Dr John Read

Professor, Clinical Psychology, University of East London. Chair, International Institute for Psychiatric Drug Withdrawal Opinions my own

[Dr John Read @ReadReadj]

On a lighter ‘note’. Our community choir performing at the Forest Gate Festival this summer. (I’m the one doing a bad Blues Brothers impersonation at the back.) Makes me happy for a moment amid the madness of our frightening world.

[Dr John Read @ReadReadj]

@TuominenPiia @joannamoncrieff Glad your work is bearing fruit in Finland Piia. (That comment has no empirical support. My English way of saying it’s nonsense.)

[Piia Tuominen @TuominenPiia]

Oh my… The topics we discussed with Professor @joannamoncrieff last Friday have sparked a discussion on my Finnish Facebook page. Someone said, for example, that I should read the latest research on ADs and neuroplasticity, and how ADs correct depression b/c of that.

[Dr John Read @ReadReadj]

Speaks volumes about Ashok Kumar, Polanski and the Ex-Green party. https://t.co/pI7qmBqXEf

[Dr John Read @ReadReadj]

https://t.co/SXYz12Hlz3

[Dr John Read @ReadReadj]

@RedYorkshire1 I also oppose the behaviour of the Israeli government. I also oppose Hamas. I also think it’s antisemitic to call the belief in a State where people can feel safe after 6 million of their relatives were slaughtered racist. It’s complicated. It’s possible to support two peoples.

[Dr John Read @ReadReadj]

If they were tearful it was an understandable response to your depressing and scary antisemitism.

[Ashok Kumar @comrade_kumar_]

Went on BBC Politics Live to discuss why Zionism is a racist ideology. The anchor and all three panelists looked like they were about to cry at the end. Very weird behaviour.

Join the Green Party.

[Dr John Read @ReadReadj]

@psychgeist52 Well put James, as usual.

[James Barnes MSc., MA @psychgeist52]

My concern with the prevalence of autism and ADHD diagnoses is this: purported neurological explanations displace psychosocial ones. Relational & social origins are thereby obscured, leaving personal difficulties & the relational and social conditions sustaining them unaddressed.

[Loading... @PieAreSqwared]

100 billion neurons and 500 trillion synapses, yet psychiatry thinks they understand this system enough to tamper with by throwing understudied drugs at arguably the worlds most complex black box.

[Dr. Roger McFillin @DrMcFillin]

Let our kids scrape their knees, fail tests, get their hearts broken, and figure things out without pathologizing every stumble. For the small percentage who genuinely need help, by all means, get them support. But for the vast majority? Keep them out of the mental health system entirely.

[Garrett W Ennis @GarrettWEnnis2]

Working in a state hospital, the collectiv view that the the treatment teams have, on average, are the views of the psychiatrists who spend 10 minutes with the patient a week, and see them only as a diagnosis whose only valid treatment is polypharmacy. It's so sad to see. The psychotropic medication interferes so greatly with real, effective therapeutic work.

[LGBTI Rights 🇮🇪32 @RightsLGBTI]

@JDaviesPhD This pathetic subservience causes so much harm and so many needless deaths. Think, for instance, how biopsychiatry still dominates the suicide prevention space, even though this individual pathology approach has for decades failed to produce any positive change.

[Justin Garson @justin_garson]

@JDaviesPhD You see this constantly. It's like underlings trying to suck up to superiors in order to gain some small advantage. I think it's a terrible miscalculation.

[James Davies 💭 @JDaviesPhD]

Mental health professionals being servile to psychiatry out of fear, ignorance or a quiet hope to make friends in higher places, is a frustrating thing to so widely observe.

[James Barnes MSc., MA @psychgeist52]

This clearly coincides with the rise in ADHD & autism diagnoses.

The point is not, however, that really some of those have bipolar, but that heterogeneous & ambiguous human experiences get categorised in different ways at different points. Just a mirage of objectivity.

[Dr John Read @ReadReadj]

Don’t you mean “Join the Anti-Semitic ex-Green Party”
And “1% of the membership has manipulated”?

[Ashok Kumar @comrade_kumar_]

The smears don’t work.
The membership has spoken.

Equal rights for all from the river to the sea!

Join the only major party that supports Palestinian Liberation.

https://t.co/IalkThrvSJ

[Peter Tatchell @PeterTatchell]

Was the Zionism is Racism motion promoted in a bid to destroy @ZackPolanski’s leadership & to crash voter support for @TheGreenParty?
Was their aim to sink the Greens to revive Your Party?
If so, they have succeeded. Support for Greens has slumped & Zack’s personal popularity has tanked.
https://t.co/sE8zORYsVF
Via @SangitaMyska
@owenjonesjourno @AaronBastani @mehdirhasan @ZoeJardiniere @GreenRupertRead @CarolineLucas @AdrianRamsay @EllieChowns @sianberry @jon_bartley @johnharris1969 @ZoeGarbett @zoesqwilliams @GeorgeMonbiot @mrjamesob @LukeAlsford @IainDale @DaleVince

[Medicating Normal @MedicatingNorm1]

"Recent research links benzodiazepine use to increased risks of heart failure, cognitive impairment in people diagnosed with schizophrenia, miscarriage during pregnancy, and falls and fractures in older adults."

https://t.co/LGF3E7xQH4

[Piia Tuominen @TuominenPiia]

@joannamoncrieff: ”I think psychiatrists have been very slow to accept these problems, partly because they just can't bear to acknowledge that these very widely prescribed drugs that all psychiatrists have been prescribing for a long time, can be so damaging.” 🔗👇

[Medicating Normal @MedicatingNorm1]

We are pleased to pass along this message and invitation from Katinka Blackford Newman, founder of Antidepressant Risks (@antideprisks)

Dear all,

I'm delighted to announce the launch of Antidepressant Risks in Conversation, a new series of live online events featuring leading researchers, writers, clinicians and campaigners exploring the risks of psychiatric medication and wider questions about mental health care.

And I'm thrilled that our first guest will be Robert Whitaker, award-winning investigative journalist, author of Anatomy of an Epidemic and founder of Mad in America.

Tuesday 10 November 2026
6–7pm GMT (1–2pm EST)
Live on Zoom

Book tickets here:
https://t.co/6XrzTGGuVl

I'll be interviewing Robert about his work, the evidence surrounding long-term psychiatric drug use and where we go from here. There will also be an opportunity for audience questions.

The idea behind this series is to create a space for thoughtful, open discussion, bringing together different perspectives and reaching audiences beyond our existing community.

These will be monthly, ticketed Zoom events, with proceeds supporting the work of Antidepressant Risks.

I'd love you to join us, and would be enormously grateful if you could share the event with your networks. We're hoping to build this into a regular forum for important conversations that don't always get the attention they deserve.

Book tickets here:
https://t.co/6XrzTGGuVl

Warm wishes,

Katinka