New blog post: http://ping.fm/bYOty - 169 Years Of The British Medical Journal Now Free Online

169 Years Of The British Medical Journal Now Free Online

 

Every BMJ article published since the journal's first issue in October 1840 is now freely available online from bmj.com. Eighteen of the BMJ Group's specialist journals - including Heart, Gut, and Thorax - are also available…..

For an introduction to the archive, a series of specially commissioned videos focussing on some of the important issues and individuals that have appeared in the journal's pages are now available at http://podcasts.bmj.com/themes/bmj/mp3/archive_videos/BMJ_archive_the_stories.mp4

169 Years Of The British Medical Journal Now Free Online

New blog post: Cuts for nursing homes in Medicare this fall http://ping.fm/O29Gz - Article - WSJ.com

New blog post: http://ping.fm/yOD4z - CDC releases guidance for long-term care on swine flu infection - McKnight's Long Term Care News

Off to the Arc Michigan Straegic Planning Session

Protest Held Inside Minnesota State Capitol Rotunda to Stop Ray's Shock — MFI Portal

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ST. PAUL, MINNESOTA: For three hours today, several dozen participants successfully held a peaceful MindFreedom International protest of the ongoing forced electroshock of Ray Sandford, a 55-year-old resident of Columbia Heights, Minnesota. The loud protest was held directly inside the majestic Rotunda of the Minnesota State Capitol in St. Paul, Friday, 1 May 2009.
Speakers during a news conference, covered by both mainstream and alternative media, included myself (flying in from Oregon, thanks to donated air ticket by MFI member Darby Penney), plus:…….

Protest Held Inside Minnesota State Capitol Rotunda to Stop Ray's Shock — MFI Portal

Disableism Day Blog Post http://bit.ly/Tb6Yq

The Age of What? on Disableism Day 2009

Culture is Frozen Struggle.
                     -after Roberto Unger

In our fight against ableism/disableism, we have passed through a legislative age (peaking with the passage of the ADA), and we are now  in an operational age, in which building support systems and creating communities that are accessible are the focus, whether through policy change, legislation, or community organizing.

What might the future hold?

• Collaboration with other communities for change that includes our issues, in a broader context of struggle

We remain isolated from the community of psychiatric survivors and that of people with developmental and cognitive disabilities.  The joke still is, “I may be _____, but I’m not ______!” (replace with your favorite vulnerable and oppressed communities). There is still no usable consensus on how to make the web accessible to people with low literacy, and the web as a whole is still growing faster than the accessible web. Driving change through peer relationships and peer organizations is still at its very beginning in both of these communities.

But Michigan has 500 peers working in the mental health system, a group of adults with DD is developing a model of peers, and I saw a nice article about an anarchist conference where safe spaces for recovery was a break out session.

• The oppression of people with disabilities still remains a cultural and ethical “right”.

While there is a lot more going on internationally than even a couple of years ago, people with psychiatric labels and persons with developmental disabilities still wallow in hideous institutions, not to mention nursing homes,  both here and everywhere.

Medicine is finding (even developing standards for), killing us before we would die on  our own, not treating us, and consigning us to ethical limbos based on our “inferiority”.  Sterilization of people with DD still goes on in hospitals everywhere. Stephen Drake and Not Dead Yet still have way too much to do.

But, institutions are being challenged internationally, families are finding the courage to challenge their members oppression, and multi-ethnic culturally focused collaborations are fighting against the assumption of cultural “rights” to oppress.

I think these two arenas are the grounds upon which our struggles will take place for the next generation.

And we need to start working on prisons and disability and post-incarceration peer support.

Struggles they will be…….

Technorati Tags: disableism day

Finding Our Roots Conferences Explores Anarchism and "Space" - News : MediaMouse Progressive Left News Blog - Grand Rapids, Michigan

 

This past weekend, I traveled to Chicago to attend the Finding Our Roots Conference at Roosevelt University. This is the third year the anarchist conference on praxis and organizing has been held. The theme of the conference this year was space:……

Mad Liberation and Safe Space

Facilitated by the Mad Tea Party group of Chicago, this workshop was about creating safe spaces where those who struggle with mental illness can have autonomy over their own recovery.

It was noted that "madness" cannot be separated from our culture. One person shared his experience in the mental health system, in which he worked a menial job six days a week that made him depressed and exacerbated his struggles. Upon seeking help, he found himself in an institution where the end goal was to get him back into a job - he recognized this as a form of oppression.

Several people expressed concern that the issue of mental health is one that gets pushed to the side in anarchist organizing. In response to this, groups have been formed in Chicago (and, I'm sure, in many other cities) to provide peer support, such as The Icarus Project)……

Finding Our Roots Conferences Explores Anarchism and "Space" - News : MediaMouse Progressive Left News Blog - Grand Rapids, Michigan

Care Coordination for Seriously Injured Veterans Improving -- House Committee on Veterans' Affairs Press Release from VA Watchdog dot Org - 04-30-2009

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On Tuesday, April 28, 2009, the House Veterans’ Affairs Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee, led by Chairman Harry Mitchell (D-AZ), conducted a hearing to evaluate the newly implemented Federal Recovery Coordination Program (FRCP). The Subcommittee examined the effectiveness of the FRCP which was established in October 2007 and went into operation in January 2008. The Subcommittee also assessed if outreach efforts by the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) has succeeded in bringing coordinated care to veterans who were injured prior to the launch of the FRCP….

Care Coordination for Seriously Injured Veterans Improving -- House Committee on Veterans' Affairs Press Release from VA Watchdog dot Org - 04-30-2009