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Essay on Pete Earley’s Book "Crazy: A Father’s Search Through America’s Mental Health Madness"
The major controversy between academic writers (Wakefield, 1997; Mechanic, 1999) as theoretical thinkers and P. Earley as practically experienced in the field of mental illness is in the perspective of looking at the problem through the lenses of right/wrong, normal/abnormal and healthy/sick. The academic literature seems to have tendency to discuss “being normal” issue as socially constructed, appeal for not labeling and respecting person as such (Wakefield, 1997; Mechanic, 1999), which supports the points the author makes in his book, how in reality mentally ill people are given their civil rights and rights of choice. Those are theoretical and legislative views on mental illness, while Pete Earley, as a father of son diagnosed with bipolar disorder, himself and presenting the life stories of other families, argues that exaggerated rights’ protection leads to painful and harmful consequences. He argues that right for treatment for mentally ill is to be the priority, rather than the right for choice, as it results in abandonment, not freedom (Early, 2006).…
Amerikāņu grāmatas pārskats un analīze par cilvēkiem ar psihiskajām saslimšanām un politiku valstī. The Pete Earley’s book “Crazy: A Father’s Search Through America’s Mental Health Madness” is an outstanding insight into “inside” and “outside” worlds of the mental illness. Having experienced frustrating strive to help his son with mental illness, P. Earley lets the reader go through his family’s route of struggling the illness and encourages deeper understanding and empathy. Not only he shows the world of mental illness on personal experience, but also presents the cruel reality of mental health system and “criminalization” of mentally ill based on his yearlong investigation in Miami-Dade County jail. The book highlights the central aspects of mental illness: understanding the illness as cruel destiny, rather than personal choice; the importance of treatment and medication; the dilemma of human rights for mentally ill people; and societal attitude and support versus criminalization and stigma of mentally ill. In this essay I would love to address central issues of mental illness relevant to social work sphere as human rights and social exclusion.
