Welcome to From Insults to Respect. Recently, I’ve been reading about the trials and tribulations of being viewed as fat. For example, in a Psychology Today article titled “Is Your Child Being Teased About His Weight?” the author, Edward Abramson, Ph.D., tells us that,
“Although the medical consequences of childhood obesity may not emerge until adulthood, the psychological effects are immediately present. Studies have shown that discrimination against overweight kids begins in kindergarten or earlier. One study of five year-olds found that they described an overweight child as ‘lazy, dirty, stupid, and ugly.’ A new study found that 4 – 8 year old children were less likely to help overweight peers with everyday tasks like picking up toys. Another study reported that virtually all overweight teenage girls had been verbally abused. College students when asked to rate the desirability of a potential spouse rated cocaine users, embezzlers, and shoplifters as better marriage partners than an obese person.”
In another article, this one titled, “Being Called FAT. It Hurts. And You Don’t Forget,” Cassey Ho, a fitness instructor, tells us about a teenager who described her experience as follows:
“I was at a family birthday party, we were all eating together at this long table with all sorts of wonderful foods laid out. I was thoroughly enjoying my plate along with my mom and sister. Then this little girl who was probably a year or two younger than me looks at me and says ‘Why are you so fat?’
“I stopped chewing. My eyes welled up with tears. The edges of my lips curled and I fought the quivering frown overcoming my face. I dropped my fork. Ran into another room. Cried. The kind of crying where you can’t stop and you can’t breathe.”
When we meet someone we care about who is dealing with this kind of challenging experience, is there anything that we can do that can be helpful? 
To address this question, I’m going to present a little scenario that kinda describes what I have done over the years when I found myself providing counseling to someone dealing with this issue. In saying the scenario “kinda” describes what I have done I mean to indicate that it really is, by necessity, a shortened description of what actually occurs in my actual counseling sessions. More specifically, in real life sessions I spend distinctly more intervals of time listening in a caring way than we will see in the scenario. I ask more questions to clarify what specifically occurred in any event being described. I am more likely to slightly rephrase what the person had said so they see that I understand what I have been listening to, thus reassuring them I’m really deeply listening. A full rendition of such a counseling session would be a fifty-minute read, way too long for our purposes.
In presenting the scenario, I hasten to mention that it is not my intention to declare that it presents the ideal approach to being helpful. It is merely offered as a useful way to set up a model that can be critiqued. I encourage readers to freely suggest any improvements, and to point out where, in their estimation, I went astray.
The Counseling Scenario
Heather, a 17 year-old high school student, arrived for her weekly counseling session.
“How are you doing?” I ask as she sits down.
Heather folds her arms as if she’s holding herself. Her mouth curves downward. There’s a slight twitching at its corners. Her eyes begin to water.
“You’re looking mighty sad,” I say. “Did something happen?”
“While my mom was driving me here, I took out a candy bar, and she told me I shouldn’t eat it because I was getting fat. Do you think I’m getting fat?”
“Heather, I like you just the way you are.”
“How can you like me? Look at how fat I am!”
“Oh, it’s very possible for me to like and respect people who weigh more than the average person. One of my favorite actresses is Hattie McDaniel who surely weighed more than you. 
She played parts in numerous movies such as ‘Gone with the Wind’ and ‘Show Boat.’ It wasn’t just me who delighted in her character portrayals, many producers must have liked her too because they selected her to play in over 300 movies, and her peers selected her to win an Academy Award. She wasn’t just a movie actress, she also was a singer and song writer as well. The United States honored her with a U.S. postage stamp for her contributions to the arts.
“William Howard Taft weighed far more than you, well over 300 pounds. Despite that, the American people selected him to be our 27th president. After that, he was selected to be Chief Justice of the United States Supreme Court, certainly one of the most respected positions in the country. So, people can surely like and respect people who weigh more than average.”
“You, and others might like and respect some people heavier than average,” Heather hastens to say, “but I bet you didn’t ask them out on dates.”
“Well, when I first started to date, I did have in mind asking out only women who matched the ideal Hollywood romantic lead image, and they did tend to have narrow waistlines. 
They also had faces that can lead one to drift into a dream. As it turned out, there were not a whole lot of such women around my neighborhood, and yet I did start to date. On some scales, those that I dated did not match the perfect Hollywood type here or there but I found I was still attracted to them. In time I got to know things about them that transcended mere looks. When I met my wife, she was wearing braces on her teeth, hardly a classic Hollywood look.
“And judging from my observations, most women that I knew during my dating days were willing to go out with guys who didn’t look exactly like Cary Grant or Robert Redford. After a while they found someone that had looks that fell short of what some might think of as perfect in every way, and nevertheless, they fell in love and got married.
