Apr 23rd, 2008 by woodstone
Have you ever noticed that mental illness seems to be one of the last “differences” that it’s still ok to make fun of or discriminate against?
There is a Saturday morning cartoon called “Lunatics Unleashed”, and the mentally ill are regularly portrayed as murderers, stalkers, criminals, and just generally “creepy” people in TV shows and movies.
I often see kids wearing t-shirts that say things like “powered by the voices in my head” and “some days it’s not even worth chewing through the restraints”, and ”are you dancing or is that a side effect of the shock therapy?”
Even our language reflects our comfort with making fun of the mentally ill. We use the words crazy, lunatic, manic, psycho, psychotic, schizo, etc. as put downs or to describe situations or experiences that are bad, stupid, dangerous, and/or out of control.
I guess if you don’t have a loved one with a serious mental illness (or have a mental illness yourself!) you probably don’t see the hurt that is caused by this kind of attitude…
It’s extremely hard to be the parent of a child who struggles every day of his life with schizophrenia, and not react when someone jokingly puts down a friend by calling them a “schizo”.
It makes me angry… very angry.
It makes me want to stop people and ask how they can laugh about such a horrible, painful illness.
It makes me want to tell them that, but for the grace of God, they could be the “schizo”…
Yes, it could have been you…or me.
And heaven forbid, it could have been YOUR child.
Unfortunately, getting angry won’t do anything to change the way our society looks at mental illness…
Instead I will have to let M’s actions speak for themselves, and do the best I can to educate people about the realities of mental illness, with the hope that someday our society will “grow up” to the point of no longer needing to put others down to feel good about ourselves.
A couple of years ago I wrote this post. M’s pdoc read it and thought I should clean it up and look into having it published. I haven’t yet, but maybe I should….
I highly recommend the book The Center Cannot Hold by Elyn Saks, an Oxford and Yale educated lawyer, professor, and psychotherapist. She also has schizophrenia.
Eloquent words describing a very real problem my friend. You are so right… both about the extreme pain that accompanies loving someone with mental illness and about the disregard our society has for their use of language with regard to this population of people. So many people don’t seem to understand that people with mental illness are PEOPLE… just like them. Terms like ’schitzo” and “retard” are everywhere, and it always hurts to the core to hear them being used as slang… as funny. There is nothing funny about it at all… just lots of pain and hurt. And so much of that hurt could be alleviated if our society would take the time to recognize that those of us with mental illness are victims of a disease process… just like those of us with cancer… but without the effective treatment opportunities to help. Words hurt… they make an already hard situation so much harder. They isolate, blame and make fun of. Please know that you are not alone in your battle both to help nurture someone with mental illness, and to educate those of us lucky enough not to be battling those demons.
A very moving, convicting, heartfelt post. i have always been slightly uncomfortable with some of those words being bandied about so casually, and i admit to having used some of them myself. In more recent years i have grown to understand just how awful and hurtful those “jokes” can be. Thank you for the reminder.
(Would you mind if i posted this on my blog?)
No, i’m fine. i’ll talk to you soon.
The anti-spam word was ‘hugs’.
Yes, you should publish it, because those who don’t know M or someone like him, can benefit from the story you tell.
Maybe they will feel guilty becaseu they were the person who laughed, or maybe they will train their children to be more empathetic (I can’t spell that word, it’s empathy, but does it have an ‘e’ or an ‘i’ when you use that form?)
One thing that M has does for me is that anti-spam word again, hugs. The first time I met ya’ll he came up and gave me a big hug. Now I have never met this person before and I’m not a huggy person, but that felt good. Most people are anti-hug or at least don’t like their space violated, but sometimes a hug is just what you need (and M knows that.)
BTW I agree about those shirts too.
Definitely agree with your pdoc - have that piece published! M sounds like he’s developing into a person of fine character who we all could learn from!
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Maura
Thanks for this post. In my work, I talk about a skill I call “tracking” where I encourage myself and others to pay attention to behaviors, judgments, and assumptions to determine patterns.
I have noticed my use of “crazy” and “lame” as well as my use of violent language (like punching numbers on an elevator).
I suggest to my audiences (and to myself) that noticing is the first step to finding patterns. Then those patterns can be altered or solidified (depending on whether you want it or not).
It amazes me how hard it is to change a habit even after an unwanted pattern is tracked.
Thank you for your words here… perhaps this will be added motivation for me to alter my language choices.
Happy Sunday and hugs to all in your home! (including Ferdinand)
Jess