A Critique and Appraisal of R. D. Laing’s Theory of Schizophrenia and Madness

Some years ago, I gave up reading as an interest and hobby, because I wanted to focus more on my own experiences, findings, thoughts, and observations, and concentrate on my own writing, and which is as good as, or even in some ways far better, than most written material on mental health today, by big authors and academics.

Just before I gave up reading entirely as a hobby and interest, I read four of R. D Laing’s books, first starting with The Divided Self, which my aunt gave me an old copy of when I was 15, although I didn’t read it until five years later, because at the age of 15, I couldn’t relate to it.

R. D. Laing was a sort of radical psychiatrist in the late 1950s, 60s, and 70s, who basically said that madness was caused by what he called dysfunctional - meaning chaotic, disorderly, or disturbed - communication in the family, by parents towards children. At first I was taken in by his findings and theories, and accepted most of what he said, but now I have my own experiences, findings, observations, knowledge, and hindsight, and I now find myself rejecting most of Laing’s basic theories on so-called Schizophrenia and madness.

Whilst I do accept that behaviours in familles can cause madness, this happens when there is just plain child abuse, involving violence and the threat of violence, dysfunctional or not in communication. Also, I see madness being created if there is verbal, mental, and emotional suppression, but I don’t see dysfunctional communication in general as causing madness. Indeed, some dysfunctional communication keeps many couples or friends together, and is part of wit, creativity, and play, whilst it’s also very important to have very clear and attentive communication.

But this is one problem I have with Laing’s views on this point, because dysfunctional conversation does not cause madness, it is indeed a solution for a form of so-called madness, such as when people think or speak incoherently, to blot out the rational control of hearing negative and intrusive voices, or when they respond to the some of the illogical everyday conversations around them. Dysfunctional communication by itself, can and does sometimes create mental health problems, or annoyance and stress, especially if there is also some social control or repression,. but these are minor mental health problems, which most people have in some way, and not anything to do with madness as such at all.

There’s no doubt that Laing was a very good writer, who wrote somewhat creatively, and who was somewhat radical and innovative, and related very well and creativity towards psychiatric diagnosed-people, but I have some fundamental disagreements with his findings and theories, on so-called Schizophrenia and madness. I have also since reading Laing, come up with my own findings, on things like seeming incoherent speech, and psychotic breakdown, preferring to look rather at a wider context and perspective, finer details, and looking at how the details relate to the whole, of many different contexts, and focusing more on the here and now.

That is not to say, that I don’t believe that mental health problems, can be caused by bad family upbringing from the past, because I believe that they can if children or adults are abused, and that post traumatic stress can be created by that, but I wanted to move on from Laing’s theories and findings, think for myself, and write about my own findings, experiences, and observations.

One thing I would like to comment on, is that during the early 1990s, it was very common and popular amongst medical doctors, and those of a conservative political persuasion, to believe that divorced parents, were a cause of Schizophrenia in their child or children. This was a socially dogmatic view on the Right-wing of politics, when usually social dogmas with falsity, untruths, and half-truths, usually come from the Left of politics. At the time, I very much disagreed with this theory of divorce causing Schizophrenia, because I thought that it was based upon a very outdated and idealistic view of the family, which refused to move on and embrace the extended family, and because it saw the individual as bonded to his family in identity, and not having or creating his own social and personal identity. In my own case, my mum and dad had to separate and divorce, because they were just not suited to be with each other in many ways, and there was a very bad, and in some ways, dangerous and threatening behaviours involved from my mum towards my dad, and the abuse that I suffered as a consequence of all of this, was intolerable, and very detrimental to my physical safety and mental health.

I’m not saying that the separation of divorce doesn’t cause any mental health problems, because I also believe that it can, but living in a situation of conflict, violence, and abuse, would have been much worse, and having step-parents can be just as therapeutic, loving, and supportive, but the Right wing have or had a very blinkered and narrow-minded view about this. Having step-parents, as well as parents, can be much better, and have many different advantages.

The other thing I would say about Laing’s findings, is that they can be hegemonised, absorbed, and used by mental health professionals, with coercion and state power, but this is a total perversion of Laing’s spirit, and his message of equality, freedom, and choice. Laing’s findings and theories on the family and madness, are now sometimes used by some mental health professionals, to impose family therapy upon individuals, where individuals are coerced or forced to interact with their families, who are often abusing or mistreating them in some way.

The individual is then sometimes objectified and observed, by social workers and other mental health professionals, watching and pontificating about them behind a one-way screen. Such so-called family therapy, when social workers were terrorising me with the Police, was tried to be forced upon me, but I refused to co-operate with such oppression, to the point where I had to hit my dad because he was hounding me to participate in it. I regret to this day that I hit him, and I screamed at him "I am not a family, I am an individual!".