“So, that’s my take on these questions you’ve been posing to me. Perhaps more important is how you have been feeling and thinking about these issues. Would it be okay if we switched to focus on this?”
“I guess.”
“Good. So, tell me a little more about how you felt when your mother said you were getting fat.”
“It felt awful.”
“You don’t like the idea that you might be becoming heavier than you would like?”
“I hate it!”
“Do you think you are becoming fat?”
Here, Heather pauses, and her face starts to turn a bit purple. After a few seconds, she says, “Lately, when I see myself in a mirror, I view myself as being fat.”
“I see.” I pause here for a few seconds, just experiencing within me strong empathy for what Heather has been going through, and also seeking a way toward some peace with it.
Then I say, “I think it would be helpful if we tried a little mindfulness exercise here. It’s quite simple. I’d like you to close your eyes for one minute and just focus on the physical sensations that you experience when recalling how you felt when your mom said you were getting fat, and how you have been feeling when you look in the mirror. I’ll also close my eyes for that minute and focus on my own physical sensations when I recall someone saying something to me that I found stressful and how I’ve been feeling when I look in a mirror. Would you be okay if we tried this little exercise?”
“Okay, I guess. What good would that do?”
“The exercise comes from several ancient wisdom traditions. It is part of what has been called ‘mindfulness.’ There is a theory that it deepens our stressful experiences in a way that perhaps leads us to take some positive actions to deal better with them.”
“Well, I guess if it will only take a minute.”
“Good. So, let’s close our eyes and focus on the stressful experiences we have just been talking about, focussing more on the physical sensations in a non-judgmental manner. I’ll keep track of the time. If you desire, at any time, to open your eyes, feel free to do so. You don’t have to keep them closed, but it is more relaxing and less distracting if you have them closed most of the time.”
“Okay.”
When the minute is up, I let Heather know that it was time to open our eyes. Then I ask her to describe what she had experienced.
“As I thought about what my mom said, I felt a tightness in my stomach and I noticed my hands squeezed very tightly into fists. When I thought about looking into the mirror, I felt like crying.”
“Anything else that you noticed on a physical level?”
“No. That’s about it. How about you, Dr. Rubin? What happened on a physical level with you.”
“I recalled when I was young I had the opposite problem than you, because people called me, in a nasty way, a ‘Skinny Marrink.’ I found, on a physical level I felt a kinda twisting sensation in the center and upper chest, and a tightness in the back of my neck. And when I thought about how I’ve been feeling when I look in the mirror, I felt a grieving sensation about my hair thinning and how much older I look, and I found on a physical level that I let out a long sigh, and then my lips tightened, and I sighed once again.”
At this, Heather smiles, and then she catches herself doing it, and she says, “I didn’t mean to smile at your distress, it’s just, well I guess I felt a little comforted hearing that even you can be stressed out about your looks.”
“Even me?”
“Well, that you’re a doctor and all.”
“I see. I suppose that’s understandable.”
Then Heather says, “When I was focussing on my physical sensations, I did think that if I don’t like how fat I’m getting, I oughta do something about it. It is healthier to not be overweight. Can you help me to come up with a plan?”
“If you like, we could work on that together. I think we would want to include not only eating less, but also eating healthy foods and getting sufficient exercise.”
“That makes sense to me, Dr. Rubin.”
Conclusion
So, there you have it, a scenario of one counselor’s effort to be helpful when someone was dealing with being viewed as fat. I hope that it was apparent in the scenario that I sought to listen in a caring manner, and remain supportive, respectful, and accepting.
Did I ask the right questions? Did I say something that you feel is wrong? Do you have any suggestions for improving the session? I encourage you all to speak up and express your views in the comment section. No one is going to bite you on this blog, I can assure you of that.
In any case, may you all find someone who will show you kindness as you meet up with all of your challenging experiences.
Jeff
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Some people will enjoy reading this blog by beginning with the first post and then moving forward to the next more recent one; then to the next one; and so on. This permits readers to catch up on some ideas that were presented earlier and to move through all of the ideas in a systematic fashion to develop their emotional intelligence. To begin at the very first post you can click HERE.
Welcome to From Insults to Respect. On this blog, from time to time, we have been discussing depression. To help us better understand this deeply troubling experience, we have looked at the biographies of several individuals who, despite their mighty struggles with depression, still managed to earn the respect of millions. Today, we quickly review three of these biographies, that of the brilliant psychologist and philosopher William James, the remarkable musical performer Joni Mitchell, and the great Russian writer Leo Tolstoy.
