![\"The](\"http:\/\/1boringoldman.com\/images\/hundred-year-war.jpg\" "\\"The")
<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
![\"Hundred](\"http:\/\/1boringoldman.com\/images\/hundred-year-war.gif\" "\\"Hundred")
Anybody recall what it was about? I remembered the Black Death<\/font><\/em>, Joan of Arc<\/font><\/em>, the introduction of the longbow in the Battle of Agincourt<\/font><\/em>. As for what it was about? England v France, Kings and things<\/font> – that’s about all I could remember. One thing I never knew, the distinct cultural identities of France and England, including languages, were formed and consolidated during that conflict. Apparently a good war is a powerful organizer of national unity and cultural identity. <\/div>\nThe thing that got me on this topic [conflicts that don’t seem to end] was thinking about all the discord lately around the questions of using maintenance antipsychotic medication in Schizophrenia and the long term use of psychiatric medications in general. I remembered similar debates from forty years ago. And I thought about how much professional identity had [and has] to do with where people stand on this issue. all of which relates to the recent Maudsley Debate…<\/a> «Does long term use of psychiatric drugs cause more harm than good?<\/font><\/strong><\/em>» [speaking of British Wars]. <\/p>\n The Maudsley Debate didn’t do a much for me. The Yes<\/font><\/em> camp had Sami Timimi<\/a>, a British child psychiatrist with the Critical Psychiatric Network<\/a> and Peter Gøtzsche<\/a> of the Nordic Cochrane Group and author of Deadly Medicines and Organised Crime: How Big Pharma has Corrupted Healthcare<\/font><\/em>. On the No<\/font><\/em> side, we had Allan Young<\/a>, Mood Disorders researcher at Kings College, London<\/a> with heavy industry ties and John Crace<\/a>, who writes for The Guardian<\/a> and spoke as a patient. The audience was on the Yes<\/font><\/em> side both before, [during,] and after the debate. The moderator did her best trying to hold the speakers and questioners to the topic [but her best wasn’t enough with such a polarized issue].<\/p>\n I knew what each of them was going to say [as will you]. And I didn’t like the question. My mind kept saying things like "For whom?<\/font><\/em>" "Which Patient?<\/font><\/em>" "Which drug? in Which Patient? For What?<\/font><\/em>" I expect that in a world of indiscriminate<\/span> or rampant overprescribing, I might go for a Yes<\/font><\/em>. But I don’t do indiscriminate<\/span> or rampant overprescribing, so I’d be a No<\/font><\/em>. But the audience at this debate might think otherwise and lump me in one or the other bad guy camp. etc. etc. I don’t like the question. But I think I might spend some time thinking about why, and blogging about that [at a later time] rather than responding to the question on the table [at a later time]. <\/p>\n The Hundred Year War started during the ravages of the Black Death and ending when the heroism and martyrdom of Joan of Arc inspired the resurgence that ultimately closed that chapter of history: "Bubonic plague and warfare reduced population numbers throughout Europe during this period. France lost half its population during the Hundred Years’ War. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_bbp_topic_count":0,"_bbp_reply_count":0,"_bbp_total_topic_count":0,"_bbp_total_reply_count":0,"_bbp_voice_count":0,"_bbp_anonymous_reply_count":0,"_bbp_forum_subforum_count":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-57170","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-opinion"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/1boringoldman.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57170","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/1boringoldman.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/1boringoldman.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/1boringoldman.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/1boringoldman.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=57170"}],"version-history":[{"count":28,"href":"https:\/\/1boringoldman.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57170\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":57641,"href":"https:\/\/1boringoldman.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57170\/revisions\/57641"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/1boringoldman.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=57170"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/1boringoldman.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=57170"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/1boringoldman.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=57170"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"War](\"http:\/\/1boringoldman.com\/images\/roses.gif\" "\\"War")
One of my memories from early childhood was of standing in our front yard when everyone had gone crazy. People were beating on pans and shooting guns, laughing and hugging each other – my parents included. My mother noticed I was frightened, crying I think. She said something like, "Don’t worry. We’re happy. The War is over!<\/font><\/em> [WWII]. But that made things worse, because I didn’t know that "War<\/font><\/em>" was something that was ever "over<\/font><\/em>". Where would it go? I thought war was just a part of life [actually, I think I might have been right about that at age 4]. Oh, by the way, the War of Roses started a few years after the end of the Hundred Years War. <\/p>\nLike the British Wars of antiquity, this one looks as if it may go on and on without resolution for a very long time… <\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"