Dr. Kirstie Alley Purges Tucker Carlson's Body Thetans

The Scientologist actress has some thoughts on mental illness.

One thing we have really made strides on, as a culture, is destigmatizing mental illness, as well as destigmatizing getting help for mental illness. It's no longer looked at as a personal failure or a source of shame, and seeking therapy or getting on needed medications isn't seen as being weak.

But Tucker Carlson and Kirstie Alley would like to change that.

Alley, who has been on a quest to ruin whatever legacy or good will she had for quite some time now (and unlike some, I actually really liked her as an actress prior to all of this weirdness), shared her thoughts on depression and mental illness — and did a little Scientology proselytizing while she was at it. Because of course she did.

Alley's particular bone to pick here was with the fact that, according to her, "one-third" of the kids at her kids' private school in Los Angeles were on "psychotropic drugs," noting that "they would go every day and the nurse would hand out their drugs to them." And, you know — if true, that would be a fair point of discussion for people more qualified to get into it than Kirstie Alley and Tucker Carlson. But instead, Alley just started going off on how depression is not a mental illness.

Transcript via Media Matters:

KIRSTIE ALLEY (GUEST): You aren't really allowed to say this in the very liberal community because they think what you're saying is stigmatizing mental illness. Well this is what I'm here to say — I don't think you're mentally ill if you're depressed.

TUCKER CARLSON (HOST): Right, I agree.

ALLEY: I don't think you're mentally ill —

CARLSON: Life is sad!

Life is sad sometimes. Especially with Tucker Carlson in it. But sadness is not "depression." They are different things. Sadness is a temporary mood brought on by a specific thing that happened, depression is a persistent state that involves much more than simply feeling sad. It can involve chemical imbalances, the way the nerves in one's brain function, the size of one's hippocampus and other physical things . People take medications to correct those issues so that their brains can function the way they're supposed to, just like other people might take heart medication so their heart can function the way it's supposed to.

Alley then goes on to explain that when she was a kid, her grandfather died and she was sad, and then claims that if she had the "right parents" right now, she would have been drugged — which is actually not really how things work. Psychologists understand the difference between situational sadness and clinical depression.

ALLEY: But I — You know people say to me "well you're a Scientologist." I feel lucky that I'm a Scientologist. Because in Scientology that is what part of and what you do is you find out why you're so screwed up. And you find out why are you depressed, there's a reason people are depressed.

BODY THETANS. The answer is body thetans. Getting rid of your body thetans and telling your auditor things that Scientology can use to blackmail you should you ever try to leave is obviously the best way to deal with depression.

CARLSON: I think you're supposed to see a psychiatrist though? Isn't that the law?

ALLEY: Well I — I don't do — the reason I don't go to a psychiatrist is because in their bag are the drugs, that's the main way they treat people.

CARLSON: Yes.

This is true. Because that is one specific function of psychiatrists. People often go to see a therapist or a psychologist for therapy and go to a psychiatrist for meds, if that is a thing they need.

ALLEY: I just want someone to go like "what's going on?" and you say "blah blah."

Yes, that would be therapy. Lots of people benefit from therapy without medication, while others need medication. And as much as some psychological meds can be "overprescribed" by crappy doctors (just as opiates and other non-psychological medications can be overprescribed by crappy doctors) they can also be life-saving. Obviously.

It's the dose that makes the poison. Medicating people who don't need it is bad, medicating people who do need it is good. This is not that hard.

All of that being said, I do hope this is all just a pitch to turn Tucker Carlson into a Scientologist, as he is one of the few people I can think of who would truly deserve everything that Scientology has to offer people. He obviously has way too many body thetans and is going to have to take a long trip on the Freewinds in order to get that sorted out.

[ Media Matters ]

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