What a disgraceful product of ignorance. This is more evidence that, when it comes to intelligently responding to mental illness, we are still a primitive species.
This was written before the ugliness of Trump was visited upon us. Solomon writes that "our nation is in a moment when prejudice runs riot." Things have gotten worse, no doubt, with a president-elect who has a chief strategist who has insulted Jews, blacks, homosexuals, etc. In fact, it boggles the imagination to think that (a) Trump is soon to be POTUS and (b) Bannon, the bigot, has the job he does. He shouldn't be allowed in the door. I'd say to pray, but it didn't work out on the election result.
1
We should remember our own flawed psyches'. As the author states, "Sanity and mental illness lie on a spectrum." Our own spectrum.
It's not my intention to defend or to appear to defend "Fear VR 5150" but the Solomon's critique (at times thoughtful) is really off the mark. It's not "mental illness" the attraction is drawing on but an exaggerated image of the truly sordid and at times monstrous reality of the once-ubiquitous state and county public mental institutions. These places -- I worked in one as a Ward Attendant during my freshman and sophomore years at university -- were nightmarish. Patients were over-medicated until they were little more than zombies; "attendants" routinely roughed up male patients and sexually abused female ones; the atmosphere was worse than that of most prisons; and the only word that's remotely adequate to summarize day-to-day life there is horror.
1
Hello, thanks for your article, Mr. Solomon.
Such kind of "recreation" is really humiliating, I can't believe it can happen in nowadays' society.
Discrimination is serious here in Hong Kong too, including the so-called "professional", ironically.
I strongly agree with you and hope there can be more people like you to speak for those people.
Such kind of "recreation" is really humiliating, I can't believe it can happen in nowadays' society.
Discrimination is serious here in Hong Kong too, including the so-called "professional", ironically.
I strongly agree with you and hope there can be more people like you to speak for those people.
2
There should be no encouragement for anyone to profit from human suffering. Until you know someone with severe mental illness, or heaven forbid, suffer from it your self, you have no idea of the depths of despair that comes with it. We most need to respect and be kind to all others, not make fun of them or be dismissive of them. If you are the lucky ones who have not had mental illness touch their lives, just be grateful and gracious.
1
I am a part of NAMI Orange County in North Carolina and we had a similar call to action last Halloween when a costume shop used the name of local psychiatric hospital with the outfit covered in blood as a costume. We were able to get them to take the costume off the shelf! And I responded with the blog post below!
https://gratefulheartyogacenter.com/2015/09/28/mental-illness-is-not-a-c...
https://gratefulheartyogacenter.com/2015/09/28/mental-illness-is-not-a-c...
2
Yes to all your critical comments on the dangers of misrepresenting mental illness and using mental illness as entertainment! But I want to bring some performance analysis into the mix because I believe that performances can be impactful in ways the designers and directors never imagined. If I'm reading your description of the event accurately, visitors would not have been simply viewers, but participants. They would have felt the panic and anxiety of not being able to move and the loss of autonomy when injected against their will. I agree that all that would have followed—the representations of "grunting" and "maniacal inmates"—are dangerous misrepresentations of those who live with mental illness...but maybe...just maybe, the participatory enactment of the loss of autonomy would have left a lasting impact. I want to believe that the physical shift in point of view—from viewer to active participant—would change the experience in such a way as to incite a shift in one's ideological point of view, but maybe these are just the desperate hopes of someone living with Bipolar II. I'll take whatever I can get. Cheers on a great article!
I hate to state the obvious, but the problem here is guns.
Why does it shock anyone that our fears of the mentally ill come out during Halloween? Halloween is a cultural construct where children dress up and play out their fears in order to confront that fear, develop a sense of control, and find humor amidst horror. My son was in first grade when a mentally ill person with a deadly weapon murdered a class of first graders less than 60 miles away from us. Now that these kids are in 5th grade, is it any wonder that the image of the deranged killer with a gun has a prominent place in their consciousness? He and his friends talk about crazed killers with a lot of posturing and bravado, and they are clearly afraid.
I've done nothing to perpetuate this stereotype in my home. I didn't have to. My kids know that we have a problem with guns in this country. Even if only .01% of the mentally ill are capable of violence, if that .01% can easily acquire weapons of war over the counter, I'd say my kids' fears are pretty reasonable.
Why does it shock anyone that our fears of the mentally ill come out during Halloween? Halloween is a cultural construct where children dress up and play out their fears in order to confront that fear, develop a sense of control, and find humor amidst horror. My son was in first grade when a mentally ill person with a deadly weapon murdered a class of first graders less than 60 miles away from us. Now that these kids are in 5th grade, is it any wonder that the image of the deranged killer with a gun has a prominent place in their consciousness? He and his friends talk about crazed killers with a lot of posturing and bravado, and they are clearly afraid.
I've done nothing to perpetuate this stereotype in my home. I didn't have to. My kids know that we have a problem with guns in this country. Even if only .01% of the mentally ill are capable of violence, if that .01% can easily acquire weapons of war over the counter, I'd say my kids' fears are pretty reasonable.
2
Thank you for this. Another example I can think of is the TV show "American Horror Story". I wanted to see what all the hubbub was about, so I went to Netflix.
I couldn't get through the second episode. It was so obvious that the show was based on the creepy "others" (people like me, you, etc.). I know that the show provides roles for people with disabilities, but what kind of roles? I think this matters, for precisely the reasons you've written about here: We are not a horror show, freak show, or any other kind of show whose main premise is "look at the abnormals, aren't they weird and scary??"
And giving disabled characters special powers trying to make up for their perceived deficiencies does not make it all better. It only highlights that we, in our natural state, are not enough.
I couldn't get through the second episode. It was so obvious that the show was based on the creepy "others" (people like me, you, etc.). I know that the show provides roles for people with disabilities, but what kind of roles? I think this matters, for precisely the reasons you've written about here: We are not a horror show, freak show, or any other kind of show whose main premise is "look at the abnormals, aren't they weird and scary??"
And giving disabled characters special powers trying to make up for their perceived deficiencies does not make it all better. It only highlights that we, in our natural state, are not enough.
1
I find the concept espoused by this revolting attempt at entertainment unconscionable. Wondrous as the brain is, it can malfunction and cannot often 'right itself' without the same sort of medical assistance that people demand for organs that lie below the neck. We are faced nearly every day with horrors perpetrated on and, very rarely (but broadcast loudly), by those who suffer from mental illness. We seem to be sinking lower and lower on the humanity scale. I sincerely hope that some day treatment of mental illness and addiction can get the compassionate attention and funding that they deserve.
1
This is a very good article, and highlights the casual way in which medieval attitudes about mental illness are still so prevalent.
We seem to be much more sensitive about how we might inadvertently offend many groups in society, but people struggling with mental illness seem to still be the butt of jokes and insults.
As a mental health professional, I never cease to be amazed at the way mental illness continues to be stigmatized.
I hope articles like this one help to chip away at the continuing prejudice.
We seem to be much more sensitive about how we might inadvertently offend many groups in society, but people struggling with mental illness seem to still be the butt of jokes and insults.
As a mental health professional, I never cease to be amazed at the way mental illness continues to be stigmatized.
I hope articles like this one help to chip away at the continuing prejudice.
3
Most certainly Halloween-style, fright-night depictions of mental illness are anathema in a civilized society. Ridicule of public figures like Donald Trump based on an acquired identity for mentally ill behavior, however, should not be sanctioned for it reinforces "healthy," acceptable demeanor for society at large and especially for public figures, so long as a path to reckoning and rehabilitation is clearly implied for any transgressors.
Thank you Andrew Solomon. Having you be able to speak so eloquently for us mentally ill sufferers, gives me comfort in knowing someone has our backs. A lot of us suffering from mental illness are unable to fight this all to common stigma. It's often hard enough for any of us to get through the day. The thought of writing something and getting it out there, seems inconceivable (as much as I'd love to be able to do just that). I just ask for one thing. In recent years, the word "bipolar", has become an adjective to describe any person, bipolar or not (and usually not), who displays any kind of behavior one finds distasteful. These behaviors most often having nothing to do with bipolar illness. Not to mention the people using this term are not MD's. Your input on this would be invaluable for everyone suffering from bipolar disorder who has to hear this term tossed around like a football. Thank you again for speaking for the rest of us.
1
The interesting thing about this debate is that it is part of an overarching 'dilemma' presented in our current climate of political awareness....where do we draw a line? Is nothing sacred or has everything become sacred?
As a woman, a person of colour and someone who has mental health issues, I've found myself seeking a balance. I will never argue about things being too 'PC' because what many who are not part of marginalized groups fail to understand is that for the first time some of us finally get to have a voice. A voice that is usually dismissed but nonetheless it's a welcome
change from being completely silenced.
Why this type of presentation is not okay is because we have not really evolved in how we treat mental illness. Yes we can separate fact and fiction in many other situations. The difference however is that while we may be entertained by extreme violence depicted at Halloween, we still abhor that real life violence and can have empathy for the sufferers. When it comes to mental illness, most of society still relies on stereotypes and many factors, including stigmatization has impeded our ability to move beyond this to a more holistic version of the picture being embedded in our social conscious. In the meantime, sufferers are depicted in media as mad geniuses (if we're lucky) but mostly we are drooling catatonic messes or murderers with a most tenuous grip on sanity.
I don't have faith that most people distinguish between fact and fiction in this case.
As a woman, a person of colour and someone who has mental health issues, I've found myself seeking a balance. I will never argue about things being too 'PC' because what many who are not part of marginalized groups fail to understand is that for the first time some of us finally get to have a voice. A voice that is usually dismissed but nonetheless it's a welcome
change from being completely silenced.
Why this type of presentation is not okay is because we have not really evolved in how we treat mental illness. Yes we can separate fact and fiction in many other situations. The difference however is that while we may be entertained by extreme violence depicted at Halloween, we still abhor that real life violence and can have empathy for the sufferers. When it comes to mental illness, most of society still relies on stereotypes and many factors, including stigmatization has impeded our ability to move beyond this to a more holistic version of the picture being embedded in our social conscious. In the meantime, sufferers are depicted in media as mad geniuses (if we're lucky) but mostly we are drooling catatonic messes or murderers with a most tenuous grip on sanity.
I don't have faith that most people distinguish between fact and fiction in this case.
1
This is a very good article, identifying how easily society slips into disparagement of people with mental health, and labelling it entertainment.
Like the author I am a clinical psychologist, and was raised in a family where mental health problems have been a common trait. While growing up with a father who was mentally ill, we became quite adept at laughing at jokes about mental health, even when these seemed indirectly aimed at our father. We have never been overly defensive about it - I still use the expression 'crazy making' lightly, and I do not flinch when others talk about 'split personalities' (even though they have no idea that such a phenomenon does not truly exist in psychiatry).
But I do draw the line at halloween costumes or other 'entertainment' aimed at deliberately mocking people with mental illness. This seems to me a kind of medieval way of externalising what we most fear about our own psyches, projecting it outward, laughing at it, and humiliating it. It reminds me of Donald Trump's degrading caricature of the disabled journalist-drawing the laughs by humiliating another.
Social bullying of people with mental health problems should have died out long ago. Let's hope that articles such as this one nudge us towards greater empathy and understanding.
Like the author I am a clinical psychologist, and was raised in a family where mental health problems have been a common trait. While growing up with a father who was mentally ill, we became quite adept at laughing at jokes about mental health, even when these seemed indirectly aimed at our father. We have never been overly defensive about it - I still use the expression 'crazy making' lightly, and I do not flinch when others talk about 'split personalities' (even though they have no idea that such a phenomenon does not truly exist in psychiatry).
But I do draw the line at halloween costumes or other 'entertainment' aimed at deliberately mocking people with mental illness. This seems to me a kind of medieval way of externalising what we most fear about our own psyches, projecting it outward, laughing at it, and humiliating it. It reminds me of Donald Trump's degrading caricature of the disabled journalist-drawing the laughs by humiliating another.
Social bullying of people with mental health problems should have died out long ago. Let's hope that articles such as this one nudge us towards greater empathy and understanding.
3
For readers who believe that the author and others are too thin-skinned about this corporate "entertainment," what if the proposed amusement park "fear attraction" were something like being an escaped slave chased through a swamp by dogs and armed law enforcement officers? Another person's suffering is not entertaining and an experience to be mocked and/or minimized. What's next? An Aleppo-themed amusement park fear attraction? Basic human decency and empathy are missing in these concepts of entertainment. As someone who treats people who suffer from varying degrees of mental illness, I don't find this proposed amusement park experience remotely entertaining.
4
A well written piece on Stigmatization of the Mentally Ill. I wonder who is ill, the society that derives pleasure from everything or the people who run these shows. The treatment of mentally is predominantly designed to keep the society safe from these individuals and most of the medications are designed to dullen the senses of the person suffering from the illness. There is very little done to treat the root cause which exists even after an 'episode'. I would like to suggest a book called Strictly Bipolar by Darian Leader who talks about how the pharmaceutical companies branding Bipolar Disorder as a biological condition and making it totally drug dependent. This condition has to be studied individually clinically and not brand one with set parameters of the bipolar spectrum. Nowadays this condition is treated with multiple drugs and trying to find the right cocktail, this is totally driven by the drug industry. Now, time is the factor and thereby old clinical approach is forgotten. Bring in back the good old family practice and do away with the spectrum parameters, and a healthy dose of empathy and empowerment to the Mentally Ill. The society should be sensitised about the sufferings of an individual and not be mocked in this manner.
I am sitting here in utter, absolute disbelief that, at the top of this Comments section, the editor has posed the question "Do you think Halloween-style depictions of mentally ill people should be an acceptable part of the holiday, or do they lead to prejudice and mistreatment?"
I'm astonished that anyone could consider this a remotely debatable notion. This is not an empathy-building VR experience of the type that advocates for the mentally ill might possibly countenance. On the contrary: it's sheer, mind-boggling cruelty directed as the most vulnerable, deeply-suffering members of society, presented in a trivializing context. The mere fact that these "exhibits" came within a hair's breadth of opening fills me with great despair. The generosity and restraint shown by Mr. Solomon in writing about it helps to mitigate some of the despair.
I'm astonished that anyone could consider this a remotely debatable notion. This is not an empathy-building VR experience of the type that advocates for the mentally ill might possibly countenance. On the contrary: it's sheer, mind-boggling cruelty directed as the most vulnerable, deeply-suffering members of society, presented in a trivializing context. The mere fact that these "exhibits" came within a hair's breadth of opening fills me with great despair. The generosity and restraint shown by Mr. Solomon in writing about it helps to mitigate some of the despair.
11
The drive to make money off of those who are ill (mentally or physically) will probably always exist in society. The psychiatric system is no better in many ways.
Empathy is always in short supply when it comes to mental illness. The Vermont Teddy Bear Company tried this with a bear in a straight jacket, something to the tune of "Crazy in Love," or other nonsense. They got lots of grief, but refused to take that bear off the market. Guess what - any business which thinks it's okay to exploit the MI will NEVER get my money, nor my support. If enough people refuse to give their hard-earned money to these businesses, eventually they will get the message.
For those who think it is okay to make money off of other people's misery- good luck when your turn comes around for your own misery (and there is no guarantee it won't - the universe has a sneaky way of giving out Karma to the offenders).
Empathy is always in short supply when it comes to mental illness. The Vermont Teddy Bear Company tried this with a bear in a straight jacket, something to the tune of "Crazy in Love," or other nonsense. They got lots of grief, but refused to take that bear off the market. Guess what - any business which thinks it's okay to exploit the MI will NEVER get my money, nor my support. If enough people refuse to give their hard-earned money to these businesses, eventually they will get the message.
For those who think it is okay to make money off of other people's misery- good luck when your turn comes around for your own misery (and there is no guarantee it won't - the universe has a sneaky way of giving out Karma to the offenders).
7
Curious that for one so in tune with empathy that author would let slip "...is deemed a danger to himself ..."
Other points I take exception with are:
- its a far leap to assert that success has been posited as incompatible with empathy;
- its not clear who is or purportedly rejecting empathy, which clearly lies with the individuals core values rather than any political position or belief;
- and to assert or imply that there is causal link to proliferation of suicides is simply a stretch;
- yes have to agree with the closing "It’s hard to think well of yourself in a world that sees you as a threat," but when we are driving stakes in the ground and cavalierly throwing people in baskets the fundamental problem is much worse.
My point is that is that the collective WE can only help when asked or allowed; we cant expect everyone to be all knowing and omniscient. As these very pages have documented time and again, people with "disability" often don't want unsolicited help, often times actually take exception or even umbrage. Moreover, as one in "the profession" surely author understands better than casual reader the deficits to CA laws, especially with involuntary commitments. Remedying it would certainly be a start.
In my neighborhood there was recent suicide "attempt" - cry for help or not I don't know. Appears that it was someone I had called about on the several times he passed by my house. If he wasn't threatening anyone/himself they couldn't do anything. So....?
Other points I take exception with are:
- its a far leap to assert that success has been posited as incompatible with empathy;
- its not clear who is or purportedly rejecting empathy, which clearly lies with the individuals core values rather than any political position or belief;
- and to assert or imply that there is causal link to proliferation of suicides is simply a stretch;
- yes have to agree with the closing "It’s hard to think well of yourself in a world that sees you as a threat," but when we are driving stakes in the ground and cavalierly throwing people in baskets the fundamental problem is much worse.
My point is that is that the collective WE can only help when asked or allowed; we cant expect everyone to be all knowing and omniscient. As these very pages have documented time and again, people with "disability" often don't want unsolicited help, often times actually take exception or even umbrage. Moreover, as one in "the profession" surely author understands better than casual reader the deficits to CA laws, especially with involuntary commitments. Remedying it would certainly be a start.
In my neighborhood there was recent suicide "attempt" - cry for help or not I don't know. Appears that it was someone I had called about on the several times he passed by my house. If he wasn't threatening anyone/himself they couldn't do anything. So....?
1
http://www.slideshare.net/rtgardner3/family-wellness-conference-oct-8-2016
I am mentally ill and gave this presentation @ 2.5 weeks ago. Many people like myself have contributed incredibly to this country. The list includes leaders in every field and many of the Founders of this country.
I am mentally ill and gave this presentation @ 2.5 weeks ago. Many people like myself have contributed incredibly to this country. The list includes leaders in every field and many of the Founders of this country.
2
At first, I couldn't believe anyone thought it was a good idea to turn mental illness into entertainment, but then I thought of the current election (and I'm not saying that as a joke). Good grief. The executives at these places are well paid and presumably have some education. What on earth is wrong with them?
10
I have a cousin who is in end stage Alzheimer's but at one point he had to be put in a lock down facility. It was awful. More money needs to towards these kinds of facilities and the general public needs to be educated about them.
It's not psychotic zombies walking around, there's Alzheimer's patients, clinically depressed and several other diagnosed illnesses in those hospitals and they deserve to be treated with the same respect as the patients on the ICU floor of the hospital.
It's not psychotic zombies walking around, there's Alzheimer's patients, clinically depressed and several other diagnosed illnesses in those hospitals and they deserve to be treated with the same respect as the patients on the ICU floor of the hospital.
12
One of the most offensive groups in stereotyping the seriously mentally ill is the gun control lobby. Repeatedly, they urge that the seriously mentally ill not be entitled to possess guns. But only those who have been involuntarily committed can legally be deprived of their gun rights. The rest of the seriously mentally ill, including the author, myself (a graduate of Harvard and Harvard Law School), and millions of gainfully employed individuals, have full legal and Constitutional rights. So we can't be deprived of the right to gun possession. Yet gun control advocates repeatedly urge that our rights be violated in the name of their cause. So it isn't just Six Flags that offends us. The gun control lobby is equally ignorant and equally offensive toward the mentally ill.
6
Tens of thousands of Americans die of suicide by firearm each year. Constitutional rights are important, but so is the preservation of life. Most gun control advocates (myself included) see no benefit in the seriously mentally ill *who pose a danger to themselves or others* in owning guns. Yes, this means that a professional evaluation by a psychiatrist could be used to restrict an individual's right to own a gun. As long as that can be appealed and is transparent, so be it. We already have other similar "gatekeeper" controls on other freedoms, like an optometrist preventing one from driving a car if you fail an eye exam. Why should guns be any different?
Instead of more guns for the mentally ill, we need more evidence-based treatment. Playing with fire is not the answer.
Instead of more guns for the mentally ill, we need more evidence-based treatment. Playing with fire is not the answer.
13
Recently, a family member committed suicide after struggling with 6 years of unemployment, severe anxiety and depression. We all tried to get him to give up his gun. We were afraid for years he would use it. He "needed it for protection" despite being a physically strong, 6 foot guy with 2 big dogs.
His brother recently said his brother always planned to use the gun once his money ran out. We did not know this. 6 month after the money ran out, despite intensive help financially and emotionally, he used it.
Our hearts are broken.
His brother recently said his brother always planned to use the gun once his money ran out. We did not know this. 6 month after the money ran out, despite intensive help financially and emotionally, he used it.
Our hearts are broken.
1
A significant minority of history's geniuses have judged the psychological state of humanity in organized societies as one of generalized madness.
In light of this POV, I should very briefly review a few of the more extraordinary features of geopolitical life in the 21st century.
Due to global warming and rising seas, we face the possibility that many millions of human beings will die of heat death, drowning, and starvation over the next 100 years.
