banect.info/

This is a static website, with no interactive content, so no push notifications, cookies, etc. & so refresh the browser manually for any updated content if returning. I often set links to open in a new tab or window and I try to indicate that action in mouseover hover text. This page was last edited/updated 09 Oct 2026.

This site is not affiliated with any similar named top level domains & my objective is to provide an augment for the cause of the global banishment of ECT (electroconvulsive therapy treatments) by presenting an argument that the tactics to coerce patients into attempting the treatment become more transparent when applying the idea of an ongoing enticement (carrot on a stick) paradigm that is utilized overall to persuade a (vulnerable & often disadvantaged) person to try; and then continue to stake their physical well-being on such a frivolous pursuit. There are people that currently use it & swear by it, but they can be lackeys for the administering "physicians" and are themselves seeking reinforcement of their self-harm by proxy "benefit".

Update: I haven't made any additions here that I've been meaning to, since again, this is such a discouraging practice in modern medicine considering the proponents who wittingly or unwittingly contribute to the continuation of the barbaric treatment. I might have mentioned a bit of this (below) but the machines to administer ECT exists and there is still capitalism involved to where they have no incintive to give up on profiting from the expensive equipment.

The information I've been wanting to include here is that in more recent social media debates on the topic there were a few proponents of the practice who shared common charcteristics with their arguments (anecdotal evidence) in which the term "catatonia" was mentioned as a matter of course.

I'm fairly certain that I've saved some screencaptures of the comments I refer to here, and will include them when I can, but the common components were that the recipients were depressed and catatonic. There was no other treatment that would work for the patients so the point was that anyone opposing the practice in light of the circumstances presented was an ignorant monster. (Of course the "circumstances" are not presented in their entirety, though.)

The proponents I refer to were family members, I think one was a husband (so the disproportionate application of the treatment to women aspect is inadvertently supported) who insisted that his wife required shock treatments in order to function (I paraphrase here). I'm certain another was regarding a parent of an adult child of theirs with the same basic narrative. Of course that means that the proponents in question here are the authors of a narrative and the word "author" is akin to "authority" so challenging the assertion made is akin to challenging authority. There's medical doctors who adminster the treatment and they have their ethics, are licensed practitioners afterall, so to continue the crusade against ECT is futile (is the ideology).

Or so people would think...

There is established scientific research with resulting articles regarding traumatic experiences and subsequent verbal communication impairment exhibited by survivors. Note that the particular article mentions trauma resulting from sexual violence but there are others which don't. I mentioned that here since that could be the most covenient point of contention to argue whether or not that would be applicable, and so forth.

I'm on federal disability benefits, so am disabled under federal law, but my kind is temporary in which I am subject to re-evaluation. (I do have minor physical disability too that is not readily apparent.) In the course of my advocacy I have realized what the central issue I have is that I consider myself an intellectual, having read a lot of both fictional and non-fictional literature in my life, and I am interested in various topics which share a community with people who have college level educations and whatnot. The issue for me is that I have not made a whole lot of money (or any) in pursuing any craft, business, trade, etc. which typically requires higher education so the obvious challenge to anything I have to discuss verbally in a conversation is subjected to be rebutted by the mere fact that I don't have a college degree. "Ad hominem" is the term for what I've described, or discrediting me completely for that fact alone.

The term Kafkatrapping (or forms of it) has been used in high federal court judicial reviews (that phrase can be searched for the proof of that assertion) so is an established and accepted concept in intellectual circles. I can further deduce here that the objective with the tactic in course of argument is to steer discussion to a topic (not really "subtopic") of the basic common human condition components of sex and violence. If that can be accomplished in course of an argument in a unrelatable topic (or directly relatable) then there is the opening for the inevitable ad hominem. The result can be simple frustration (oh, haha, see?) that can cause a person to become agitated and flustered resulting in their becoming unable to communicate distinctly. A person can lose the ability to articulate well and then that aspect is then used as evidence to refute/repudiate them.

I will provide a quick example of what could transpire in a discussion with a well-meaning advocate who has endured violent trauma themselves (for example) who is against the practice of shock treatments and presenting the case to ban ECT to a family member. There may be progress made to convince a person that ECT is wrong and the family member may be in agreement but yet still doesn't (admit to) seem to understand the problem since it is voluntary medical treatment (in most countries) so a person is free to not participate. If the advocate then said something along the lines of "but people are still essentially forcing them to undertake the proceedure" and then could quickly be faced with the family member laughing at them since what was said could easily be misconstrued as being about a man's foreskin because the two words, forcing and foreskin sound so similar. The advocate obviously is attempting to admit to being sexually frustrated but just doesn't have the willpower to overcome their problem.

