On Thu, 13 Sep 2012 07:15:16 -0700, Stuart McKelvie wrote: > >Dear Tipsters, > >Michael P. wrote: >"Perhaps Daniel is wrong on this point but it is clear that Laing suffered from >alcoholism and depression through significant parts of his life. In Alan >Beveridge's obituary for Laing, he make the following >statements: >(See: http://pb.rcpsych.org/content/22/7/452.full.pdf )" > >There is no doubt that Laing drank to excess and may have suffered from >alcoholism and depression, but that is a far cry from being hospitalized for >shizophrenia. > >You can read an account of his experiences observing and mixing with and >listening to patients in his autobiographical book Wisdom, Madness and Folly >(1985).
Where have I said that Laing did NOT interact with "patients"? The issue was whether Laing ever suffered from schizophrenia. Daniel asserts that he had while you seem to assert that Laing did not. My searches have not turned up anything supporting Daniel's claim but I am not a Laing scholar (acolyte?). A most reasonable course of action might be for you to question Daniel for the basis of his claim. However, in my searches, I came across a number of things about Laing apropos Szasz: they apparently hated each other. Szasz, the "libertarian" had serious disagreements with Laing as noted in the following: http://www.thefreemanonline.org/columns/the-therapeutic-state-anti-coercion-is-not-anti-psychiatry/ The interested reader can find other writings by Szasz on Laing. Oh, one other thing I learned about Laing that I came across in a review of two biographies on Laing, one by his son. I quote the relevant section from the review: |Finally, though not really surprised, I was dismayed by the indiscriminate |sweep of Laing’s anti-Americanism. I happen to agree with Laing when he |states that the great popularity enjoyed by Carl Rogers and Abraham Maslow |during the sixties and seventies is an appalling reflection on the poverty of |American intellectual life. (And so did Erich Fromm, incidentally.) l8 But |recalling two American collaborators, Joseph Berke and Leon Redler, |Laing said: “They were imbued with . . . the Yankee, New York number |of going down to Montgomery on freedom marches on behalf of blacks |they had never met and didn’t know anything about and had no idea what |the blacks in South Carolina felt about this discovery of their cause. . . . |This was a sensibility I had very little time for.’’ Pompous ass! For the complete review. see: Burston, A. (1996), Adrian Laing. R. D. Laing: A Biography. London: Peter Owen, 1994. 248 pp., $50.00 Bob Mullan. Mad to Be Normal: Conversations with R. D. Laing. London: Free Associations Books, 1995. 406 pp., $22.95 (paper). J. Hist. Behav. Sci., 32: 177–183. doi: 10.1002/1520-6696(199604)32:2<177::AID-JHBS2300320202>3.0.CO;2-1 -MIke Palij New York University [email protected] --- You are currently subscribed to tips as: [email protected]. To unsubscribe click here: http://fsulist.frostburg.edu/u?id=13090.68da6e6e5325aa33287ff385b70df5d5&n=T&l=tips&o=20400 or send a blank email to leave-20400-13090.68da6e6e5325aa33287ff385b70df...@fsulist.frostburg.edu