Other gargantuan catastrophes loom as more immediate possibilities. To take just one: There is a icemass larger than Pennsylvania in West Antarctica called the Thwaites Glacier. It's being closely watched by climatologists because its collapse would cause a rapid inundation of, for instance, most of Florida.
No one knows how close this glacier is to letting go of its increasingly tenuous hold on the land beneath it and dumping itself into the sea.
Moving right along, we have seen the beginning of uncontrolled human migrations that may reduce many countries on this planet to chaos. Meanwhile, both Russia and America still act as though their best hope for national security lies in the deployment of ever more sophisticated nuclear warheads and ever more sophisticated means of delivering them.
So who's crazy? Who's dangerous? I would be tempted to say that all of us, proudly marching in lockstep toward a new dark age, might well qualify as the madmen and madwomen whom we like to mock and disparage.
In light of this POV, I should very briefly review a few of the more extraordinary features of geopolitical life in the 21st century.
Due to global warming and rising seas, we face the possibility that many millions of human beings will die of heat death, drowning, and starvation over the next 100 years.
Other gargantuan catastrophes loom as more immediate possibilities. To take just one: There is a icemass larger than Pennsylvania in West Antarctica called the Thwaites Glacier. It's being closely watched by climatologists because its collapse would cause a rapid inundation of, for instance, most of Florida.
No one knows how close this glacier is to letting go of its increasingly tenuous hold on the land beneath it and dumping itself into the sea.
Moving right along, we have seen the beginning of uncontrolled human migrations that may reduce many countries on this planet to chaos. Meanwhile, both Russia and America still act as though their best hope for national security lies in the deployment of ever more sophisticated nuclear warheads and ever more sophisticated means of delivering them.
So who's crazy? Who's dangerous? I would be tempted to say that all of us, proudly marching in lockstep toward a new dark age, might well qualify as the madmen and madwomen whom we like to mock and disparage.
8
Maybe some folks need VR to get a glimpse of what it is like to be at a Trump rally while brown... or be a black man pulled over for no reason... or a woman trying to get her point across in the boardroom while men talk over her. That is scary.
9
[Although clearly off topic] As the author notes: "Our nation is in a moment when prejudice runs riot."
This comment is so typical of the pervasive bias in how WE [seemingly] digest information. I'll defer to respective readers to asses the veracity of KonkOnc's comment and counterpoints.
This comment is so typical of the pervasive bias in how WE [seemingly] digest information. I'll defer to respective readers to asses the veracity of KonkOnc's comment and counterpoints.
The stigmatization of mental illness is a double tragedy in that those who need treatment may fear to seek it out while those who are treated may find themselves socially ostracized. We have a major epidemic of PTSD in our military, but many soldiers report they are punished by dismissal if they seek help for this now curable illness, We have a candidate for President who clearly [Disclosure: I'm a psychologist] suffers from Narcissistic Personality Disorder, but there is a conspiracy of silence in most of the national media. Ignorance of and about mental illness only serves to preserve the stigma and often prevents those in need from even being aware that successful treatment is available or for excusing their bizarre and typically destructive behavior as somehow normal. Mental illness is not entertainment whether it be in an amusement park or in the tawdry antics of a political candidate.
8
Perhaps the best way to convince large businesses that this kind of "entertainment" is totally unacceptable is to boycott them, and send them a resounding message in the language they understand best: money.
7
This is why we can't have nice things: people with an intolerant viewpoint insist that all the rest of society share that viewpoint.
Here is a tolerant alternative: entertainment is not just entertainment; entertainment is therapy. Halloween is a time where it should be socially acceptable to manifest our anxieties about life. Mental illness is one such anxiety. Popular misconceptions about it reflect genuine anxieties.
I don't like haunted house experiences, but if I did and I went to one I would expect to see every conceivable depiction of human dysfunction and depravity simulated. Inaccurately. Unfairly. But in a way that embodies emotional truth. That is their purpose.
Here is a tolerant alternative: entertainment is not just entertainment; entertainment is therapy. Halloween is a time where it should be socially acceptable to manifest our anxieties about life. Mental illness is one such anxiety. Popular misconceptions about it reflect genuine anxieties.
I don't like haunted house experiences, but if I did and I went to one I would expect to see every conceivable depiction of human dysfunction and depravity simulated. Inaccurately. Unfairly. But in a way that embodies emotional truth. That is their purpose.
5
I have depression.. and anxiety.. and OCD (probably, along with a few other things) (also survived cancer!) ..
I love your comment.
I'm glad I'm not nearly as sensitive to such things as to need to get them shut down so that nobody can ever experience them.
I love your comment.
I'm glad I'm not nearly as sensitive to such things as to need to get them shut down so that nobody can ever experience them.
3
Here's the problem: this perception of mentally ill people as violent and morally delinquent has real lime implications: we suffer job discrimination, social alienation, lack of affordable treatment, and constant stigmatization.
Mentally ill people account for a tiny percentage of violent crimes, yet people assume we're more likely to be violent than so called normal people. In fact, we're more likely to be victims of violent crime rather than the perpetrators. We're vulnerable to physical and sexual abuse in hospitals and prisons, and women who are mentally ill are more likely to be raped--the more severe her illness, the higher her risk. Homeless mentally ill women are at the worst risk. Of course, when we report being victims of crime, we're much less likely to be believed, cuz we're nuts.
In the worst case, this perception of us leads to police killing mentally ill people when they very obviously don't have to, as well as society in general not caring when we die. Stuff like this asylum horror house help to make people see us as less than human, and once you see someone that way, it's much easier to commit or ignore discrimination and crimes against us. And yes, I've been using the word "us" because I'm one of those scary crazy people, and I've experienced first hand the consequences of this hateful thinking.
Mentally ill people account for a tiny percentage of violent crimes, yet people assume we're more likely to be violent than so called normal people. In fact, we're more likely to be victims of violent crime rather than the perpetrators. We're vulnerable to physical and sexual abuse in hospitals and prisons, and women who are mentally ill are more likely to be raped--the more severe her illness, the higher her risk. Homeless mentally ill women are at the worst risk. Of course, when we report being victims of crime, we're much less likely to be believed, cuz we're nuts.
In the worst case, this perception of us leads to police killing mentally ill people when they very obviously don't have to, as well as society in general not caring when we die. Stuff like this asylum horror house help to make people see us as less than human, and once you see someone that way, it's much easier to commit or ignore discrimination and crimes against us. And yes, I've been using the word "us" because I'm one of those scary crazy people, and I've experienced first hand the consequences of this hateful thinking.
1
I still have nightmares, and wake up sobbing, breathing erratically and uncontrollably, about my time spent in a "treatment center". I'm lucky the nightmares aren't every night, as they were for the first few months after I finally got out of that hellhole. The trauma I was forced to experience, the unqualified and power-hungry staff I had to obey at the age of fifteen, will follow me for the rest of my life. As will the ignorance of the people who have not had this experience, a fact I have to accept. I was unfortunate to be born with a predisposition for depression and anxiety, but my PTSD could have been avoided if our society's attitude and our treatment of mental health wasn't so warped and non-compassionate. I'm so lucky to have escaped the system, but I've met countless others who's lives will never be healthy and happy because of how they were treated throughout their childhoods, locked in mental hospitals and abused. People need to understand this, realize that these institutions are money-hungry and run by people drunk on power and superiority.
18
What seems most horrible here is that the vast majority of outrage expressed (both by Mr. Solomon in the article and by commenters here) is directed toward the “transmogrification” of mental illness into “spooky entertainment” rather than at the transmogrification of the so-identified mentally ill person into an a subjectified Other subjected, at the hands of the State, to persecution, incarceration, isolation, and abuse. The real horror – and it’s evident even in Mr. Solomon’s opening description of the “entertainment” – lies not in so-named “mental illness” but in the grotesque brutality of its so-named “treatment” (i.e., the strapping-down ...). How many people here in these comments remark not upon the suffering invoked by the former but rather on the barbarity produced by the latter? That, I think, is the real horror: the contours of “mental illness” can be negotiated and lived in the course of “life”; the savagery of its “treatment” cannot.
Should be an acceptable part of the holiday? No. Lead to prejudice and mistreatment. Yes.
Well, that was easy.
Well, that was easy.
3
What is the caption on the graphic doing there?
It's pointless and a bit condescending to readers, as if we couldn't see it for ourselves. It is also at cross purposes with itself, as it detracts from the power of the piece.
It's pointless and a bit condescending to readers, as if we couldn't see it for ourselves. It is also at cross purposes with itself, as it detracts from the power of the piece.
1
Accessibility for people using screen readers? Keeping track of images by tagging them with relevant information? Allowing people to get the gist without loading graphics?
It's a more common practice than you seem to think, and I doubt the root of it all is condescension.
It's a more common practice than you seem to think, and I doubt the root of it all is condescension.
Is this- making a mockery of the very real pain and suffering of mental illness- what our country has come to? Is this yet another result of the "tell it like it is" (which is code for derision and contempt) mentality?
As a caring human being, a clinical psychologist and the mother of a teen with a significant mental illness, I find this appalling. Apparently nothing is off limits. Why would anyone find this acceptable?
As a caring human being, a clinical psychologist and the mother of a teen with a significant mental illness, I find this appalling. Apparently nothing is off limits. Why would anyone find this acceptable?
6
We need a movement in this country, in the spirit of breast cancer awareness, or gay life awareness that reframes the perception of alcoholism, addiction and the other mental health illnesses.
We need to reframe the conversation around managing these chronic illnesses, to celebrate the hard work of recovery, sobriety, and navigating and managing an individual's mental health.
Like breast cancer awareness and gay life awareness, we need to assert and celebrate the strength, doggedness, creativity and hope of family, friends and community whom craft a life dealing with sobriety, recovery and mental health.
Respect, celebration, awareness, and a place at the table.
We need to reframe the conversation around managing these chronic illnesses, to celebrate the hard work of recovery, sobriety, and navigating and managing an individual's mental health.
Like breast cancer awareness and gay life awareness, we need to assert and celebrate the strength, doggedness, creativity and hope of family, friends and community whom craft a life dealing with sobriety, recovery and mental health.
Respect, celebration, awareness, and a place at the table.
3
It's not alcohol & drug abuse that frighten people, & addiction & alcoholism already have a place at the table. Witness the multiple media campaigns to get help for them, including ads for treatment centers pointing out that total costs may be covered by insurance.
These treatment centers are very different from the jail cells & locked units in hospitals of various types where many with more invisible mental illnesses may find themselves, with unrelenting oversight & "management" by aides, nurses, rules & schedules. Places where soap & toothbrushes, etc. may be kept in central storage cubbies instead of patient rooms, where razors may only be used with supervision, where residents who don't show up for a meal or session may be subject to chart notations & possible restriction of privileges, where wires are removed from women's bras & laces are removed from everyone's shoes & pants & most personal belongings (cellphones, prescriptions, etc.) are taken to storage, no matter why the person is there. People who really need support & kindness have extremely limited telephone & visitor rights, with visits often restricted to public areas. This goes on in hospitals public & private, not just the jail cells people with serious mental illness can find themselves in.
Let's start with ending the stigma against invisible serious mental illness & then we can move on to "celebrating" those lives with appropriate treatments and places at the table.
These treatment centers are very different from the jail cells & locked units in hospitals of various types where many with more invisible mental illnesses may find themselves, with unrelenting oversight & "management" by aides, nurses, rules & schedules. Places where soap & toothbrushes, etc. may be kept in central storage cubbies instead of patient rooms, where razors may only be used with supervision, where residents who don't show up for a meal or session may be subject to chart notations & possible restriction of privileges, where wires are removed from women's bras & laces are removed from everyone's shoes & pants & most personal belongings (cellphones, prescriptions, etc.) are taken to storage, no matter why the person is there. People who really need support & kindness have extremely limited telephone & visitor rights, with visits often restricted to public areas. This goes on in hospitals public & private, not just the jail cells people with serious mental illness can find themselves in.
Let's start with ending the stigma against invisible serious mental illness & then we can move on to "celebrating" those lives with appropriate treatments and places at the table.
Ladies and gentlemen: Those of us who have been been, and who are, in the strangle hold of depression or any form of mental despair: let us go forward spiritually, arm in arm. If you'll reveal yourself to some of your family and friends, so will I ... and on and on we go. It is the only way. I used to be worried about what others think. No more. Let us go together. We are not alone.
Mr. Solomon, thank you.
Mr. Solomon, thank you.
17
@GRATEFUL
The NY Times has been trying to discuss disability and to bring it to the forefront of discussion..such as #BlackLivesMatter
or
October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month with “pink things “EVERYWHERE!”
YET those of us with disabilities, ESPECIALLY THOSE of us with “silent” disabilities, still need a voice. (Not blind with a service dog). We come from such disparate back grounds, our disabilities are SO different that inevitably anger comes through in the comments.
For example one commenter stated he was a lawyer and that the disabilities act (Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990) allowed able bodied man and women a chance to never work--to lie back in a hammock and “enjoy” life while HARD-WORKING tax payers paid for these lazy people!
So--Thank you Ted Kennedy (D-MA) and Orrin Hatch (R-UT) for coming together and bringing this act to America. Remember a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away when Dems and GOP ACTUALLY worked together across the aisle for the good of our country!?
Last year our contrary congress REFUSED to pass an international disabilities act! The GOP stated that no group of countries was going to tell US what we could or couldn’t do! Even Bob Dole a disabled veteran was booed off the floor for backing this international bill!
Another woman commented “When will I a normal white woman get “special gifts and privileges” as these minority groups were getting!
We want EQUAL treatment--That’s all.
The NY Times has been trying to discuss disability and to bring it to the forefront of discussion..such as #BlackLivesMatter
or
October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month with “pink things “EVERYWHERE!”
YET those of us with disabilities, ESPECIALLY THOSE of us with “silent” disabilities, still need a voice. (Not blind with a service dog). We come from such disparate back grounds, our disabilities are SO different that inevitably anger comes through in the comments.
For example one commenter stated he was a lawyer and that the disabilities act (Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990) allowed able bodied man and women a chance to never work--to lie back in a hammock and “enjoy” life while HARD-WORKING tax payers paid for these lazy people!
So--Thank you Ted Kennedy (D-MA) and Orrin Hatch (R-UT) for coming together and bringing this act to America. Remember a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away when Dems and GOP ACTUALLY worked together across the aisle for the good of our country!?
Last year our contrary congress REFUSED to pass an international disabilities act! The GOP stated that no group of countries was going to tell US what we could or couldn’t do! Even Bob Dole a disabled veteran was booed off the floor for backing this international bill!
Another woman commented “When will I a normal white woman get “special gifts and privileges” as these minority groups were getting!
We want EQUAL treatment--That’s all.
5
Take good care.
2
Unlike many that have protested this attraction, I am one of the few people to actually experience Fear VR at California's Great America media preview. At no time was any mention made of being in a psychiatric hospital , just a hospital. They made a point of mentioning that we were to have an eye exam. Granted, this may have been a last minute story change, because Cedar Fair did remove "5150" from the title before anyone experienced it, but the point stands; as presented to the media and public, this was just a hospital.
The story is simple; the hospital is being terrorized by Katie, a woman with dangerous, powerful telekinetic abilites. That is not mental illness. It is Fictional! Imaginary! Make Believe!
Fear VR (to repeat, 5150 was removed from the title before it opened) was straightforward horror with no connection to mental illness; it is a shame that Cedar Fair buckled to these uninformed complaints.
The story is simple; the hospital is being terrorized by Katie, a woman with dangerous, powerful telekinetic abilites. That is not mental illness. It is Fictional! Imaginary! Make Believe!
Fear VR (to repeat, 5150 was removed from the title before it opened) was straightforward horror with no connection to mental illness; it is a shame that Cedar Fair buckled to these uninformed complaints.
4
An earlier comment was posted about the long-term devastating effects that the emptying of state run mental health facilities initiated by Ronald Reagan had on society. It surely increased the incarceration rates as well as the homeless population. But then, everyone already knows that-right? To pretend that policy and leadership does not trickle down to our day to day quality of life, is short sighted and lazy thinking. I hope Deborah Danner becomes the face, the voice and the essence of all further discussions about how to treat those who are terrified.
9
Thank you Andrew for taking this up. As a privileged white male with bipolar I guess I finally understand the concept of 'microagression'. Bipolar almost killed me and it is always lurking in my life, so I don't really see turning psychiatric wards into an amusement park ride as OK.
17
These themes in entertainment reflect the audience's personal understanding with the troubles of the human psyche. A monster used to personify mental illness is far less gruesome than the real darkness which causes people to take their own lives. The use of mental hospitals as a setting for horror stories also demonstrates familiarity with the historical and present mistreatment of patients in those institutions. A better example of the mentally ill being demonized is the gun control debate, which has come to focus on mental health even when only a tiny percentage of people who kill are sick.
3
Thank you for making this point. That troubled me throughout the article. The human psyche does naturally simplify and demonise all it's greatest fears. If anything, the fact that we are all capable of losing our minds, or turning to the dark side, makes that a perfect empathic area to manifest in our ghouls. Especially since more hyper psychological states tend to reflect our general religious ideation around certain historical ghosts, and their role in defying our greatest collective fear - death.
1
This man's disability should be accepted as normal (meaning an acceptable handicap which does not induce harm in others), a part of this society's fabric. There are others who would be classified as mental terrorists: the criminal minds in our society. These come naturally to people's tongues as misaligned and feared. Many (ex-)felons have families, friends and sympathizers because they took the time to understand them. When the societal mind of America can look beyond the fearsome criminal mask, then perhaps this society may actually make advancements that are not present today. That goal is long and hard, perhaps calcified.
3
Yes, when do we disabuse ourselves of the criminal model - this childlike delusion that good and bad people still exist, and everyone acts only out of their own free will - independent of any socio-economic context?
2
The NRA as the largest gun lobby is REALLY pushing the idea that there is NO problem with guns themselves---Just need to keep guns our of the hands of the mentally ill...when study after study shows that it’s the mentally ill who are attacked and victimized in increasing numbers across our country.
No we citizens with major depressive disorder, bipolar tendencies, schizophrenia, dissociative disorders are the ones beaten up and beaten down by “good citizens.” Sure we have had mass shootings and bombings done by those with untreated or partially treated illnesses--such as the Aurora killer, the Colorado Planned Parenthood mass murderer, and the Newtown mass murderer.
So the NRA says “Guns are NOT the problem--the problem is citizens with mental illness. No. You just can’t blame those of us with mental illnesses as being responsible for our tens of thousands killed in the USA by guns.
Our mental health industry is in shambles. Budgets for NIMH and state hospitals have been slashed across the country. Mental Illness is as REAL as breast cancer and worse as it steals our very souls. We can get billions of dollars for Breast Cancer awareness month--even the NFL puts on pink arm bands, pink socks, then sells those items while giving 5% to cancer research! How pathetic!
Until Mental illness is seen as a discrete REAL illness, a real disease with proven treatment modalities---most people will CONTINUE to think that mental illness is just a “character weakness.”
Speak up!
No we citizens with major depressive disorder, bipolar tendencies, schizophrenia, dissociative disorders are the ones beaten up and beaten down by “good citizens.” Sure we have had mass shootings and bombings done by those with untreated or partially treated illnesses--such as the Aurora killer, the Colorado Planned Parenthood mass murderer, and the Newtown mass murderer.
So the NRA says “Guns are NOT the problem--the problem is citizens with mental illness. No. You just can’t blame those of us with mental illnesses as being responsible for our tens of thousands killed in the USA by guns.
Our mental health industry is in shambles. Budgets for NIMH and state hospitals have been slashed across the country. Mental Illness is as REAL as breast cancer and worse as it steals our very souls. We can get billions of dollars for Breast Cancer awareness month--even the NFL puts on pink arm bands, pink socks, then sells those items while giving 5% to cancer research! How pathetic!
Until Mental illness is seen as a discrete REAL illness, a real disease with proven treatment modalities---most people will CONTINUE to think that mental illness is just a “character weakness.”
Speak up!
5
Wll said. Thank you. I find the whole concept of these type of "rides and attraction" offensive and harmful to the max. There is, as you say, enough stigma which is both dangerous and counter productive. And, what is really frightening is the amount of mentaly ill in jail. They need help the same way any other ill pero
5
I am both appalled and teary -- not only as the mother of a young woman who has been fighting mental illness since she was in preschool, but as a human being. Where was the voice of reason and compassion during the long preparations that would have had to go into creating this affront to human dignity? This outrage was not only a failure of our most basic sense of respect for one another but an instance of going along with the crowd despite one's strong misgivings.
Once past childhood, I have felt like an outcast for hating Halloween. I think I have a better understanding now of why I do. Our fears are not funny. They are not diminished by creating costumes out of them. And they have the capacity to turn us into a much more real kind of monster.
Once past childhood, I have felt like an outcast for hating Halloween. I think I have a better understanding now of why I do. Our fears are not funny. They are not diminished by creating costumes out of them. And they have the capacity to turn us into a much more real kind of monster.
5
Thank you as ever, Andrew Solomon.
6
I have struggled with depression my entire life. It was Mr. Solomon's book "The Noonday Demon" that first gave me real hope, and strength for the struggle. When the urge to commit suicide seemed irresistible, I voluntarily sought help at an emergency room. This was before Obamacare. When my husband divorced me that same year, I discovered that I had rendered myself uninsurable because of admitting the truth about a preexisting condition and trying to get help for it. Now I have insurance again, but my treatment for the depression is categorized as "behavioral health" issues. I have seen no progress whatsoever on the stigma of mental illness.
