While you two throw authority figures at each other as if someone's resume actually can mean they must be right, I have a few basic questions to think about.
1. Is our behavior dictated by the chemicals and hormones sloshing around our bodies, or do we actually think, weigh the evidence, consider the consequences, and make decisions of our own free will? Or perhaps, our behavior is a mix of both?
2. In a world without institutionalized education, would ADHD and ODD, etc ever be an issue? Is ADHD really an abnormality, or is it something that is just a normal characteristic of some human beings? After all, we on Fornit's criticize the Troubled Teen Industry for its one-size-fits-all approach while ignoring that education in the USA lumps all kids together by age in the same education model and expects every kid to be developmentally at the same level at the same age. Doesn't that just seem stupid, or is it just me?
3. Why are 84% of kids who take Ritalin, male? Perhaps a bias against aggressive, active, boy behavior in the schools?
In the 1960s, there was a movement away from the punishment model in our prisons, to the rehabilitation model. It was believed that criminals 'weren't born, society created them.' By definition, someone must be commiting a crime because they suffer from a mental disorder. Prisoners, therefore, should be treated instead of punished. Prisons should be replaced with mental hospitals. This model, besides being really scary, crashed and burned as it was discovered that rehabilitation was not nearly as easy or as effective as hoped.
In other words, think for yourselves folks, and ditch the authorities and experts. They tend to be idiots with an agenda, anyway.
