Psychiatrists Who Targeted Trump Face Backlash
“we have faced a wave of backlash—not just from political observers but from doctors in our own field”
Bandy Lee and other mental health professionals, who targeted President Trump in a nakedly political attempt to help Democrats, are now experiencing some push back from people who see this for what it is.
Lee and Leonard L. Glass, a psychiatry professor at Harvard, just wrote this for Politico:
We’re Psychiatrists. It’s Our Duty to Question the President’s Mental State.
Eight months ago, moved by what we were witnessing in the American president, we joined 25 other psychiatrists and mental health experts in putting our concerns into a book, The Dangerous Case of Donald Trump. We believed Trump’s mental state presented a danger to the public and felt we had a duty to warn them. We intended the book, which became a best-seller, as a service, putting the royalties into a fund for public good.
Since the book’s publication, however, we have faced a wave of backlash—not just from political observers but from doctors in our own field. Many commentators claimed that we were violating the Goldwater rule, the American Psychiatric Association’s ethical directive that psychiatrists should not diagnose anyone they have not personally evaluated. A past president of the American Psychiatric Association called our work “tawdry, indulgent, fatuous, tabloid psychiatry.” We heard similar criticisms last week, after Politico reported that one of us, Dr. Bandy Lee, had met with members of Congress to discuss the president’s behavior and mental health.
But these criticisms get two things wrong: first, that we are violating the Goldwater rule, and second, that we should avoid talking about the president’s mental health. Without diagnosing Trump in a specific way, as the Goldwater rule prohibits, it is not only acceptable but vitally necessary to have a public conversation about mental state of our nation’s leader.
It’s the job of psychiatrists to monitor the president’s mental health? Since when? Oh right… the minute a Republican won the presidency. I don’t recall Bandy Lee or her colleagues voicing any concern when Obama would get off teleprompter and get stuck like a skipping record. If, if, if, if, if, if, if…
In fact, during the 2016 election, talk of Hillary’s physical and mental health was declared off limits by Democrats and most of their media allies.
This has gotten so ridiculous that the American Psychiatric Association has issued a statement:
APA Calls for End to ‘Armchair’ Psychiatry
Today, the American Psychiatric Association (APA) reiterates its continued and unwavering commitment to the ethical principle known as “The Goldwater Rule.” We at the APA call for an end to psychiatrists providing professional opinions in the media about public figures whom they have not examined, whether it be on cable news appearances, books, or in social media. Armchair psychiatry or the use of psychiatry as a political tool is the misuse of psychiatry and is unacceptable and unethical.
The ethical principle, in place since 1973, guides physician members of the APA to refrain from publicly issuing professional medical opinions about individuals that they have not personally evaluated in a professional setting or context. Doing otherwise undermines the credibility and integrity of the profession and the physician-patient relationship. Although APA’s ethical guidelines can only be enforced against APA members, we urge all psychiatrists, regardless of membership, to abide by this guidance in respect of our patients and our profession.
A proper psychiatric evaluation requires more than a review of television appearances, tweets, and public comments.
Bandy Lee has vanished from Twitter in recent days for reasons which should be obvious. Speaking of Twitter, this is a great point:
The politicalization of psychiatry by @BandyXLee exposes far more about psychiatrists than it does about Trump.
Sadly, their profession will suffer a crisis of credibility.
And worse, patients will be the ultimate victims.
— Dr. Milton Wolf (@MiltonWolfMD) January 7, 2018
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Comments
“Bandy Lee has vanished from Twitter in recent days for reasons which should be obvious.”
*****
She has been MIA since it has been reported that her Connecticut license to practice medicine expired in May 2015 and is “pending renewal”.
I’m sure it’s routine for a “renewal” to take almost 3 years.
She also can no longer prescribe medication!
As a psychometrician, despite possibly violating professional ethics, I feel fully qualified to diagnose her as an idiot.
As a person who has heard of Freud, I concur.
Maybe, but are you saying you are providing this assessment based on a face to face meeting with her and her giving up her rights for patient confidentiality for this mental health assessment?
Sorry, B_2, but to avoid a double standard, the dems can no longer require what you suggest. We do know that won’t stop them.
Did you somehow miss the sarcasm in the comments to which you replied?
As a professional mental patient, I think she’s crazy, too.
Just in case, B_2, /sarc
Scientologists like Tom Cruise are a bunch of whackadoodles. Scientology and Psychiatry are at odds because L Ron Hubbard’s past. But between Scientologists and Psychiatrists, the Psychiatrists are now looking like the bigger group of whackadoodles.
That’s a tough comparison. On one hand you have unstable individuals who blindly turn to a weird set of superstitions and on the other hand you have scientologists.
He he!
Professors who do this set an example for their students. She should be terminated for violation of ethics.
…and SUED!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
And so should be the “25 other psychiatrists and mental health experts” in that book.
And which definition of terminated are you using?