I do not think Halloween should be used as an excuse to further and amplify this cruel stigmatizing of the mentally. However, I do not see labeling Donald Trump as having a personality disorder is meant as an insult. I think it is a clear warning to the voters of what to expect from this man. It is a clear warning that this man consistently operates outside the social norms, and a way to make it easier to predict his future behavior. There is a difference, bigly, between a narcissist and a run-of-the-mill jerk.
I do not think Halloween should be used as an excuse to further and amplify this cruel stigmatizing of the mentally. However, I do not see labeling Donald Trump as having a personality disorder is meant as an insult. I think it is a clear warning to the voters of what to expect from this man. It is a clear warning that this man consistently operates outside the social norms, and a way to make it easier to predict his future behavior. There is a difference, bigly, between a narcissist and a run-of-the-mill jerk.
11
They will need to identify the bullying personality as a form of mental illness, assign to it a diagnosis code. Domineering consensus-seeking, catch-phrasing, "You're not the victim; I'm the victim", etc. Then the labeling and finger-pointing might be less gratifying.
1
Absolutely pathologize bullying, and with those criteria. Shift the stigma to where it belongs, for the sake of common welfare, and then treat our evil doers, since - if we are truly honest, and educated - we will recognise their pain, anger and humiliation, too. We will see their explosiveness and violence as an outward manifestation of the same agony. (Just maybe treated from a safe distance.)
2
No haunted house would ever dare present a room filled with cancer patients receiving chemo or radiation treatment and there are plenty of horrors that go along with this illness. Descriptions of treatment and ravage effects of many illnesses would be shocking to the most not to mention the faint of heart. It’s extremely sad that the illnesses and addiction are burdened with such enormous stigma. Haunted houses such as the ones you describe keep these stigmas alive and keep the facts of these diseases and those suffering in the shadows of the dark ages. No one wins based on that.
7
Thank you Andrew. I read the first edition of Noonday Demon during a severe battle with depression that I inherited genetically and kicked in at 30. I am now in the midst of healing from a second round (or is it third...) where I contemplated suicide every day. I am now back up thanks to therapy and meds and feel like such a great version of myself. I never want to go back but it always looms there in the background. Mentally healthy people struggle daily with holding it together with modern pressures and responsiblities. It is so sad that people with mental illness are still so stigmatized. Here in LA we are surrounded by mentally ill people sleeping on the sidewalks. I wish there was a fiscally compassionate billionaire who would just come up with a magic solution to help these people. I don't know what the solution is but in the meantime I view them with compassion knowing I may be just a few support systems away from the same situation. So no, it's not okay to have these kinds of depictions. It is cruel and insensitive and it just makes mentally ill people "scary" and "funny."
11
just the fact the question is posed as an option is outrageous-the idea of the mentally ill as amusement park fodder is disgusting
7
too have suffered from depression and like a parrot on a pirate's shoulder, it still squawks in my ear occasionally. A friend of mine calls it the black dog that visits from time to time. To have at any "amusement park", a feature that regards mental illness as a fun-house attraction, is both offensive and frightening. Would they have a cancer ward attraction? Or hey, here's a good one - how about a leprosy attraction or AIDS? Not funny? No and neither is it funny to make fun or be amused by, people who have mental illness. I would have hoped that in 2016 the owners and designers, of these parks would be encouraging people to NOT see mental illness as amusing, because it's not. Not for the patient(s), nor their families.
6
I get the author's point, but if Halloween can't be politically incorrect, we may as well just abandon it. The whole point of it (for adults anyway) is to be transgressive for one night of the year. As long as people behave themselves the other 364 days...
2
Thanks once again, Andrew. xo.
9
Andrew,
What a fantastic opinion piece. And what a horrible idea for entertainment by the creators of this VR experience. I will have to think carefully about visiting Six Flags in the future. I, too, was diagnosed with a mental illness as a teenager, and while my illness is also well-managed, it is something I need to be vigilant of daily. Only my immediate family, close friends and psychiatrist know that I fight and win a battle with my demons every single day.
I also generally never mention my illness, and then only in general terms, and never use the pronoun "we," because I was burned by a co-worker years ago (who made up a story about me that drew HR's attention to me). And I am a nurse, and my co-worker was, too!
You know the prejudice and stigmatization of the mentally ill runs deep when you can even find nurses willing to engage in it.
What a fantastic opinion piece. And what a horrible idea for entertainment by the creators of this VR experience. I will have to think carefully about visiting Six Flags in the future. I, too, was diagnosed with a mental illness as a teenager, and while my illness is also well-managed, it is something I need to be vigilant of daily. Only my immediate family, close friends and psychiatrist know that I fight and win a battle with my demons every single day.
I also generally never mention my illness, and then only in general terms, and never use the pronoun "we," because I was burned by a co-worker years ago (who made up a story about me that drew HR's attention to me). And I am a nurse, and my co-worker was, too!
You know the prejudice and stigmatization of the mentally ill runs deep when you can even find nurses willing to engage in it.
13
If they made it a horror show for those of us who are mentally ill but don't have insurance for drugs or therapy - maybe then it would be more apropos...
Seems like a nightmare to me!
Seems like a nightmare to me!
5
In our real world, working with and caring for people with "mental illness" is just part of the job of living.
We all live with and work with, and care for, valuable friends and co-workers who are sometimes depressed, confused, frightened, deluded. That's life.
I hope we all get better at working with our "not totally sane" friends, co-workers etc.
The very very few who go violent - or "total psycho" -- keeping in touch
as much as possible is the way to go.
Halloween-style depictions of crazy people -social good - helps people get a clue how crazy our politicians and CEO's are.
We all live with and work with, and care for, valuable friends and co-workers who are sometimes depressed, confused, frightened, deluded. That's life.
I hope we all get better at working with our "not totally sane" friends, co-workers etc.
The very very few who go violent - or "total psycho" -- keeping in touch
as much as possible is the way to go.
Halloween-style depictions of crazy people -social good - helps people get a clue how crazy our politicians and CEO's are.
It's mean to be sure but horrifying psychiatric patients have been haunting the isles of halloween retailers since I was a small child. Illness and death are a part of the human condition and the myth of exclusion will always be with us. At least they're not burning unfortunates at the stake anymore, or at least fewer
3
Dear Mr. Solomon,
A solid 40% of Americans support Donald Trump, a man who constantly disparages women, gays, non-whites, the handicapped, foreigners, Muslims, immigrants...and even war heroes, along with anyone who isn't a virile, wealthy white man.
Question: Do you really think Trump's deplorable group cares about the mentally ill?
Answer: They don't. A solid 40% of Americans who support Trump think that anyone who isn't a Trumpite is a piece of [expletive].
Including the mentally ill.
And the only 60% who aren't Trumpites only care on some days, but not on other days.
A solid 40% of Americans support Donald Trump, a man who constantly disparages women, gays, non-whites, the handicapped, foreigners, Muslims, immigrants...and even war heroes, along with anyone who isn't a virile, wealthy white man.
Question: Do you really think Trump's deplorable group cares about the mentally ill?
Answer: They don't. A solid 40% of Americans who support Trump think that anyone who isn't a Trumpite is a piece of [expletive].
Including the mentally ill.
And the only 60% who aren't Trumpites only care on some days, but not on other days.
4
If you mean Jason, Freddy Kruger etc. I find nothing wrong with it. These are disturbed individuals who refuse to get help. As such I see no reason to not depict them in any form of entertainment. They are the stuff of nightmares and belong in the fantasy realm of Halloween just as Trump and Hillary do.
Thank you for calling this out; I will share this article with the NAMI family support group I attend.
My relative lives with this stigma; most painful is that the teenage children buy into the perception that it is the relative's fault and criticize everything from taking too many drugs (all prescribed for the disease), to taking a job below the level of a former career, to disabilities caused by such drugs (e.g., pre-diabetes), to mood changes. They say very cruel things and spend most of their time at their other parent's house. (As with most victims of mental illness, they are now divorced and the ex-spouse and partner are more likely to heap blame than help resolve issues; though they sometimes try, they have their own problems.) As one who loves all of them, I am aware to some extent of each person's diagnosed and potential mental illnesses and am grateful that my good health permits me to help--but I can never, never know how devastating it is for them.
Mental illness is a physical illness--not a deficit of character or will.
Insurance rarely covers the cost of residential care, nor does public mental health funding for any victims other than those charged with crimes.
My mother died of cancer when I was a teenager--the support from the community for her and for us was great. When a relative has a mental illness that decimates a family and its income, one can rarely succeed with a crowd-funding website, no matter how cute the kids or dire the need.
My relative lives with this stigma; most painful is that the teenage children buy into the perception that it is the relative's fault and criticize everything from taking too many drugs (all prescribed for the disease), to taking a job below the level of a former career, to disabilities caused by such drugs (e.g., pre-diabetes), to mood changes. They say very cruel things and spend most of their time at their other parent's house. (As with most victims of mental illness, they are now divorced and the ex-spouse and partner are more likely to heap blame than help resolve issues; though they sometimes try, they have their own problems.) As one who loves all of them, I am aware to some extent of each person's diagnosed and potential mental illnesses and am grateful that my good health permits me to help--but I can never, never know how devastating it is for them.
Mental illness is a physical illness--not a deficit of character or will.
Insurance rarely covers the cost of residential care, nor does public mental health funding for any victims other than those charged with crimes.
My mother died of cancer when I was a teenager--the support from the community for her and for us was great. When a relative has a mental illness that decimates a family and its income, one can rarely succeed with a crowd-funding website, no matter how cute the kids or dire the need.
13
Yes with cancer comes sympathy. But mental illness is not a "casserole" disease. Neighbors don't flock over to help with food and support.
9
I have suffered depression for years. My family has a history of mental illness. I went through childhood trauma. Nothing is worse than being ridiculed or shamed for it and someone telling you to "pull up your bootstraps." I'm horrified to hear that people are making money off of people suffering or who have suffered from mental illness. I have been hospitalized and there's nothing funny about a 5150, 5250 and a 5260 code. Upon leaving a facility, there is often a form given that one has to sign that they will refrain from certain actions and this is legally binding. I still have friends who make fun of mental illness. I often think they are so ignorant or afraid of this is they’re coping mechanism for dealing with their own fears. I say to myself "I have a dream" and that is future generations will not have to battle the stigmas for mental illness. So many of are leading productive lives. As a result of depression I am able to have more compassion for others and in being there for others, I help myself in reaching out. Basic compassion is what is needed. There are people out there who are violent, but they do not represent the vast majority of people suffering. Since Regan’s cutbacks on mental illness the situation has only worsened. It has led to people who are mentally ill unable to obtain proper assistance. These people often become homeless and on the streets. It’s a sad situation indeed.
42
People who need to have access to psychiatric care and/or medications are often given a hard time by coworkers, employers, insurance companies, well meaning friends, and family who do not understand that we are not seeing a psychiatrist for the fun of it or taking drugs to get high. We have real problems that will not be solved with a change of scenery, willpower, or whatever other non medical solutions they suggest to us. Mental illness is real.
I spent two years of my college career so depressed that I barely remember those two years. What I remember most is darkness, causing myself pain with razor blades so I was sure I was alive, hoping to die, and knowing that my family didn't care (and that last was most depressing of all because it was based in reality). Like most people with mental illness I know how to function but there are times when it becomes very hard: losing a job for no reason, or even losing a friend (not that I have many) or just a downturn in mood.
People joke about taking a mental health day but I know that if I do that when I'm severely depressed it could mean I won't get up again. The medication I take keeps me from slipping underneath the surface and drowning. The lack of selection for specialists and therapists for psychiatric issues means that if I were to need therapy plus medication I might not be able to find a therapist I can work with. My goals are maintenance not change. I need to get to work not be encouraged to work.
I spent two years of my college career so depressed that I barely remember those two years. What I remember most is darkness, causing myself pain with razor blades so I was sure I was alive, hoping to die, and knowing that my family didn't care (and that last was most depressing of all because it was based in reality). Like most people with mental illness I know how to function but there are times when it becomes very hard: losing a job for no reason, or even losing a friend (not that I have many) or just a downturn in mood.
People joke about taking a mental health day but I know that if I do that when I'm severely depressed it could mean I won't get up again. The medication I take keeps me from slipping underneath the surface and drowning. The lack of selection for specialists and therapists for psychiatric issues means that if I were to need therapy plus medication I might not be able to find a therapist I can work with. My goals are maintenance not change. I need to get to work not be encouraged to work.
10
Knotts Berry Farm...the bucolic name of this park certainly belies what it has apparently become in this edgy age. It began as Walter Knott's pleasant farm stand and family restaurant, developing later into what was envisioned as a "summer-long county fair". Evidently, it has fallen far from the shade of its original tree.
12
Welcome to Trump World.
4
I'm not sure what a "Halloween-style depiction of mentally ill people" is. I haven't participated in Halloween since I was a child...and I haven't been interested in horror movies since I was a child. Sadly unlike many people, I grew up and quickly came to NOT think of mentally ill people as parts of "holidays".
I know, for most Americans there is little difference between Saint Patrick's Day, Halloween and Christmas although as a Celt I loved learning about the real roots of Halloween and have no use for Saint Patrick's Day or Christmas.
In fact, I wish we had another phrase so that the mega-sociopaths like Donald Trump were not referred to as "mentally ill." I even feel bad about calling Donald Trump a "pig" because it's unfair to pigs.
I do think SNL should have done a sketch about Donald and Hillary's House of Horrors. Unfortunately they're off this week.
I know, for most Americans there is little difference between Saint Patrick's Day, Halloween and Christmas although as a Celt I loved learning about the real roots of Halloween and have no use for Saint Patrick's Day or Christmas.
In fact, I wish we had another phrase so that the mega-sociopaths like Donald Trump were not referred to as "mentally ill." I even feel bad about calling Donald Trump a "pig" because it's unfair to pigs.
I do think SNL should have done a sketch about Donald and Hillary's House of Horrors. Unfortunately they're off this week.
3
As one of the something like 1 in 5 people with mental illness, I am--- of mixed feelings on this. Part of me thinks this is harmless fun, Part of me thinks it would be "stupid" and not even fun, Part of me wants to experience the VR trip to the psych ward as they set it up, and yet a small part of me agrees with the author's suggestion that it is offensive.
I want to say there are medical reasons behind most mental illnesses, or at least contributing factors. For eyxample, I've had sinus headaches and pressure for the entire time i've had a mental health diagnosis (20 years), and this clouds my brain which affects my abilities to think clearly when the pressure is strong enough. I am next week trying a balloon sinus dilation and am hoping this finally fixes that problem, and when that's gone (if), I am hoping the other symptoms will get and stay better. Of course if that's a cure, i might have to get a job and stop being a disability leach.
I want to say there are medical reasons behind most mental illnesses, or at least contributing factors. For eyxample, I've had sinus headaches and pressure for the entire time i've had a mental health diagnosis (20 years), and this clouds my brain which affects my abilities to think clearly when the pressure is strong enough. I am next week trying a balloon sinus dilation and am hoping this finally fixes that problem, and when that's gone (if), I am hoping the other symptoms will get and stay better. Of course if that's a cure, i might have to get a job and stop being a disability leach.
3
I am truly appalled, but not entirely surprised, given the nature of some of the violent and subversive video games being created for our young people today. Even a publicly traded amusement park company must demonstrate a certain degree of sensitivity if they are to survive. As a Social Worker 20 years of experience, as well as the niece of an uncle with schizophrenia, I am keenly aware that mental illness is no joke.
What would have been next? The developmentally disabled? Seniors with dementia? I understand that a group was asking that the game be restored. Shame on them, and shame on the park! I applaud the men and women who protested this horrible attempt at entertainment. It should serve as a morality tale for our time. In a world where so many have been desensitized to pain and violence, it is imperative that we flip the script. We need to work hard to protect those who, through no fault of their own, cannot protect themselves.
What would have been next? The developmentally disabled? Seniors with dementia? I understand that a group was asking that the game be restored. Shame on them, and shame on the park! I applaud the men and women who protested this horrible attempt at entertainment. It should serve as a morality tale for our time. In a world where so many have been desensitized to pain and violence, it is imperative that we flip the script. We need to work hard to protect those who, through no fault of their own, cannot protect themselves.
7
As a person with mental illness in her immediate family and having suffered from depression, I have read "The Noonday Demon" and am honored and enlightened to have read this article. Thank you, Mr. Solomon for being an advocate always.
15
who me? I think people should dress up as Ronald Reagan. we would still have hospitals and institutions for the mentally ill were it not for president Reagan, who thought government spent too much money. so he spent even more in tax gifts and then claimed the deficit was the bigger problem.
9
Appalling. Here we are a nation that is obsessed with not saying anything offensive for fear of hurting people's feelings, yet the most emotionally vulnerable of our citizens seem to be not only fair game, but fun game.
16
Mental illness is an easy plot device for writers and directors to go to to insert drama, action, and suspense into their stories, just as slapstick is an easy plot device they go to for comedy. Anything and everything will be used at some point as a plot device, depending on the current societal triggers.
Mental illness and physical misfortune are emotional triggers, and writers are going for emotion. Police abuse has been a trigger and is more so now, and has been used as a plot device in dramas and sometimes horror. Food safety was a trigger when Upton Sinclair wrote "The Jungle".
People are going to write about triggers, and it can't be avoided. The problem with emotional triggers as plot devices is they affect people who have had personal experience with real situations that have not been romanticized, satirized, or dramatized.
The fiction is a constant reminder of the reality, and they can't help but feel ostracized. That can't be avoided either, but nor should it be. Rather than trying to censor dramatized or satirized depictions of mental illness, gun violence, alcoholism, drug abuse, etc., which is a losing fight, those affected by the reality can use the fiction as an opportunity to educate people about the real consequences, as Dr. Solomon has done here.
Censorship is unproductive, but education produces more knowledge and care about the reality than if the fiction didn't exist at all.
Mental illness and physical misfortune are emotional triggers, and writers are going for emotion. Police abuse has been a trigger and is more so now, and has been used as a plot device in dramas and sometimes horror. Food safety was a trigger when Upton Sinclair wrote "The Jungle".
People are going to write about triggers, and it can't be avoided. The problem with emotional triggers as plot devices is they affect people who have had personal experience with real situations that have not been romanticized, satirized, or dramatized.
The fiction is a constant reminder of the reality, and they can't help but feel ostracized. That can't be avoided either, but nor should it be. Rather than trying to censor dramatized or satirized depictions of mental illness, gun violence, alcoholism, drug abuse, etc., which is a losing fight, those affected by the reality can use the fiction as an opportunity to educate people about the real consequences, as Dr. Solomon has done here.
Censorship is unproductive, but education produces more knowledge and care about the reality than if the fiction didn't exist at all.
2
I'm not someone who is easily offended, but absolutely not! You can have a lot of fun with Halloween without resorting to dressing up as a mentally ill person.
Mental illness is horrifyingly difficult. I have bipolar disorder (and more mildly, adhd/panic disorder) and am on SSDI. I am unable to work, have struggled with addiction to opiates as a way to soothe the pain, and struggle regularly still with suicidal thoughts. I am getting better, finally, after being properly diagnosed two years ago. But, the struggle my husband, family, and friends have been through with me, has had a tremendous impact on their lives. The trauma of the experience of mental illness. The stigma in the media and in society writ large. 20% of bipolar people will successfully commit suicide. THINK about that. 1 in 5. Imagine another disorder with that death rate. Yet, we continue to mostly ignore it and other mental illnesses.
It is a tragedy, not something to be mocked. Thanks to everyone out there who has helped me and is understanding towards people like me. We really appreciate it.
Mental illness is horrifyingly difficult. I have bipolar disorder (and more mildly, adhd/panic disorder) and am on SSDI. I am unable to work, have struggled with addiction to opiates as a way to soothe the pain, and struggle regularly still with suicidal thoughts. I am getting better, finally, after being properly diagnosed two years ago. But, the struggle my husband, family, and friends have been through with me, has had a tremendous impact on their lives. The trauma of the experience of mental illness. The stigma in the media and in society writ large. 20% of bipolar people will successfully commit suicide. THINK about that. 1 in 5. Imagine another disorder with that death rate. Yet, we continue to mostly ignore it and other mental illnesses.
It is a tragedy, not something to be mocked. Thanks to everyone out there who has helped me and is understanding towards people like me. We really appreciate it.
12
We all should be scared of mental illness. A ball and chain that clinks onto your ankle and sucks the ability to experience joy out of your body. Medications and treatments continue to fall short in the horrible US healthcare system; (dubbed a revolving door of psychiatric treatment by authorities).
This VR game is tasteless and tacky to be sure. But it sounds like it plays on the stigmatization of the asylum as a horrible place, rather than the stigmatization that specifically affects the mentally ill. They are horrible places. I watched a close relative be admitted to the hospital ward 32 times in one year. She slept in chair outside the nurses station because the ward did not lock the men and woman in separate wards and other patients had been raped previously. Psychiatric wards are full of real life horror.
This VR game is tasteless and tacky to be sure. But it sounds like it plays on the stigmatization of the asylum as a horrible place, rather than the stigmatization that specifically affects the mentally ill. They are horrible places. I watched a close relative be admitted to the hospital ward 32 times in one year. She slept in chair outside the nurses station because the ward did not lock the men and woman in separate wards and other patients had been raped previously. Psychiatric wards are full of real life horror.
