Video Interview of pioneer and campaigner Slyvia Caras

[Jill]

http://www.peoplewho.org/

Slyvia Caras in the interview above is a pioneer for people who (people who experience voices, visions, mood changes and fear) as she calls those of us with mental health disabilities getting together on the internet. In fact my first experience of email contact with others like me was on the Madness list Slyvia started back in the 1990s. Not many people in the UK were even on the internet but in the US they were more advanced and over 500 people were on that list.

Now in her 70s Slyvia still runs the People Who site, the Iris announcement list and campaigns in international and local arenas for our voices to be heard. In this interview she argues against the expansion of mental health services especially into areas like diagnosing and medicating children and sees intervention as a poor substitute for care and communication in our communities and in society.

[Jill]

PS

I did meet Sylvia in Oxford once when she was stopping over on her way to an international conference and we discussed the power of the internet to enable us to unite and form allies and get support with others who are affected by mental health disabilities. Have we made the most of the opportunties the internet provides for increased communication and less isolation or are we wasteing its potential I wonder?