Mental health is an important part of a person’s overall health. It is more than the absence of a mental disorder, it is the ability to think, learn and understand one’s emotions and reaction of others. It defines a person’s capability to cope with stresses which we face in our day to day life and how one tackles them. Mental health in itself is more related to the feeling of self. It is basically how you view yourself and how that affects your day to day activities.
In the new age of mass media and modern day journalism the information is readily available through news, movies or even social media from which we get tons of information put forward by different people who have different ideologies and different backgrounds, this information can be used for different purposes and may actually paint a rather skewed or rather more simplified picture for the general audience which is US, but this “skewed” picture might convey something else entirely which might change the outlook of the given topic which is mental health in this case.
In this age of popular storytelling the characters which are portrayed in the media trivialise or dehumanise the very concept of mental health, thus increasing the stigma associated with them for the sake of money and views.
13 reasons why a popular Teenage drama based on the bestselling books by Jay Asher, follows teenager Clay Jensen as he returns home from school to find a mysterious box with his name on it lying on his porch. Inside he discovers a group of cassette tapes recorded by Hannah Baker -his classmate and crush-who tragically committed suicide two weeks earlier. On tape, Hannah unfolds an emotional audio diary, detailing the thirteen reasons why she decided to end her life. This well acclaimed series, which is currently streaming on Netflix which claims to “educate” the audience about suicide while portraying its after effects but instead romanticises the very concept on which the whole series is built on. As the reaction of Hannah to the individuals who caused her harm or perceived harm promotes the misconception that suicidal behaviour is selfish and seems to use revenge as the motivation for doing such self harm, as she leaves behind a box of cassette tapes which contained the detailed description of events which unfolded and various wrong doings of the people which lead to Hannah's death.
A critically acclaimed movie “American Psycho” in which Patrick Bateman who lives in New york and works as a investment banker who is shown to have “Narcissistic personality Disorder” in which the person has a inflated sense of ego and importance, a deep need of excessive attention and lack of empathy. He is focused on fitting in and though he has real flesh and blood, he does not feel like a human being. He kills random people he comes across, as well as those who he thinks are better off than him or are in the way of his success.
This vivid portrayal inflates the stigma around people who suffer from these kinds of conditions, according to recent studies most psychologically ill people never commit crimes much less kill people.
The portrayal of mental health in media is often one dimensional and does not account for the audience perspective, these mental health issues are used as leverage to uplift the story or just to make the character interesting compromising the impact it will have on the millions of people who might be watching it.
In the present century due to mass exchange of information people have started to become aware and have started to respond to such portrayals, thus making the creators aware of what the audience actually wants and improvising the content accordingly. Due to which there have been many accurate depictions of mental health issues in media.
Silver linings playbook (2012) captures a well rounded sense of bipolar disorder without glamorising the condition. In addition to portraying the mental illness in a humanised and relatable way.
Black Swan (2010) does a great job to convince the viewers that only reasonable outcome of the career path is mental illness of one form or the other, competition is relentless, glory is short lived, regiment is literally disfigurement.
In the end, the media isn’t the only source of stereotypes and stigma. Prejudice can come from well intentioned individuals with mental illness according to Wahl "We don't want people to focus only on the media as scapegoats. Yes indeed they are leading the race but there are others as well”.
- Arsh Shikalgar
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