Media Discrimates Against Mentally Ill More Than Blacks

The prime time media uses negative stereotypes to depict mental illness almost 4 times more than it does blacks.

The numbers are from a study, Liz Sayce cites in her book From Psychiatric Patient to Citizen: Overcoming Discrimination and Social Exclusion

The research found that films and tv shows run during prime time depicted the mentally ill characters as villians 73% of the time, blacks 20% of the time and the disabled 12% of the time.

This means the media discriminates against the mentally ill almost 4 times more than blacks and 6 times more than the disabled.

The book also noted a second study published in the The British Journal of Psychiatry found programming for children under 10, showed the mentally ill as “crazy” , out of control and without positive qualities.

No one is suggesting that changes in content be imposed on the media however the studies show that the popular media exploits and perpetuates the stigma of the mental ill.

Bipolar/Schizophrenia Advocacy Groups Gone “MAD”

This is a fascinating NYT article called MAD. It describes the efforts of different bipolar/schizophrenia advocacy groups to create social change.

I have problems with the style and rhetoric of some but support most of their goals. The organization I have the mixed feelings about MindFreedom International and their stand on drugs. I am for anything that keeps the drug companies on their toes. They should be challenged. The risk is that the advocacy group may dissuade people who really need psychotropic drugs from taking them. It’s up to the individual which is the way it should be in most cases.

The Stanley Medical Research Institute advocates forced medication for the most seriously ill who have great potential to hurt themselves or somebody else. I believe this foundation was created by a man whose son killed someone in NYC by pushing them in front of a train.

Although their tag line “Navigating the Space Between Brillance and Madness” makes me cringe, the Icarus Project is doing great things by educating the public and helping their own.

The only thing that I have a major problem with is referring to mental illness as “extreme mental states” or “dangerous gifts”. It maybe tantalizing to use this rhetoric but it’s terribly misguided.

Mental illness is just that an illness. We are talking about physical and mental suffering. We’re not talking about some group that suffers because of their race, gender or sexual preference. Mental ill people face both; they suffer medically and face being stigmatized and discriminated against.

One other thing, I believe the article’s author is not quite correct when she said things like exercise and peer counseling were “strategies that are well outside the mainstream of psychiatrists and many patients.”

I would like to hear other opinions.

M.I.T. Discriminates Against Students Who Might Need Emotional Support

I just read an Newsweek article from 2004 called Dealing With Depression. I could not believe my eyes. It described MIT’s policy against admitting students who have even a hint of needing emotional support.

MIT Admissions Dean Marilee Jones says she’s looking to enroll “emotionally resilient” students. “If we think someone will crumble the first time they do poorly on a test, we’re not going to admit them,” she says. “So many kids are coming in, feeling the need to be perfect, and so many kids are medicated now. If you need a lot of phar-maceutical support to get through the day, you’re not a good match for a place like MIT.”

This is absolutely outrageous. Instead of providing the resources for qualified students who have some indication that they might need emotional support they have opted to deny them admission.

The article is about the overall problem of mental illness on college campuses; how there are 1100 students who commit suicide every year; 40% of the student population had at least one depressive episode which made it difficult to function and 30% have anxiety disorder or depression.

Some other institutions are trying to accommodate students who have depression, bipolar or anxiety by taking some of the follow steps.

• Implementing a 24 hour wellness hot-line
• Soliciting information from students with special needs such as taking medication or seeing a therapist
• Scheduling one on one appointments between therapist and student at their dorm
• Having a psychiatrist on staff

The Newsweek article also has some news about the types of support that some students with depression and other problems are receiving in high school.

As for M.I.T., they have chosen to eliminate the problem rather than address it. I believe that their admission policy is an abomination. I’ve written to M.I.T. to see if this policy is still in place.

Update after the initial post, I found the Dean of Admissions disavowed the quote. She was subsequently removed from her post because she lied on her resume.

Stigma Among the Enlightened

“Society’s silence about mental illness is deafening. When you are diagnosed you disappear. …’There’s this attitude out there that if you come back from cancer, you’re a hero, but if you come back from depression, you’re damaged goods.’” from Andre’s Picard’s article about mental illness in Canada Toronto’s Globe and Mail

Depression seems to extract an even greater toll from the community of physicians. “[T]here are still pockets of stigma in a society like medicine. It’s a paradox: The healer can’t be sick.” The suicide rate for male doctors is twice the average for the general population; the rate for female physicians double the rate of male physicians. Read more.

But there is a price. The late treatment, severity of symptoms and easy access to potentially lethal drugs – along with the pervasive stigma in society – means the rate of suicide among male physicians is about twice that of the general population. Among female physicians, it is about four times higher.

You Never Saw John Wayne Cry

Who Would You Rather Be?

• “We all know individuals who can transform hopeless situations into challenges to be over come, just through the force of their personalities. This ability to persevere is the quality people most admire in others; and justly so.” – Mihlay Csikzentmihalyi, talking about “ordered consciousness” from his book Psychology of Optimal Experience

• “… Hypersensitivity to adversity, vulnerability in the face of stress, withdrawal from intimate connections, premature aging, sluggishness in recovery, deteriorating course, chronicity of impairment, failed resilience….” Dr Peter Kramer, describing “symptoms and traits that characterize depression” his book Against Depression

People who have chronic depression or bipolar disorder appear far removed from the heroic archetype. So removed that their manner can make others very uncomfortable.

Who would actually want to live their lives this way? I have overcome alot in my life. Why can’t they? Whatever is ailing them I don’t want any part of it. The world is a dangerous place. You can’t count on them. They don’t have the mettle to take the bumps and bruises of life. If I associate with them, people would think I was weak. Weak is not allowed. This is the mindset we are up against.

Kramer describes the inner challenge those of us with depression face.