Call for papers: "PsychOUT: A Conference for Organizing Resistance Against Psychiatry"
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About David W. Oaks, MindFreedom International Executive Director
Here's a capsule summary about David, director of MindFreedom International, along with links to his workshops and some of his popular speeches. Utne Reader named David one of its 50 "Visionaries" for 2009! For information about workshop and speaking engagements by David, contact the MindFreedom office.
Utne Reader magazine's Nov.-Dec. 2009 issue has declared David to be one of its 50 "Visionaries" for 2009, for more info click here.
Director of WHO's mental health department says, "I think the global debate about human rights and mental health needs the contribution of people like David Oaks." To read the complete statement click here.
A brief biography about David W. Oaks
David W. Oaks, director of MindFreedom International, has been a
psychiatric survivor human rights activist since 1976.
David was born on 16 September 1955 in Chicago, Illinois, USA. All of his grandparents were immigrants from Lithuania. Both of his grandfathers were coal miners in rural Illinois before moving to Chicago.
David's parents were working class loving parents who both worked in offices. David had a brief encounter with mental health care after his high school graduation from St. Ignatius College Prep in 1973.
In the Fall of 1973 David attended Harvard University on scholarships, including one from his father's Teamster's Union.
In David's sophomore, junior and senior year he experienced the psychiatric system. David was placed in psychiatric institutions five times. He was diagnosed both "schizophrenic" and "manic depressive" (now known as "bipolar") and underwent forced psychiatric drugging and solitary confinement. David has been given neuroleptics (including Thorazine, Stelazine, Haldol, Mellaril, Navane), lithium, anti-depressants, etc.
It was while in a solitary confinement cell that David decided he wanted, once freed, to take action to improve the mental health system.
A psychiatrist at McLean Hospital, a Harvard teaching institution, told David that because he had a genetically-caused chemical imbalance he would have to remain on powerful neuroleptic psychiatric drugs the rest of his life.
That psychiatrist turned out to be incorrect.
Harvard's student volunteer agency Phillips Brooks House placed David with one of the early psychiatric survivor human rights organizations, Mental Patients Liberation Front, which met at Vocations for Social Change near Central Square in Cambridge, Massachusetts. David wrote his senior paper about community organizing with psychiatric survivors, and graduated with honors in 1977.
With support from peers and his family, David used exercise, nutrition, counseling, wilderness trips, and employment to recover mental and emotional well being. He has been off all psychiatric drugs since 1977.
David helped form one of the first user-run psychiatric survivor activist drop-in centers with MPLF at the Stone Soup Art and Poetry Gallery, and later at an MPLF office across from the Boston Garden.
As well as his activist work in the field of human rights in the mental health system, David has also worked in the environmental, peace and social justice movements.
David is on the board of directors for the United States International Council on Disability.
David lives with his wife Debra in Oregon and loves camping and gardening. David helped found and is a member of a men's support group which has met since 1989.
David is available for speaking engagements and workshops. He has presented on topics such as "community organizing for independent systems change in the mental health system" to a diverse range of participants including in Chile, Norway, Ireland, Turkey, Germany and throughout the USA.
Psychiatrist and author Loren Mosher, former director of the National Institute of Mental Health Scizophrenia section, said in the LA Times, ""The fact that the movement has survived is due in large part to David's ability to work like a dog for almost no money and his ability to mollify those people who are outraged. He has managed to keep a lot of disparate opinions under the tent." To read the LA Times Sunday Magazine article about David Oaks, click here.
E-mail address: oaks (at) mindfreedom.org
