Sometimes media can be a useful tool for teaching.
But other times it can be a harmful stigma-creating machine.
Mental illness is heinously portrayed inaccurately.
Things like making horror movies where the serial killers have Dissociative Identity Disorder – or D.I.D (previously Multiple Personality Disorder) – and one of the alters committed the crimes and they have no clue. Shows that have school shooters with Bipolar, etc. These types of things create misconceptions and breed fear around mentally ill individuals; because of course they are a danger to society, right?
Eating disorders are glamourized, and self harm is usually only shown as suicide attempts. Eating disorders are not what the UK`s version (which came before the American version) of Skins shows. People with eating disorders do not smile and giggle a lot and say “Oh wow, how lovely!” all the time. They are not “cool” things to have and will not make you beautiful. They are also not chosen. Eating Disorders are serious mental illnesses that have been proven to have some genetic origins in many cases. Self harming is not necessarily a suicide attempt; it is just a misguided – and addicting – way of coping with extreme pain, distress, or other things.
Depression is not simply “feeling sad” or being “down” all the time – and it is not always so obvious as the commercials about “Depression Hurts” seem to say that there are so many physical symptoms that make depression something anyone can see in an individual It’s a chemical imbalance in the brain, and often the most depressed people seem happy and normal because they pretend they are O.K.
Why do people with mental health issues (of any form) pretend they are alright, you ask?
Mostly because of the stigma. For example, someone who has DID may be scared to tell people because people are misinformed and do not understand it. Humans are afraid of things they do not understand; and when the media heightens this fear – it has ugly repercussions for suffers of mental illnesses, and how they are treated.
Media needs to quit creating harmful stigmas and use its power for healthy education instead.
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