Madness Radio

Can psychotherapy work against the mainstream system? What does it take to be truly compassionate as a professional? And what are the downsides of promising alternatives such as Open Dialogue? Michael Montgomery grew up in Ireland and experienced firsthand the impacts of trauma and violence; a meeting with a visionary friend introduced him to psychiatric oppression. Today he is an existential psyc...

Is “schizophrenia” a broken brain — or shamanic journeying to ancestral dimensions? Is being “out of touch with reality” actually visions of deeper truth and racial healing? Dick Russell – author of 17 books including on the JFK assassination and a biography of Jungian James Hillman – followed doctors’ advice when his son Franklin was diagnosed psych...

Will Hall greets community FM station Valley Free Radio for its 20 years anniversary celebration! Founders Will and Ed Russell sparked the volunteer-run station in Northampton, Massachusetts, dedicated to peace, ecology, and social justice — and home to Madness Radio. Congrats on 20 years of amazing volunteer run community programming and an antidote to our corporate drive media! Video here:...

Mad Camp is an annual summer camp for mad people in Northern California – with people joining from all over the world! What’s it all about? Madness Radio producer and co-host Jessica Gallinger attended Mad Camp 2024 and interviewed Mad Campers about their experience, she’s joined by Mad Camp co-founders Dina Tyler and Will Hall to talk about the crazy wild vision they are unfoldi...

How do decriminalizing drug use and sex work advance mad liberation? What lessons can psychiatric survivors learn from the harm reduction movement? Caty Simon’s activist leadership spans the low-income rights, psychiatric survivors, sex worker, and drug users union movements, and she was a key organizer at Freedom Center in Western Massachusetts. Caty is on the leadership team of National Su...

Legendary psychiatric survivor activist Irit Shimrat escaped psychiatric incarceration to become a leading anti-psychiatry organizer. Co-founder of the Ontario Psychiatric Survivors’ Alliance, Irit edited the Canadian magazine Phoenix Rising: The Voice of the Psychiatrized and wrote Call Me Crazy: Stories from the Mad Movement, bringing together the stories of many leading activists. Irit shares h...

Do grieving goats lick psychedelic lichen? Altered states are part of nature, used by plants and animals for survival(!). How does ecology reveal the evolutionary – and spiritual – purpose of psychosis? Steven Morgan, psychiatric survivor and trainer in Intentional Peer Support , led the Another Way sanctuary and was project director for Soteria Vermont . Today he journeys in the wilde...

Will Hall’s June 2024 Grand Rounds talk at University of California San Francisco Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences – where he was locked up as a young man! – titled “New Visions of Psychosis: Abolition as Clinical Best Practice.” Revenge is a dish best served cold. Video here: https://youtu.be/adYrzmJ2w50?si=nwAQBM2F6oYmbShe transcript here . 58 min ve...

Is madness dysfunction and breakdown – or part of human evolution that helps us survive? Writers going back to Hippocrates saw madness as the organism’s way to cope with its environment, so why has this view almost disappeared today? Justin Garson, professor of philosophy at Hunter College and author of Madness: a Philosophical Exploration , joins co-hosts Will Hall and Jessica Gallinger to...

What can R.D. Laing, madness, and Star Trek teach us about the end of the world – and saving it? Will Hall reads “ Can Madness Save the World? Where R.D. Laing—and Star Trek—Meet ,” published on Mad In America March 14, 2024. The essay draws on the original series Star Trek  episode City on the Edge of Forever and on The Obvious , Laing’s speech at the 1967 Dialectics Of Li...

Does hearing God’s voice make you mentally ill? Will psychiatry help you cope with grief and rejection – or make things worse? After a distressing romantic breakup Alison Smith went to her college clinic for help – and was locked up, drugged, and labeled psychotic. Positive and mysterious voices – including visions of Jesus – suddenly turned dark and persecutory, and...

Dina Tyler’s FANTASTIC, heartful, brilliant December 2023 Grand Rounds talk at UCSF Medical School, “Improving Outcomes for Psychosis: Psychiatric Survivor and Critical Psychiatry Perspectives.” Also available as a video . ( Transcript ) ( Slides from talk ) ( 58 min ) www.dinatyler.com Journal of Humanistic Psychology The post UCSF Grand Rounds | Dina Tyler | Madness Radio first...

