This is the most profound book I ever read. Laing defines mental illness as an ontological crisis with the potential to be a spiritual breakthrough. He decries psychiatry for perversely thwarting this potential with various forms of torture (incarceration, drugs, electroshock, etc.) As to normality, Laing argues it is the product of a pathological "us and them" mentality underlying personal identity and group dynamics.
To be well-adjusted to our modern dysfunctional society is not healthy for the individual or society. Who is more dangerous? Laing asks: the psychotic who mistakenly believes he carries a hydrogen bomb in his stomach or the perfectly adjusted B-52 bomber pilot who will drop very real hydrogen bombs when ordered to do so?
The chapter titled "The Bird of Paradise" is hypnotically poignant in exploring the inner world of thoughts and emotions. Laing was much more than a scientist. He was a visionary who shed light on the dark role of pscyhiatrists as voodoo-like priests and purveyors of social engineering.
The Politics of Experience critiques the idea of normality in modern society, and argues that it is not people who are mad, but the world. It presents psychosis as "a psychedelic voyage of discovery in which the boundaries of perception were widened, and consciousness expanded". It was inspired by Laing's extensive experimentation with LSD. Although he never considered himself an anti-psychiatrist, Laing has been called "the most influential and iconic of the anti-psychiatrists of the 1960s and 1970s". The Politics of Experience is his best-known book.
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