Free Republic

Pedophilia, in the sense of the persistent sexual attraction to children, is a disorder, not a crime, and deserves special protections in law. That’s the premise of a recent New York Times opinion piece by Rutgers law professor Margo Kaplan, who argues that “stigma” surrounding adults who are sexually attracted to children prevents them from seeking psychological help. As a result, Kaplan asserts, pedophiles should be protected by the same anti-discrimination laws that require society to accommodate other “disabilities.”“By some estimates, 1 percent of the male population continues, long after puberty, to find themselves attracted to prepubescent children. These people are...

I read an article recently, by Brandon Turbeville, about the Executive Actions Obama signed January 3 further limiting our gun rights, and it got me to thinking about the “Axis of Evil” which have now joined forces to disarm us. Although there are plenty of tertiary players, it’s mainly Obamacare, NSA and the American Psychiatric Association (APA) who make up this merry collaboration of oppressors. Although Mr. Turbeville covered the idea of using mental disorders to disarm the population in his article, I wanted to dig deeper and further illustrate how all of the elements are in place now to...

Enlarge Image On Saturday, the board of trustees of the American Psychiatric Association (APA) voted to approve the final text of the DSM-5, the next revision to the leading manual for diagnosing mental illness. The fifth edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, which originated in 1952, will be released next May at the APA's annual meeting in San Francisco. The revision process leading to DSM-5 began in 1999, and APA says it consulted more than 1500 experts in 39 countries in updating the criteria for diagnosing hundreds of psychiatric conditions. It has been a bumpy...

Step into my parlor, and let me wave my diagnosticulator at you. OK, let me just consult the book. Ah! Just as I suspected. Since you yelled at that IRS agent during your audit, we know you suffer from temper dysregulation disorder with dysphoria. This is normally seen in children, and is what we used to call a temper tantrum. Actually, it is a mental disease. When seen in adults such as yourself, it requires medication, if not confinement. It’s for your own good. And speaking of children, you have some, do you not? With a guardian such as yourself...

The way psychiatrists describe childhood mood swings, gender identity, autism and dozens of mental health disorders could soon change drastically. The American Psychiatric Association (APA) is in the midst of massive revisions to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, better known as the DSM. This tome is the repository of diagnostic criteria for everything from schizophrenia to insomnia. The implications are far-reaching, from how a disorder is named and so how it's viewed by the public to whether treatment for the disorder gets covered by health insurance. For instance, the controversy over the naming and inclusion of gender-identity...

IF you ask my daughter, Isabel, what autism means to her, she won’t say that it is a condition marked by impaired social communication and repetitive behaviors. She will say that her autism makes her a good artist, helps her to relate to animals and gives her perfect pitch. The stigma of autism is fading fast. One reason is that we now understand that autism is a spectrum with an enormous range. Some people with autism are nonverbal with profound cognitive disabilities, while others are accomplished professionals. Many people with milder symptoms of autism have, for the past 20 years...

Marxist Muslim Barack Hussein ObamaHussein ObamaHussein ObamaHussein Obama is mentally ill and getting worse. The angst will continue as long as he persists in Islam World Rule rather than America with Christian heritage intact.

More than half of the task force members who will oversee the next edition of the American Psychiatric Association’s most important diagnostic handbook have ties to the drug industry, reports a consumer watchdog group. The Web site for Integrity in Science, a project of the Center for Science in the Public Interest, highlights the link between the drug industry and the all-important psychiatric manual, called the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders. The handbook is the most-used guide for diagnosing mental disorders in the United States. The guide has gone through several revisions since it was first published, and...