Reviews for Ethics and Research with Children: A Case-Based Approach

The average rating for Ethics and Research with Children: A Case-Based Approach based on 2 reviews is 4.5 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2008-08-06 00:00:00 Ged Hession As usual for Szasz, his book takes a very expansive look at the topic at hand--in this case, drug use and policy. He brings us in conclusion to a fundamental question: Are we ourselves merely the victims of our own poor choices that are beyond our control,in need of protection by a paternalistic totalitarian society (not just government, but medical-industrial complex), or are we able to make hard choices and be responsible on our own? In classic Szaszian style he uncovers the hypocrisy and inconsistency of the social mores we accept implicitly. He argues that current medical science in fact shares much with traditional religion and "magic," that Western society promotes its own traditional drugs (alcohol and tobacco) and discriminates against nonWestern drugs, and that much legislative policy creates by definition the problems it purports to solve. While some policy change has happened in the 40 years since he published, much remains remarkably relevant. He considers the meaning of the words 'addiction' and 'pharmakos' and what their meaning communicates about our worldview assumptions. Along the way for free we learn of the virulent racism of Samuel Gompers, the cocaine habit of Sigmund Freud, the marginalization of the role of women in traditional medical history narratives, and what Malcolm X, Edmund Burke, and the Puritans had in common. I don't always agree with Szasz here, but he never fails to make me consider things from perspectives I hadn't before imagined. Am I mistaking metaphor for the literal? Am I mistaking sentiment for logic? Have I thought about the bias of the person I'm listening to? These are questions I consider more often thanks to Szasz (R.I.P.), the conscience of psychiatry and the gadfly of totalitarian government everywhere.

Review # 2 was written on 2014-07-31 00:00:00 Robert Armstrong According to Szasz, health is the dominant good in our society. So, for example, medicating someone against their will is justified, because health trumps freedom from assault. This is part of what he calls the Therapeutic State. By contrast, in medieval society, religion was the dominant good. Szasz makes an analogy between those who misused religion then - witches - with those who misuse therapies now - drug dealers and users. How is drug misuse officially defined? According to Szasz, the answer lies not in the drug, but the user. At the start of the 20th century opium was considered indispensable in medicine, and only became 'dangerous' when there were too many users of the wrong kind - notably, Chinese. In the same way, he says, that it's absurd to use lab analysis to detect kosherness in wine, a drug is labelled 'dangerous' not according to its pharmacology but rather its users. He argues that addiction has only been defined as a disease since the early 20th century, and wrongly. Drugs are used by individuals for their own various reasons and, he says, this is no business of the medical establishment or the state. On opiates again, although Szasz doesn't mention it, the US expected a huge number of returning Vietnam veterans to be persistent users, but it didn't happen, because their main reason for opiate use ended with their participation in the war. Addictiveness is something ascribed to drugs used by the wrong kind of people. Hence, for example, until the 1980s cocaine was not considered addictive. In another of Szasz' pithy phrases, it is 'just as absurd to search for non-addictive drugs that produce euphoria as it would be to search for non-flammable liquids that are easy to ignite.'