　

There is a view that some radical feminists have about Laing, that he had a problem with his mother, because she was cold and cruel to him as a child, and so therefore he blamed all mothers for madness and was a misogynist. Such views about Laing, are based upon ideological ignorance, jealousy, misandry (hatred of men), and a basic misunderstanding of Laing’s work and the facts. Laing actually supported and defended many of his female patients, who were victims of abusive fathers, and in his case studies of madness and the family, he is not in any way biased against mothers. On the contrary, in one part, in one of his books, he actually endorses women oppressing men, if they have been oppressed by other men, and it is here on the gender issue that I think Laing lacked morality and ethics.

Laing very much defended women who were abused as children or adults, and in his case studies of families causing madness, did not one-sidedly blame mothers. He did speak out against his own mother's abuse towards him as a child, and I think that he was right to do that. I have done this about my own mother, but I have also understood what influenced and motivated her to abuse me, and forgiven her, not least because she has changed and loves me immensely, and I love her immensely too.

Another major criticism about Laing, is that the way Laing is used by mental health services is anti-family, and that this is extreme and a great shame, because I don't believe that Laing himself was anti-family. To some extent, this attitude of the mental health/social workers and professionals, is due to the fact that they see psychiatric-diagnosed people as children, in order to take away our rights as adults, and they also see their role as our parents and even our bosses. The fact is, they do use Laing to prise people away from their families, but then they terrorise and totally neglect psychiatric-diagnosed people without any support, and give us the ultimatum and double-bind (no-win situation) of choosing between two sets of parental abusers - the mental health/social workers and professionals on the one hand - and the actual and real families on the other. This is because the mental health workers and professionals, don't really want to be our carers or parents, and they have very little nurturing skills towards psychiatric-diagnosed people, but instead they want to be controllers and authoritarian figures in a Police state. In a way, they see us as their slaves and property, and think that it's their job to abuse us, but that it's wrong for our real parents to do so.

Such a double-bind (no-win situation) in the identity and mind, with being trapped between these conflicting pressures, of abusive powers of the social, psychiatric, and mental health authorities on the one hand, and abusive parents on the other, can in itself create a split in the identity and mind of the psychiatric-diagnosed person, but there is absolutely no recognition, realisation, or responsibility of the reality of this, by the social workers, psychiatrists, and mental health professionals.

It is the forcing of people from their families which is the bad thing. If a person wants to be somewhat autonomous from their family by choice, if they are being abused or mistreated by their families, or if they want to create and raise a family of their own, or find their independence and new role in society, then that is in a way fine, but forcing them away from the family, and in a situation where they have no more connection or relationship to it, and no other support, is a very bad and detrimental thing, for all the reasons I have given.

The main objection I have to one of Laing’s main theories on so-called Schizophrenia, is the view he had that Schizophrenics hold back and isolate themselves from others. This is simply not true, except in cases where individuals are marginalised or terrorised, or can’t fit into very conservative environments. In a way, saying that we hold back from others, is another way of saying that we are selfish, and yet psychiatrists and social workers are the real parasites, who earn lots of money from poor and vulnerable people’s problems in daily living. They don't want us to be altruistic, they want hierarchies of carers, and patients who are treated as if we have no valid or human thoughts and feelings.

The other thing Laing draws reference to, is that supposedly a split occurs in the Schizophrenic’s identity and mind, and a false self is created which takes over or becomes autonomous. Such Cartesian Dualism ii completely oversimplified when understanding human beings. Firstly, psychiatric diagnosed people, have more elasticity and flexibility to be different selves than other people, who are more intact, rigid, and less adaptable. Secondly, a false self, may just be a feminine side to a man, or a masculine side to a woman, which the person might be trying to separate, form a relationship or love with in some way, and then integrate the two, in order to create a much more balanced or holistic human being. All of this is beyond the training and understanding of psychiatrists and social workers though, who like robots, only believe what is written in their text books.

Then there is the whole matter of which Laing called ‘ontological insecurity’, where a person is supposedly alienated from their bodies, other people, and the world, and feels naturally at unease and in despair in the world. Ontological insecurity is actually what most people experience. It’s only those people who try to break out of that, who get labelled as ontologically insecure and insane. . .

To end on a positive note about Laing, from reading Laing’s books, I learnt from him that there are three basic levels to communication and relatedness. The first one, is understanding and finding common ground, or what most people call a consensus. The second level, is agreeing to differ. The third level, when the other two things can’t be achieved, are parting ways.

Extremists don’t follow this formula though, as they practise something Laing called mergence when they form a group or collective, which suppresses their differences and individual identity and freedom. From seeing some liberal counsellors, I also learnt that people can attack or criticise something in others, part of which they are denying in themselves. This doesn’t hold for social and material conditions though, but is a good thing to be reminded of. These counsellors also pointed out about people who protest too much, that in fact they are projecting their own characteristics and attributes onto others.