Finally, in an earlier post (see 
Wrenshall Smith encountered him returning from the battle and depicted him as “much depressed. He dismounted and took a seat on the stone. What is the situation, I asked? Bad–very bad, he replied.” Samuel Beckwith noticed that after Cold Harbor Grant’s face developed “a careworn expression that indicated sleepless nights and fearsome days.” When he delivered a message to the general’s tent, he found him sunk in thought. After absorbing the telegram, Grant sighed, “Beckwith,” he said, “the hardest part of this General business is the responsibility for the loss of one’s men. I can see no other way out of it, however; we’ve got to keep at them. But it is hard, very hard, to see all these brave fellows killed and wounded. It means aching hearts back home.”
The doctors’ statements about this imply that if treated with “antidepressants” this can decrease the risk of suicide enough so that the depressed patient, by taking the drug, is better off than facing the risk of any adverse effects of the drug. But the doctors don’t know what the long term effects of taking the drugs are. What’s more, the scientific evidence currently available indicates that these drugs do not reduce the risk of suicide, and may actually increase it by as much as 8 percent (see 
This alternative is uplifting, less stigmatizing, and conducive to a recovery point of view. It is a view that posits that depression has the potential to open our eyes to the fullness of truth. The suffering that goes along with the experience is a natural part of life, a view held by Nietzsche, as well as Buddhists and many other wisdom traditions. Additionally, it is an enormous source for creativity, and as we go through it, it can lead to one insight after another.
This is an important lesson for so many of us who were brought up being taught to feel embarrassed and guilty when experiencing deeply sad emotions. In fact, for those who were brought up this way, they often believe that it is proper to lose respect for people who experience such emotions. They often end up having, each time they, personally, experience depression, a double depression. That is, not only do they at times begin to become depressed because of the reasons that would normally lead to feelings of melancholy, but they are additionally depressed about feeling that there is something terribly wrong with them, that they have bad genes and a stigmatizing illness requiring medication with all kinds of negative side-effects.
Giving up this tendency to feel a double depression for those who learned it throughout their childhood and well into their adult life often requires a relationship with someone providing quality social ties and social support. Substantial evidence (see 
Although it is least expensive to receive this kind of support from warm, close friends and family members, sometimes those whom we are most close to hold the very same pathologizing beliefs that is holding one back from real recovery. At such times, finding a professional personal counselor who does not hold to the pathologizing point of view can be enormously helpful if the financial situation can be reasonably worked out. Discussions with the professional who typically responds in a very supportive manner, models for the person receiving counseling the type of skills that is helpful when we look within as we experience melancholy. Instead of berating ourselves for acting pathological, we come to learn to be kind to ourselves and to nurse hope that something positive will come from what we are going through.
Some non-pathologizing counselors will also encourage you to learn to meditate and utilize other mindfulness techniques. Here you practice observing your physical sensations when you are dealing with the disrespectful perceptions. In time, the disrespectful words that you tend to direct at yourself come to lose their disturbing nature. For a period of time these words still come, but you end up smiling at them as you realize they are not matching reality. In time, they may completely fade away as you embrace the physical sensations that come with melancholy.
Now, I understand that many people will find it hard to find in their community the type of counseling services I am describing. This may be because many professional counselors have adopted the same pathologizing approaches as psychiatrists, although they do believe counseling services, when combined with drug treatment, can be beneficial. For those who would like to work with a non-pathologizing personal counselor but find it difficult to find one within a convenient distance from home, I highly recommend two who can work with you individually via Skype–my son, Jack Star Rubin, and his lovely wife, Emily Whyte Rubin (see 
Many people have come to feel that the psychiatric profession has failed to treat them respectfully. Several issues have inflamed them, arguably the most emotional being involuntary drug treatment which, to them, is often viewed as torture.
“(a) Review the anti-torture framework in relation to persons with disabilities in line with the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities as authoritative guidance regarding their rights in the context of health-care;
Involuntary psychiatric interventions are legitimized under national laws, and may enjoy wide public support as being in the alleged “best interest” of the person concerned, or because it protects people in the community from the violence that some people labelled mentally ill will carry out. Nevertheless, according to the UN report, “…to the extent that they inflict severe pain and suffering, they violate the absolute prohibition of torture and cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment.
When people are forced to take psychiatric drugs, it often feels like torture because of a number of their side effects. For example, akathisia makes it hard to stay still. It causes an urge to move that you can’t control. You might need to fidget all the time, walk in place, or cross and uncross your legs. Akathisia is often hard to describe, and it can take over a person’s life and feel awful.
