack Geiger, review of Cruel Compassion, p. 25.

PR Newswire, April 24, 2000, "CCHR Honors Its Co-Founder, Humanitarian Dr. Thomas Szasz," p. 4037.

Psychiatric Times, June 1, 2006, Abraham L. Halpern, review of "My Madness Saved Me": The Madness and Marriage of Virginia Woolf, p. 42.

Psychology Today, December, 1980, review of Sex by Prescription, p. 120; February, 1981, Paul Robinson, review of Sex by Prescription, p. 88.

Publishers Weekly, August 15, 1980, review of Sex by Prescription, p. 49; May 18, 1992, review of Our Right to Drugs, p. 54; September 30, 1996, review of The Meaning of Mind, p. 73; April 2, 2001, review of Pharmacracy, p. 56; August 27, 2007, review of The Medicalization of Everyday Life: Selected Essays, p. 76.

Reason, December, 1990, review of The Untamed Tongue: A Dissenting Dictionary, p. 45; November, 1992, Jacob Sullum, review of Our Right to Drugs, p. 64; July, 2000, "Curing the Therapeutic State," p. 27; January, 2003, review of Pharmacracy, p. 58.

Reference & Research Book News, November, 2002, review of The Meaning of Mind, p. 6; May, 2004, review of Ceremonial Chemistry: The Ritual Persecution of Drugs, Addicts, and Pushers, p. 143.

Risk: Health, Safety & Environment, summer, 2000, Paula W. Jewell, review of Fatal Freedom: The Ethics and Politics of Suicide.

Science Books & Films, May, 1981, review of Sex by Prescription, p. 268; January, 1988, review of Insanity: The Idea and Its Consequences, p. 142.

SciTech Book News, December, 2002, review of Liberation by Oppression, p. 97.

Time, December 15, 1980, "The Savonarola of Sex," p. 100.

Times Literary Supplement, January 19, 2007, Andrew Scull, "Untruly Madly Deeply," p. 8.

USA Today, March, 2004, "Getting Away with Murder: Vincent Gigante and Exculpatory Psychiatry," p. 26.

Whole Earth Review, summer, 1990, Andrew Dick, review of Ceremonial Chemistry.

ONLINE

Thomas Szasz Home Page,http://www.szasz.com (November 7, 2007).