Re: David Talbot lies again

john enzinas (911087e@dragon.acadiau.ca) wrote: : dlt@lightside.com (David Talbot) writes the dumbest thing i have see yet : aside from woody's posts:

: [comments about someone undergoing ECT deleted]

: >But given that the above is true, if ECT is so effective why is it not used by : >all the other shrinks on themselves? Only one psych? Diane this is not really : >impressive. : >

: could it be because they don't have mental problems severe enough to merit it? : or does that make too much sence for you.

This brings up an interesting point. From what I can tell, Scientology offers a "one size fits all" approach to curing the ills of mankind. Psychology and psychiatry assume that different problems require different treatments, the underlying assumption being that different mental problems are truly different, not just different manifestations of the same underlying cause. Scientology, on the other hand, appears to me to incorporate the belief that there's some common cause for all mental problems, whether it be the "reactive mind," "body thetans" or what have you. Grand Unified Theories that claim to answer the Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe, and Everything hold a certain attraction for a lot of people, but often their answers aren't even as good as "42."

Given the "one size fits all" perspective, it doesn't surprise me that David would ask the question he did. From that sort of perspective, the question to be answered is "is ECT an effective treatment, period?" rather than "is ECT an effective treatment *for* certain cases of severe depression that have not responded to more conservative measures?" I really don't think he understands the difference. An inability to form what psychologists call "differentiated categories" is a common feature of what's known as the "authoritarian personality" which is something that cults generally appeal to (other features of the AP include strong discomfort with ambiguity, an extreme fear of being wrong about anything, a tendency to see all issues as black and white, a desire to identify with "strong" institutions, and a tendency to view all relations between people in terms of dominance and submission). Note that the authoritarian personality type by itself is *not* considered a clinical disorder (although paranoia often involves an exaggeration of AP traits).