Excuses, Excuses
Walter Freeman's son has tried to make a case for his father. Here's a quote:
Freeman's son remains steadfast in his determination to protect his father's legacy. "Today's climate is very different from the 1930s," he said. "The pioneers who faced the problems squarely and worked with what they had at hand should be honored, with due allowance for their imperfections. "Past abuses should not be repeated, but we need to know with clarity what they were, in order to avoid them, while maintaining freedom of action to deal with the unknown."
I wonder if by "imperfections" he means his father flippantly referring to his van as "a lobotomile"? I tend to call that callous and twisted. It's indicitive of his callous and twisted attitude toward his patients.
I wonder if another imperfection would be lobotomizing a 12-year-old-boy? I call that sick and criminal.
How about when he lobotomized Carol Noell's mother for headaches? Is that an imperfection? I call that a total departure from the supposed treatment guidelines that were in place which allowed operations only the "seriously mentally ill" or those with intractable pain.
It reminds me of that claim that Freeman lobotomized Rosemary Kennedy for "retardation". Freeman's son protests that Rosemary had "encephalitis" and that this is the reason that she was lobotomized. Of course, even if she did have encephalitis, why would his father lobotomize her for that? Isn't that ANOTHER departure from the supposed guidelines? Face it - there were no guidelines. He poked an icepick into the brains of anyone he could justify doing it to. Walter Freeman was a monster. He wasn't a maverick and he wasn't a genius.
Why did he take and keep photos of nearly every patient he ever had WITH the icepick still in their eyesocket? It's hard to believe he needed a photo of every single one simply for medical purposes ... I think he liked them.
Freeman's son remains steadfast in his determination to protect his father's legacy. "Today's climate is very different from the 1930s," he said. "The pioneers who faced the problems squarely and worked with what they had at hand should be honored, with due allowance for their imperfections. "Past abuses should not be repeated, but we need to know with clarity what they were, in order to avoid them, while maintaining freedom of action to deal with the unknown."
I wonder if by "imperfections" he means his father flippantly referring to his van as "a lobotomile"? I tend to call that callous and twisted. It's indicitive of his callous and twisted attitude toward his patients.
I wonder if another imperfection would be lobotomizing a 12-year-old-boy? I call that sick and criminal.
How about when he lobotomized Carol Noell's mother for headaches? Is that an imperfection? I call that a total departure from the supposed treatment guidelines that were in place which allowed operations only the "seriously mentally ill" or those with intractable pain.
It reminds me of that claim that Freeman lobotomized Rosemary Kennedy for "retardation". Freeman's son protests that Rosemary had "encephalitis" and that this is the reason that she was lobotomized. Of course, even if she did have encephalitis, why would his father lobotomize her for that? Isn't that ANOTHER departure from the supposed guidelines? Face it - there were no guidelines. He poked an icepick into the brains of anyone he could justify doing it to. Walter Freeman was a monster. He wasn't a maverick and he wasn't a genius.
Why did he take and keep photos of nearly every patient he ever had WITH the icepick still in their eyesocket? It's hard to believe he needed a photo of every single one simply for medical purposes ... I think he liked them.
posted by Christine at Tuesday, January 18, 2005
2 Comments:
I have personal proof in that every lobotomy victim or family member I've ever worked with was able to find a photo of their own or their loved one's operation. For example, Howard from the LA Times story (http://www.psychosurgery.org/index_files/Page3280.htm) found a photo of himself (at age 12) with the icepick in his eye in the George Washington University archives. Needless to say it was pretty disturbing.
Interestingly there are also many "thank you" notes among the photos in Freeman's archive. The librarian there, a Mr. Anderson, initially thought that Freeman's work couldn't have been so bad ... he had all these nice notes after all. I guess it never occurred to him that they weren't necessarily genuine. But then he met Howard, heard his story, saw the awful photo, and seemed to change his mind completely. But I digress.
Aside from all the anecdotal stuff, Dr. Elliot Valenstein of U. Mich. also wrote about it in his book "Great and Desperate Cures". I don't have it here or I'd look up the exact citation for you.
Here's that citation I mentioned earlier. It's on page 231 of "Great and Desperate Cures":
"Normally it took a certain force to drive the leucotome through the bony orbit, but in this patient, the bone was so thin that the laucotome went through with hardly a touch of the mallet. When Freeman, as was his custom, stepped back to to photgraph the leucotome in place, it sank a full two inches further into the brain up to the hilt of the handle."
The footnote on that reads in part:
"Freeman took a profile view of most patients with the leucotome in place. It is not clear what value these pictures had, other than to identify patients later or to prove, if necessary, that the surgery had been done."
I mean ... yikes.
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