Seeking Soteria is a candid and compassionate memoir by Eugene Larkin, one of the original staff at Soteria House—a groundbreaking project offering humane, relationship-based alternatives to psychiatric hospitalization. Larkin blends vivid recollections with reflections on mental illness, transformation, and what it means to truly be with someone in crisis. A call to rethink care, the book honours the quiet power of presence, relationship, and community in healing.
Mad Camp is an innovative approach for those with extreme states and experiences, and who want support and understanding outside traditional psychiatry. The past two in 2023 and 2024 were each a resounding success. The 2025 schedule is July 3 - July 7 in Austria; and July 31 - August 4 in Middletown, California. Read more and sign up!
This past April, the FAA loosened its standards regarding pilots' use of antidepressants. However, "...expanding pilot use of antidepressants flies in the face of mounting evidence of serious adverse effects associated with antidepressants. There is ample reason to question whether any antidepressants should be approved for pilots."
Check out a new collective of ethical practitioners and consider joining. The Conscious Clinician Collective was recently launched. According to the website:
Our bold mission is to cultivate a community where individuals and families engage with ethical mental health specialists and ALL healthcare professionals dedicated to upholding the principles of informed consent, medical freedom, and respect for personal autonomy. In the face of widespread ideological and industrial deception, we will provide access to a spectrum of science-based health information across disciplines, empowering people to make informed decisions about their mental health and overall well-being.
Dr. Bob Johnson's podcast offers one simple explanation for intractable psychological disturbances – traumatic origins are deeply buried. The sufferer cannot recall them without their frontal lobes becoming "blocked" – so however diligent and persistent the doctor is, the more they press these sufferers, the more tightly do they become obscure. If you don’t know what you're doing, you get nowhere. No wonder too many doctors have concluded that ’nothing works’. They then come to blame the patient, rather than their ignorance of the impact of trauma on speech centre and frontal lobes (see Bessel van der Kolk’s brainscan work).
In 1991, Dr Bob Johnson began work as a psychiatrist, in a Special Unit inside a maximum security prison. This Unit was located in the UK’s then flagship prison, Parkhurst, on the Isle of Wight. The Unit was for prisoners regarded as too dangerous for Broadmoor, the pre-eminent UK high-security prison hospital. Over a five year period, he set out to persuade these violent men, including a number of known serial killers, that however horrendous their childhoods had been, they were now adult, so could let all their ‘nursery nightmares’ slide into the past, where they belonged.
In this podcast, he discusses with his wife Sue, how they came to move there, how the men reacted, and, as an introduction, what one of the more notorious UK prisoners thought of the whole affair. Charlie Bronson has made a name for himself in the media – here his heart-felt letter to Dr Bob gives a whole new slant on both himself, and on the work undertaken. Sue has written a graphic account of what it was like from her point of view. Happy viewing.
During our 25th annual conference October 28-29, 2023, ISEPP announced the winners of its three awards:
ISEPP Lifetime Achievement Award - for recognition of sustained and dedicated efforts made throughout one’s career in the struggle to overturn the medical model of human distress. Presented to David Edward Walker, PhD. Click the link below to read the citation.
ISEPP Special Achievement Award - For recognition of specific projects and programs developed as alternatives to the orthodox mental health system. Presented to Rachel Flanigan, PhD. Click the link below to read the citation.
Mary Karon Memorial Award for Humanitarian Concerns - Named in honor of Mary Karon, wife of the late Bert Karon, who had been a lifelong activist psychologist and member of ISEPP. Mary and Bert were in a serious car accident in 2007, leaving Bert in need of constant and daily care. Mary provided that care with the hope of giving Bert the ability to continue in his fight against medicalized psychiatry. Mary died a few years later, making Bert promise that he would continue his work. This award is given to those who show a similar dedication to supporting the ISEPP mission. Presented to Sue Parry. Click the link below to read the citation.
A new Report on Improving Mental Health Outcomes, a collaboration of scholars, activists, and survivors (James Gottstein, Esq, Peter C. Gøtzsche, MD, David Cohen, PhD, Chuck Ruby, PhD, and Faith Myers) argues that the mental health system's standard interventions (especially overreliance on drugs and incarceration into psychiatric facilities) are harmful, counter-productive, and forced on unwilling patients. These standard interventions turn upside down known facts about what helps people in distress while they violate principles of international law. The authors argue that People (relationships), Place (safe places to live), and Purpose (meaningful activities), alongside hope, all within a voluntary system of services, should be made broadly available via public and private programs. The authors describe over a dozen currently available approaches embodying these principles, which they suggest would both dramatically improve treatment outcomes and reduce treatment harms.
During our 25th annual conference October 28-29, 2023, ISEPP announced the winners of its three awards:
A new 