6
At age 73, I typically think I have seen it all and then I hear about something like this. What on earth were they thinking to do such things at Knotts Berry Farm and Six Flags!!!! Zombies, yes, mental patients no!!! A resounding "no"!!!
2
This country has hit a new low in nastiness. We have lost our humanity.
4
For thirty some years, I have lived with an albatross tied round my neck--a borderline personality whom I married and who left me with our child to pursue his rich college sweetheart (who left him at the altar AGAIN). He has kept me hostage by using our child as his leverage. I sometimes think that mentally ill people who do not accept help ARE monsters. My ex sure fits the bill. No amount of kindness and understanding is enough. His pain is ALWAYS the most important issue.
5
Personality disorders are different from mental illnesses caused by brain abnormalities.
Tough call. For the sake of cogency, I'm going to just address these entertainments. I think for many well informed, empathic and good-hearted people they would be good, scary, harmless fun. However, these entertainments do convey harmful stereotypes which help maintain present public policies that harm thousands upon thousands. I have no problem with what these activists did, but I think it might have been better to have convinced the parks to provide educational materials at the beginning and the end of the ride. There could be scary looking display posters for people to read while they are standing in line and also pamphlets when they departed. These materials could have countered common myths embedded in the show and also provided additional info about mental illness while not diminishing the entertainment.
Mental illness is not a crime. Deborah Danners was in her private apartment--she was said to be behaving "erratically." Not criminally. She made it clear as crystal she did not want the police in her apartment---they should have apologized, gone into the hallway, and called a mobile mental health center. If Ms. Danners was having a seizure--they wouldn't expect her to respond rationally to barked commands. Trained technicians would succor her. Police should not respond to mental health crisis--they don't have the training and they tend to feel just as frightened as any one else of such people. When Britney Spears was behaving erratically, when she kidnapped her own children and held them hostage in a bathroom, the respondents managed to resolve the whole mess peacefully and without a shot or a taser or a laser going off. During the Victorian era, mental hospitals were like campuses--psychiatrists and nurses lived on campus with their families, so they could respond 24/7 to any problems. When someone has a mental health problem--don't call the police. Every hospital needs to restore their mobile crisis team so that when something like this happens--trained mental health people and nurses, armed with injectable, long-acting anti-psychotics on en-route. Problems with reality testing are not a crime, nor are they an amusement ride.
3
If they want to give guests a really scary experience, maybe they could find a way to simulate mental illness and have employees treat the visitors like dangerous zombies. Then remind people that over 26% of the American population suffers from some form of a mental illness, and that people with Alzheimer's, brain cancer, epilepsy, and other common illnesses were also confined to mental hospitals not so long ago. What fun!
6
There was a time in England at least, and perhaps elsewhere, when tours of bedlam were acceptable entertainment. I find nothing like what Solomon describes as entertaining. Looking back at movie "Psycho" now, I can also see that the mentally ill are often portrayed with horror. Still part of the human psyche I fear.
I see this ignorance quite often, "psycho donuts"(depicting a donut running from an ambulance on their front door) and "5150 sushi" where I live in California. This NYT story came to be given Americans lack of education/insight and funding. Why not say Cancer Donuts? Back in the 40s asylums were beautiful places where those with mental issues could come and go as they pleased and the highly chronic were admitted. Patients dressed up to feel good about themselves and the landscaping was impeccable. Today the mentally ill are primarily treated in jails where they are preyed upon and left for dead. It's not going to change stigma until it happens to your family as it has mine. It is a horror show to be mentally ill and get services in the US. That's a ride I'd like to set up for all Americans to experience. Once you take that ride, you'll be scared enough to scream at politician's to superfund and change the entire system or in this case, the real horror show.
3
These attractions were careless and are part of a culture that demonizes mental illness in an age where we know more about how many people are mentally ill and the scientific reasons why. And it's not problematic solely for the healthy people who might go in and not think much about the implications, but also those who are mentally ill, who have to look at horrible depictions like this and think of themselves as subhuman. Maybe just as bad, those who do find themselves hospitalized or institutionalized associate these places as nightmare factories rather than places to potentially get help. (Whether or not these institutions are actually providing the necessary care is another discussion) I've dealt with severe depression for nearly half of my life, and while I think being able to poke fun at it and talk about it in the open will lead to destigmatization and hopefully better care, it needs to start and be guided by those who are part of the experience, not whoever thinks it's good fodder for entertainment in a haunted house.
4
I guess Solomon agrees with Trump: "Our nation is in a moment when prejudice runs riot."
And I guess they better continue taking Huckleberry Finn off library shelves. Not because of Jim--we've already pretty much worked that one through--but because of Pap, the scariest character in all of American literature. He is, after all, mentally ill.
And I guess they better continue taking Huckleberry Finn off library shelves. Not because of Jim--we've already pretty much worked that one through--but because of Pap, the scariest character in all of American literature. He is, after all, mentally ill.
1
Physical illness-mental illness: Not one of us escapes. We are human and mortal.
5
The Edge, I call it - that terrible place where where a single thought is all that stands between you and non-existence. Until I had been there, I had no idea the darkly transformative power it held. I will never be the same person as the one who stood on The Edge, looked around for a while, and ultimately chose not to pull the trigger.
Attempts to romanticize mental illness, like Fear VR 5150, are ill-conceived and serve mainly to widen the gulf between healthy people and those of use who must struggle to keep our inner selves in order.
Attempts to romanticize mental illness, like Fear VR 5150, are ill-conceived and serve mainly to widen the gulf between healthy people and those of use who must struggle to keep our inner selves in order.
3
Would we find it entertaining to create virtual slavery? virtual rape? virtual end-stage cancer?
2
As long as it's virtual, yes. Virtual reality gives us the experience a lot of different realities (and non realities) and these experiences can help shape us as people.
-Rob
-Rob
1
"We" is the wrong word. "We" don't matter. What matters is the someone may find that entertaining. Furthermore: entertainment is therapy. Too many people seem to think entertainment is an unworthy human occupation. What ignorance!
Mr. Solomon rightly points out that the depiction of mentally ill persons as zombies is not acceptable. He notes that there,"are more mentally ill people in our prison system than in our health care system." However, the reason for this is that the advocates for the mentally ill (like the NRA fights gun control) fight any involuntary commitment laws. These laws were largely abolished in the 60s and 70s sending the mentally ill patients out into the streets. Those mentally ill persons who are not equipped deal with life, by default, are arrested and convicted for their "crazy behavior." So they end up in the prison system because of their "advocates." The states are more than happy to close the mental hospitals and save money. The wardens of the jails and prisons become defacto heads of mini mental hospitals. Since the general public doesn't have strong feelings on the subject, those with the loudest voices (advocates for mentally ill) usually will prevail.
Involuntary commitment laws were regularly abused by people who wanted to get their relatives' money or just get them out of the way. They were applied to people who were not mentally ill, but were inconvenient. They put away gays, ideological opponents, imaginative artists, and independent women. They were a tool of oppression and greed, and we are better off without them.
4
We still have involuntary commitment laws, but now the commitment is time-limited (with possibility of renewal depending ...) instead of unspecified, likely forever & forgotten. They also now require a hearing with witnesses, evaluations, etc., & attorneys, assigned if necessary. Nonetheless, the system doesn't always work because the stigma of mental illness clouds the judgment of lawyers, judges, mental health "professionals" & people called as witnesses, on both sides.
People end up in jail because the mental health "system" is inadequate, beds in emergency treatment places unavaible, & jail is expedient for getting mentally I'll people off the street & out of sight/out of mind. America has far more jail cells than emergency beds for psychiatric patients. We seem to like it that way.
People end up in jail because the mental health "system" is inadequate, beds in emergency treatment places unavaible, & jail is expedient for getting mentally I'll people off the street & out of sight/out of mind. America has far more jail cells than emergency beds for psychiatric patients. We seem to like it that way.
Personally, I'm more frightened of "sane" people, especially if they're bankers, politicians, or lawyers, than I am someone who's only walking around with a supposedly somewhat crazed look on their face but who are otherwise honest.
4
Thank you, Mr. Solomon. You are amazing.
3
Andrew, thank you for this beautifully written piece -- I have tears in my eyes. Mental illness seems to be the last frontier - for research, for insurance coverage, for understanding it as a "real" illness and not a character flaw, and the last resort of cruel and pretty pervasive humor.
Our family has had some experience with all of which you've written. Family members are no less loved or valued for having mental illness. It may be that only with close familiarity will attitudes change. And the first is that "crazy" people are scary and/or funny.
Thank you for your good work and your sensitive prose.
Our family has had some experience with all of which you've written. Family members are no less loved or valued for having mental illness. It may be that only with close familiarity will attitudes change. And the first is that "crazy" people are scary and/or funny.
Thank you for your good work and your sensitive prose.
5
It has been and can still be a horror show. Not the people who are suffering from a mental illness but how they have been treated. It's the fear of how people became lost in worst of mental health care's history.
I'm not here to say it should or shouldn't be used as a Halloween prop. But the scariest displays were always based on what was real as opposed to the imagined evils around us.
Maybe if we did mental health better it wouldn't seem scary enough to use at Halloween.
I'm not here to say it should or shouldn't be used as a Halloween prop. But the scariest displays were always based on what was real as opposed to the imagined evils around us.
Maybe if we did mental health better it wouldn't seem scary enough to use at Halloween.
4
No, I certainly don't think mental illness or depression is a laughing matter, although I do wonder about a segment of society that celebrates and elevates an egomaniac and personality disordered individual like Trump as its national leader. I certainly don't want any person with poor impulse control like Trump anywhere near the nuclear launch button. Trump needs psychological help, not votes and applause and adulation. And that's scary.
5
Making fun of the handicapped (mental, and/or physical) is childish - something I was taught many, many years ago. I've worked with some of these people, have had similar problems of my own, and recently lost my 36-year-old son Lance (MBA + CPA) to some sort of drug overdose I'm certain was connected to his issues.
Perhaps the most dramatic example of how mental illness can prevent someone from working is that recently publicized of a Harvard Law classmate of our current Chief Justice. Please, no more mocking, especially along the lines of D. Trump and now these childish Halloween depictions. Instead, let's put money into bringing them back into fully functioning in society, freeing them from their internal demons.
Perhaps the most dramatic example of how mental illness can prevent someone from working is that recently publicized of a Harvard Law classmate of our current Chief Justice. Please, no more mocking, especially along the lines of D. Trump and now these childish Halloween depictions. Instead, let's put money into bringing them back into fully functioning in society, freeing them from their internal demons.
3
So, after battling severe anxiety and depression for years, a family member committed suicide.
Mental Illness is not some sort of joke or entertainment. For our family, it is a tragedy.
Mental Illness is not some sort of joke or entertainment. For our family, it is a tragedy.
76
I am so sorry for you and your family's loss, and especially for the family member who could no longer bear the terrible pain of severe anxiety and depression. My heart goes out to that soul and to all of you left behind.
4
This is appalling, and appallingly wide-spread. There is a huge billboard here in Philadelphia offering such "fare" for Hallowe'en, Pennhurst. I urge everyone to stay away. This is not entertainment. If only it were used evidence of the terrible treatment of people with terrible diseases, but it is not. Thank you once again, Andrew Solomon, for bringing this to the forefront. I have read your book, so I know you know from whence you speak. Be well.
9
I am a psychiatrist and I work with the chronically mentally ill, as I have since I started my residency. It is my joy to do so. I work mightily with them about fighting stigma, about their fears of participating in society, about their worries about stigmatization at work (if that is possible for them) and so on...and now this. I wish, oh, how I wish, that one could put on FB, "I was diagnosed with schizophrenia, and am so fortunate to have found treatment that is helping me." And what if the reply could be, "I'm thinking of you, good for you to get help, I'll calll you to see what you need," as people do for their friends with every other kind of illness. With mental illness, the world falls silent and into fear. Everybody knows this.
But: to call the mentally ill frightening, objects of terror, or even worse, objects of derision, not even humans but some alien species, well, there is no excuse for it. I hang my head in shame for our society and in fear for the safety of my patients, who barely dare to go out in public as it is. Can you blame them?
When will it be as unacceptable to call someone "crazy" as it is to call them the N-word, gay, the R-word or another ethnic/racial epithet?
Ellen B. Tabor, MD
But: to call the mentally ill frightening, objects of terror, or even worse, objects of derision, not even humans but some alien species, well, there is no excuse for it. I hang my head in shame for our society and in fear for the safety of my patients, who barely dare to go out in public as it is. Can you blame them?
When will it be as unacceptable to call someone "crazy" as it is to call them the N-word, gay, the R-word or another ethnic/racial epithet?
Ellen B. Tabor, MD
87
Thank you, Doctor Solomon, for speaking up for the huge percentage of the American population who suffer (I don't use the word lightly.) from both psychological disorders and stigmatization. And, I'm curious if you call your psychiatrist by his first name: “In this room, Andrew, we never forget that you are entirely capable of taking the express elevator to the bargain basement of mental health.” I found this condescending and, in the words of an old joke, "What do you mean 'we', Dr. Shrink.'"
3
This form of entertainment is nor more acceptable than having a fun house depicting abuse of children, minorities, LGBT persons and many others. Companies like Six Flags can generate revenue without demonizing mental illness. Zombies should have been their first choice because most people know what a zombie is and realize they don't actually exist. For those that do believe in zombies, they'd be hard pressed to find one to do harm to. Mentally ill people are everywhere and need acceptance and assistance. To be show cased in the worst possible way gives rise to fear, misunderstanding and further alienation and degradation. I grew up at a time when it was socially acceptable to make jokes about and disparage any minority and though I didn't like it, I did nothing to challenge or change it. I feel grateful to Andrew and the others that intervened on behalf of those who have no voice of their own. You are showing us the high road we should have been taking all along.
6
I am not able to gin up the level of outrage of most of the commenters here. The escaped psychopath mental patient is a well-established trope in horror and action/adventure storytelling. Michael Myers of "Halloween" fame or Arkham Asylum in the Batman universe, for instance. They are pretty universally accepted, but maybe they shouldn't be? There are a number of racist, xenophobic and misogynist stereotypes that were once stock in trade of our storytelling that would not be acceptable today in most of society. In 50 years will we look back at these storylines as an unfortunate relic? Tough to say, but this opinion piece does give me a lot to think about.
15
Turning mental illness into a freakish Halloween attraction seems a bit much.
Also, I'm sure a lot of attendees would go away from the exhibit and consider themselves 'informed' about the nature of mental illness.
Also, I'm sure a lot of attendees would go away from the exhibit and consider themselves 'informed' about the nature of mental illness.
3
A bigger question here is why anyone would willingly subject themselves to any of these VR attractions. Why would you want to experience things like this? I guess this is where I get off in terms of embracing technology.
1
thank you for stating the obvious about kindness and compassion!
4
As someone who's struggle with depression & anxiety has never reached the point of hospitalization & drugs stronger than Xanax I feel for those who's conditions are so much harder to manage. To reduce these people & their struggles to entertainment for adults is dehumanizing on a level we haven't seen since Victorian England & its equivalent here. I thought we had grown past this obscene nonsense. These companies have no excuse for this contemptible behavior & their rationalizations are sophomoric at best. Words don't express the outrage this idea provokes.
7
About 50+ miles outside of Fargo there is an old Kirkbride that still stands but is generally closed, Fergus Falls State Hospital. It is a hauntingly beautiful place and when they used to do tours I went and would never dream of treating it as a horror freak show. These were/are profoundly sad places so much so that even for a skeptic like me regarding the supernatural you 'feel' something, a heaviness, a sadness for those once residing in this institutions. You take something with you, the knowledge that sanity and insanity are a hair width away from each other and we are susceptible to the other side at one point or another. Making fun of those with ANY kind of illness, whether it's visible purely inhumane and disgusting.
40
I can relate to the perspective of this article. The stigma and ignorance surrounding mental illness is deplorable. Why on earth would someone create a "ride" like this? It is offensive and insensitive! It just goes to show that people are devoid of common sense and compassion. And the media and Hollywood's lackluster interpretation of mental illness is only portrayed in a pigeonholed, counterintuitive fashion that narrows the scope of mental illness. In other words, mental illness is often typecast.
That is all.
That is all.
3
Pink Floyd's 1982 rock opera 'The Wall' is probably one of the best known modern day examples of how mental illness can affect an individual.
As described on the back of the DVD: "...Our story is about Pink, a Rock & Roll performer, who sits locked in a hotel room, somewhere in LA. Too many shows, too much dope, too much applause; a burned out case. On the TV, an all too familiar war film flickers on the screen. We shuffle time & place, reality and nightmare as we venture into Pink's painful memories, each one a "brick" in the wall he has gradually built around his feelings.
Slowly he withdraws himself from the real world & slips further into his nightmare as he imagines as an unfeeling demagogue, for whom all that is left is the demonstration of power over his thinking audience, the culmination of the odious excess of his own world and the world around him. His internal self trial follows, as the witnesses of his past life, the very people who have contributed to the building of the wall, come forward to testify against him." - Alan Parker
__
It wasn't until after surviving a TBI, in '90, that I first watched this rock opera; having had already been diagnosed with PTSD and being unipolar, suffering from bouts of terrible depression and mood swings yet, this was relatable. The symbolism in the scenes and though I have always been a huge fan of Pink Floyd, the lyrics suddenly took on a new meaning.
A very cathartic experience.
As described on the back of the DVD: "...Our story is about Pink, a Rock & Roll performer, who sits locked in a hotel room, somewhere in LA. Too many shows, too much dope, too much applause; a burned out case. On the TV, an all too familiar war film flickers on the screen. We shuffle time & place, reality and nightmare as we venture into Pink's painful memories, each one a "brick" in the wall he has gradually built around his feelings.
Slowly he withdraws himself from the real world & slips further into his nightmare as he imagines as an unfeeling demagogue, for whom all that is left is the demonstration of power over his thinking audience, the culmination of the odious excess of his own world and the world around him. His internal self trial follows, as the witnesses of his past life, the very people who have contributed to the building of the wall, come forward to testify against him." - Alan Parker
__
It wasn't until after surviving a TBI, in '90, that I first watched this rock opera; having had already been diagnosed with PTSD and being unipolar, suffering from bouts of terrible depression and mood swings yet, this was relatable. The symbolism in the scenes and though I have always been a huge fan of Pink Floyd, the lyrics suddenly took on a new meaning.
A very cathartic experience.
1
this is another in a long line of NY Times first person articles which premise that an identity claimed as lived experience -- an exhaustive recitation of "standing" is part of the literary form -- is used to justify the control of speech by another person. in this case, the person is a corporation, but the control is applied to individuals as well.
everything about the six flags "attraction" sounds rilly tacky and stupid to me, but "bloody bodies on the floor" seems hardly credible as a representation of a typical mental hospital. (my "standing"? i once did a psych research project in the SF General psych ward.)
mental derangement has been a trope in literature since medea and macbeth. it has served well as a metaphor for greater issues of character, power and social control. i don't see why the six flags concept can't be interpreted as alluding to the captivity and control of individuals sealed inside a media bubble, made insane by conspiracy theory, and served the stuporizing injection of moral certitude.
six flags did not equate mental patients with zombies, it made that reach only after pressure from the identity privilege activists.
i prefer a world where six flags is left to mount its spectacle so that informed public discussion (and likely ridicule) can follow. instead, we get prior constraint of expression by a self elected minority who condemn a commercial concept a priori.
this cannot be seen as anything but a danger to free speech.
everything about the six flags "attraction" sounds rilly tacky and stupid to me, but "bloody bodies on the floor" seems hardly credible as a representation of a typical mental hospital. (my "standing"? i once did a psych research project in the SF General psych ward.)
mental derangement has been a trope in literature since medea and macbeth. it has served well as a metaphor for greater issues of character, power and social control. i don't see why the six flags concept can't be interpreted as alluding to the captivity and control of individuals sealed inside a media bubble, made insane by conspiracy theory, and served the stuporizing injection of moral certitude.
six flags did not equate mental patients with zombies, it made that reach only after pressure from the identity privilege activists.
i prefer a world where six flags is left to mount its spectacle so that informed public discussion (and likely ridicule) can follow. instead, we get prior constraint of expression by a self elected minority who condemn a commercial concept a priori.
this cannot be seen as anything but a danger to free speech.
2
People exercised their right to free speech by stepping up to criticize Six Flags. Six Flags took their concerns under consideration and made a decision, probably after weighing the bottom line implications (maybe after doing some consumer research)--which is all that matters for them. How is this a danger to free speech?
7
On the contrary. They're free to "speak" in this manner if they please and activists are equally free to protest. Free speech does not mean if you insult people, they just have to take it - let alone, pay for the privilege. We can vote with our pocketbooks. This outfit did not want to lose customers, so they listened. Seems to me this worked just right.
2
Thank you, Andrew, for your column and wonderful book. I'm a three-time survivor, including a brief hospitalization, from 1983-94 when treatment of clinical depression was still in the dark ages. Abraham Lincoln would have never been president today because he suffered from clinical depression. Winston Churchill would never have been prime minister because he suffered from the "Black Dog," as he called it. With clinical depression, it really does take one who has suffered the most agonizing debilitation imaginable to know what another clinically depressed person is experiencing. What the world needs to see every day is Lincoln's magnificent description of clinical depression, or "melancholy" as it was called back then. "A tendency to melancholy...let it be observed, is a misfortune, not a fault." This begs the question: How can anyone create a horror show out of another person's misfortune? Certainly not someone who has lived through it.