Tardive dyskinesia occurs at a cumulative rate of 4-7% per year in otherwise healthy, relatively young patients treated with many of the so-called antipsychotic drugs. After only a few years, 20% or more of those treated will be afflicted with tardive dyskinesia. Older patients have an even higher risk.
According to the 
Individuals who are male teenagers or young adults are also more at risk of violence than the average person in a given population. Thankfully, for my two sons, our society does not require that all of these at risk individuals be placed on psychiatric drugs.
The best scientific analysis that looks at whether or not the drugs significantly reduce violence when involuntarily administered has been provided by the nonprofit group called Cochrane (see 
The best predictors of future violence are a history of past violent crime, victimization, involvement with illegal drugs and drug markets, poverty, life trauma exposure, and ambient neighborhood crime. When these factors are not present for an individual, being classified as mentally ill is not related to violence. Rather than the vague notion of mental illness, it appears that these are the real factors that lead to the statistically modest increased risk of violence among those labelled as mentally ill because such labelled individuals are more likely to be exposed to these risk factors (see 
Clearly, people in our communities have justification to want to keep people from harming themselves or others. I know I don’t want violent people running around my neighborhood. However, the use of psychiatric drugs too often lead people to think that the mental health professionals did what was needed, and thus reduces the necessary motivation to advocate for more helpful action. In my view, there are far better ways to address these concerns without any need for involuntary treatment or torturing anyone.
First of all, we already have laws for someone who commits a violent crime. I support these laws because without them many people who might otherwise act violently find that to avoid prison time they can choose a nonviolent alternative, thus making our communities safer. For those who fail to choose nonviolent ways to deal with life challenges, the law requires that they serve time in prison. Removing them from our communities for a period of time leads to our communities being safer, and gives the person who committed the crime an opportunity to consider better alternatives to deal with the type of situation that led to their incarceration. Moreover, as they serve time in prison, they become older, thus they enter an age range that leads to more thoughtful considerations and a much lower likelihood of choosing violent options.
Now, I hasten to point out that many prison officials believe that when people serve time they should be punished in degrading ways. But most people placed in prison, whether they are displaying behavior that often leads one to receive a mental illness label or not, are best treated with respect and dignity. The vast majority will eventually return to our neighborhoods and to traumatize them with abusive actions while they are in prison increases the risk that they will become less than ideal citizens. There are a number of countries that have been trying out more humanistic approaches to treating prisoners and the results have been very promising.
For those people who are at risk of violence, we can incentivize them to learn nonviolent ways to deal with the kinds of anger arousing situations that they may potentially face. For example, people who have been convicted of a violent crime and are serving out their sentence can be incentivized to learn prosocial skills by reducing their sentence a month if they demonstrate mastery of the skills. People at risk who are not incarcerated may be offered some other incentives such as access to better housing, or even be provided a monetary incentive that is about the same amount as the combined cost of a drug management program. Drug management typically includes the cost for the drugs plus the time for professionals to assess, prescribe, and monitor the patient. Monitoring the patient includes regular meetings to assess drug side-effects, readjust the medication dose, prescribe a different or additional drug, and sending out a social worker or nurse to remind patients to take their prescriptions. These costs are significant and if redirected to incentivizing people at risk, it would lead to a significant level of voluntary participation.
What would a program that teaches nonviolent ways to deal with anger arousing situations look like? Teachers would identify their student’s pattern of anger expression and the situations in which the student typically experiences anger. Responding to criticism and providing criticism are particularly hot spots, so they would be the focus of early lessons (see 
In a 
In a second 
Negative criticism is coming our way whether we like it or not. And within a relationship, providing it can be essential. If one of the parties is doing something that is bugging the other, keeping silent could unnecessarily lead to the relationship coming to a premature end when a constructive discussion might have easily settled the matter.
That said, there are times when someone is providing one criticism after another and it becomes too much to process all at once. At other times, someone might provide criticism that is in a style that uses a tone of voice that is hard to bear. 
Sometimes we have been recently bombarded by some type of stress, and as a result, we may not be in any mood to hear any criticism for a while. Under these sets of circumstances, it makes perfectly good sense to briefly let the person who is seeking to provide criticism know that usually we are very open to hearing criticism, but for right now, we need a little break (see blog posts 
So, Sarah and Bob in the past had agreed with me about all of this. And then at dinner one evening they revealed to me that within their relationship they have come to an agreement that when either one of them wants to provide some constructive criticism to the other they first ask for permission. They also prefer others who want to provide criticism to them do likewise. Let’s take a close look at this approach.