Audiobook mp3 of Chapter 7 “A Ten Day Voyage”, from The Politics of Experience and the Bird of Paradise , by R.D. Laing, read by Will Hall. Full book .mp3 (cntrl/rtclck save as to download): https://www.madnessradio.net/audio-extra/RDLaingPoliticsOfExperienceLaingAudiobookFULL.mp3 Full book as chapters on this YouTube playlist: www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLMya78GAdrpxtOjEayvMp1lC88c...

Why are assault, kidnapping, and torture legal – when you have a psychiatric diagnosis? Is psychiatry’s legal double standard unjust in the same way a double standard would be for being female or Black? Does disability justice mean psychiatric abolition – and reparations? Tina Minkowitz, survivor of psychiatric institutionalization and a human rights lawyer, helped draft and nego...

Are psychotherapy’s assumptions completely misguided? What is really at stake in the research and practice of psychology? Is it possible to take a step back and see “psy” for what it is? Craig Newnes is a Jewish dad, grandad, musician, writer, and former director of one of the UK’s largest NHS Psychological Therapies Directorates, and he joins Will Hall to discuss a critica...

How does the terror of child abuse inspire the heights of spiritual awakening? Are risky behaviors with drugs and extreme sports also a search towards healing? Co-hosts Dina Tyler and Will Hall talk with Paris Williams, who has a PhD in clinical psychology and went through his own experience of extreme states and madness. Paris took flight from extreme childhood trauma and became a world class han...

Therapist Ryan Hofrichter flips the mic on Madness Radio host Will Hall for a wide-ranging discussion about madness, psychiatry, and being a therapist. Topics include power in therapy, psychiatric diagnosis harms, naming ethical and professional dilemmas, working outside of the mainstream mental health system, understanding emotional distress in context, tragedy as potentially transformative, the...

Can teens lead their own mental health education? Are suicidal feelings and self harm “contagions” that young people shouldn’t talk about? How can mutual aid and peer support solve our youth mental health crisis? Felicity Krueger emerged out of trauma, anxiety, and the challenges of multi-racial adoption to become a leading teen advocate in Kentucky and nationwide. Felicity joins...

Are trauma, medication injury, and holistic health connected? Does Lyme disease infection relate to tardive dyskinesia from psychiatric drugs? Is there a spiritual purpose to debilitating illness? Monica Cassani is a psychiatric survivor and early leader in internet support with the Beyond Meds – Everything Matters website and community. Monica’s struggle with chronic iatrogenic illnes...

Read this book! Is discriminating against people who have — or are labeled with — psychiatric disabilities ever justified? Is denying equality before the law necessary in times of crisis – or does it open the door to widespread abuse and violence? Journalist and community development activist Rob Wipond’s new book Your Consent Is Not Required: The Rise in Psychiatric Detentions,...

Should we reform – or abolish – psychiatry? Can capitalism provide mental health, or do we need some kind of socialism or anti-capitalism? Vesper Moore is a leader in the youngest wave of the psychiatric survivor movement; he was radicalized against psychiatry as a teen when his mother sought help and met medical violence instead. Vesper joins co-hosts Jacks McNamara and Will Hall, two...

When Karin Jervert withdrew from 5 psychiatric medications the conflicting voices and forces in her head became pathways to art and spirit. Through Buddhism and earth-based ceremony Karin discovered a new world – and a new sense of self – from her suffering. Co-hosts Jacks McNamara and Will Hall discuss art, ancestors, and the nature of reality with Karin, who today is arts editor for...

When Cassie Wilson experienced mental distress due to an internship setting triggering past trauma memories, she called student counseling – and then police came to her home, handcuffed her, and detained her in a hospital for 6 days. In this episode Cassie, a psychiatric survivor and student of human rights and neuroscience, discusses with co-hosts Jacks McNamara and Will Hall her experiences in t...

Mad Camp is coming! July 20-24 2023 – and annually – mad people are gathering for summer camp in the forested mountains two hours north of San Francisco. You heard that right! Swimming, hiking, campfires, hanging out, napping, dancing, music, art, dancing, the stars… Mad Camp is all about community friendship and connection. And there are also stirrings of mad camps on the east c...

The essay from Mad In America Sept 2021 “Ending The Silence Around Psychedelic Therapy Abuse” , read by Will Hall: Michael Pollan’s hugely influential new book on psychedelic medicine, How to Change Your Mind , is overly enthusiastic and largely uncritical. All the new hype and questionable science about miracle treatments as the next wave of cures for mental disorders leaves out huge...