Madness Radio: Survivor Spoken Word Leah Harris

First Aired 12-30-2009 Duration: 52:14

Leah Harris was orphaned after both parents were diagnosed with schizophrenia and died from medication toxicity. Today she is a leading voice in survivor activism, and her powerful spoken word poetry, including "I Was A Teenage Mental Patient," has been featured in publications including Word Warriors: 35 Women Leaders in the Spoken Word Revolution, and DC Poets against the War: An Anthology. Leah is also the co-coordinator of the US Network of Users and Survivors of Psychiatry. Buy her new cd "Take Refuge" at the National Empowerment Center: http://bit.ly/7f5kyN. www.myspace.com/dharmamamaleah, www.usnusp.org/

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righteous anger

Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Tue, 01/05/2010 - 04:52.

I loved what Leah had to say on righteous anger... and it becoming toxic to the host, which is the word I'll use for the people who have had the anger injected into them by psychiatry's atrocities....

A whole show on anger would be great. I've learned a lot from death row exonerees... and gitmo survivors....

(their writing, not personally)...

I think we survivors of coercive psychiatry are so alone in our communities, our experiences so extreme and not often shared by our existing friends and family, we can learn from people who have experienced extreme systemic violence in other areas, such as death row, political torture... etc...

THanks will

Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Tue, 01/05/2010 - 07:48.

THanks will for the lunatic fringe blog link... awesome blog...

here's that link:

Submitted by MadnessRadio on Tue, 01/05/2010 - 12:46.

http://lunatickfringe.wordpress.com/

Can someone send me in the

Submitted by Dani Scott (not verified) on Mon, 01/11/2010 - 12:54.

Can someone send me in the right direction to view the Esmond Green video mentioned? I can't find it on the web anywhere.
Thanks!

Esmin Green

Submitted by MadnessRadio on Mon, 01/11/2010 - 13:31.

Hi, her name was Esmin Green, and there is a lot of information on the internet about her, including an article here from CNN:

Woman who died on hospital floor called 'beautiful person'

The videos of her death on youtube and elsewhere are extremely upsetting, so please be cautious. I personally have heard descriptions of the video, but have not seen it.

Here is a photo of Esmin when she was alive:

On Systemic Violence

Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Sun, 01/17/2010 - 09:45.

I could not have said this any better. Thank you for your comments and especially as you parallelled the experiences of forced psychiatric treatment and its very real psychological similarities to the effects that other extreme system violence such as victims of torture of all kinds endure.

And thank you to Leah Harris for her work! Wow, I was so moved by her poetry. This gives my artist within permission to get her rage out on the page too and through the use of music as a form of healing.

Awesome show!

Sincerely,

Jacquie B. Psychiatric Survivor - Ottawa, Canada

me and my book and experiences

Submitted by Matthew Freeman (not verified) on Tue, 01/26/2010 - 10:57.

i was directed to this great site by my publisher...my new book of poems details some of the good and bad experiences i've had with the realm of psychiatry...please let me know if anyone would like to look at the poems!! and keep on doin it!

Great - can you leave your email address

Submitted by MadnessRadio on Tue, 01/26/2010 - 11:10.

That's great Matthew - feel free
to leave your email address for people to contact you.

Your Poems

Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Mon, 02/01/2010 - 05:38.

Hi Matthew

I would love to read some of your poems. I am always looking to be inspire by the works of other survivors. Thank you for offering.

Sincerely,