When Sarah finds that Bob has done something that she would like him to consider changing, rather than hoping Bob will at some point invite her to provide some criticism to him about that issue, she could, herself, bring the issue up to him uninvited when she thinks he might be in a receptive mood. More specifically, Sarah, before providing feedback, first checks in with herself to see if she has sufficiently calmed herself from any anger or annoyance that she has been experiencing. This is important because if she seeks to provide feedback to Bob when she is angry or annoyed, either at him, or at someone else, her tone of voice might inadvertently provoke a level of defensiveness within Bob that would be counterproductive.
Bob also uses the same approach as Sarah when he wants to provide her some feedback. Both agree that this approach has been very helpful to them. Sarah explained that upon hearing the phrase, “Are you open to my giving you some feedback about something?” it gives her a few moments to check in with herself. “Am I up to having a criticism type discussion right now, or would it be better to wait for a more apt time? If I am up for hearing it, I can take a moment to prepare myself.” Bob agreed.
At this point in the conversation, I recalled that just prior to this conversation I had mentioned to Bob that his eye glass lenses looked like they had some smudges on them. He seemed to find some value in what I had said, as he looked the lenses over and cleaned them. So, I asked him if he would have preferred, when I mentioned the smudges, that I first had asked him if he was open for some feedback. He smiled, and said that in that type of situation there was no need for asking for permission.
The conversation about this topic ended at this point, but a day or two later, we got back into it. In attempting to clarify in my own mind how the Sarah and Bob approach would work in a variety of situations, I asked Bob, “If you accidentally left your fly open, would it be okay if I just whispered to you in private that you needed to zipper up, or would you prefer that in that kind of situation I first ask if you were open to hearing some feedback?” He said that with that type of situation coming right to the issue would be fine, though it would be helpful if I said it in a non-putdown manner, perhaps pointing out that we all goof up like that from time to time.
Yes, there are times when I do feel within me some sensitive feelings upon hearing some negative feedback. Nevertheless, I’d rather deal with that than discourage anyone from letting me know, straight out, what they think I can do to improve. Moreover, I am confident that I have the skills to use those sensitive feelings in a constructive, creative manner. I also wonder if people might respect me more for being the type of person they can be straight and honest with, who gracefully welcomes criticism, and really takes the time to seriously consider what someone has to say.
Samantha Bee, who, on her cable comedy TV show “Full Frontal,” called first daughter Ivanka Trump a “feckless c*nt,”using a vulgar reference to the female anatomy. Samantha tore into Ivanka after the first daughter had posted a beautiful photo depicting her and her child treasuring their mother-child relationship. This post occurred at the same time the press was showing disturbing images of children of illegal immigrants being torn from their mother’s arms and then sent to separate places, perhaps permanently.
Like Roseanne, Samantha quickly apologized, saying, “I would like to sincerely apologize to Ivanka Trump and to my viewers for using an expletive on my show to describe her last night. It was inappropriate and inexcusable. I crossed a line, and I deeply regret it.”
Many have expressed anger believing that it’s not fair that Roseanne got fired while Samantha didn’t. These people tend to support this position by saying that both did the same thing, insulting a political figure in a vile manner and using discriminatory language.
First of all, I don’t watch a great deal of TV, so I’m not all that familiar with either Roseanne or Samantha’s various performances. Whenever I have had glimpses of Roseanne doing her shtick, I occasionally found it pleasantly humorous.
Upon hearing that she was going to star in an updated version of her old show, many were hopeful because it was going to depict family and friends with different political views interacting. If the discussions on the show were done in a loving thoughtful manner it might prove to be a great opportunity for Americans to positively self reflect. As it sadly turned out, I feel for the many fine people who were engaged in creating the show who themselves had done nothing wrong. They now must face the incredible turmoil that the kind of hateful language that Roseanne used tends to breed.
As for Samantha, there were times I caught her performances on The Daily Show with Jon Stewart and found her satire insightful, but she too often came across as just being mean to those whom she was being critical of. My wife, who has been watching her since she has had her own show, tells me that her commentaries are often spot on.
As a parent myself, I found myself imagining how he might have felt upon hearing someone use such language against his daughter. But then it came to my attention that from his lips not a single word was uttered opposing what Roseanne had said that denigrated so many. Where was his outrage over how their parents felt upon hearing Roseanne’s hateful comments? It occurred to me that Roseanne is a high profile person who supports him.
When Megan Kelly, during one of the last presidential debates, had asked Trump some challenging questions, he attacked her, saying she must have had blood coming out of…wherever. This struck me and many others as obviously sexist. Trump apparently had no sympathy for Megan or her father.
