Against Therapy: Emotional Tyranny and the Myth of Psychological Healing

by Jeffrey Moussaieff Masson

Book Overview

In this book the author suggests that the techniques and aims of psychotherapy are open to abuse. He regards it as self-evident that the therapist makes demands on the patient that cannot be fulfilled... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0689119291
• ISBN13: 9780689119293
• Release Date: January 1988
• Publisher: Atheneum Books
• Length: 279 Pages
• Weight: 1.10 lbs.

Customer Reviews

An excellent critique that is still relevant today

When an author puts forth the claim that all psychotherapy should be abandoned on the grounds that the entire field is inherently corrupt, one is tempted to dismiss him as a crackpot. But Dr. Masson is no crackpot. He is the former director of the Sigmund Freud Archives and a psychotherapist himself. Given those qualifications Dr. Masson's ideas are worthy of consideration--however radical they may appear. By the time you finish this book, with its well researched history of psychotherapy, you will be convinced. The abuses of patients at the hands of psychotherapists and psychoanalysts over the past century and a half are so horrifying as to make some chapters almost impossible to read. But Masson's object is not to shock us with the details of the sexual, emotional and physical abuse that psychiatric patients have suffered, but to demonstrate that the entire field rests upon a false assumption which basically guarantees that patients will be mistreated. The assumption is that therapists know what sanity is. They do not--for the simple reason that nobody does. The only thing that therapists can know is how their society defines sanity. (Even that is a stretch. Unlike anthropologists, psychologists are not trained to analyze social norms and mores.) As has been amply demonstrated, the notion of sanity changes substantially from one era to the next. A woman in the 19th century could be incarcerated for life in a mental asylum for "incurable pride" or for "moral insanity", terms which we find quaint nowadays, but, as they were taken seriously at the time, destroyed countless lives. And if we find these terms quaint, just imagine how such culturally specific concepts as "neurosis" will be viewed in the future. The reason that Masson takes special aim at psychotherapy, of course, is that it is his area of expertise. In reality any situation in which one human being can decide the fate of another may lend itself to abuse. (As the saying goes: "Power corrupts.") What makes psychotherapy and related fields so unique is the degree to which they have become entrenched throughout the entire system. The diagnosis of mental illness sticks like glue, no matter who makes it, and no matter how little real evidence there is to support it. Masson wrote this book in the 1980s, and it is tempting to think that since then we have come a long way in terms of patient rights, treatment for the mentally ill (however their illnesses may be defined), and general awareness of the pitfalls of psychological diagnoses. Most of us believe that the abuses of the past are now behind us. If you believe that, or that Masson's critique is out of date, think again. In 1988, Ean Proctor, a young boy confined to a wheelchair with ME (known in the US as Chronic Fatigue Syndrome) was forcibly removed from his parents on the grounds that they were "enabling" his illness. Ean was taken to a state hospital where to "prove" that his illness was "all in in his head" they threw him into

"Selling the Brooklyn Bridge"

I thought this book should be read by all mental health professionals and the so called accreditation organizations (they don't look in the right places). . . Masson goes directly to asking questions about the power deferential in therapy . . .I could go on with my own observations and experiences within this field, but this is not the place . . . I do, however, believe that both power and psychiatry practice need better supervision. . .My only critique of the book is that because Masson seems to know most about psychiatry and psychoanalysis, he quickly added Chapter 8 not fleshing this section out enough.This book has inspired me to want to do some research -- I would like to do some reseach on what Masson brings up on p. 190 -- and the psychology of the seller of the Brooklyn Bridge. . .

Great insights, great criticism, important questions

Against Therapy is an elaborate critique of the concept and practice of "therapy." The greatest praise, in my view, goes to the fact that Masson has in this book, along with others that he's written, denounced several very serious issues with therapeutic practices, specially the harm and abuse that are carried out against defenseless human beings in many cases to a lethal point or one that condemns a human being to a life of sanctioned torture. Using very poignant historical examples, Masson clearly shows how terrible but sanctioned diagnoses and therapeutic practices have been used to torture people into submissive roles society ascribes to them, or to make their mental health seriously deteriorate as a result of their so-called "treatment." His examples are especially focused on how a patriarchal society uses a variety of violent techniques to punish, torture, and/or make women submissive. While all his examples and points are well taken, he elaborates more on the male/female power war to the exclusion of others. Another point of praise, is that Masson has also given a big focus to the issue of sexual abuse of children and its gross denial in society. But while he does give examples of children that were grossly mistreated, he does not elaborate on how similar structural forms of oppression that women have faced from a patriarchal society are present in society's structure regarding adults v. children. He also highlights much more male abuse of female children and ignores other forms of sexual abuse, a format that does a disservice to other victims by continuing the silence about it. We know today that the number of male children abused is immense and has been continuously overlooked. We also know that issue of girls abused by women is still at a tip of the iceberg stage. But overall, his wonderful empathy with the deeply unjust suffering of so many children, women, and men is also another poignant mark of his work.Masson goes further than just examining and denouncing barbaric practices, all carried out in the name of science or therapy or for the good of the patient, and usually carried out with total impunity, and he takes the next important step to ask if the fundamental premises and model of psychoanalysis, psychiatry, and psycotherapy are not where the roots of such a vast and disturbing problem lie. This is a tremendously important question to ask and he does a fine job in elaborating on various intrinsic power, greed, corruption, and oppressive social structure issues involved in making therapy relationships harmful. It's not only on the greatly abusive relationships level that he asks these questions, but also regarding how the very notion of "the therapist:" falsely constructed as one person who knows it all, who is "sane, without any problems," who is "adult," who is "ethical," v. the "patient" construct of being "crazy," more infantile, therefore incapable of knowing anything (specially about him or herself), or whose

A needed point of view

from the author of DREAMING YOUR REAL SELF: A PERSONAL APPROACH TO DREAM INTERPRETATION; WHO'S CRAZY, ANYWAY?; and DREAM BACK YOUR LIFE.Masson has written an important book that should be studied as part of the education of every mental health professional. The power imbalance in the therapeutic encounter makes it imperative that if you are going to see a psychotherapist, the focus must be on restoring confidence and self-understanding and not being told by what you should be. For professionals, the temptations of such power often leads to unethical behavior. Yes, AGAINST THERAPY is an angry book-- and rightfully so.

Rethinking therapy

As a psychotherapist and seminar leader, I welcome a book thatcalls the whole profession into question. While I believe there ismore room for discussion of the specifics, I think Masson's book raises some serious quesions about the practices and ethical considerations of the psychotherapy environment. It was instrumental in my movement toward group work and away from individual work with clients. AGAINST THERAPY should be required reading for all students in the helping professions.