11
Mr. Solomon, thank you for bringing this to everyone's attention.
When my son threatened suicide at a teen because of depression & PTSD I was utterly isolated. Literally no one, including my family, was supportive. Many were outright hostile. At school, his advisors stripped him of his leadership roles, 2 he'd taken 4 years to earn, because "he didn't seem to care at all" -- even when I had a doctor's note that he was depressed, they still acted as though he were a spoiled snob. When he tried college but couldn't handle it & left with a medical note after attempting suicide, my family told me he 'needed to get a job, he couldn't just sit around the house all day.' When I tried to explain the depth of his illness, my family said, "If it's really that bad, lock him up in a psychiatric hospital." I felt like I was in the curb, & my family & friends kicked me there. I had no idea how to help my son & was terrified for several years when his PTSD was at its worst.
The only one to save me was his child psychiatrist--several times I called him sobbing & he'd listen for 45 minutes & give advice & calming words. And didn't charge because he knew i was a single mom. I will always be grateful to him.
Thankfully my son is much better now, but he still faces discrimination. Returning to college, he was advised not to reveal how he overcame adversity in colleges apps "b/c they might think you'll snap."
Because his illness invisible, many people have no idea how brave & strong he is.
When my son threatened suicide at a teen because of depression & PTSD I was utterly isolated. Literally no one, including my family, was supportive. Many were outright hostile. At school, his advisors stripped him of his leadership roles, 2 he'd taken 4 years to earn, because "he didn't seem to care at all" -- even when I had a doctor's note that he was depressed, they still acted as though he were a spoiled snob. When he tried college but couldn't handle it & left with a medical note after attempting suicide, my family told me he 'needed to get a job, he couldn't just sit around the house all day.' When I tried to explain the depth of his illness, my family said, "If it's really that bad, lock him up in a psychiatric hospital." I felt like I was in the curb, & my family & friends kicked me there. I had no idea how to help my son & was terrified for several years when his PTSD was at its worst.
The only one to save me was his child psychiatrist--several times I called him sobbing & he'd listen for 45 minutes & give advice & calming words. And didn't charge because he knew i was a single mom. I will always be grateful to him.
Thankfully my son is much better now, but he still faces discrimination. Returning to college, he was advised not to reveal how he overcame adversity in colleges apps "b/c they might think you'll snap."
Because his illness invisible, many people have no idea how brave & strong he is.
17
I'm so sorry your loved ones abandoned you when you needed them most. You, too, are brave and strong. Best wishes to you and your son.
2
Thank you so much for your kind words.
2
We have a similar thing going on here in Pennsylvania, not involving virtual reality, but equally distasteful. The Pennhurst State School and Hospital was a sprawling institution to the west of Philadelphia that was opened in the early 20th century, probably with the best of intentions within the limits of the medical science of the time, but it degenerated over the years into a place of genuine horror where mentally ill and developmentally disabled patients were warehoused in squalid conditions, given little care and frequently abused. After years of litigation, Pennhurst was finally shut down in the 1980's. No one who lived in the Philly area during the 70's and 80's could have missed the disturbing stories of what went on within its walls.
But for the past few years, the current owners of the site have operated a Halloween season terror attraction, complete with a fictionalized back story (about a doctor torturing patients, no less) and a search for the ghosts of deceased patients who allegedly haunt the grounds. Although the owners have claimed they are raising money to restore the property, the real horrors of Pennhurst are too close in time for this to feel respectful. Former patients and their families are still living in the area, and the rest of us remember all too well the graphic news reports.
But for the past few years, the current owners of the site have operated a Halloween season terror attraction, complete with a fictionalized back story (about a doctor torturing patients, no less) and a search for the ghosts of deceased patients who allegedly haunt the grounds. Although the owners have claimed they are raising money to restore the property, the real horrors of Pennhurst are too close in time for this to feel respectful. Former patients and their families are still living in the area, and the rest of us remember all too well the graphic news reports.
4
The individuals who came up with these "entertainments" should be fired. Too bad they can't be charged with libel.
2
Halloween is a time for those so inclined to confront what they are afraid of and examine why they are afraid of it—and whether they fear it in others or in themselves.
The commenters pointing out that there are other attractions and Halloween tropes that play off of mental illness miss the point. The fact that the problems the author points out are ingrained elsewhere is not an argument for creating this type of offensive theme parks. The Washington Redskins and Cleveland Indians are not arguments for starting, or renaming franchises with equally offensive names.
3
Let's imagine that you have a child who takes medications to manage a psychiatric condition. The child is mature enough to understand that s/he has problems with thoughts and emotions that interfere with functioning - e.g., mental illness. How do you think that child feels seeing mental illness portrayed in a such a terrifying and repulsive manner? To see illness, which is beyond their control, used a tool to frighten, disgust, and entertain?
7
I am clinically depressed. No one is afraid of us — we're utterly ineffectual; how can someone who can't summon the will to change his bedsheets present a threat to anyone? We're asked to "pull ourselves together" or just go away.
43
"No one is afraid of us — we're utterly ineffectual." This made me smile. (Aptly put.)
2
You may be depressed, but you have an excellent brain - good thought process, good insight and you are an excellent writer. Couldnt help but notice.
2
They are not afraid of you, they are afraid of themselves.
The harsh reality of clinical depression is that no-one sees it for the hell it really is.
In today's Times are recordings of Donal Trump sneering at failures and mistakes. This is not an uncommon reaction to a society brought up on the negative reference to "Loser!" Being able to call anyone "loser!", appears to insulate that individual from personality flaws most of us would feel sorrow/remorse for.
As a survivor of clinical depression, two suicide attempts, and my own Donald Trump, I can see clearly into todays rhetoric regarding mental health.
It would be a benefit to society if schools were to develop a study for ages 13 and up, based on FRANKENSTEIN, and specifically the play by Nick Dear based on Mary Shelly's work. A film starring Benedict Cumberbatch and Jonny Lee Miller, make the case for compassion for the different and suffering, in a way that could change the future of tolerance for all afflicted by physical or mental disorders... imagine.
In today's Times are recordings of Donal Trump sneering at failures and mistakes. This is not an uncommon reaction to a society brought up on the negative reference to "Loser!" Being able to call anyone "loser!", appears to insulate that individual from personality flaws most of us would feel sorrow/remorse for.
As a survivor of clinical depression, two suicide attempts, and my own Donald Trump, I can see clearly into todays rhetoric regarding mental health.
It would be a benefit to society if schools were to develop a study for ages 13 and up, based on FRANKENSTEIN, and specifically the play by Nick Dear based on Mary Shelly's work. A film starring Benedict Cumberbatch and Jonny Lee Miller, make the case for compassion for the different and suffering, in a way that could change the future of tolerance for all afflicted by physical or mental disorders... imagine.
6
I had to stop psych treatment for lifetime of treatment resistant depression (no meds help) and PTSD as you now have to sign a contract that if you even MENTION the word suicide OR am angry at a system, corporation or person I can be locked up IMMEDIATELY! I’m told--no more Newtowns or Auroras or VA Techs on their watch!
The NRA has made mental illness their straw man--Guns are ALWAYS good--it’s the mentally ill using them that is bad. We mentally ill are more often the victims NOT the ones who prey on others.
B/C health insurance fails to pay a psychiatrist adequately (They only do medical consults for 5 minutes) “other therapists” are used. Here in Georgia, ministers count as therapists! A 6 week certification as a “life coach” counts! There are woefully undereducated for working with real disease of schizophrenia, major depressive disorder, bipolar, dual diagnosis (drug use with mental illness--about 80% of people in treatment in psych hospitals).
Working with a therapist requires complete trust--but I can’t say “I am so depressed today”--ding! ding! into a facility. I am angry at my boss--ding! ding! Into lockup.
Every therapist will tell you that involuntary psych hospitalization is a joke unless you can afford $50,000/mo in Malibu.
No RNs on floor..just “techs” who are former SEC linemen. Last time, 30 of us crammed into a day room, TV on all day..seen ONCE by a foreign doctor--punished w isolation, or not getting to go to dining hall.
I just hope to die soon!
The NRA has made mental illness their straw man--Guns are ALWAYS good--it’s the mentally ill using them that is bad. We mentally ill are more often the victims NOT the ones who prey on others.
B/C health insurance fails to pay a psychiatrist adequately (They only do medical consults for 5 minutes) “other therapists” are used. Here in Georgia, ministers count as therapists! A 6 week certification as a “life coach” counts! There are woefully undereducated for working with real disease of schizophrenia, major depressive disorder, bipolar, dual diagnosis (drug use with mental illness--about 80% of people in treatment in psych hospitals).
Working with a therapist requires complete trust--but I can’t say “I am so depressed today”--ding! ding! into a facility. I am angry at my boss--ding! ding! Into lockup.
Every therapist will tell you that involuntary psych hospitalization is a joke unless you can afford $50,000/mo in Malibu.
No RNs on floor..just “techs” who are former SEC linemen. Last time, 30 of us crammed into a day room, TV on all day..seen ONCE by a foreign doctor--punished w isolation, or not getting to go to dining hall.
I just hope to die soon!
4
I'm so sorry for your frustration and ill treatment. I hope that somehow a small miracle will happen for you, and a compassionate professional will come along who can help. I don't know you, but please know you matter to me.
2
I second Julia's comment, Nuschler. I'll be thinking about you. I always look for your posts. I hope things get better.
1
I believe this type of entertainment needs to continue, as long as the next amusement is the watching of cancer victims in pain. If you do not think its ok to view cancer or tuberculosis patients in pain or dying, then it certainly is not ok to derive entertainment value out of the plight of the mentally ill or mental illness.
Ironically in my lowly opinion, severe mental illness can kill you quicker than any other physical ailent. Here, I am not talking about suicide but rather how depression can erode and destroy one's desire to live. Mental illness can rob an individual of rational judgement and bring about their death or the death of others. Nevertheless, insurance companies are allowed to provide less hospitalization days or in/outpatient psychiatric care in contrast to other medical conditions, i.e., cancers, etc.
Time has come for society to demand and provide the necessary psychiatric treatment. Time has also arrived for us to tell insurance companies that the fact that you are no longer earning a 40% profit and now that profit is down to 20% is no excuse to raise premimums. The reality check is to insurance companies, either accept your 20% profit or there doesn't have to be health insurance companies in the future of America.
Ironically in my lowly opinion, severe mental illness can kill you quicker than any other physical ailent. Here, I am not talking about suicide but rather how depression can erode and destroy one's desire to live. Mental illness can rob an individual of rational judgement and bring about their death or the death of others. Nevertheless, insurance companies are allowed to provide less hospitalization days or in/outpatient psychiatric care in contrast to other medical conditions, i.e., cancers, etc.
Time has come for society to demand and provide the necessary psychiatric treatment. Time has also arrived for us to tell insurance companies that the fact that you are no longer earning a 40% profit and now that profit is down to 20% is no excuse to raise premimums. The reality check is to insurance companies, either accept your 20% profit or there doesn't have to be health insurance companies in the future of America.
20
The stigma is real and extends beyond the patient. I was once at dinner with an acquaintance who cavalierly explained to me that he was pretty open-minded when it came to choosing a mate, but one line he wouldn't cross is accepting a person who has mental illness in their family. He was, of course, unaware that depression runs deep in my family and that my brother committed suicide. He was also (to his credit) much ashamed of what he had said when I told him this, but I was still amazed that of all the terrible things that could happen to a family, some with genetic components and some not, this -- this -- was the one he decided he could not bear. Why not heart disease?
20
All due respect- you really don't see the difference between heart disease and suicidal/violent tendencies?
1
To be honest, I understand your friend. I have mental illness in my family, and diabetes as well. I'd rather have diabetes or deal with a diabetic any day of the week and twice on Sunday. The depression, bipolar disorder and anxiety are unbearable. I'm always worried about what I may have passed onto my kids. If you strike out and get a bad version of one of these illnesses, it is not a happy existence. The turmoil these diseases cause (for everyone involved, not just the patient) cannot be overstated.
I won't even address the "entertainment" described in this article, as any decent human being knows it's morally abhorrent.
I won't even address the "entertainment" described in this article, as any decent human being knows it's morally abhorrent.
4
Because, living with a person with mental illness, it is always about them. Everything revolves around that person and how they are feeling that minute, hour, day. There is no room or interest in your needs, wants, or desires, they are the center of their and your universe. You will always be the rock - paying the bills, cleaning the house, changing the bedsheets, making and keeping the appointments, picking up the medicine, reminding/encouraging/cajoling. The best quote I read was "When your life flashes before your eyes and its someone else's". Go into a relationship with your eyes wide open, you will love the person and want to do your best for them, but at the end of the day, your life will be subsumed by their disease.
1
The author clearly misses the point. Our society cannot function without a certain level of trust, and trust flies right out the window in the face of instability. What is more unstable and unpredictable than mental illness? He may not like it, but mental illness deserves its place in the spectrum of fear.
4
Mental illness may deserve its place in the spectrum of fear - as you claim. However, it does not follow that it is therefore also deserving of being an Amusement Park Attraction. We should not try to profit from other people's mental illness, unless you are a person completely devoid of compassion towards others.
2
We used to stigmatize cancer that way. Diabetes. AIDS. Basically, any illness we didn't understand. Mental illnesses are physical illnesses, just less well understood. Instead of being fearful, please try to educate yourself. You will be helping yourself as well as others.
4
That doesn't mean it has to be a circus act.
5
I'm surprised to see such an article in the NYT; the newspaper whose crossword editor has made a career out of clues and answers that demean the neurologically different. Hey, Will, I dare you to call me a "maniac" or "nutso" or "batty" or "loonytunes" or "wacko" (or any of the other derogatory slurs you enjoy so much) to my face. I triple dog dare you.
8
I find these games and sports so profoundly offensive that there are no words to express my rage. (And I know a lot of words.)
My grandfather spent twenty years, off and on, in Missouri's public psychiatric hospitals (Farmington #4 and Fulton #1) during the decades when these facilities were shamefully understaffed and overcrowded. The guards were so happy when Thorazine got introduced in the 1950s. My grandfather was treated with both Thorazine (100 milligrams a day) and a bilateral lobotomy.
Many of these hospitals were emptied after 1963, when JFK helped pass a law calling for more "community health centers." JFK would have known something about this issue since his own sister was lobotomized via a quicky "ice pick" procedure by Walter J. Freeman II, the carnival barker of psychosurgery. (Rose Kennedy had no idea her daughter was undergoing surgery. Her husband made the decision and arranged the operation on his daughter.)
Now I've heard that the enormous, abandoned asylum north of Ithaca NY (Willard) plans to invite campers to stay overnight and be haunted by the ghosts of the lost inmates, those drugged and shackled and enslaved men and women. Great Halloween trick! What fun! Chills and thrills! And there are other defunct state psychiatric asylums throughout the country that have arranged the same sort of tourist attraction. Visit the ghosts.
Hmm. I'd like to haunt these tourists. Really haunt them. I think I could do it. Just let me know the date and time.
My grandfather spent twenty years, off and on, in Missouri's public psychiatric hospitals (Farmington #4 and Fulton #1) during the decades when these facilities were shamefully understaffed and overcrowded. The guards were so happy when Thorazine got introduced in the 1950s. My grandfather was treated with both Thorazine (100 milligrams a day) and a bilateral lobotomy.
Many of these hospitals were emptied after 1963, when JFK helped pass a law calling for more "community health centers." JFK would have known something about this issue since his own sister was lobotomized via a quicky "ice pick" procedure by Walter J. Freeman II, the carnival barker of psychosurgery. (Rose Kennedy had no idea her daughter was undergoing surgery. Her husband made the decision and arranged the operation on his daughter.)
Now I've heard that the enormous, abandoned asylum north of Ithaca NY (Willard) plans to invite campers to stay overnight and be haunted by the ghosts of the lost inmates, those drugged and shackled and enslaved men and women. Great Halloween trick! What fun! Chills and thrills! And there are other defunct state psychiatric asylums throughout the country that have arranged the same sort of tourist attraction. Visit the ghosts.
Hmm. I'd like to haunt these tourists. Really haunt them. I think I could do it. Just let me know the date and time.
29
It was Ronal Reagan who closed the mental health hospitals to save money by dumping the patients out in the cold. They were supposed to be cared for in community clinics that he didn't bother to fund. Reagan was one of the worst presidents ever.
7
Hello Molly, I'm sure you're right, and that Reagan made things worse, But the "Community Mental Health Act" was passed in 1963, during Kennedy's administration, after more and more journalists began exposing the awful conditions in state psychiatric hospitals. (See "Shame of the States.").
And even before Reagan, few of these promised "community health centers" were actually built. Today, many mentally ill people simply end up in prison.
Two of the three historic "hospitals" I visited in Missouri have easily been converted into prisons: Farmington #4 and St. Joseph #2. Fulton #1 is still a high-security asylum. The first "madhouse" in the nation established west of the Mississippi.
There was a time, during the Depression and WWII, when the number of beds in state psychiatric hospitals equaled the number of beds in all other hospitals combined. They housed (and literally shackled) patients with tertiary syphilis, as well as difficult "unwanted children," and lots of loosely defined schizophrenics.
A number of the attendants and guards were farmers who'd lost their farms. They used socks equipped with bars of soap to subdue difficult patient (didn't leave much of a mark). And many of these asylums were so efficient in managing orchards and hog and pig barns, with the help of "patient" labor, that they made a profit. Willard (New York State) was one of the most enterprising.
And even before Reagan, few of these promised "community health centers" were actually built. Today, many mentally ill people simply end up in prison.
Two of the three historic "hospitals" I visited in Missouri have easily been converted into prisons: Farmington #4 and St. Joseph #2. Fulton #1 is still a high-security asylum. The first "madhouse" in the nation established west of the Mississippi.
There was a time, during the Depression and WWII, when the number of beds in state psychiatric hospitals equaled the number of beds in all other hospitals combined. They housed (and literally shackled) patients with tertiary syphilis, as well as difficult "unwanted children," and lots of loosely defined schizophrenics.
A number of the attendants and guards were farmers who'd lost their farms. They used socks equipped with bars of soap to subdue difficult patient (didn't leave much of a mark). And many of these asylums were so efficient in managing orchards and hog and pig barns, with the help of "patient" labor, that they made a profit. Willard (New York State) was one of the most enterprising.
2
Frankly, I'm confused. Now, I don't have the whole story, just what's presented in this article. But, it seems obvious to me that the VR horror show is ... well, fiction. Obvious fiction. It's styled as a "haunted house." Adults understand that such things are not, and not intended to be, realistic depictions of anything.
Actual mental illness, just like actual violence, is not a joke. And, to the extent it is taken lightly is a problem in its own right. But, this is tantamount to saying that works of "low art" like the Texas Chainsaw Massacre should be forbidden along with more acclaimed works like Silence of the Lambs.
Maybe it perpetuates a stigma. Although it's far from obvious. The sheer heightened extremity of the situation and clearly coded horror flick and entertainment language seems to counteract that.
At any rate, this is worlds away from purchasing tickets to Bedlam or an actual institution. These are *actors,* playing *roles.*
Actual mental illness, just like actual violence, is not a joke. And, to the extent it is taken lightly is a problem in its own right. But, this is tantamount to saying that works of "low art" like the Texas Chainsaw Massacre should be forbidden along with more acclaimed works like Silence of the Lambs.
Maybe it perpetuates a stigma. Although it's far from obvious. The sheer heightened extremity of the situation and clearly coded horror flick and entertainment language seems to counteract that.
At any rate, this is worlds away from purchasing tickets to Bedlam or an actual institution. These are *actors,* playing *roles.*
30
I believe the other is suggesting that it's still too close to home. I would imagine you may take exception to a ride that simulated rape. Or more importantly, Six Flags would never trot out that ride. The reason is because it is disrespectful to those who have actually experienced that type of trauma. The other is asking that the parks, and we do the same for individuals who have suffered the trauma associated with mental health. No one is forbidding works of fiction, or even rides. The activists communicated their views to the parks, who ultimately agreed.
5
So, would it be entertaining to watch a show of black slaves being whipped and raped, so long as it was clear that they were *actors* playing *roles*?
2
Would a Halloween attraction based on a slave ship or plantation slave quarters be okay because it's "just fiction"? No. I thought not. Perpetuating stereotypes and deriving entertainment from the suffering of others should be beneath us all.
9
What possible benefit to society is the "Fear VR 5150", regardless of changing to zombies? IMHO, this type of "entertainment" does nothing to enhance our better selves, and we desperately need to be "enhanced", if this election season is any indication.
9
As a psychologist, I tend to be wary of what mental health people have to say on the subject of mental illness. I tend to side with patient based groups, such as VOICES, which does wonderful work. That said, this is really a wonderful essay. Heartwarming. Kudos to Dr. Solomon.
17
The other thing people do not seem to generally realize about mental illness is how connected it is to childhood trauma. The mentally ill are people who have experienced acute suffering, and often as very small children. Further, kids abused as children do not learn healthy, adaptive skills. So they have extra bad inputs and fewer good inputs.