As I thought more about this, it seemed to me that most of the people who felt Samantha should have been fired are supporters of Trump. These are the same people that had heard how he had bragged about grabbing women, heard women testifying that he had done so, and heard his comment about Megan Kelly. They, nevertheless, have not been calling for his firing, and instead, they went out and voted for him, thereby recommending that rather than be fired, he be hired to serve as the president of the United States. So, their arguments for why Samantha should be fired ended up ringing off key to my ears.
As I questioned him, it became clear that in his opinion both of the performers’ comments were equally bad because they were very insulting. Moreover, both were discriminatory–Roseanne’s comment being discriminatory in it being racist and anti-muslim; Samantha’s comment being sexist.
In contrast, Samantha, who is a woman, made a sexist comment that offends women. She had not done anything similar in the past. Moreover, she made it clear that she was seeking to insult just one person and for something specifically not being done by that person. Unlike what Roseanne had done, Samantha’s comment did not directly insult her boss; in fact, her boss very likely agreed with the point Samantha had tried to make. These are very clear differences to me.
This is not to say that there isn’t a very helpful place for providing criticism to those with whom we disagree. But to me there are destructive and constructive ways to go about this.
Welcome to From Insults to Respect.
A mock funeral mourning those lost to psychiatry or who have had their spirits broken and struggle to survive is to be held as protesters deliver a public message to psychiatrists at the annual meeting of the American Psychiatric Association on Sunday, May 6, 2018. “First, Do No Harm” is the message that protesters hope will go viral and get people to think twice before getting involved with psychiatry.
I became interested in the conflict about the use of psychiatric drugs very early in my career as a psychologist. I began to discuss the issues with psychiatrists as well as those who objected to this form of treatment. A broad outline of what I heard follows:
In contrast, critics of psychiatric drugs have made the following counter claims: The use of psychiatric drugs has unleashed the worst medically induced disaster in history. They have caused millions of people to become addicted to them, suffering debilitating, life threatening side effects. Rather than promoting mental health, these drugs are being used to promote social control and conformity. Reduction in hospitalization, moreover, occurred not because of the use of these drugs, but because of a deinstitutionalization policy that became known as “dumping.” Problems now being handled with psychiatric drugs can be more effectively, safely, and humanely handled with a variety of social support systems, counseling, mindfulness, healthy diet, and physical exercise techniques.
As I heard these conflicting claims, I initially thought that psychiatrists had principles of science on their side. With my graduate training in research methods and statistics, I thought that by doing a thorough job finding out the scientific research that backs up the psychiatric drug supporters I could explain in an easy to understand language why psychiatric drugs are necessary. With such an explanation, perhaps the conflict would be resolved.
I began with researching Ritalin because I was working in Rochester, NY’s school system. This was from 1974 to 1979. It was a time when drugs were just beginning to be prescribed more and more to treat students who had teachers dissatisfied with their activity level or ability to pay attention. I had witnessed a time when schools managed to deal with such problems without the use of this drug and life went on reasonably well. With the rise in its use, some thought it was a wonderful advancement, while others were expressing great discomfort at this new trend.
Not all of the findings were supportive. At the time I initially did my research, there was only one study that looked at the long-term results of Ritalin use. It compared children placed on methylphenidate, the generic version of Ritalin, with those who received no treatment. The children in the two groups were matched with respect to age, IQ, socioeconomic class and sex. After 3 to 5 years, no statistically significant differences were found between the two groups on the following outcome measures: emotion maladjustment, delinquency, Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children, Bender gestalt visual-motor test, and academic performance.
Perhaps most troubling of all was the recognition that the safety of long term use of Ritalin had not been established despite many students being treated for years.
In the end, I discovered that although the approval process of the FDA had in its documents the available scientific evidence in making its decision to approve Ritalin, the reviewers’ decision nevertheless relied more on their personal values. It seemed to me, and it still does, that different people looking over the same scientific evidence could, depending on their values, come to completely different conclusions about whether or not the drug should be approved.
For example, Marcia Angell, M.D., is a former editor in chief of The New England Journal of Medicine, and now is a member of Harvard’s Medical School. In her insightful book, The Truth About the Drug Companies: How They Deceive Us and What to Do About It, she writes, “Is there some way companies can rig clinical trials to make their drugs look better than they are? Unfortunately, the answer is yes. Trials can be rigged in a dozen ways, and it happens all the time” (p. 95).
Civil rights activists worked for generations to make some progress in achieving their goals. Among the most successful of these advocates was Martin Luther King, Jr. When advocating for civil rights, he avoided throwing insults at those who resisted the changes he was after. Instead, he focussed on painting his dream in beautiful, hopeful phrases and demonstrating in nonviolent, but impossible to ignore, peaceful resistance.
