Fatal Freedom Quotes

“The insanity defense is not merciful. Involuntary mental hospitalization is not a treatment. Both are coercive methods of social control. Both rest on attributing an absence of mens rea to the actor. Both result in the "protected" person's being deprived of liberty. Both function as tactical weapons in psychiatry's war on dignity, liberty, and responsibility.”
― Thomas Szasz, Fatal Freedom: The Ethics and Politics of Suicide

“The fact that physicians commit suicide more frequently than do lay persons ought to unmask their claims about suicide prevention as self-serving propaganda.”
― Thomas Szasz, Fatal Freedom: The Ethics and Politics of Suicide

“The person who kills himself sees suicide as a solution. If the observer views it as a problem, he precludes understanding the suicide just as surely as he would preclude understanding a Japanese speaker if he assumed that he is hearing garbled English.”
― Thomas Szasz, Fatal Freedom: The Ethics and Politics of Suicide