If a parent is cruel, you might think "I am a bad person" or "I deserve punishment" or "I am worthless." These thoughts are the mind's way of trying to understand a very painful, impossible situation and leaping to a child's conclusions. Thinking like this for 5 or 10 years is a kind of programming that can lead to self-isolation and depression.
If a parent is cruel, you might think "I am a bad person" or "I deserve punishment" or "I am worthless." These thoughts are the mind's way of trying to understand a very painful, impossible situation and leaping to a child's conclusions. Thinking like this for 5 or 10 years is a kind of programming that can lead to self-isolation and depression.
84
I am astonished that your post is a NYT Pick.
Parents cause mental illness? What evidence do you have for this statement?
Adverse conditions, including poor parenting, may trigger mental illness in someone who is susceptible, but it is not causal. This is like the (now thankfully discredited and discarded) theory that bad parenting causes autism.
How is this theory that parents cause mental illness any better than the theory that mentally ill persons with distressing symptoms are criminals and should be treated as such - many comments shared such episodes in a rightfully critical manner.
Parents cause mental illness? What evidence do you have for this statement?
Adverse conditions, including poor parenting, may trigger mental illness in someone who is susceptible, but it is not causal. This is like the (now thankfully discredited and discarded) theory that bad parenting causes autism.
How is this theory that parents cause mental illness any better than the theory that mentally ill persons with distressing symptoms are criminals and should be treated as such - many comments shared such episodes in a rightfully critical manner.
Most mental illness has genetic links, and as often as not manifests in people who are raised in loving, supportive environments without any mental or physical abuse or social trauma. Perpetuating the myth that mental illness is primarily the result of neglectful or abusive parenting helps to further stigmatize mental illness and prevent families from seeking help.
7
Some people with mental illness suffered no trauma as children. Don't paint with too broad a brush.
1
Thank you for this article and for your, and NAMI's, immediate and impassioned action to put a stop to this horrifying debasement of people suffering from mental illness. How anyone at Cedar Fair and Six Flags could even consider using involuntary psychiatric commitment as an "attraction" defies belief. The only thing I can think of is that not one person considering monetizing mental illness as "entertainment" has ever dealt with a mentally ill family member or friend -- which seems hard to believe. Frankly, as you mention, this gross misunderstanding and distrust is what is contributing to the deaths of mentally ill people at the hands of the police. Thank you, thank you, thank you for calling attention to the need for sensitivity, compassion and just plain decency when considering mental illness and the people it affects.
14
I spent several years in a mental facility as a young man. I thought that I would never be able to function normally again, but with some great care I have worked and raised a family and acted outwardly like most other people. It has been a large struggle at times. Keeping it a secret from potential employers has always been a big concern since most businesses would react negatively to hiring some on e with a history of mental illness.
The public needs a lot of education on the whole subject
The public needs a lot of education on the whole subject
26
You should disclose after you are hired. It's not fair for your co-workers if something happens and they are not prepared.
Despite relatively successful meds, it's bad enough I still have what I call "the argument of percentages" with people I know and love--how much of a bad day is a truly bad day and how much of it is the illness. That's why some people still don't know I suffer from bipolar disorder. Otherwise--thanks to still accepted stereotypes like this--it then turns into 100% the illness and is used to dismiss me and my concerns outright.
I am not a sideshow attraction.
I am not a sideshow attraction.
12
Right but don't your co-workers have rights, too? I once worked in an office which had to be shut down and the police called because it turned out one of the people who worked in a different department lost it at work- she was hysterical. screaming and crying and barred herself in an office. We were all really scared and no one, including our bosses, had previously known that this woman suffered from bipolar disorder. It took a long time to get her out. Obviously, no one got any work done that day! It's not fair to others when you don't disclose something like that. No one was prepared to handle it.
Atb, in some workplaces, disclosing a mental illness would lead to being fired. It's best for people to inform their bosses, but I can understand why some are scared to do so. I have epilepsy, and I've been advised to be circumspect about telling employers about it right away.
1
So what's next? Censor "Hamlet" because it deals with madness and suicide? Burn all the Gothic novels in which a "Madman" is a stock monster? Outlaw Halloween movies? Prohibit teaching Dickens and Dostoyevsky because their novels feature mentally ill characters some of whom kill themselves? Nobody forces Mr. Solomon to go to amusement parks if doing so distresses him. But now he wants to impose his personal phobias on the rest of us and worse, to emasculate the entire culture to allay his fears. I know some of the greatest minds in history suffered from what today would be diagnosed as a mental disorder, whether depression or schizophrenia. So I hope Mr. Solomon's mean-spirited, censorious attitude is not characteristic of the population of mentally ill in general. Believe it or not, most people understand the difference between an actual patient and a fictional image and between a real hospital and a horror show. Mr.Solomon's mental issues are not a sufficient reason to muzzle the rest of us.
7
Wrong. Not everyone is blessed with common sense. Look at what happens in the news daily: people suing other people and companies about common sense stuff (i.e. The Bumbo Seat parents - they sued over the picture on the box thinking the baby was on a countertop. The Bumbo people had to recall all of the seats and change their illustration on the box, etc.), corporations making medications unattainable for patients with life-threatening conditions (Mylan's EpiPen).
The creation of these so-called amusement park rides is a slap in the face for individuals suffering from mental illness. So no, I don't think the author isn't narrow-minded in his interpretation. The ignorance and insensitivity surrounding mental illness is shocking. Shouldn't it be "common sense" for these amusement park "attractions" to not exist when it is an inane concept which alienates a large portion of the American population?
I respectfully do not agree with your perspective. Sorry.
The creation of these so-called amusement park rides is a slap in the face for individuals suffering from mental illness. So no, I don't think the author isn't narrow-minded in his interpretation. The ignorance and insensitivity surrounding mental illness is shocking. Shouldn't it be "common sense" for these amusement park "attractions" to not exist when it is an inane concept which alienates a large portion of the American population?
I respectfully do not agree with your perspective. Sorry.
9
First of all, your whole comment is a straw man - no one is arguing for government censorship.
Second, the other works of art to which you refer PORTRAY mental illness; they dont mock it, stigmatize it, distort it, and turn it into a horror show. Is the difference really lost on you?
Meanspirited? This piece is extremely empathic. It's scary you cant perceive that.
Emasculate? So masculinity is somehow associated with being insensitive, mocking people, and cheering for puerile displays of grotesqueness? Fascinating.
Finally - no, most people dont know the difference. Most people know next to nothing about severe mental illness. Most people are frightened by psychiatric hospitals and patients. As a psychiatric social worker for 20 years, I know this for sure.
More important: Many people who ARE THEMSELVES mentally ill don't know the difference - that's part of their illness. These kinds of portrayals absolutely become part of our collective consciousness, and people with mental illness absorb that. It directly impacts their illness, and makes it worse, when they believe they are scary to others, capable of horrific acts, essentially a side show freak.
And that's what these attractions are - side shows. They turn psychiatric patients into freaks. That you defend that says alot about you.
I wonder how you'd feel if the characters were cops and the attraction was "escape from the crazy cops".
Your comment is one of the most upsetting things I've ever read.
Second, the other works of art to which you refer PORTRAY mental illness; they dont mock it, stigmatize it, distort it, and turn it into a horror show. Is the difference really lost on you?
Meanspirited? This piece is extremely empathic. It's scary you cant perceive that.
Emasculate? So masculinity is somehow associated with being insensitive, mocking people, and cheering for puerile displays of grotesqueness? Fascinating.
Finally - no, most people dont know the difference. Most people know next to nothing about severe mental illness. Most people are frightened by psychiatric hospitals and patients. As a psychiatric social worker for 20 years, I know this for sure.
More important: Many people who ARE THEMSELVES mentally ill don't know the difference - that's part of their illness. These kinds of portrayals absolutely become part of our collective consciousness, and people with mental illness absorb that. It directly impacts their illness, and makes it worse, when they believe they are scary to others, capable of horrific acts, essentially a side show freak.
And that's what these attractions are - side shows. They turn psychiatric patients into freaks. That you defend that says alot about you.
I wonder how you'd feel if the characters were cops and the attraction was "escape from the crazy cops".
Your comment is one of the most upsetting things I've ever read.
1
I don't believe Dostoyevsky ever ridiculed or made fun of the mentally ill, in face he himself was a bit on the loose of ends. He wrote about the reality of his day and what he knew. Gross over-exaggeration on your part @Mor.
3
Mr. Solomon, thank you so much for this article I cried as I read it, and I sent the link to the article to all of my friends. I am printing a copy of it to take to my psychiatrist today. I too have long struggled with not only mental illness, but also the stigmatization and disenfranchisement that sadly goes along with it. I've got a long list of diagnoses (hang on - here we go): bipolar disorder, borderline personality disorder, PTSD, anxiety, eating disorder, and substance abuse. To the average person without mental illness, this is what that can look like - Crazy. Nuts. Loony. Weird. Overly emotional. Stupid (I'm definitely not stupid, I have a 155 IQ). I am in fact, unequivocally, none of those things. I'm bright, funny, kind, loving, and incredibly sweet. I cannot work due to my illnesses (my work history is terrible), but I do what I can for my community by actively volunteering for two non-profits that I absolutely love. What I am is a person with a medical diagnosis, and sometimes I get sick. It's no different than having cancer or diabetes. Sometimes your illness is in remission and you feel great. Other times, it comes out of remission and it flares up and you feel like absolute dog crap for a while. I will never understand why we haven't moved completely out of the dark ages yet, when we threw people into asylums. We are still doing this to some degree, and this is why I believe people with mental illness are the last great frontier of disenfranchised people.
27
If you can't work, how do you support yourself? Not being mean, but I really don't get it.
Agree with most others here; mental illness is not entertainment. I've seen many new 'creations' with today's technology that I find offensive. I don't watch or don't attend. However, this bizarre show may actually create some empathy with those that have never suffered with any mental issues. Too many do not understand even depression, much less other mental issues. May make it real for them?
2
Offering such a horror show as a spectacle for "fun" is reminiscent of the late 1600s and onward when the public were freely allowed into Bedlam hospital in London so they could stare at the ravings of the "lunatics" to satisfy their own vile fascination and for amusement. It sickens me that we do not seem to have moved on as a society. Disgraceful.
17
I find it most disturbing that the developers of these so called attractions would believe them to be popular enough to be profitable. And I've no doubt that they are correct, which makes the whole idea frightening. Just think what this says about the average American.
It is no wonder that social apathy is taking hold in our society. People are bombarded with all sorts of violent and demeaning media that cause us to feel a little less attached to our neighbors with each exposure. I suppose it is a natural by-product of being human… this desire to get down and dirty with our base selves. I find it frightening and refuse to partake.
It is no wonder that social apathy is taking hold in our society. People are bombarded with all sorts of violent and demeaning media that cause us to feel a little less attached to our neighbors with each exposure. I suppose it is a natural by-product of being human… this desire to get down and dirty with our base selves. I find it frightening and refuse to partake.
16
Can you help PA's NAMI advocate the same in PA with Field of Screams. A few of us have tried to convince FOS to change their terrible Haunted Assylum, but they have been less than compassionate. In fact, when they were first approached, the attraction was a very small part of their Halloween visit. Then they built it into one of three main attractions. I contacted the president of PA's NAMI for assistance, but received a reply that felt like they were feeling defeated themselves about advocating for a change. Kudos to you for motivating others to do the right thing!
12
Psychiatric patients, a misunderstood reality we abhor, perhaps we feel so close to, many times at the edge of reason and emotional control. In Bolivia, at a psychiatric hospital, there is a sign at the entrance that says: 'not all that are, are in; nor those in, are' (crazy, that is). How true, given that many of us do have personality disorders compatible with daily living outside, partly due to adequate treatment, part due to sheer luck of circumstances (such as a protective environment). To mock it, is cruel, and decidedly out of line.
10
I wonder where all this high dudgeon a couple of years ago when a whole season of "American Horror Story" was set in an old-fashioned mental institution, run by Jessica Lange as a cane-wielding nun who flogged inmates who got out of hand. Perhaps the ratings were high enough to make it unassailable.
Let's face it: mental illness itself is scary, and the Draconian methods of treating it in centuries past--specifically the belief that it was a manifestation of devil possession (mental and/or emotional difficulties still are referred to frequently as demons)--very much fit the whistling-in-the-graveyard Halloween tradition. It has nothing to do with modern psychiatric methods, or ridiculing sufferers of mental illness.
In fact, today there's a flip side to "Mental Illness Is Not a Horror Show": the "Beautiful Mind" mindset which suggests that mental illness is somehow noble, even an achievement, which has people bragging about being "in therapy," as if that makes them more important or worthwhile, rather looking down on people not in therapy as shallow or in denial. That in its own way trivializes mental illness just as much as a theme park horror attraction.
Perhaps Halloween itself should be banned as culturally insensitive and offensive to modern sensibilities. But you take away "It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown" over my dead body (whimsically depicted on someone's front yard as a Halloween decoration).
Let's face it: mental illness itself is scary, and the Draconian methods of treating it in centuries past--specifically the belief that it was a manifestation of devil possession (mental and/or emotional difficulties still are referred to frequently as demons)--very much fit the whistling-in-the-graveyard Halloween tradition. It has nothing to do with modern psychiatric methods, or ridiculing sufferers of mental illness.
In fact, today there's a flip side to "Mental Illness Is Not a Horror Show": the "Beautiful Mind" mindset which suggests that mental illness is somehow noble, even an achievement, which has people bragging about being "in therapy," as if that makes them more important or worthwhile, rather looking down on people not in therapy as shallow or in denial. That in its own way trivializes mental illness just as much as a theme park horror attraction.
Perhaps Halloween itself should be banned as culturally insensitive and offensive to modern sensibilities. But you take away "It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown" over my dead body (whimsically depicted on someone's front yard as a Halloween decoration).
26
What nonsense. Just one straw man argument after another.
- No one is talking about banning anything
- season two of AHS was all about empathy with psych patients. I watched it with great glee because the villains were not the patients, but the staff. Just like in real life! It was sensitive as to mental illness. You're making the same error people make who call Trump's sexual assault tapes "locker room talk" and then point at Beyonce grinding. Just as not all sexy talk is sexual assault talk, not all portrayals of mental ilness, even in a horror show context, are demeaning. AHS was not. These attractions are.
- Ban halloween? Again - no one is talking about banning anything. But if people dress up as Indians or psych patients or arab terrorists they should be rightly criticized. Halloween itself is not inherently demeaning to anyone. What on earth are you talking about? Did you think this through or just reply on impulse?
- People in therapy look down on people not in therapy? My goodness. Who are you hanging around with? What a projection.
Nothing in your post really speaks to the issue: These attractions demean people with mental illness and contribute to their suffering and to society's ignorance on the subject. Therefore these attractions are being criticized. Your whole post is a red herring and misses the point.
- No one is talking about banning anything
- season two of AHS was all about empathy with psych patients. I watched it with great glee because the villains were not the patients, but the staff. Just like in real life! It was sensitive as to mental illness. You're making the same error people make who call Trump's sexual assault tapes "locker room talk" and then point at Beyonce grinding. Just as not all sexy talk is sexual assault talk, not all portrayals of mental ilness, even in a horror show context, are demeaning. AHS was not. These attractions are.
- Ban halloween? Again - no one is talking about banning anything. But if people dress up as Indians or psych patients or arab terrorists they should be rightly criticized. Halloween itself is not inherently demeaning to anyone. What on earth are you talking about? Did you think this through or just reply on impulse?
- People in therapy look down on people not in therapy? My goodness. Who are you hanging around with? What a projection.
Nothing in your post really speaks to the issue: These attractions demean people with mental illness and contribute to their suffering and to society's ignorance on the subject. Therefore these attractions are being criticized. Your whole post is a red herring and misses the point.
4
Are you referring to the movie version of "A Beautiful Mind"? I found the book chilling.
One need not look to centuries past and the bad old days, just take a look in this very paper: http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/nyregion/abused-and-used-series-page....
Dr. Solomon, Your grace and eloquence in defending the defenseless is profoundly moving. In the mishegas that passes for democracy in today's electoral process I hold out no hope that the quiet voice of reason and compassion will be persuasive and prevail. Yet, we must listen to you and do what we can to rectify the coarse insensitivity that prevails. It is sustained and now augmented by our politicians. The entertainment industry has no moral commitment beyond profit. Even if it means coarsening our sensibilities and degrading the defenseless, a mode and manner of today's politicians, the entertainment executives will proceed at any cost to degrade human dignity and concern for others to improve the bottom line. We have no shared morality. We have profit as our guiding light. Concern and compassion and devotion to the well being of others does not enhance the bottom line.
God bless you for your eloquence and devotion to making us think. What impact will our actions have on others? Do we have any moral center? Do we really care for one another or are we still in a jungle but now with deadly weapons and technology that dehumanizes each one of us?
A fellow psychoanalyst says, "God Bless you!"
God bless you for your eloquence and devotion to making us think. What impact will our actions have on others? Do we have any moral center? Do we really care for one another or are we still in a jungle but now with deadly weapons and technology that dehumanizes each one of us?
A fellow psychoanalyst says, "God Bless you!"
11
It is hard to believe that people green lighted the development and roll out of this "entertainment". Civility and empathy are surely in decline further enabled by this real life horror show of an election cycle.
Truly troubling.
Truly troubling.
24
"Will it make money? Ship it!"
1
Thank you.
As one who has watched both family members and patients, who has been on the psych wards and witnessed/felt the genuine suffering and courage it takes to make it through, I am horrified by the use of a psychiatric hospital as the set for a horror thrill. The less visible effects of mental illness are handed down through generations, and much of the most damaging aspects have to do with stigma, ridicule, isolation. The suffering is real.
Thank you for your honesty, for refusing to stay in the shadows.
As one who has watched both family members and patients, who has been on the psych wards and witnessed/felt the genuine suffering and courage it takes to make it through, I am horrified by the use of a psychiatric hospital as the set for a horror thrill. The less visible effects of mental illness are handed down through generations, and much of the most damaging aspects have to do with stigma, ridicule, isolation. The suffering is real.
Thank you for your honesty, for refusing to stay in the shadows.
24
Thank you Andrew Solomon. I'm sure you helped many people today by sharing your experience with such eloquence and fortitude.
25
I think psych ward conditions vary. Some are excellently run so nobody is ever in danger(with a lot of security cameras everywhere just in case:)! Andrew, I'm so glad you got the right treatment and fixed yourself pretty well so you are able to report on it. I also have had the privilege. I think psych ward conditions vary, but myself don't prefer psychological torture in a funhouse. Once went to Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde's bar on Seventh Avenue near Christopher Street around Halloween one year around 2007 and was impressed how clean it felt in the absolute darkness and the hard cider was good, but here the audio(which for me a musician is almost as powerful as VR if not more:) felt very intrusive because the audio, while it started out funny, became a little bit crazy-making to anyone with a slight tendency to self-referentiality. I can say though that no one would ever confuse this ride you are speaking of with depressives! So it's not about to be a threat to you. Really we all have our things, everyone has something, 1/3 are bipolar and I don't know the ratio of depressed people to (there's no such thing as) normal in the USA, but:
Don't forget someday, if you ever need to tinker, to try Solian(amisulpride) as the Prolactin rise is a great wholistic feel-good hormone! It's legal if prescribed by and sent to your psychiatrist(from out of the country- still not FDA approved- thanks FDA:/) Europe is way ahead of us with this light non-TD med; as they were with diabetes.
Don't forget someday, if you ever need to tinker, to try Solian(amisulpride) as the Prolactin rise is a great wholistic feel-good hormone! It's legal if prescribed by and sent to your psychiatrist(from out of the country- still not FDA approved- thanks FDA:/) Europe is way ahead of us with this light non-TD med; as they were with diabetes.
1
Solian, the brand name of the drug amilsulpride, is another so-called atypical antipsychotic, a pharmaceutical drug. The description in this comment is wildly misleading.
Wonderful, Mr. Solomon. Thank you.
14
This example is a feature; not a bug. Media as a rule portray people who are behaving as a result of extreme emotional or perceptual distress as leads on every "local news" program every day, every hour of the day. Video of the distressed person is used as click bait to see what the crazy criminal did, and there is NEVER followup to find out what the fate of the undiagnosed/untreated/uncared for person is.
Any suspect associated with violence is specifically assumed to have a mental illness (schizophrenia is inferred, but never stated). The wastebasket term, severely mentally ill, is used to corral, dehumanize and segregate people who are most definitely termed "the other" and who are avoided at all costs - in schools, in the workplace and in all modes of general society.
Psychiatric hospitals deserve their house of horrors reputation: they routinely deprive people admitted to them their civil rights, their right to privacy and decent treatment. They are not therapeutic, and are designed to function exactly as prisons. Licensed staff are usually bottom of the barrel performers whose greatest employer asset is that they show up.
Treatment is directly aimed at two goals: keeping patients dumb and docile.
These entertainment venues are so appealing because they hew very close to reality, and it makes the danger felt, but safe. They are horrifying for those of us who have experienced them first hand. Otherwise, they are worth the price of admission for cheap thrills.
Any suspect associated with violence is specifically assumed to have a mental illness (schizophrenia is inferred, but never stated). The wastebasket term, severely mentally ill, is used to corral, dehumanize and segregate people who are most definitely termed "the other" and who are avoided at all costs - in schools, in the workplace and in all modes of general society.
