Scientology takes heat Down Under

MSNBC/September 19, 2006
By Jeanette Walls

Don’t be surprised if Tom Cruise blasts Australia as being “glib.”

The federal government’s mental-health spokesman has blasted an anti-psychiatry exhibit sponsored by an offshoot of Scientology as “incredibly irresponsible.”

The exhibition, operated by the Citizens Commission on Human Rights, slams psychiatric practices and claims that psychiatry is an “industry of death.”

“It’s ill-informed and it’s dangerous to undermine a highly respected and important part of the medical profession,” Christopher Pyne, Australia’s parliamentary secretary for health with special responsibilities for mental health told Australia’s Daily Telegraph. “Patients who see a psychiatrist shouldn’t have their faith in psychiatry shaken by crackpot claims.”

But Shelly Wilkins, the executive director of the exhibit, says that CCHR doesn’t oppose psychiatrists, merely their practices, explaining, “None of psychiatry’s so-called disorders or illnesses or diseases are actually based on any scientific proof.”