And, please, don't commit the mistake to buy for a second that "this only happens in China". Rather, it's only in the NYT because it happened in China and not in a Western country.
In an investigative report published Monday by a state-owned newspaper, public security officials in the city of Xintai in Shandong Province were said to have been institutionalizing residents who persist in their personal campaigns to expose corruption or the unfair seizure of their property. Some people said they were committed for up to two years, and several of those interviewed said they were forcibly medicated.
[...]
During a 20-day stay, he said, he was lashed to a bed, forced to take pills and given injections that made him numb and woozy. According to the paper, when he told the doctor he was a petitioner, not mentally ill, the doctor said: I dont care if youre sick or not. As long as you are sent by the township government, Ill treat you as a mental patient.
[Emphasis mine]
[...]
Once a detainee has been officially diagnosed as dangerously mentally ill, theyre immediately taken out of the criminal justice system and they lose all legal rights, said Mr. Munro, who has researched Chinas practice of psychiatric detention.
[Emphasis mine]
Some here think the Mental Health Industry is a good basket with a few rotten apples - I think the opposite is much closer to the truth. And this is why. And no, this is not exclusive to China, no matter what Western practitioners or ngo's try to tell you. And least of all with us, for god's sakes...
URL: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/12/09/world/asia/09china.html?ex=1386565200&en=0b6412dd9b4288c4&ei=5124