With that point expressed I will leave this section (for now) with the definition of the fallacy "Argumentum ad baculum" (Latin for "argument to the cudgel" or "appeal to the stick") is an informal logical fallacy that occurs when someone uses force, coercion, or a threat of negative consequences to compel acceptance of a conclusion instead of using reason or evidence.

§ 872. The 'argumentum ad baculum' is unquestionably a form of irrelevancy. To knock a man down when he differs from you in opinion may prove your strength, but hardly your logic.
"Deductive Logic (1888)" Author: St. George William Joseph Stock

It is not difficult to surmise a plausible scenario in which a recipient of ECT is coerced into accepting the treatments in the course of an ultimatum involving their ability to communicate verbally in any capacity with anyone. Even though it's admiited (now) that there is resulting brain damage, the recipient makes the choice of accepting that consequence in trade for their freedom of speech. It is self-immolation that is coerced. In other words the recipient's vulnerability is extorted in the course of capitalism.

Oh... I located at least one of the comments I was referring to, there were others as well. This one was thorough enough to include what was needed for my purposes. No, I didn't fabricate the person's assertion but it's sorta so hokey (and tragic) that it could be assumed so. The cliche’ exists in which there is a narrative that some people's associated background or (socioeconomic) circumstances, and the consequent fortitude necessary to overcome the odds, is at higher degree than what an average person who interjects themselves in the advocacy against the practice is capable of understanding and is actually just weak, foolish, jealous, sheltered, privileged, etc., or shaming them in other words. There is the perpetual non-intellectual stand-in posit (for lack of better term) that anyone who involves themselves in other people's problems with intentions to help but are not obligated to be by matter of occupation are just in denial about their own lack of sexual satisfaction in their lives so therefore are actually dangerous themselves. So the medical providers participating and their patients are the mature adults in the resulting narrative which means the opposition thereby is not. Or, the other option is again, their ignorance is to blame. (The question there then is what exactly are they supposedly ignoring.) In any event, of course the practitioners can use the people's willingness to abuse themselves physically as reason to continue promoting their malpractice.

Alison F—

I have had a course of ECT treatments twice in my life...both fixed the problems so deep & wide that there existed no other way back to victory, hope & life.

My sweetheart the same.

Iremember being almost catatonic in my 20's when my parents & psychiatrist asked me to sign. Having no comprehension of their reasons~ I did, deep down inside, want to trust them. So I signed for ECT @ roughly 24yrs.old.

BEST CHOICE I made in that painful era.

The 2nd time I was committed after 6-7 deaths of my dearest & favorite companions-

I fairly grabbed my psychiatrist's jacket pleading: "Can we try ECT for me? Please! think it will work". He smiled: "I had exactly that treatment n mind for you, Alison.”

ECT worked wonders!

Again.

Overwhelming pain & chronic m.h.disease over time beat a nerve path of depression, hallucination + suicidal ideation in many of us. The ECT goes in gently & shocks certain routes + cells to disrupt this destructive route. When you are recovering, at least in my case- all sorts of happy childhood memories had space now to flood me with joy.

My responses to negativiy no longer beat the old street in my head. Twas FREE again!

Bill & his sister made that choice for him after his service. He had same resurrecton

Earlier content...

I personally wasn't going to involve myself to this extent with this cause due to emotional toll (oh, sadistic people catch on & are always ready to scapegoat an advocate for human rights!) ... but it dawned on me that the providers were using an ongoing enticement tactic when I read the account of someone who experienced the sessions. He wrote that there were a series of them that he committed to, and completed in spite of the fact that there was another event in his life during the interim between sessions that was a hindrance. (Note: I re-read over those parts in Matt's book & he missed three appts. He was still determined though, is the point.) It became clear that it was by his principles that he was resolved to follow through with finishing his appointments.

So then it becomes more obvious that there are the tactics of appealing to a patient's own moral ethics (don't waste peoples' time unless you're serious, type thing), & exploiting their desperation. The patient is validated by the attention and acceptance. They'd feel an inclusion into a prestigious & esoteric cult that is even gov't & culturally sanctioned. With everything said & done the patient doesn't have much alternative but to see it as a positive experience so there's placebo, too!

I further contend here that if there is physical benefit it is possibly only an adrenaline rush produced in the body that causes an endorphin release ... I haven't made a point to look into that idea further ... but a person could feel tough by enduring the treatment even with the (newer) anesthetics used. I don't want to know much about the drugs used either but I once seen somebody say there's a new one used that helps "reboot the brain", was the way it was phrased. ⇽ I was involved in an argument on social media where someone was insisting that it was the anesthetic, propofol, that helped "reset" the brain but the person may have associated the article I found (prior link given) with ECT. The words "reset" & "reboot" are both liberally used in pseudo-scientific articles that I've found though, such as here & here.

