#forced institutionalization

[starschizo]

sometimes someone makes a callous reply on an antipsych post about how its "not all black and white like antipsychs try to make it" and then 9/10 you look at their blog and the only mental illnesses theyve ever talked about having is depression. and i dont say that to downplay the severity of depression, but did you know that, at least where i live, the suicidality psych ward and the psychotic psych ward are different? i've been lucky enough to only be admitted to the suicidality one and it was not pleasant, and was inhumane on the basis of being medical incarceration with all that entails, but we had a girl in our wing that was supposed to go to the psychosis wing because she was in active psychosis but ended up in the suicidality wing because the psychosis wing all had covid, and i befriended her and listened to her talk about her experiences, and her previous admissions to the psychotic wing were all fucking horrific.

this was the same hospital, mind. a different floor of the same building. but while we were doing group therapy about emotional regulation and trust building, the other floor was locking people in isolation and straitjackets and forcibly sedating them for crimes as minor as being too loud.

i don't remember exactly where i was going with this, just generally that like. your experiences with psych are not universal, not even close.

[allthecanadianpolitics]

Quebec psychiatrists group supports bill on forced hospitalizations for mentally ill

The association of Quebec’s psychiatrists says it supports a bill that would make it easier to forcibly hospitalize someone in a mental heal

The association of Quebec’s psychiatrists says it supports a bill that would make it easier to forcibly hospitalize someone in a mental health crisis. Existing law permits authorities to treat someone against their will only if their mental state poses a “grave and immediate danger” to themselves or others. The bill would instead allow authorities to forcibly hospitalize people whose mental state presents a “situation where there is a danger” to themselves or others.

Read more.

Tagging: @newsfromstolenland

[wildwren]

July 24th, 2025 - trump advancing eugenicist agenda towards disabled americans

Read the ACLU statement

"WASHINGTON – President Trump signed an executive order today directing states to criminalize unhoused people and institutionalize people with mental health disabilities and substance use disorder.

The order, titled “Ending Crime and Disorder on American Streets,” directs the Justice Department to expand indefinite forced treatment for people with mental health disabilities or substance use disorder, and those living on the street who “cannot care for themselves.” The order also purports to eliminate federal funding for evidence-based programs, like harm reduction and housing first, that save lives, and directs federal funds toward cities and states that criminalize substance use disorder, punish people for sleeping outdoors, or enforce other laws targeting unhoused people.

The order also calls for sweeping federal data collection on unhoused people and those with mental health disabilities, raising serious concerns about surveillance, privacy, and how such data could be used to justify further criminalization. Instead of funding services or support, the administration is prioritizing profiling and control."

Details on how this will play out on the state level, taken from a statement from the Vermont Center for Independent Living:

"This executive order:

• Ends support for Housing First, a proven Vermont strategy that helps people stabilize and rebuild their lives.

• Promotes forced institutionalization by expanding civil commitment laws and undermining longstanding legal protections for people with psychiatric disabilities.

• Conditions federal funding on aggressive enforcement of anti-loitering and anti-camping laws, resulting in sweeps and arrests rather than housing and support.

• Targets harm reduction programs, despite Vermont’s leadership in opioid response strategies that prioritize dignity, safety, and survival.

• Encourages data-sharing between housing and health agencies and law enforcement, raising serious privacy, disability rights, and civil liberties concerns.

• By conflating affordable housing access with involuntary treatment compliance, the order threatens the rights and dignity of people with disabilities. Specifically, it requires recipients of federal housing and homelessness assistance to mandate substance abuse treatment or mental health services for participants diagnosed with substance use disorder or serious mental illness."

pls consider reblogging, thx!

[furiousgoldfish]

How do you feel about institutionalization?

I've never been institutionalized, I think it's probably okay.

Never been institutionalized, I find it scary/anxiety inducing.

Never been institutionalized, it's one of my worst fears.

I know someone who's been institutionalized, and they said it was okay.

I know someone who's been institutionalized, they were traumatized by it.

I know someone who's been trough it, they said it's okay if volountary.