Psychiatric hospitals deserve their house of horrors reputation: they routinely deprive people admitted to them their civil rights, their right to privacy and decent treatment. They are not therapeutic, and are designed to function exactly as prisons. Licensed staff are usually bottom of the barrel performers whose greatest employer asset is that they show up.
Treatment is directly aimed at two goals: keeping patients dumb and docile.
These entertainment venues are so appealing because they hew very close to reality, and it makes the danger felt, but safe. They are horrifying for those of us who have experienced them first hand. Otherwise, they are worth the price of admission for cheap thrills.
3
You're right. Let's close all the psychiatric hospitals and units as we are doing and put the mentally ill in prisons where they receive no treatment of any kind except to be beaten.
If you want better mental health facilities, someone is going to have to pay for it. Do you hear any politician say he or she is in favor of raising taxes for this? I certainly haven't and it's about as unlikely to occur as Trump being honored as a Mexican-American organization's man of the year.
If you want better mental health facilities, someone is going to have to pay for it. Do you hear any politician say he or she is in favor of raising taxes for this? I certainly haven't and it's about as unlikely to occur as Trump being honored as a Mexican-American organization's man of the year.
3
“Licensed staff are usually bottom of the barrel performers whose greatest employer asset is that they show up.”
I have colleagues who are the BEST at what they do in the psych profession and I feel you are unfair to them.
The number one problem in psych hospitals is injury. In the past it was common for nurses and doctors to be hurt seriously--skull fractures, ribs broken, ruptured spleens from being pummeled by psych patients.
Now there has to be a balance of helping a patient and keeping the staff safe. That takes a LOT of money which states are decreasing all the time. In a regular hospital injuries from patients is very rare. Emergency departments have paid security with guns or police officers/deputy sheriffs always on duty.
Psych hospitals don’t get enough insurance reimbursements to have BOTH RNs, doctors with one to one security staff.
Private psych hospitals that the wealthy go to have such a ratio. But 99% of psych hospitals have had to go to 24/7 cameras, RNs who ONLY watch behind one way glass on CCTV monitors. Meds are handed out by an LPN behind plexiglass--think of how you get movie tix--talk thru a microphone, then handed tix through a slot..same with meds.
Then they have large and very strong techs to watch over the patient population.
Of course it’s a horrid, non-therapeutic system..but insurance companies and state budgets DON’T CARE. The mentally ill do not have a strong voice--not like breast cancer pts.
All comes down to money & safety
I have colleagues who are the BEST at what they do in the psych profession and I feel you are unfair to them.
The number one problem in psych hospitals is injury. In the past it was common for nurses and doctors to be hurt seriously--skull fractures, ribs broken, ruptured spleens from being pummeled by psych patients.
Now there has to be a balance of helping a patient and keeping the staff safe. That takes a LOT of money which states are decreasing all the time. In a regular hospital injuries from patients is very rare. Emergency departments have paid security with guns or police officers/deputy sheriffs always on duty.
Psych hospitals don’t get enough insurance reimbursements to have BOTH RNs, doctors with one to one security staff.
Private psych hospitals that the wealthy go to have such a ratio. But 99% of psych hospitals have had to go to 24/7 cameras, RNs who ONLY watch behind one way glass on CCTV monitors. Meds are handed out by an LPN behind plexiglass--think of how you get movie tix--talk thru a microphone, then handed tix through a slot..same with meds.
Then they have large and very strong techs to watch over the patient population.
Of course it’s a horrid, non-therapeutic system..but insurance companies and state budgets DON’T CARE. The mentally ill do not have a strong voice--not like breast cancer pts.
All comes down to money & safety
3
And on cue, the kneejerk assumption that theonly response would be to close beds. Why not create humane and therapeutic places, safe supported housing and inclusive communities informed by a responsible news-providing media? Why not call for effective care and treatment that relieves and abates the underlying distress rather than medication expressions of it? Why assume that it costs more or costs an unreasonable amount to benefit society? Why not drive policy toward an inclusive, tolerant and virtues-based model?
Why?
Why?
3
I am mentally disabled. I suffer from severe depression, schizophrenia, .. ..mostly dissociative disorder,....depersonalization AND derealization...with the now occasional psychotic episode.....the episodes used to be often.
Been this way for about fifteen years now.
I see "RGs" (regular people), as odd now. But you must understand that they can not understand the depths that I and others can go to. Even my wife of 28 years can still not feel the depths of my pain. It's not possible for it would be threatening to her well being. It's by design.
Let all the RGs go on in their world of "positive illusion". Don't blame them for it. I'd be there to if I could.
On the ironic note. I actually inherited stock in Cedar Fair and I worked at Cedar Point when I was a teenager. I should give them a call. I have been in and out of several psych wards over the years, getting ECT and such. Perhaps I could give them some pointers.
Been this way for about fifteen years now.
I see "RGs" (regular people), as odd now. But you must understand that they can not understand the depths that I and others can go to. Even my wife of 28 years can still not feel the depths of my pain. It's not possible for it would be threatening to her well being. It's by design.
Let all the RGs go on in their world of "positive illusion". Don't blame them for it. I'd be there to if I could.
On the ironic note. I actually inherited stock in Cedar Fair and I worked at Cedar Point when I was a teenager. I should give them a call. I have been in and out of several psych wards over the years, getting ECT and such. Perhaps I could give them some pointers.
29
Thank you for your contribution to this forum. I like your attitude.
5
Thank you for your brave post. While I cannot understand exactly what your suffering is like, I too suffer - see my post :)
I have a cocktail of diagnoses, and yes you are very correct in that others look at us and go, well can't you just stop it? Can't you just snap out of it? Uhh, no, we can't. Can you just snap out of your diabetes? Just remember, our species evolved to due variation and we are the special ones because we get to feel to the absolute depths of humanity. With deep, searing pain comes ultimate joy and bliss. Be well my friend :)
I have a cocktail of diagnoses, and yes you are very correct in that others look at us and go, well can't you just stop it? Can't you just snap out of it? Uhh, no, we can't. Can you just snap out of your diabetes? Just remember, our species evolved to due variation and we are the special ones because we get to feel to the absolute depths of humanity. With deep, searing pain comes ultimate joy and bliss. Be well my friend :)
9
As the mother of a son who suffered from extreme schizophrenia I always appreciate Andrew Solomon for his knowledge, kindness, and writing ability
55
It seems we haven't moved very far beyond mid 18th century England where wealthy folks took tours of the Bethlehem Asylum better known as Bedlam to look at the mentally ill for their amusement.
Closer to NYC, I noticed that in a Times article on local haunted houses for Halloween there was picture of room in one where there were advertisements on the wall for Ritalin and Valium as if psychiatric medications should scare people.
Mr. Solomon is right that no one would ever consider doing anything similar with AIDS or breast cancer or diabetes. If anybody wanted to scare people, let them put up pictures of those with head or neck cancer. I've known many physicians who have been sickened by them.
Closer to NYC, I noticed that in a Times article on local haunted houses for Halloween there was picture of room in one where there were advertisements on the wall for Ritalin and Valium as if psychiatric medications should scare people.
Mr. Solomon is right that no one would ever consider doing anything similar with AIDS or breast cancer or diabetes. If anybody wanted to scare people, let them put up pictures of those with head or neck cancer. I've known many physicians who have been sickened by them.
36
Sincerely hope this becomes one of the NYT's most widely read Opinion Page pieces, thank you Mr Solomon for your powerfully written and truly brave article. If readers are appalled, please share the article with your community, contact the theme parks and be an advocate and an ally for those in need.
11
The medications themselves are not scary, how often and why they are used is horrifying.
1
I too have suffered from depression and like a parrot on a pirate's shoulder, it still squawks in my ear occasionally. A friend of mine calls it the black dog that visits from time to time. To have at any "amusement park", a feature that regards mental illness as a fun-house attraction, is both offensive and frightening. Would they have a cancer ward attraction? Or hey, here's a good one - how about a leprosy attraction or AIDS? Not funny? No and neither is it funny to make fun or be amused by, people who have mental illness. I would have hoped that in 2016 the owners and designers, of these parks would be encouraging people to NOT see mental illness as amusing, because it's not. Not for the patient(s), nor their families.
78
I was 14 when my mother had a "nervous breakdown" and was taken to the state mental hospital. My Dad, an alcoholic but loving man, managed somehow. My sister grew up to be a bar tender and drug dealer. I became a psychologist. Life is no surprise.
83
I hear you, Kathy. Early on-the-job training here too.
1
Thank you Andrew Solomon for speaking out. I'm sure you have helped many others today with your eloquence and fortitude.
4
I read your wonderful book on travel, "Far & Away", this summer and have great admiration for your insights, empathy and curiosity about other people, and good writing. For there still to be a prejudice about mental illness in this country, in spite of outstanding individuals like yourself, a shameful, medieval mindset must still exist. I don't understand a lot of this country.
2
As great a danger as the fears you describe is the self-interest of the care community, which thrives on others' illnesses, and biases powerful decision-makers towards labeling and compartmentalizing treatment and care options, such that people can end up stuck in a system of "care" that has the unconscious result of suppressing their individuality and personal freedom on a long-term, or even life-long, timescale. For care-givers, including physicians and therapists, there is no unencumbered reward when someone with mental illness recovers.
1
I guess I'm just really out of touch, because I can't imagine who would even THINK of a psych-ward theme park attraction, let alone go through with it.
Is it just that people are becoming less empathetic, as recent studies purport to show?
Is it just that people are becoming less empathetic, as recent studies purport to show?
8
Companies are desperate to come up with new ways to generate media attention.
2
It seems that we have travelled back in time to Bedlam. For a few pennies one could view the mad, for amusement, and to raise income for the hospital. Now, we can feed the flames and fill the coffers of Six Flags. Eight centuries and it comes to this.
14
I was a consulting neurologist for the 300 bed inpatient services of a major psychiatric hospital on the East coast for over 20 years. I spent a great deal of time with both patients and staff on the units and can unequivocally say from first-hand experience that life on the units was basically 'booooring'. There was the occasional situation where an involuntarily committed patient got out of control and had to be restrained and medicated against their wills, but these were few and far between. A true-to-life portrayal of a psychiatric hospital would be like Andy Warhol's 8 hour movie of the Empire State Building, in which the high point was when a bird flew by. While the proposed VR 'entertainments' have rightly been scotched, we do have cable TV programs which exploit the plights of the mentally ill. As the author rightly points out, there are more mentally ill people in our prison system (2.4 million) than in our psychiatric hospitals. Cable TV shows such as "Lockup" focus much of their content on violent confrontations between inmates and guards but I suspect that for the most part, prison life is just a boring as life in a psychiatric hospital. In addition, psychiatric hospital's core mission is to rehabilitate the mentally ill so that they can function outside the hospital. Prisons, on the other hand, may be called correction institutions, but have devolved into true horror shows, run by corporations and not the state. We should all be ashamed we let this happen.
10
I'm glad that the two companies found the modicum of decency necessary for them to decide against these grotesque projects, but it's appalling that they didn't conclude on their own that they were massively unacceptable--or that the projects were ever conceived in the first place.
As the parent of a young woman who has struggled with depression since her teens, although not to as incapacitating a degree as Mr. Solomon, I am always aware that tomorrow may not be as good as today and that we are all vulnerable. She is doing well thanks to a caring psychiatrist and a maintenance dose of an SSRI, but I know that it's only a matter of time before she slides again into that awful place.
To use human suffering for an amusement park attraction is awful beyond words. What is the matter with people? Failure of empathy indeed.
As the parent of a young woman who has struggled with depression since her teens, although not to as incapacitating a degree as Mr. Solomon, I am always aware that tomorrow may not be as good as today and that we are all vulnerable. She is doing well thanks to a caring psychiatrist and a maintenance dose of an SSRI, but I know that it's only a matter of time before she slides again into that awful place.
To use human suffering for an amusement park attraction is awful beyond words. What is the matter with people? Failure of empathy indeed.
11
I too have been on both sides of the mental health fence and have been involuntarily committed for being a danger to myself. I thought the beginning of this article was a bizaare tongue-in-check description of something. It took another reading to realize it was true. No "political correctness" has been developed for the mentally ill. Oh, sure, mental health units in acute care hospitals are now "behavior health units" but we know what that means. The mentally ill do not have the political power other diseases such as breast cancer has achieved. Mental Health walks do not flourish throughout the nation. Thank goodness Altziemer's is finding its public voice. It is sad that we have to pit one disease against another for attention and funding.
I have been fortunate to have had the resources to access the most cutting edge mental health treatments and will no longer have to suffer ECT. But it has made me be painfully aware as I receive countless phone solicitations for breast cancer that I have never received a solicitation for mental health support. Mental health hangs out there to be ridiculed, hidden, and shamed.
I have been fortunate to have had the resources to access the most cutting edge mental health treatments and will no longer have to suffer ECT. But it has made me be painfully aware as I receive countless phone solicitations for breast cancer that I have never received a solicitation for mental health support. Mental health hangs out there to be ridiculed, hidden, and shamed.
11
Thank you for the great points: what's really scary is how little we know about brain bio- chemistry. And how lacking our treatment is. Those are the horror show elements.
7
Applying for SSI disability? With your first application include a one page
history of your circumstances, plus letters of diagnosis and support from your psychiatrists and other doctors. Get help writing your history, if necessary.
history of your circumstances, plus letters of diagnosis and support from your psychiatrists and other doctors. Get help writing your history, if necessary.
2
"As both a psychiatric patient and a professor of clinical psychology, I was saddened to see painful lived experiences transmogrified into spooky entertainment."
I hope you can add the rape, torture, and murder of women to the list of what does not constitute "entertainment" (although that might result in the cancellation of a hefty list of TV shows).
I hope you can add the rape, torture, and murder of women to the list of what does not constitute "entertainment" (although that might result in the cancellation of a hefty list of TV shows).
20
!!!!!!!!!! This needed saying
2
I can imagine a few people involved in late-night giddiness induced by alcohol and/or drugs batting about such an idea. But a group of reasonable intelligent, sane, executives investing a corporation's money to create an insane asylum theme park? What's next, Serial Killer World?
11
KD, let's not give anyone any ideas! Serial Killer World? I wouldn't put it past them.
Especially since it's clear that Big Corp execs the world over have absolutely no qualms about exploiting anyone or anything - no matter what destruction they wreak - to make money and stoke their own egos.
Especially since it's clear that Big Corp execs the world over have absolutely no qualms about exploiting anyone or anything - no matter what destruction they wreak - to make money and stoke their own egos.
3
You've done it again, Mr. Soloman. Thank you so much for your thoughtful and shrewd observations on our society in relation to mental illness ( that chapter in your book was so rewarding, too). And thanks for being a part of the movement that stopped these horrifying "shows." How such an "entertainment" could even occur to anyone, i don't know. But I think it might indicate a bat or two in the belfry, certainly.
6
The greatest horrors in the saga of serious mental illnesses (SMI) is the lack of scientific brain research that could eradicate all SMI.
There are already enough clues uncovered by scientific research to show that it is parasites, prions, misfolded proteins and other microbes that infect human brains and destroy the lives of millions.
Until we bring science, instead of social studies, into the fore of schizophrenia and depression studies, for example, we have no hope of eradicating chronic brain diseases from humanity.
Most governments cling to the hope that simple social engineering can defeat these medical diseases. Better funded scientific brain research could reliably bring a true picture of the root causes of human brain diseases.
What are we waiting for?
There are already enough clues uncovered by scientific research to show that it is parasites, prions, misfolded proteins and other microbes that infect human brains and destroy the lives of millions.
Until we bring science, instead of social studies, into the fore of schizophrenia and depression studies, for example, we have no hope of eradicating chronic brain diseases from humanity.
Most governments cling to the hope that simple social engineering can defeat these medical diseases. Better funded scientific brain research could reliably bring a true picture of the root causes of human brain diseases.
What are we waiting for?
4
"What are we waiting for?"
Scientology, apparently.
Scientology, apparently.
1
Thank you for continuing to fight against the stigma of mental illness!
7
To Andrew, The Orange County branch of the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) and Doris Schwartz -- my heartfelt thank you.
Your editorial and your actions to protest will be read around the world. You rang the bell for awareness of mental illness. Now, please everyone, share this story. Let's ensure everyone can hear.
Your editorial and your actions to protest will be read around the world. You rang the bell for awareness of mental illness. Now, please everyone, share this story. Let's ensure everyone can hear.
18
I heard recently that in Victorian England Saturday entertainment could be had by buying tickets to watch the patients in the Bedlam asylum. I was horrified but at same time I felt smug that we have progressed much beyond that - I'm not so smug after reading this. Simply put, mental illness should not used for entertainment.
110
No one else's pain or misfortune should be used for entertainment. This seems so evident, doesn't it?
5
As someone who spent time in a psychiatric hospital as a depressed and suicidal teenager (and still battles the former), it's distressing to hear that it's still considered okay to demonize very real medical issues that affect real people and their families. The author is correct, we wouldn't turn cancer treatments or terminal illnesses into amusement attractions, so why is this okay? Sadly, I'm reminded that empathy is not a universal condition.
155
That Knott's Berry Farm would venture an "entertainment" based on mental illness is ludicrous. That it was assumed that the public would enjoy this is abysmal.
Mental illness is just that: illness to be treated. As medicine has advanced, treatments have become increasingly successful. Psychiatric conditions should be met with skill and compassion, not derision. You
Mental illness is just that: illness to be treated. As medicine has advanced, treatments have become increasingly successful. Psychiatric conditions should be met with skill and compassion, not derision. You
19
When I was a neuropsych intern, I sat in on social worker team meetings at a medical center. One day the leader told us enthusiastically that a man had called 911 to report that he could feel an epileptic seizure coming on and had no medications at hand. For some reason, a police car was sent. He was thrust into the back seat and locked in.
The seizure began in full force during transport to the hospital. He kicked out one of the windows of the police car!
On arrival, he was quickly manacled and strapped into a hospital bed with an armed guard at his side. His cries were pitiful, but soon shut down by a huge dose of medication.
"That'll teach him!" the head social worker crowed.
(Oh, did I say epilepsy? Sorry. He had schizophrenia... a disorder that is also *not* volitional. BTW, when I gently ventured my opinion about his treatment and their attitude toward mental illness, I was ejected from the meeting. I went home and called my younger daughter, just to hear her voice. She has schizophrenia.)
The seizure began in full force during transport to the hospital. He kicked out one of the windows of the police car!
On arrival, he was quickly manacled and strapped into a hospital bed with an armed guard at his side. His cries were pitiful, but soon shut down by a huge dose of medication.
"That'll teach him!" the head social worker crowed.
(Oh, did I say epilepsy? Sorry. He had schizophrenia... a disorder that is also *not* volitional. BTW, when I gently ventured my opinion about his treatment and their attitude toward mental illness, I was ejected from the meeting. I went home and called my younger daughter, just to hear her voice. She has schizophrenia.)
152
Heartbreaking.
Best wishes to you and to your daughter.
Best wishes to you and to your daughter.
2
Your short illustration of the easy pigeon-holing of mental illness as some sory of volitional act-- something one can be blamed for-- is very apt. It made sense and hit home immediately. You say it well....too bad it still needs to be said, and to so many people.
5
This is so sad -- heartbreaking the way the man was treated and the attitude in the meeting. Especially from social workers who should know better.
1
This is utterly grotesque. Capitalism at its utter worst, trying to make a profit from the agony of others. Horrifying. How could something like "Knott's Berry Farm" come up with this insane pseudo-insanity. If it weren't so horrifying, it might be funny that they switched from mental illness to zombies. The pseudo equivalence of the mentally ill and zombies is also horrifying. Dare I say this is a sort of Trumpian "entertainment?"
33
Not sure how you feel about Big Pharma, but they do very well profiting from the misery and agony of others!!
3
Ironically I am at the tail end of reading your book and just saw this in today's paper. I am a nurse manager on an adult psychiatric unit and can attest both professionally and personally to the devastation of this disease. Mental illness is a horror show but for the families and individuals who suffer from it.
Outside of trying to make a buck with a "new" scary fun house idea, perhaps people unconsciously need to put distance between depression and themselves. " it ain't me babe".
Outside of trying to make a buck with a "new" scary fun house idea, perhaps people unconsciously need to put distance between depression and themselves. " it ain't me babe".
14
What is troubling to me is that this article even needed to be written. If kindness were the lens through which we viewed the world, we would all be happier people. Isn't it odd that we behave in a manner destined to thwart the achievement of the core desire of our species?
14
Thank you, Mr. Solomon for this essay. My mental illness began about the same time as yours, but came on gradually, so that over a decade my personality changed in ways I am saddened and embarrassed to admit. Many drugs were tried; some that failed left me with other permanent health problems. I am now relatively stable but still monitored. Part of what has made recovery difficult is the onset of new non-mental illnesses; part is the worsening of pre-existing physical problems. Through it all I have had very helpful therapists who are able to explain what is going on so I can at least try to hold my head up and say I am not really abnormal, I am simply un-normal.
22
Our politicians and other quasi-experts must stop promoting the idea that mental illness is at the nexus of acts of violence. People with mental illness are no more likely to commit acts of violence that anyone else. Whether the provocation is internal or external, it is people with no empathy who are most prone to violent behavior. Read "The Science of Evil: On Empathy and the Origins of Cruelty" by Simon Baron-Cohen.
