Published:
Letter to the Editor
In Response to Scientology's Silence of Free Speech
By Sylvain Galibert
I just read your article Scientology's Silence of Free Speech and figured I would drop in a few notes and rectify a few points.
"Now, anyways to get back on track I am entirely open for you giving me any verification that scientology isn't against prescription drugs. Looking at the CCHR & PSYCHIATRY AN INDUSTRY OF DEATH - your funded museum. The church makes claims such as the Virginia Tech massacre was a consequence of the murderer taking Prozac, with no proof of course. Now correct me if I'm incorrect, isn't Prozac a prescription drug?"
Being against a specific category of prescription drugs, namely psychotropic drugs and being against prescription drugs in general are two different things. Scientology is resolutely against psychotropic drugs. It is not against other kind of prescription drugs. As a matter of fact, Scientologists are strongly advised to seek assistance from a competent medical doctor when ill. (And therefore purchase and use prescription drugs to cure physical illnesses).
So no, in my 14 years in Scientology, I have never seen anything to support the claim that Scientology is against prescription drugs in general. On the other end, we make no mystery we are against mind-altering drugs. Is this point still unclear?
"Why didn't you bring up in your article that scientology's strong opposition of psychiatry has resulted in the deaths of its members? Take Jeremy Perkins for example: He was born into the church, his two parents where devoted scientologists. He was diagnosed with schizophrenia at a young age. They refused to give him prescribed drugs to control his schizophrenia and instead go with scientology's option of vitamins. At age 28, voices in his head eventually won him over and he killed his mother, stabbing her 77 times in their kitchen. This has happened many times. I can provide evidence for all my claims, if you can debunk them, then please do so. A lot of it actually comes from court documents due to freedom of speech."
This was a tragedy indeed. However your assumption here is that, if he only was given the proper drugs, Jeremy Perkins would never have committed this crime. This assumption is baseless. There is no evidence of that whatsoever.
In fact, most evidences point in the exact opposite direction. You mentioned Prozac earlier. Had you bothered to look past the marketing statements, you would have learned that 1089 suicides have been reported to the FDA in 2000* in connection with Prozac alone, and about 10 times as many violent crimes, including rape, torture and murder. These figures reflect only incidents reported to the FDA and as such are a matter of public records (would you consider FDA records as evidence, I wonder?). The actual figures are probably much higher even as only a minority of incidents is ever reported to the FDA. And bear in mind that the figures provided above are for Prozac alone, and that chemically similar drugs have similar records, unsurprisingly.
The fact is that tens of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands violent crimes were committed by people under direct influence of the very same drugs you advocate, so it is absurd to look at a couple isolated tragedies and say "if they were permitted to take psychiatric drugs, this could have been avoided".
If that was true, Jeremy Strohmeyer, 18 year old, wouldn't have raped and killed a 9 years old girl. He was on Dexedrine. Or perhaps 16-year-old Luke Woodham wouldn't have stabbed his mother, Mary Woodham, to death and wouldn't have shot nine people in his school. And on the same rationale, Kip Kinkel (15) would not have murdered his parents and shot 22 people in his school... the list goes on and on and on and on.
You want evidence and don't believe me or any other scientologist? Totally fine by me. Feel free to contact the FDA directly and get the details. Contact surviving and relatives. Investigate. All psychiatric drugs combined, we are talking about several hundreds of thousands acts of violence. I am pretty sure you should be able to find a few of them, if you only looked. And it's not just a matter of statistics. Behind those numbers are real people, who were subjected to these drugs you are so fond of and nevertheless committed the worst atrocities imaginable. So blaming Scientology for advising not to take drugs is ... how hypocritical can you get?
To conclude this, I would like to quote the last line of your article:
"Why don't you do your research mike, provide proof in order to persuade people - anecdotal evidence isn't enough."
Good advice. Why don't you? 2 - 3 isolated cases *is* anecdotal evidence. The evidence against psychotropic drugs is not limited to 2-3 cases, unfortunately.
Popping a happy pill and living happily ever after is such a nice concept. Unfortunately, it doesn't work that way and many people paid with their lives and happiness in search of that chemical paradise. Life can get rough at times, but drugs are not the solution. In many case, they are the problem.
*These figures were obtained through the use of the Freedom of Information Act.
judythpiazza@newsblaze.com
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* The views of Letter writers do not necessarily reflect the views of NewsBlaze
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