The problem with normalising mental health issues By Dulcie Gething

In this day and age, everyone seems to be talking about mental illness. From TV shows like Euphoria to musicians like Lana Del Ray, the media is tackling serious mental health conditions like anxiety and depression and bringing them to the forefront in pop culture. So, why is this a bad thing? Surely bringing a topic like this to our screens and attention would help to show that there are real people behind these conditions. However, is normalisation the answer to progressing beyond the shame and discrimination that mentally ill people still face?

Often people, companies and schools will set out to normalise mental illness with the intention of helping those who are suffering feel less alone and trying to help people recognise the signs before it’s too late, but normalisation and destigmatisation are two different things. The word ‘normal’ should not be associated with mental illness and it never should be. More than a quarter of 18 to 25 year-olds had a mental illness in 2018 (SingleCare), and although that’s a worryingly high number, it is not the majority even if we are often made to feel like it is. Oftentimes, the words ‘normalisation’ and ‘destigmatisation’ are used interchangeably when it comes to talking about our mental health but they are very different things. Normalisation means ‘bringing or returning something to a normal condition or state’, according to the Oxford English Dictionary, while destigmatisation is the ‘action or process of removing the negative connotation or social stigma associated with something…the process of making a person or thing more socially acceptable (“DESTIGMATIZATION | Meaning & Definition for UK English | Lexico.com”). Making mental health conditions ‘normal’ means accepting that it’s a part of society and not doing anything to fight it. Destigmatising them means helping people have productive conversations and supporting them properly instead of dismissing those problems as just being ‘a part of life’ or something that ‘everybody goes through’. Destigmatisation involves more work and a collective effort to eradicate mental illness by preventing these issues in the first place and supporting people by understanding their individual needs.

With depictions and conversations about mental health seemingly everywhere and everyone posting their every thought and feeling on social media, it is clear that as a society, we have progressed to the point where we are more in touch with our emotions. Many people are now self-diagnosing themselves with mental illness based on what they have read online which is dangerous for many reasons. The first being that people may end up oversimplifying an issue and diagnosing themselves with one condition when they could really suffer from multiple and the second being that, without the expertise of a professional, many people could make the mistake of exaggerating an issue. The words ‘depressed’ and ‘anxious’ seem to be thrown around a lot at the moment and ‘OCD’ is often used as an adjective. The danger of this is that when someone says that actually feel depressed, anxious or ‘OCD’, there is a lack of surprise or urgency from others when they hear it. Of course, many people often feel that way and that shouldn’t be discounted and the concern from many about the shockingly high numbers of people with these conditions is completely justified but making people feel like mental illness is normal stops many from tackling these problems and creates a culture where people just give in and stop actively trying to stop these issues from affecting our lives and the lives of others.

The very phrase ‘normalising mental illness’ should set off alarm bells in our heads. Do we really want to live in a society where it is normal to be unhappy? I think it’s important for people to look at the way they are approaching mental illness and help others learn that it isn’t normal to be struggling and it isn’t something everyone is going through; it is something that deserves to be acknowledged and taken seriously. Of course, it is incredibly important to discuss mental health but teaching people, especially children that it’s not a big deal stops people from coming forward and invalidates the struggles that people with mental illnesses face on a daily basis. It is important to look carefully at the media we are consuming and the conversations we have and question whether we are actually progressing past stigma at all.