Welcome to
More people indicated they dislike the new tax plan than like it for three basic reasons: They think the new law favors the wealthy over the middle and working class. They’re suspicious that tax cuts for businesses are permanent but tax cuts for individuals are temporary. And they think it’s irresponsible to finance the tax cuts with debt that future workers will have to shoulder.
There is an estimated 1 trillion dollars per year of new debt the US government will have due to the tax cuts. “The small amount most get,” said one concerned citizen, “will be eaten up by the massive debt we’re adding but not benefitting from.”
“The new tax policy would deliver more than 50 percent of its benefits to the top 1 percent, according to an 
For example, the fracking industry utilizes such heavy equipment that transporting it breaks down the highways in the areas that they operate more quickly than average utilizers. The added cost to maintain the highways would be paid for by a fee.
The US government has long supported a tax plan that encourages its citizens to purchase their own home by offering a reduction in taxes for those who have a mortgage. To continue this encouragement of home ownership, the tax proposal I am advocating for would make the first $100,000 of a home purchase tax free.
What are the benefits of this plan’s elimination of taxes on earnings of businesses and corporations? To begin with, as soon as a government begins to seek taxes from the earnings of organizations such as businesses and corporations, the organizations’ self interests lead to actions taken by incredibly well financed lobbyists. This consumes an enormous amount of our government representatives’ time. The plan I support would free up our representatives so they can work directly on doing what’s right for we, the people.
In manipulating the system, corporate lobbyists manage to embed incredibly complex formulas into the tax code to hide the various benefits to their organizations. Manipulations, such as establishing offshore companies, manage to successfully hide from the tax collectors. Savvy tax lawyers find one loophole after another. All of these efforts are financially costly to corporations and other businesses, wasting their resources, while having a negative effect on our economy as a whole.
Let me add that many people are under the misconception that corporations pay a huge percentage of the needed federal revenues. With that impression, these people think that if we end taxes on corporate profits, individual citizens’ taxes would have to skyrocket. However, as the chart on the right indicates, prior to the new tax overhaul, corporate taxes covered about ten percent of all federal revenues. Now that that overall has been passed, it’s percent of all federal revenues is significantly less. Because my tax plan would have corporations paying a new federal sales tax on the goods and services that they purchase, plus the rich paying an increase in their income tax, there would be no loss in federal revenues from the elimination of taxing corporate profits.
Another benefit of my proposed tax plan is that the majority of citizens would find that figuring out their income tax burden would be enormously simplified. Once a year they would merely add up their income, notify the IRS what that amount is, and as long as it is not more than $100,000, they would be done. No more hiring a tax preparer, or spending hours pouring over tax receipts to figure out what can be written off and what can’t.
Well, first I was influenced to some degree by Warren Buffett’s rule. The Buffett Rule is named after American investor 
After considering what Buffett has said on this topic, I then read Capital in the Twenty-First Century by economist
Piketty”s careful analysis argues that a progressive tax on both income and inheritance reaching a maximum of 80% would be required to adequately reduce inequality. At the same time, he recognizes the political difficulties of achieving this. I chose 50% as a number that perhaps is more reasonably achievable in the not too distant future.
Paul Krugman, a New York Times columnist and Nobel Prize–winning economist, disagrees with Ryan’s assessment. Thus, he stated that “the economic record certainly doesn’t support the notion that [the current] superlow taxes on the superrich are the key to prosperity.” He backs this up with evidence like the fact that the U.S. economy added 11.5 million jobs during President Bill Clinton’s first term, when the capital gains tax rate was over 29 percent.
Moving on, what about the concern expressed in the Yahoo poll about the new tax overhaul increasing the national debt? In my proposal, the sales tax would be set at a level that would be just high enough so all of the current government programs would be adequately funded while slowly reducing the national debt. How high a sales tax would that be?
As long as there is real competition in the marketplace, corporations will be forced to pass on at least some of their 21% savings in taxes to their customers, thereby leading to citizens ending up paying a total amount that is less per sale even with an 8% sales tax.
And many middle class folks have, because of the resentment they feel, been talking about the rich in the most disrespectful manner, while passing around on the internet images of them being big fat greedy folks.
No doubt you have all noticed the recent commotion over the new US White House policy of raising tariffs on some manufactured goods. There are those who are enthusiastically supporting this, while others are vehemently arguing that we would be far better off sticking to the previous policy. Well, from my way of thinking, both policies have serious drawbacks. So, in today’s post I would like you all to consider a far wiser alternative, one that I call a “Regional Manufacturing Policy.” Before I explain this alternative, and why it would be so much better, particularly for respecting the environment, let’s review the current commotion as it stands now.
