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Psychology Group Celebrating the ‘Maladjusted’By Mike Ervin “It may well be that our world is in dire need of a new organization, The International Association for the Advancement of Creative Maladjustment.” —Martin Luther King Jr., King made that reference in a speech to the annual meeting of the American Psychological Association. Here’s more from that speech: “There are certain technical words in every academic discipline which soon become stereotypes and even clichés. Every academic discipline has its technical nomenclature. You who are in the field of psychology have given us a great word. It is the word maladjusted.... “But on the other hand, I am sure that we will recognize that there are some things in our society, some things in our world, to which we should never be adjusted. “There are some things concerning which we must always be maladjusted if we are to be people of good will. “We must never adjust ourselves to racial discrimination and racial segregation. We must never adjust ourselves to religious bigotry. “We must never adjust ourselves to economic conditions that take necessities from the many to give luxuries to the few. We must never adjust ourselves to the madness of militarism, and the self-defeating effects of physical violence... “Men and women should be as maladjusted as the prophet Amos, who in the midst of the injustices of his day, could cry out in words that echo across the centuries, ‘Let justice roll down like waters and righteousness like a mighty stream,’ or as maladjusted as Abraham Lincoln, who in the midst of his vacillations finally came to see that this nation could not survive half slave and half free… “And through such creative maladjustment, we may be able to emerge from the bleak and desolate midnight of man’s inhumanity to man, into the bright and glittering daybreak of freedom and justice.” You’ll find this and several other speeches in which King spoke of the importance of reveling in being maladjusted on the Web site of MindFreedom International: www.mindfreedom.org. MFI is an alliance of nearly 100 groups in 14 countries that defends the human rights of psychiatric survivors and promotes humane, empowering alternatives. David Oaks, the Harvard-educated director of MFI, calls himself a psychiatric survivor human rights activist. At various times in his life, he has had what psychiatry has labeled schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, psychosis and severe depression. Time magazine gave this account of a 1965 speech King delivered to the New York City Bar association: “What the U.S. needs, King said, is a ‘divine discontent.’ He spoke of his own ‘maladjustment’ to segregation, religious bigotry, the ‘madness of militarism’ and ‘the self-defeating effects of physical violence’ {and} half-jokingly urged the formation of an ‘International Association for the Advancement of Creative Maladjustment.’” Oaks doesn’t think King was joking. And so at an MFI conference and retreat last July at Wisdom House in Litchfield, Conn., members voted to officially launch the IAACM as part of MFI. Oaks says: “We want to make this real. We want to make this more than just a great speech, and this is the movement that can do it.” So on October 11th, National Depression Screening Day, the IAACM made its debut. MFI members in the U.S. and three other countries did what they call Mad Pride events. The purpose of MFI’s Mad Pride campaign is to empower psychiatric survivors and raise public consciousness through activities such as art, theater, music, poetry, protests and vigils. Oaks and a few others did what they termed a “screening for normality,” outside the headquarters of the American Psychiatric Association in Arlington, Va. They dressed in white medical coats and scanned passersby like airport security screeners. But instead of using wands for scanning, they used rubber chickens. The chickens, they said, were highly sensitive instruments that could detect even the slightest trace of normality. But because no normality was detected in anyone, each person scanned was presented with a certificate declaring him or her officially free of normality. “You would think if normality existed anywhere it would be at the APA,” Oaks says. “And the punch line is: You can’t find it. Normality doesn’t exist.” Oaks sees the IAACM as a vehicle for those who are abnormal, which is everyone, to publicly celebrate their maladjustment. In the case of MFI, Oaks says the point of humorous street theater is to radically deconstruct the concept of madness in the psychiatric sense. “The first person who thinks of something is often considered mad,” Oaks says. “The first person who said, ‘Maybe we should end slavery,’ was probably called mad. It was an unshared belief, and that’s what’s at the center of a delusion — an unshared belief. Not all unshared beliefs are good, but many are.” Oaks said he’s sent messages to King’s son, Dexter, informing him that one of his father’s calls has been answered with the formation of the IAACM. “No response,” he says. “But that’s OK. We’ll keep trying.” Oaks wants to do more mad street theater under the banner of the IAACM on January 26th, the day the World Social Forum is calling for political actions around the world with the theme of “Many Struggles, One Movement.” But he emphasizes that everyone who is maladjusted — which is everyone, especially every person with a disability — can declare himself a member and leader of the IAACM and hold a “public, peaceful, ‘denormalizing’ event,” such as a normality screening, anywhere at any time. (Normality screening kits, complete with white coats and rubber chickens, can be ordered from the MFI Web site.) Oaks asks anyone doing an IAACM action to take a video and post it on YouTube or take pictures and post them on Flickr, an on-line hoto management and sharing application. Put IAACM in the title and send Oaks the ID number so he can spread the word. This “viral Internet activism,” as Oaks calls it, is “a wonderfully healing thing.” ** Mike Ervin is a writer and member of ADAPT, a group that works for the civil rights of people with disabilities. |
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