Our fundraising drive continues in November! We hope to raise the money needed for MindFreedom’s Comfort Calls/Shield program.

We will be developing a training program and continue recruiting dedicated volunteers who will give hope to people in their darkest moments.

In addition to intensive training and staffing program oversight, your donation will help us to purchase tracking software, design/create training materials and continue the call-in support program in our New York office.

Please visit the donation page here:
http://www.razoo.com/story/Comfort-Calls-Shield-Program

Please give as generously as you can to help us re-invigorate this vitally important program. If you can’t donate at this time, you can still help us reach our goal by sharing this newsletter WIDELY with family and friends. And don’t forget to post a link to it on your Facebook page.

What is the Comfort Calls/Shield program?
Comfort Calls program is a collection of specially-trained volunteers who are available by phone to offer a measure of peer support for callers who are under stress of an abuse by or within the mental health system. It is not meant to be a crisis line for emergencies.

The MindFreedom Shield Campaign is an extension of our Comfort Calls program, which provides additional protection for MindFreedom members who want to register. The service is provided free of charge to MindFreedom members only. Our volunteers are trained to help you through the process of signing up. If a member with a Shield is threatened with coerced psychiatry, that member can quickly activate a public alert system.

I hope you will you join in helping us raise what is needed for this crucial MindFreedom program. Thank you!

Sincerely,

Celia Brown, Board President
MindFreedom International

Visit our Facebook page to get up-to-the-minute posts on issues of importance for our work to win human rights in the mental health system. We welcome your comments and involvement!

A September 29th airing of a 60 Minutes segment shamefully portrayed people with psychiatric histories as violent, inhuman, unworthy of compassion and incapable of making their own decisions. CBS offered one point of view from E.Fuller Torrey, whose solution is more forced treatment and a life sentence of psychiatric institutionalization and incarceration.

In response this media disaster that promotes stereotypes and completely leaves out the voices of psychiatric survivors, MindFreedom has launched a change.org petition to CBS. We have called the petition, “Jeffrey Fager, 60 Minutes Executive Producer: Let Psychiatric Survivors Speak for Themselves!”

Nearly 300 people have signed so far, but we need many more of you to voice your concern…please sign this URGENT petition and share WIDELY!

The MindFreedom Choices Committee is planning a conference for July 24th through July 27th, 2014, at Wisdom House in Connecticut.

Visit the MindFreedom web site to find out more, or to prepay* before December 31, 2013, email: creativerevolution2014@gmail.com.

The goal of the conference is to inspire and encourage more people to develop alternatives to the mental health system. We will create time for networking so that people can support each other in building and running alternatives.

* $25 discount available to those who prepay before December 31st.

MFI Book Club starting up:
Sign up today!

Sign up today, by clicking here to add your name to the LISTSERV called, “MFI-BookClub-Talk.” We’ll announce the first book choice for December via the LISTSERV or watch for an announcement on our Facebook page.

The book by Robert Whitaker (pictured to the left), “Anatomy of an Epidemic,” is just one of many that are available from our MadMarket online bookstore.