Sense of “to come to an end” is recorded from 1640s; meaning “dismiss from a job” is recorded from 1973; that of “to assassinate” is from 1975.
Since I mentioned she was a professor, obviously I was referring to her professional position in relation to students.
And any organization that is serious about practicing Journalism should terminate any employees who violate the code of ethics for the Journalism profession. If they don’t then they should label themselves “entertainment” or maybe “fake news.”
I’m sure it was merely Brandy Lee experiencing a psychotic break
Maybe took too much Nyquil for a cold.
Makes one do wacky things like accidentally releasing classified transcripts
I trade stocks. It is my duty to ensure that the president’s stock portfolio is balanced.
OMG WHAT A LOAD OF SHIT. Crawl back under the rock you came from you stupid twit.
Unethical shrink acts unethically, protests reaction.
Clown steps on rake, protests sharp pain in face.
Same, same.
Quotes from three parties … and it sounds like all are a bit in “denial”.
Dr. Glass insists, without evidence or any rationale, that a violation of the Goldwater rule is not a violation of the Goldwater rule.
The APA writes, “Armchair psychiatry or the use of psychiatry as a political tool is the misuse of psychiatry and is unacceptable …” Not acceptable? So the 25 doctors who so blatantly violated it are being expelled from the Association? Huh, didn’t think so. It it’s accepted even once, then apparently it is acceptable. Accepting it 25 times practically carves it in stone.
Dr. Wolf writes, “And worse, patients will be the ultimate victims.” Not so. How is discovering that a gaggle of doctors are unethical quacks going to damage patients? Now they know who to avoid. The way to protect the profession is to expel those who don’t perform at an acceptable level.
Delusion and rationalization are her best traits. During my rotation through psychiatry the admonition was that the physician must first understand their biases and when treating a patient compensate for those biases so that they do not compromise care. The “crazy old man” has been used enough before as to be always suspect as with Reagan… yet they are blind to major concerns about Hillary… or Bill… or JFK… or Woodrow Wilson.
It is not as if the public is unaware that the occupation attracts head cases.
It’s unfortunate that some people here feel the need to insult an entire profession (IE the field attracts head cases) because some members do stupid and unethical things. Can you name me a profession that is free of such people?
That’s easy. Another profession that does a multitude of unethical reprehensible things is $2.00 prostitutes. Obviously a profession with the ethics of a heroin addict.
I promise that I am not disrespecting all psychiatrists, but all of the ones I went to college with that were studying in that field were totally screwed up. They had all kinds of questions about their own lives and what is truly right and wrong. They had self-doubt issues and a need to be liked by everyone. I would rather talk to a priest, though I am not a Catholic than a psyco.
I agree with that. In Abnormal Psych class they said those who went further into the filed and especially those who became psychiatrists were the most abnormal of all. As I recall they said they all undergo analysis to determine how looney they are.
Well I guess if you don’t have a license then they can’t take action against your license, lol.
This isn’t the Soviet Union. Psychos are held accountable for politically-motivated psychotic displays. Positive progress.
More proof that a whole bunch of Democrats lost their minds during the last election, and have yet to regain their composure.
I am glad to see, however, that the APA can recognize blatant malpractice and unethical behavior.
More proof that a whole bunch of Democrats and #neverTrumpers lost their minds during the last election, and have yet to regain their composure.
And we don’t have to go far to see it either
“More proof that a whole bunch of Democrats lost their minds during the last election…”
Valerie,
1. “minds”? I see no evidence those exist.
2. What may have passed as minds were lost long ago…
🙂
Self-aggrandizing and sanctimonious Leftist zealots have managed to politicize academia, corporate offices and Boardrooms, sports and the arts — why should the medical field be any different?
This fraud is just the useful idiot of the week.
Why make her more of a media figure than we have to?
Same with that idiot ‘comic’ and bigot, chelsea handler.
Ignore these people – just attack their handlers. (No pun intended.)
You all make excellent points. Isn’t anyone going to stand up for her excellent fashion sense? Her whole look is smashing, each point an excellent choice, hair style, jacket, blouse, jewelry, color and lines. I can’t take my eyes off her.
Go to China, she’s a cookie-cutter replica of the modern Chinese woman. There are easily another 50 million just like her in China, and some are even honest.
Who knew that psychiatry was so easy that one could do it from the TV on a person they never meet. Medicine is so simple these days that one can do a cellular diagnosis and just drive by people and come up with the problem and more than likely a treatment.
Don’t patients have to sign papers to allow them to be examined? Did Trump sign those papers and if so isn’t this a violation of HIPPA?
The critics are right. This is a huge ethical breach of monumental proportions and the people involved need to be sanctioned. I hope the backlash continues.
“we have faced a wave of backlash—not just from political observers but from doctors in our own field”
Violate a professional ethics code provision which has been in place for a bit more than half a century and this it the thanks you get. Who’d a thunk it?
Yep, it’s not “backlash”, it’s valid criticism of a breach of professional ethics for the sake of political activism.