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Thomas Szasz

Thomas Szasz Quotes

Psychiatrist

Thomas Szasz, born on April 15, 1920 in Hungary, was a renowned American psychiatrist, writer, and philosopher. He is known for his critical views on psychiatry and liberalism, particularly his skepticism about the nature of mental illness and his emphasis on individual freedom.

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Famous Thomas Szasz Quotes

“Since this is the age of science, not religion, psychiatrists are our rabbis, heroin is our pork, and the addict is the unclean person.”

Persons Age Addict Psychiatrist Heroin Pork Rabbi

Book:The second sin

Source: The second sin

“After generations of living under medical tutelage, which provides us with protection (albeit illusory) against "dangerous drugs", we have failed to cultivate the self-reliance and self-discipline we must possess as competent adults surrounded by the fruits of our pharmacological-technological age.”

Self Age Generations Dangerous Discipline Drug Adults Fruit Protection Medical Self Discipline Technological Self Reliance Reliance Competent Illusory Dangerous Drugs Tutelage

Book:Our Right to Drugs: The Case for a Free Market

Source: Our Right to Drugs: The Case for a Free Market

“A child becomes an adult when he realizes that he has a right not only to be right but also to be wrong.”

Children Age Realizing Family Adults Maturity Adulthood

Author:Thomas Szasz

“Adulthood is the ever-shrinking period between childhood and old age. It is the apparent aim of modern industrial societies to reduce this period to a minimum.”

Age Modern Childhood Periods Aim Old Age Adulthood Minimum Fatherhood Shrinking

Author:Thomas Szasz

“The plague of mankind is the fear and rejection of diversity: monotheism, monarchy, monogamy and, in our age, monomedicine. The belief that there is only one right way to live, only one right way to regulate religious, political, sexual, medical affairs is the root cause of the greatest threat to man: members of his own species, bent on ensuring his salvation, security, and sanity.”

“It taught me, at an early age, that being wrong can be dangerous, but being right, when society regards the majority’s falsehood as truth, could be fatal.”

Age Dangerous Taught Regard Majority Falsehood Being Wrong

Author:Thomas Szasz

“We achieve active mastery over illness and death by delegating all responsibility for their management to physicians, and by exiling the sick and the dying to hospitals. But hospitals serve the convenience of staff not patients: we cannot be properly ill in a hospital, nor die in one decently; we can do so only among those who love and value us. The result is the institutionalized dehumanization of the ill, characteristic of our age.”

“Institutional psychiatry is a continuation of the Inquisition. All that has really changed is the vocabulary and the social style. The vocabulary conforms to the intellectual expectations of our age: it is a pseudo-medical jargon that parodies the concepts of science. The social style conforms to the political expectations of our age: it is a pseudo-liberal social movement that parodies the ideals of freedom and rationality.”

Source: The Manufacture of Madness: A Comparative Study of the Inquisition and the Mental Health Movement