Revolutionary Socialism in the 21st Century
 
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mental health

Greater Manchester mental health early intervention service strike

Video report from the Greater Manchester mental health early intervention service strike picket line

Cass Review: dangerous and transphobic

Lisa Leak and Colin Wilson explain why we should reject Cass and renew the fight for trans liberation.

Interview | Empire of Normality

Hazel Croft talks to author Robert Chapman about their new book and discusses neurodiversity and how we can challenge the capitalist logics of ‘normality’.

Hundreds gathered to oppose abuse of psychiatric patients, celebrate Mad culture, and call for psychiatric abolition.

Why should socialists think about psychoanalysis?

Following a series of rs21 meetings this autumn, Marianne Kelly considers what we gained from our discussions of therapy, the mental health industry and psychoanalysis as a tool to critique capitalism.

Mad Pride campaigns for psychiatric abolition

Hundreds gathered to oppose abuse of psychiatric patients, celebrate Mad culture, and call for psychiatric abolition.

Photo shows protestors rallying round a speaker outside NHS england and Elephant and Castle underground station at the demonstration on 4 December 2021, called by transgender action block.

A huge step forward for trans protest in Britain

rs21’s Charlotte Powell reports on a demonstration outside NHS England and explains why it is a hugely important moment in the struggle for trans liberation in Britain.

A picture of seaglass washed up on the beach.

Patient Humans and other poems

Leila Platt writes on experiences of mental health treatment, Covid and power in ‘Patient Humans’ and other poems.

lockdown mental health government Tories

A psychologist’s view: Tory blame games hurt our mental health

The government’s blame games and their failed Covid strategy have helped to turn the pandemic into a full-blown mental health crisis.

‘I can’t fathom how bad it’s going to get’

The Covid-19 pandemic is combining with further government attacks on the health service to push the NHS, and its workforce, into unprecedented crisis.

A group of people tending to a small flowerbed under a windowsill.

What a way to make a living – A former mental health care worker

A former care worker details her experiences in residential mental healthcare.

Review: The Work Cure

Jack Pickering reviews The Work Cure: critical essays on work and wellness

Organising in response to COVID-19

As criticism of the UK government’s response to the COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic mounts, rs21 members highlight the flourishing grassroots responses that aim to provide support and to demand more effective action from government and employers

Resistance not resilience: ruling class and radical approaches to mental health

While employers want healthy workers, they are not prepared to look at the deeper causes of mental distress.

Solidarity with university strike

Read the new bulletin on the UCU strike!

Introducing USS Strike Bulletin, a collaborative online project exploring the bigger questions around neoliberalism in Higher Education.

David Widgery book review

It Moves!

Barnaby Raine finds much to admire in Against Miserabilism, a new edition of writings by the late socialist author David Widgery

Living with depression under capitalism

Kate Bradley looks at her experience of depression, the interplay of austerity and mental health problems, and the ambivalent role of state services

Socialist views mental illness

The politics of mental health

Hazel Croft argues that, while reducing stigma is a good start, we also need a more radical approach to mental health

Stressed out: Twenty One Pilots and teenage lives today

Teenager Tazmin Aldis looks at the important issues behind Twenty One Pilots’ songs which have been watched a billion of times on Youtube.  Twenty One Pilots are the latest young American male duo to burst onto the music scene. Tyler Joseph and Josh Dun are perhaps unlikely suspects on today’s music charts which are typically flooded with the […]

LBGT organisations close in the face of Tory cuts despite claims of support

Organisations supporting LBGT people are currently closing down at a rapid rate. Colin Wilson discusses why this is happening despite the British ruling class claiming to support LGBT people. The number of LGBT youth groups in the North West has halved since 2010, reports the Guardian recently in an article headlined “Services for LGBT young people […]

The rise of the GERM: how is education messing with our minds?

With the neoliberal assault on education seemingly unending, Andrew Stone, a teacher and NUT rep in south London, considers the role of education today and how we can fight back “Anorexia is increasing among primary-age children. Self-harm was reported as a direct response to the pressure of SATs [national tests taken at ages 6-7 and 10-11] […]

No return to the thirties: an eyewitness warning

Jean Edmond looks back to the poverty and defeats of the 1930s, and warns against them returning. This article appeared in Issue 10 of the Northern Star, a Leeds based publication. My name is Jean Edmond. I was born on 19th March 1921 in Bootle near Liverpool, the daughter to a struggling housewife and an […]

Cambridge students boycott essays in campaign for reading week

Dan Swain reports on a new campaign by students at Cambridge University. Students at Cambridge University are campaigning for the introduction of a reading week, and committing to refuse to submit work during the fifth week of term in order to make it happen. The campaign reflects a growing awareness of the effect of stress […]

Not ‘crazy’ as in wacky, but ‘mad’ as in ‘fuck this’

A Marxist analysis of the mental ill health epidemic has to lay the blame squarely at the door of class society, and the alienation, injustice and misery it causes.

The politics of depression: Mark Fisher on mental health and class confidence

Anindya Bhattacharyya spoke to Mark Fisher about the politics of mental health, magical voluntarism and the ideology of neoliberalism.