Note: I had the idea that the word exhilarating may be applicable for the benefit and so I searched for electroconvulsive therapy "exhilarating" (the quotes to show results that include the word). One of the results contained the word but in comments of an article and not directly associated with the treatment. The article is actually in defense of ECT by a recipient, Natasha Tracy, that was published a bit over a decade ago. The comment that includes the word is praising Natasha's article and is from another woman who professes to benefit from the treatments. Natasha's argument is flawed from the beginning though, since she presents it from a skewed perspective (meant to shame those who advocate against ECT) in that it's implied that it's the recipients that we find fault with for cooperating with the providers. It's really taking part in promoting the treatments ... vehemently defending ECT to the point of quoting some neurological details on how well it's actually understood by the doctors ... again, to shame us ... if it's so well understood then why would there be any discernible "memory loss"? (she admits is a side-effect). The question needs to be asked is how could that be accurately evaluated? Granted, I'm thinking that there'd be a retort of "there's memories I'd like to forget" but that's an irrational, emotional defense. I would like to point out that there's also coinciding natural maturing process of the person where they can feel invincible when young adults that can outwardly be revealed with their recklessness and physical risks taken for excitement and that normally would subside in late twenties. (We call that a "variable".)

In this light I would also point out from personal observation (and I'm inserting two paragraphs here, this one and the preceding one, so I may have already mentioned this...) but there are the people in the mental health system culture who are fine with the role of perpetual patient ... people that like to take any opportunity to talk about the abuse they've endured ... oftentimes in such a way to shame anyone who takes a minute to listen ... and that's their purpose in this life in their view. I used the term self-mutilation by proxy which is (obviously) oxymoronic, but as fitting as I can come up with. To promote that lifestyle isn't very responsible or fair. I've probably also mentioned that the recipients are seeking reinforcement and Natasha's article seems to affirm that theory. I'd like to also note that there was a man that commented about ECT helping his wife and he included a link to their/her blog but the link is dead. What's the mortality rate among the people merely commenting on Natasha's article? How many that defended it a decade ago still would now? (I'll probably use the article comments to delve into doing some of my own research eventually.) In the U.S. the confidentiality laws coupled with the exception of a patient's right to review their own psych records is used to the providers' advantage to cover the violating of 14th Amendment U.S. Constitutional rights of people caught up in their system.

The proponents' argument for ECT is a house of cards when critically scrutinized! There are a lot of ostensibly legitimate articles that tout ECT as life-saving but there are also many people who regret receiving treatments (and mention their brain damage) yet are not being heard in the medical journal articles or in "mainstream media" when the topic is covered!

Oh! Their other argument is that ECT is non-invasive but my contention is that the "non-invasive" is based on accepted cultural concept of electricity; that it's energy & not a physical material substance or object (& drop the subject since it is a scientific thing & they're the "scientists" there so don't worry about that, type thing), but a question I had is "do electrons have mass" and there was an answer here: "Why does an electron have mass?". Someone with a bachelor's degree in science from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute included in the answer: "We know that electrons have mass because we’ve measured it directly.", so electricity has physical mass (or weight) so it is invasive in the literal sense of the word. The providers should know that & disclose the information to the potential recipient!

This article, Electroconvulsive Treatment: Hypotheses about Mechanisms of Action, confirms my theory that the electricty doesn't do anything beneficial that couldn't be achieved in some other truly non-invasive way. I used the expression "adrenaline rush" because that was a generic term that I used when I was younger. I surmised that the people promoting the treatment might've never had such a sensation without a coinciding physical event. There is a kind of (dangerous) illicit drug combination that a person can experience with narcotics or barbiturates and stimulants, i.e., heroin & "speed", that will produce similar sensation without any external physical stimuli. I personally have never tried that combination but have experienced what I determined to be similar sensation with an effective combination of drugs. That was one of my personal comparisons that I utilized, anyway.

In some countries it is legal to use ECT on a involuntary (non-consenting) patient in spite of the fact that the United Nations Human Rights Council has condemned forced psychiatric treatment, including electroshock therapy (ECT).

Dr. Alice Stewart alerted the medical community that x-rays used on pregnant women can harm unborn children and was countered with a study related to the effects of atomic bomb radiation, but there was a difference in type of exposure. 30 more years of x-rayed babies before it changed. (So there's that to consider).