I know someone who's been trough it, they said even volountary was traumatic.

I've been institutionalized, and found it okay.

I've been institutionalized, and found it bad, but bearable.

I've been institutionalized and found it traumatic.

I have mixed feelings, I think it's different for different cases.

See results

Voting ended onJul 20, 2024

If you have experiences to provide or facts to provide about this, please add them on this post!

[tired-fandom-ndn]

I think people really fail to grasp how damaging being locked away in an institution is and deprived of safe loving contact and freedom of choice. Not just prisons, but places like secure hospitals and psych wards etc too. They're not places that lend well to supporting people in re-entering the world again.

As someone who spent a good chunk of time in a psych ward as a teenager, yes, this, absolutely. The complete isolation, being treated as something to be controlled instead of as a person who needs kindness and help, and the lack of any support when released is a perfect mix to just. Completely destroy someone.

People in these institutions are not people. Plain and simple. They're numbers and bodies to be churned through the system as quickly and efficiently as possible and that leaves a lasting impact on a person's health and wellbeing, not to mention the social ramifications of being locked away from society for weeks to decades and getting little to no support when you're just thrown back in as if nothing has changed.

[crimeronan]

14 and 15 for the fic asks?

14. Post a line of dialogue from one of your WIPs without context.

“Seventy-two hours involuntary, then a hearing, then seventy-two hours voluntary, forty-eight hours of notice before the discharge, I did it all by the book.  I’m not stupid.  You shut up and scrape by on minimum compliance, you get out and forgotten like that.”  A snap of her fingers.  “So don’t go thinking I pulled some prison break and you can play the hero cop who saves the woebegone public from the crazy psycho bitch.  I don’t play that game.”

15. Post the last line you wrote without context.

Ronan pressed two fingertips to his temple. For a second, Gansey thought he was making a "shoot me" gesture, until he realized Ronan was rubbing it like he had a headache brewing. "You covered for us with Cheng."

[exigencelost]

While I agree with prison abolition I dont understand the connection between that and involuntary confinement in a psychiatric hospital setting? Some countries may do it badly but in the UK by and large it's the only way to help acutely unwell people who do not realise they are unwell, it never lasts longer than is needed. Could it be improved? Sure, but I dont think they're equal. Can you please explain what you meant?

I don’t know enough about psychiatric health to talk in detail about what a comprehensive community-based, healing-oriented approaches to supporting people with severe mental illnesses would look like. I know that we need them, but past that—I’m just not the person to ask.  To answer your question of “what I meant” when I said that captivity is wrong: I meant that captivity is wrong. Also, the idea of “separating people from society” as a solution to anything is both futile and cruel.  

Anyone with experience in abolitionist mental health work is free to add to this. 

[intersex-ionality]

Same lurker who talked about psychiatric ward staff using sleep deprivation as a punishment for bad behavior. But that most recent thing you rebelogged? Yeah. Big mood. Big fucking mood. Like, if you got people out here who will actively choose death before hospitalization, that's a sure sign of a problem and the problem isn't just that we want to die.

Yeah, it actually took a lot of work on the part of my therapist to help me understand that in the state I lived in at the time, I couldn’t be committed against my will, except in the case of suicide attempts. My ex-husband sometimes threatened me with commitment to make me comply with his wishes.

And, like, on the one hand, great!

On the other hand, if we can understand how the threat of commitment is abusive and dangerous in all these other situations, then how is it possible that it suddenly becomes totally okay and safe if you’re in a psychologically agitated state?

The answer, of course, is that it doesn’t actually become okay or safe. Just normal.

It’s bad.

And I also get that a lot of people in that state of mind are not going to seek out help on their own, because that’s not how they’ve been trained to think about their illness, and the illness itself prevents them from adopting new plans.

But shit, dude, if we stopped threatening people with drug-prison-torture for asking for help, it probably wouldn’t be quite so difficult to ask. And the sooner with shift the culture on that, the sooner the great majority of people who “can’t” ask for help learn that they actually can, and we can focus more direct offers or assistance on the much smaller population of people who still can’t ask.