In Memoriam: A Cautionary Tale and A Legendary Tale

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PSYCHIATRIC VIEWS ON THE DAILY NEWS

Psychiatry is always loaded with challenges, probably because it so readily is connected with how society grapples with the vulnerabilities of human nature. One such challenge is how we have the tendency to blame and scapegoat the other for perceived risks. That contributes to racism. Another is how we explain the worst ways people can treat one another. That contributes to cults.

Over the year, 2 psychiatrists have passed away that we have yet eulogized, one who was associated with cultish false memories about prior abuse, and another who broke racial barriers in psychiatry. They provide lessons of caution and inspiration.

Bennett Braun, MD: Dissociative Disasters

Dr Braun died on March 20, as discussed on April 12, 2024, in the New York Times article “Bennett Braun, Psychiatrist Who Fueled ‘Satanic Panic’, Dies at 83.”¹

He became well-known in the early 1980s. As people began to claim to having been abused by devil worshipers, Dr Braun—and some other psychiatrists—claimed that he could help patients uncover memories of childhood trauma that evolved into multiple personality disorders. The media covered sensational stories of such abuse.

Around the same period, I had a couple of patients who seemed to recall being involved in an abusive cult. Treatment guidelines were absent, so I decided to proceed with caution and curiosity.

Dr Braun set up a hospital unit dedicated to dissociative disorders in Chicago. Some of the patients were medicated and kept hospitalized for a year or more. One of them was said to be a leader of a cult that had tortured thousands of children. She came to believe that and recalled “eating body parts of up to 2000 people a year.”

As the social panic about such cases waned in the early 1990s without corroborating evidence, that patient sued him and won her case. His unit was closed and Dr Braun received a 2-year suspension of his license, though not admitting any wrongdoing. Later, in Montana, he lost his license for overprescribing medication.

June Jackson Christmas, MD: Breaking Barriers

During the same early 1980s, Dr Christmas became the first Black woman president of the American Public Health Association. Before that, she was commissioner of the Department of Mental Health and Retardation under 3 different New York mayors. She broke other racial barriers, fulfilling her desire that “maybe if I went into psychiatric medicine I could teach people not to be racist.”

Later in her life, she concluded that “the barrier of racism is greater than being a woman,” according to her obituary in the January 4, 2024, New York Times article “June Jackson Christmas, Pioneering Psychiatrist, Dies at 99.”2

Other areas of special interest for her included geriatrics, alcoholism, foster care, and deinstitutionalization. She also received a certificate in psychoanalysis from the William Alanson White Institute.

Among other things, her legacy included the Dr June Jackson Christmas Program to help underrepresented groups enter psychiatry as a profession. What was her own strategy to be a pioneer in overcoming racism? She said: “It seems to me that I’ve often been in places where if you wanted to make life better for yourself, you had to work to make life better for everybody.” And she did.

Lessons Learned

The careers of Drs Braun and Christmas overlapped in time, but could not be more different. Among other things, one failed despite social advantages, while the other succeeded despite social obstacles. As the Aesop fable of the hare and tortoise goes, the tortoise’s plucky perseverance usually eventually can win the race over the overconfident hare.

Dr Moffic is an award-winning psychiatrist who specialized in the cultural and ethical aspects of psychiatry and is now in retirement and retirement as a private pro bono community psychiatrist. A prolific writer and speaker, he has done a weekday column titled “Psychiatric Views on the Daily News” and a weekly video, “Psychiatry & Society,” since the COVID-19 pandemic emerged. He was chosen to receive the 2024 Abraham Halpern Humanitarian Award from the American Association for Social Psychiatry. Previously, he received the Administrative Award in 2016 from the American Psychiatric Association, the one-time designation of being a Hero of Public Psychiatry from the Speaker of the Assembly of the APA in 2002, and the Exemplary Psychiatrist Award from the National Alliance for the Mentally Ill in 1991. He is an advocate and activist for mental health issues related to climate instability, physician burnout, and xenophobia. He is now editing the final book in a 4-volume series on religions and psychiatry for Springer: Islamophobia, anti-Semitism, Christianity, and now The Eastern Religions, and Spirituality. He serves on the Editorial Board of Psychiatric Times.

References

1. Risen C. Bennett Braun, psychiatrist who fueled ‘satanic panic’, dies at 83. The New York Times. April 12, 2024. Accessed October 18, 2024. https://www.nytimes.com/2024/04/12/us/bennett-braun-dead.html

2. Roberts S. June Jackson Christmas, pioneering psychiatrist, dies at 99. The New York Times. January 4, 2024. Accessed October 18, 2024. https://www.nytimes.com/2024/01/04/nyregion/june-jackson-christmas-dead.html