Let's talk: glamorising mental illness

And thus (hopefully) ends another unplanned hiatus. I'm crawling out of my pit and back to this blog with an unfortunately bleak issue that is incredibly close to me, and something that has been gnawing away for a long time - arguably too long. So, fair warning, this post is not going to be a bucket full of laughs. Don't get me wrong, I could post something funny and witty but I don't want to demean the issue at hand. It's a big one. And it's growing.

The issue at hand: the glorification of  mental illness (read: I'm looking at you Skins).

Let me start by saying that I don't consider myself to be in this group. I feel this is fairly important so as to not look judging or biased: I'm not chronically unwell. I have a few issues, but I would never consider myself to be in the chronic depression group. And actually....a lot of other people aren't in this group, though you wouldn't know it. When people think of mental illness, they think of EST, they think of extreme psychopaths, they think of beautiful mad girls who scream crazy (*cough* Effy Stonem *cough). Actually...more often than not, most people fall on the less extreme end of the scale - but that's another issue.

For a long time the glorification of mental illness has gotten on my nerves. I ask you now, go on to tumblr and type in: "mental illness", "depression" and I'm willing to bet a fair amount of money that somewhere in the first few pages you'll find a black and white gif of Kaya Scodelario, paired with a suitably grungy comment (probably Lana Del Rey lyrics, that seems to be the thing at the moment) *

* I just did my own test. Five posts.

I suppose I find this issue all the more irritating, as I follow so many people who cry "don't glorify mental illness" then indeed do post one of the gifs/photos/images. I'm not saying that there aren't people out there who are deeply unwell, but the image of Effy Stonem ripping up pages and screaming that she's crazy is not the image of mental illness and should not be. Don't get me wrong, it's brave that Skins decided to take the issue in hand, and I applaud them for that. They've never shied away from issues at hand and that's great....admittedly they then totally crucified the important issues of mental illness and just turned it into a catalyst for another love triangle.....but maybe that's just my view. The problem is that the "Effy's" of the world don't really exist. Effy is a glorified, sanitised version of pyscosis who everyone seems to want to be just like -

Allow me to stop you there: you should not want to be like Effy. What Effy goes through is devastating, and destroys everyone around her-

But she looks so pretty..... (actual comment I heard when talking about this issue)

And that's your issue. Shoving a pretty face on top of a serious issue and throwing it on telly just pushes forward this stereotype of the mad pixie dream girl, and it has to stop. I'm being extreme, and shows like Bedlam and even My Mad Fat Diary are helping to close the gap and give an honest portrayal to mental illness, and that's great, that's amazing, but lets not forget: there are far more Rae's than there are Effy's.