Countries that have established trade policies with the US after long and hard negotiations see this move by the Trump administration as a violation of trust and some are threatening retaliation. When the US administration said it might exempt Canada and Mexico, this led to other countries expressing that they are being treated disrespectfully for they have been US allies for years.
The reasons some support the raising of tariffs are several. The US has the knowhow to produce any of the goods that would be considered for a tariff increase. US workers are eager to do the job as long as it pays at least a living wage; that is, a wage that permits a person working 40 hours a week, with no additional income, to afford the basics for a modest but decent life, such as, food, shelter, utilities, transport, health care, and child care. Although other countries have workers who are willing to do the job for lower salaries, there are several benefits to the US if it sticks to having US citizens do jobs that can competently be done by them. Though prices may go up a few dollars per item if the US keeps manufacturing jobs in the US, people earning the money in the US will spend their earnings in the US, helping the national economy. Fewer US citizens will need to be drawing on welfare programs. There is a pride that goes along with having local workers being part of what keeps the country rolling along.
Complicating all of this is the fact that other countries buy some of the manufactured goods made in the US. If the US reduces foreign product purchases because tariffs make them too costly, foreign countries may raise tariffs on US products leading to making them so costly fewer foreigners will buy those products. Then those corporations’ employees in the US that are manufacturing these products will lose their jobs. Pennsylvania workers could end up with an improved job situation while other states will end up with a worse job situation. The complexities in this type of trade war make it extremely difficult to predict what the final outcomes will be.
The corporations may make this decision because Chinese workers are paid sufficiently less and the power plants that are used can be run at less expense because there are less pollution control requirements. The result is more profits by maintaining the current policy than if a decision was made to manufacture all manufactured goods within the region those goods are to be sold.
According to an investigative report form the UK newspaper the Daily Mail, the 16 biggest ships in the world produce more pollution than all the world’s cars. This is because of the higher levels of sulphur oxides and nitrous oxides that large container vessels produce when compared to cars.
The alternative, raising tariffs plan, offers no real significant improvement in protecting the environment. Prior to Trump announcing his policy to raise tariffs, there were already numerous tariffs in place that were negotiated by all the concerned stakeholders. Despite that, millions and millions of miles of needless transportation was still going on. Meanwhile, the increase of tariffs lead to allies becoming enraged, lawsuits are already being filed, and final consequences of all of the stirred up ill will are unlikely to lead to benefits for all but a very few.
Imagine the United Nations coming to an agreement about a policy that is in the interest of protecting the environment. This policy calls for a three-year transition period that leads to all manufactured goods that are sold in a region being fully manufactured in that region, with the workers getting paid at least a living wage.
To further envision what a RMP would require, imagine North America being divided into 5 or 6 regions, Europe divided into 2 or 3 regions, and so on. If Apple intends to sell its iPhones in each of these regions, it would be required by RMP to create manufacturing plants in each of these regions, thus dramatically reducing miles of transportation, along with the pollution that goes with it.
The article goes on to say, “The Trump administration, handing automakers a victory, is preparing to announce an effort to weaken strict Obama-era pollution standards.”
“12% of patients will benefit from the treatment, while the remaining 88% will suffer the adverse effects of treatment without any additional therapeutic benefit beyond placebo. Those are the odds that a person contemplating taking an antidepressant drug might want to know.”
Whenever we learn of a mass shootings, we hear people unfairly connecting the horrendous murderous acts to people who have been classified as having a mental illness. 
For example, at one point immediately after one such tragic event, Paul Ryan, the former speaker of the House, announced, “People with mental illness are getting guns and committing these mass shootings.” Such statements connect in the minds of the public the notion that people who have been labelled mentally ill are dangerous, thereby promoting the stigmatizing of a group of people, the vast majority of whom are no more violent than average citizens.
In one series of studies we find that violence involvement during adolescence is also a potent risk factor for ongoing violence involvement well into young adulthood (
People who have been labelled mentally ill come from a full range of social and economic conditions. At the same time, such labelled people are somewhat more likely to be exposed to social and economic risk factors such as poverty, crime victimization, involvement with illegal drugs and drug markets, early life trauma exposure, and ambient neighborhood crime. Perhaps it is this exposure, rather than the vague notion of mental illness, that leads to the statistical increased risk of violence among mentally ill labelled people. Examining this possibility, Swanson et al. (see 
The mental illness explanation for the school atrocities is far too simplistic, unfairly stigmatizes an enormous number of nonviolent individuals, and diverts our attention from coming to understand the real factors that are involved.