Mad Anarchy: Defending The Right to be Different

People in the US labelled as ‘mentally ill’ have a 16 times higher risk of being killed during a police encounter, compared to people not labelled as such – a 2015 report says. This risk of being killed intersects and cumulates with race and class. In other places in the world, being labelled ‘mentally ill’ is also associated with a higher risk. Police killings are only the top of the iceberg of the major repression faced by people with this ascribed label. Society generally fears, shuns, distrusts, rejects and attacks them, or tries to treat and help but often in a paternalistic-authoritarian way. Many are made to feel as if they exist only to be normalized. In this session we together are going to explore ways to address this dimension of domination as anarchists, and work towards a society that is truly free for all equally – also for those who are mentally different or ‘mad’.