DSM5 - "THE EMPEROR CALLED ADHD HAS NO CLOTHES" + DR FRED BAUGHMAN ON DSM5

    A brief look at the history of the APA's Diagnostic and Statistical Manual demonstrates its scientifically void, "pseudoscientific" nature. 

The manual has grown from 112 mental disorders/illnesses in its initial 1952 edition, to 163 in the 1968 DSM-II, to 224 in the 1980 DSM-III, 253 in the 1987 DSM-III-R, and 374 in the 1994 DSM-IV.  How long will it take for every human behavior to be labeled a mental illness?  The changes in diagnostic criteria from the first DSM to DSM-IV were all decided in committee by a show of hands, not dictated, as science would mandate, by researchers working in laboratories with medical data from large population segments with demonstrable abnormal biological symptoms.  Included on the APA's website is the statement that "No published investigation in the field (brain scans) has determined that any structural or functional abnormality is specific to a single psychiatric disorder."  The Food and Drug Administration's website includes an alarming number of warnings on the harmful effects of psychiatric drugs.  How often is the public informed?

    Psychiatrist Walter Afield, testifying before the House of Representatives Select Committee of Children, Youth, and Families said, "The DSM-III, we're talking about everyone in this room will fit into two or three of the diagnoses.  In DSM-II, homosexuality was a disease.  In III, it's not.  Every new disease that's defined gets a new hospital program, new admissions, a new system and a way to bilk it."  In recent years the APA has come close, by a show of hands, to removing pedophilia from its list of mental disorders.  So daydreaming of little boys by grown men is not a disorder but daydreaming (ADD) by little boys is a disorder worthy of brain-damaging drug therapy.

    As Dr. Baughman, an authoritative voice on ADD/ADHD, states, "ADHD, like the vast majority of psychiatric disorders/diseases, was never discovered or validated by demonstration of a confirmatory physical abnormality.  Rather, it was invented in committee at the American Psychiatric Association in 1980 (ADD) and has been revised on two separate occasions since, in 1987 (hyperactivity added) and 1994."  ADD/ADHD is the most common DSM diagnosis providing an unlimited cash cow for the biopsychiatric industry.

    A clear view of the arbitrary and subjective nature of the DSM can be found in any school psychologist's office.  It is called the SNAP-R/DSM-III Rating Scale and it is used by most schools to label children as ADD/ADHD.  This questionnaire "is a revision of the infamous Swanson, Nolan and Pelham Questionnaire."  All of the 46 questions describe normal, natural and mostly harmless childhood behaviors.  As a response to questions about absentmindedness, difficulty playing quietly or talking excessively, how scientific is "not at all, just a little, pretty much or very much?"

    Again the voice of Dr. Baughman, "Whenever, for a single day, a child, or anyone in the life of a child, is lead to believe that that child is 'brain-damaged,' 'diseased,' 'abnormal,' when they are not - that child has been stigmatized, harmed, and damaged.  This has been the stuff of an immense, multi-billion dollar industry, and it is fraudulent... We must go back to valuing the children for what they are - innocent, needy, incomplete, loving, omnipotent - the embodiment of all of the potential of human-kind."