19
I fhink your statement tbat people with mental illness are no more likely to commit acts of violence must be amended. People with certain types of mental illness are not likely to become violent, but the capacity hovers for many caught in the throes of a psychotic episode. A cousin of mine, convinced drug dealers were running amok in his apartment complex, fired into a car full of teenagers. Another acquaintance calmly talks about the voices that tell him to stab his family. One day he may follow their directives.
I live in a community that houses a state forensic hospital. The people within those walls have committed acts of violence, some of them horrific. While we must have better national dialogue about mental illness, we can't - in our efforts to remove stigma - dismiss that capacity for violence that roils in some patients.
I live in a community that houses a state forensic hospital. The people within those walls have committed acts of violence, some of them horrific. While we must have better national dialogue about mental illness, we can't - in our efforts to remove stigma - dismiss that capacity for violence that roils in some patients.
1
The NRA and its slaves in politics like to perpetuate the myth that the real reason for gun violence in this country is mental illness and not too many guns. That those politicians who say this don't really believe it is that while they talk about improving mental health services they never vote any money to make this happen.
3
Keen Observer, the mentally ill are much more likely to be the victims of violence, than the perpetrators of it. Please educate yourself, instead of writing only about your personal experiences. Anecdotes aren't data.
4
Andrew, I'm encouraged by your efforts to remove the stigma of the "other" from those suffering from mental ills. As someone who lived in the slough of depression before undergoing CRT in the late 90s, I can attest that it's bad enough weathering depression, anxiety, and the general disapproval that greets inappropriate responses to societal cues without being used as cheap entertainment.
Or, worse yet, equated with zombies.
We celebrate our imaginations, yet we medicate those whose imaginations have taken control.
Whenever the discussion about gun violence turns inappropriately away from the ubiquity of guns to a pious debate about how best to cure mental illness, it's clear that we would prefer not to address a solvable problem (please look at Australia's success in curbing gun violence, and then look at industrial powers Japan and the United Kingdom, whose incidence of such violence is minuscule compared to America's), opting instead to concentrate real hard to solve a problem whose solution will perpetually elude us.
Those who wish to enter the world of the mentally ill should be administered a daily regimen of Prozac, Wellbutrin, lithium, Pamelar, and Xanax. The truly exciting prospect of feeling absolutely nothing and wondering why will have them coming back for more.
Or, worse yet, equated with zombies.
We celebrate our imaginations, yet we medicate those whose imaginations have taken control.
Whenever the discussion about gun violence turns inappropriately away from the ubiquity of guns to a pious debate about how best to cure mental illness, it's clear that we would prefer not to address a solvable problem (please look at Australia's success in curbing gun violence, and then look at industrial powers Japan and the United Kingdom, whose incidence of such violence is minuscule compared to America's), opting instead to concentrate real hard to solve a problem whose solution will perpetually elude us.
Those who wish to enter the world of the mentally ill should be administered a daily regimen of Prozac, Wellbutrin, lithium, Pamelar, and Xanax. The truly exciting prospect of feeling absolutely nothing and wondering why will have them coming back for more.
7
I object to your use of the idea that these medications will leave one "feeling absolutely nothing." This is not the normal effect. I have been on antidepressants for more than 20 years and I assure you I felt joy at my daughter's wedding, awe at the births of my grandchildren and the normal feelings of everyday life. A vast improvement over the nothingness of depression.
6
Well said, Mr. Solomon. Perpetuating the myth of psychiatric disorders as a moral weaknesses, satanic curses, or "otherness" worthy of ridicule risks undoing decades of research showing that these are biologic illnesses, like asthma, hypertension, and diabetes. This "entertainment" sounds like dangerous propaganda that could quickly devolve into calls for modern day Salem witch trials and defunding of parity acts that protect access to mental health care.
25
What people do for entertainment purposes won't have an impact on mental health parity laws. These entertainments may serve to make people less uncomfortable with mental illness and more aware of their own attitudes and beliefs about the topic. Mental illness is predicted to be much more widespread in the future. Society will not be able to lock them up in institutions forever. Many ordinary citizens will encounter people with mental illness in their daily activities. This isn't VR, it's R.
When I read the opening paragraph of this article, I thought it was an April Fool's joke, then realized how far we are from April 1!! I cannot believe two corporations would make a 'ride' out of illness in this day and age. Twenty five years ago, I wouldn't have been surprised although still deeply offended. Today I am both.
122
Thank you for this comment. It really is absurd, and almost unbelievable. Like Springtime for Hitler in Germany. Who is running Knott's Berry Farm's theme park?!
2
Thank you for this thoughtful piece. Like Andrew, and many, many others, I straddle the worlds of mental health professional and psychiatric patient. But I am also an artist, as is Andrew. So my reaction to learning that "painful lived experiences are being transmogrified into spooky entertainment" is...but, of course. American Horror Story, anyone? Edgar Allen Poe? Now, we may prefer that those experiences be exported safely to "the past" or an alternative universe, or a dystopian future, but it is the function of the artist to try and make legible the horrors of human experience. Money both corrupts and supports this process of transmogrification, and public conversation provides context, and limits. I for one could not support a VR visit to the crematoria, or to the slave cabins, though we watch movies and read novels out of the same need to imagine what we can never fully know.
6
You're right to point out that there must be a market for this, as there is for other glimpses of a painful and abusive past. We have all accessed these glimpses through movies and novels with barely anyone batting an eye about the inappropriateness of the subject matter or the fact that an author or actor made money from its publication. It seems somewhat hypocritical to draw a line at VR being used as a medium for accessing what is painful or disturbing about society. I hope that we can all learn compassion for others regardless of status in life, since it is highly probable that everyone is connected to someone who has suffered from mental illness or abuse.
Having dealt both professionally and personally with people who've suffered from depression, bi-polar disorders and other mental illnesses, it can certainly seem like a "horror show," though the reality of it is certainly not at all entertaining. Neither is death, yet producing horror shows and horror movies and portraying zombies are all trying to make entertainment out of death and dying.
Perhaps the reason that mental illness and death have long been subjects of attempts at humor is because they are among the conditions that men and women may fear the most.
Perhaps the reason that mental illness and death have long been subjects of attempts at humor is because they are among the conditions that men and women may fear the most.
48
(Not Mark) I was thinking that too. Many of us know family and friends that suffer from mental illness and it is a difficult and often life changing condition. It seems to come out of nowhere and for many that seems to be most frightening. Like people who get a diagnosis of say, diabetes, others can say," well, that's not a surprise, they would not loose weight". No one can point to another with mental illness and say, "that's what happens when you X". It's not a lack of empathy as much as fear it could happen to them or ones they love.
1
Do you think most women fear mental illness more than they do breast cancer?
And, by the way, zombies are fictional whereas the mentally ill are very real.
And, by the way, zombies are fictional whereas the mentally ill are very real.
1
Steve, if I had to decide between breast cancer and dementia, it would be a real tossup. I saw my mother deal with both.
3
Recently my husband was taken to the ER after a psychotic episode. If he had a brain tumor he would have been considered 'sick' and the treatment (or lack of it) and approaches would have been different. Because he had dementia he was treated as a dangerous man and akin to a 'criminal.' We have to fix this! NYT help lead the way please.
89
Don't look to The Times to lead the way. You can search high and low for many articles in it that don't present psychiatric medications as being universally bad and psychiatrists as uncaring knaves in the pocket of Big Pharma.
3
"The rejection of empathy." A beautiful and telling phrase. The rejection of empathy is itself insane. Who can live or create beauty in a world without empathy? What child can grow to healthy adulthood without it? What sickness can be healed or heart torn asunder can be mended without empathy? Thank you for this writing, for sharing your self with the rest of us - and yes, your wisdom born of experience.
29
"'The rejection of empathy.' A beautiful and telling phrase. The rejection of empathy is itself insane. Who can live or create beauty in a world without empathy?"
"Create beauty" may be a problem, but as for simply living?Many, many low- or null-empathy human beings have found success there. It's always been an evolutionary minority, but it's never scored anywhere near low enough on the 'survive to pass your genes on to the next generation' scorecard to go extinct.
"Create beauty" may be a problem, but as for simply living?Many, many low- or null-empathy human beings have found success there. It's always been an evolutionary minority, but it's never scored anywhere near low enough on the 'survive to pass your genes on to the next generation' scorecard to go extinct.
1
It must be universally true that people need to feel important, in one way or another. Attributing good qualities to ourselves and bad qualities to others is the way of it, or so it appears. An exploitable proposition in areas such as entertainment, politics and war. There is a market for a way out of that, fueled by dissatisfaction of the heart with it. Different methods grew out of the possibility that we were all creatures of God, or could all arrive at a common mindset. Much of that was suppose to be available to everyone. Today it seems more scientific to fight the battle of personal freedom, pushing back against real and perceived violations of individual choices or unchosen states of being. In the pages of the Times no doubt one can detect dishonest rhetoric on both side of any issue. 'There are regular reports of police who respond aggressively or violently to the erratic behavior of mentally ill people, whether they are armed or not — the latest being the killing of Deborah Danner, a woman with schizophrenia, by a New York City Police Officer.' Notice here that the police are aggressive or violent, whereas the mentally ill people are merely erratic. The officer will try to make the case that Danner was armed and dangerous, Apparently she had been so before, as is often the case in similar incidents. So I think what can happen is that, tired of demonizing bad actors, it gets flipped around and we demonize the people we trust to deal with them.
3
The differences between the police officer and Ms. Danner is that Ms. Danner could not control her actions, the officer could; and the police officer is supposed to be trained to de-escalate the situation without resorting to murder.
Many police are aggressive and violent, this is a very real problem in our society, just as discrimination against the mentally ill is a real problem.
Many police are aggressive and violent, this is a very real problem in our society, just as discrimination against the mentally ill is a real problem.
88
"Police Commissioner James O’Neill almost immediately placed the sergeant, Hugh Barry, on modified duty, stripped of his badge and gun. Mayor Bill de Blasio said at a news conference that the sergeant had not followed training or protocols for dealing with those with mental illness, and for some reason had neither used his Taser nor waited for specialized officers trained to deal with such situations. Mr. O’Neill said: 'We failed.'"
This was the mayor's and the NYPD's response to the shooting of Deborah Danner. The police have forces that specialize in dealing with situations involving those that struggle with mental illness. These forces should have been utilized but they weren't and Deborah Danner's life was unfairly taken as a result. Solomon is not demonizing the police by highlighting her death. He's making the point that violence as a first response to the mentally ill is inappropriate and stigmatizing. Even the police commissioner recognizes this.
Mental health can be an issue that everyone, right or left, can get behind. Instead of looking for reasons to strengthen bipartisanship, let's look for solutions that seek to heal the millions of Americans who struggle to maintain their mental health for reasons beyond their control.
This was the mayor's and the NYPD's response to the shooting of Deborah Danner. The police have forces that specialize in dealing with situations involving those that struggle with mental illness. These forces should have been utilized but they weren't and Deborah Danner's life was unfairly taken as a result. Solomon is not demonizing the police by highlighting her death. He's making the point that violence as a first response to the mentally ill is inappropriate and stigmatizing. Even the police commissioner recognizes this.
Mental health can be an issue that everyone, right or left, can get behind. Instead of looking for reasons to strengthen bipartisanship, let's look for solutions that seek to heal the millions of Americans who struggle to maintain their mental health for reasons beyond their control.
11
Police Officers are not trained to de-escalate a situation. There are currently attempts at de-escalation training for some Officers.
2
More fine work from Mr. Solomon. To me the proposed exhibit begs the question of exactly where the mental illness lies - in the individual - or in society, and the fact that the exhibit was blocked is a hopeful sign...
"It is no measure of health to be well adjusted to a profoundly sick society"
http://www.jkrishnamurti.org/index.php
"It is no measure of health to be well adjusted to a profoundly sick society"
http://www.jkrishnamurti.org/index.php
40
Mr. Solomon, tell this also to all the indie rock hipsters and their intelligentsia followers that mential illness is not something to glorify, or use as a muse, as in creativity being so close to madness, so you have some emotional content to work into your songs/novels/films, and so on. I am glad Fear VR 5150 was shelved. But far too often, mential illness has entered the general public consciousness this way, or through other types of entertainment as I say here. I am disabled myself, and know being disabled is no freak show, or hip, cool, trendy, fun, and so on. In fact, it's something everyone should know.
14
I agree with most of what Mr. Solomon says, but not all. VR5150 is an involuntary confinement law. Virtually every state has one. And, as Mr. Solomon says, it allows the state to institutionalize those who are a danger to themselves or others. What he doesn't say is that a very small percentage of the mentally ill are committed involuntarily. And those who are, are treated as distinct by the law. The great majority of the mentally ill check into mental hospitals on their own, And they retain full Constitutional rights -- the right to vote and the right to possess guns and the right to decline treatment among them.
One of my best friends went through involuntary commitment. She had late-onset schizophrenia and was never the same again. I point all of this out because I think this essay is confusing and tends to suggest that all the seriously mentally ill are the same. I've heard too many folks call for depriving rights to the seriously mentally ill. That reflects ignorance of the law and ignorance of the different sorts of mental illness.
One of my best friends went through involuntary commitment. She had late-onset schizophrenia and was never the same again. I point all of this out because I think this essay is confusing and tends to suggest that all the seriously mentally ill are the same. I've heard too many folks call for depriving rights to the seriously mentally ill. That reflects ignorance of the law and ignorance of the different sorts of mental illness.
12
While you make an important distinction, I do not see the relevance to the points being made in the article. The mentally ill should be off limits at an "amusement" park. A different article can amply elucidate the distinction between voluntary and involuntary commitment.
16
A startling article expressed with irrefutable logic, brave vulnerability, and sad disappointment. A hospital is now a haunted house, its patients howling ghouls wrought to provide us chills and thrills. Building such a monument to ignorance and bigotry is a sign of undiagnosed spiritual illness. Stage four.
96
This may be the first time that an editorial has rendered me temporarily speechless.
The use of virtual reality (VR) to exploit mental illness is not only immoral, but in my non-professional opinion, it has the capability of causing real and lasting damage to those who step into the situation that has been described.
There's several real-life elements within this proposed scenario that many of us have experienced or are experiencing. To name a few:
1. Confinement - loss of control, claustrophobia
2. Fear of needles
3. Hypersensitivity to physical pain
4. Hypersensitivity to other people's pain
Combine that with the potential physical side affects of VR (headaches, nausea, vomiting, sweating, disorientation, etc...) and that's a recipe for disaster.
I see a potential of PTSD written all over this.
The use of virtual reality (VR) to exploit mental illness is not only immoral, but in my non-professional opinion, it has the capability of causing real and lasting damage to those who step into the situation that has been described.
There's several real-life elements within this proposed scenario that many of us have experienced or are experiencing. To name a few:
1. Confinement - loss of control, claustrophobia
2. Fear of needles
3. Hypersensitivity to physical pain
4. Hypersensitivity to other people's pain
Combine that with the potential physical side affects of VR (headaches, nausea, vomiting, sweating, disorientation, etc...) and that's a recipe for disaster.
I see a potential of PTSD written all over this.
53
Thank you for this column. So important, all that you say. As the mom of a 51-year-old son diagnosed with autism I can relate to the harm that can come from ignorantly portraying any disability in such a fashion as you describe. There is already enough fear of the unknown in our society and exploiting the plight of individuals in circumstances out of their control is unconscionable, especially when done in the name of the almighty dollar. Completely inforgivable.
43
Mental illness already is isolating to those who live with it and their families. These amusement park attractions seem to separate us even more from the rest of humanity.
50
Perhaps a cancer ward virtual reality show could be next? If that's financially successful, imagine the possibilities: Parkinson's, Alzheimer's etc. $cha-ching!
34
Hollywood has made money off of depicting misery for many decades. Consider all the movies dealing with end of life scenarios involving ________ disease/disorder. Analyze This and Analyze That were humorous forays into the world of anger management. The Sopranos was somewhat less humorous and hugely successful. Girl Interrupted made it possible for everyone to see how fraught and confrontational coming of age can be even for those who apparently navigate various phases with little obvious angst. The classic One Flew Over the Cuckoos Nest is still hailed as an example of moral victory over a controlling medical establishment and psychotropic drugs. Attempts to make money from mental illness and other types of illness are obviously successful. What the author might address are the following questions: 1. what's to be done with the money raised in such a non-conventional way? 2. will any of the proceeds support those who have mental illness? 3. are those who would pay to see such an amusement smug or merely curious? 4. does the amusement serve as a warning, a mirror or just another way to feel better by comparison?
1
When we laugh at the performer who blithely and obliviously strolls along, only to step on a banana peel and fall on his face, we are laughing at the way all of us can be surprised by life, at the often painful but also somehow funny human condition of not knowing what comes next. This laughter acknowledges that we are all, in this sense, in the same boat.
But these virtual-reality attractions seem to have had quite an opposite message: they would stigmatize and negatively group those who, as the author puts it, "cross over from one side to the other," that is, from relative mental health into mental illness. That such a form of "entertainment" would be constructed at all is deeply troubling, and it speaks to the illness of the society outside of the mental institution far more than it does about those who dwell within it.
I think that most of us are fearful--and justifiably so--of living in a society in which empathy, kindness and mere civility are constantly under attack and in which people are so often categorized as winners or losers on the basis of dubious measures of ability, achievement, and stamina. This may be the fear that drove the creation of these virtual reality experiences--the fear of our own vulnerability and the seeming cruelty of the society in response to vulnerability; the game met an accompanying need to see the mentally ill as freakish and inhuman, as "not like us."
But these virtual-reality attractions seem to have had quite an opposite message: they would stigmatize and negatively group those who, as the author puts it, "cross over from one side to the other," that is, from relative mental health into mental illness. That such a form of "entertainment" would be constructed at all is deeply troubling, and it speaks to the illness of the society outside of the mental institution far more than it does about those who dwell within it.
I think that most of us are fearful--and justifiably so--of living in a society in which empathy, kindness and mere civility are constantly under attack and in which people are so often categorized as winners or losers on the basis of dubious measures of ability, achievement, and stamina. This may be the fear that drove the creation of these virtual reality experiences--the fear of our own vulnerability and the seeming cruelty of the society in response to vulnerability; the game met an accompanying need to see the mentally ill as freakish and inhuman, as "not like us."
44
Thank you for this very insightful poignant essay, for speaking out and describing a situation that many who suffer mental illness are not able to do. We laugh at what frightens us, to transform what is scary into the inane and harmless. But you are correct, mental illness, or wellness, is a spectrum, and we are all capable of occupying any seat along the field. Thank you for pointing out so elegantly how everyone traveling this journey of life. especially those struggling to attain mental wellness, should be shown respect.
58
My 20 year old son developed chronic anxiety and depression as a result of multiple failed surgeries attempting to correct his spinal deformities. His friends and family, people who remember him as a laughing "happy" teenager, are constantly saying things such as, "just snap out of it." Or, "what's wrong with you, let's just go out and have fun." Or, "why won't you get that next operation that can fix your back?"
These are caring people who are totally sympathetic about his spinal pain and deformity (he can no longer stand straight up), sometimes even crying after seeing him. Yet often they seem oblivious to his emotional anguish, as if he is choosing to "be depressed."
As he has remarked to me many times, "they don't get it, I can actually deal with my back a lot easier than my brain."
I hope people truly think about what the author writes here.
These are caring people who are totally sympathetic about his spinal pain and deformity (he can no longer stand straight up), sometimes even crying after seeing him. Yet often they seem oblivious to his emotional anguish, as if he is choosing to "be depressed."
As he has remarked to me many times, "they don't get it, I can actually deal with my back a lot easier than my brain."
I hope people truly think about what the author writes here.
200
I wrote a regular comment on this essay, but I want to write to you and express my sympathy with and empathy for your young son. I am 53. My mental and physical problems are not necessarily directly connected, but together they of course make day-to-day life troublesome. All five of my lumbar vertebra and disks are crumbling due to congenital deformities, disease, and decay. So far, I have avoided surgery, but I believe it's only a matter of time. I agree completely with your son when dealing with well-meant but unhelpful comments that "they don't get it, I can actually deal with my back a lot easier than my brain." I hope your doctors can help things work out well for you.
5
I was a psychiatric nurse for eight years and the idea of creating a expedition that features the mentally ill, guised as zombies, saddens me horribly. Those who deal with mental illness on a daily basis, face so many struggles; fighting stigmas and having the courage the seek care are two of the biggest struggles. For someone who maybe considering getting help for a problem they are having, seeing a very normal human situation wrapped in the world of horror could keep them from seeking help. Finally, for those brave people who have sought help and have been hospitalized, how demeaning to see it depicted this way! I personally see each person who seeks help for their problems and mental illness as someone with great strength. However, those who who would try and profit from twisting the very real struggles and successes of real people will these illnesses need help for the very thing they mock.
140
keep up the good work! the lives pf people who have a mental illness matter too. what we see in the videos of police killing people exemplifies just how not to act when dealing with people in acute or long term crisis...nice connection
33
It is not only the tendency to see anyone who has or has had a psychiatric problem as a threat, but also the deeply embedded belief that mental illness is a sign of personal weakness which is damaging. In our current climate, the latter is powerfully destructive. Trump and his fans prize "strength" and individualism, but those struggling with psychological issues whether schizophrenia, major depression, PTSD, or other aftereffects of an abusive relationship or childhood are denigrated as weak.
I too have had my experience with the mental health system. I used to carry a quote I found in a newspaper (from where I don't remember) "To admit to having been depressed is to suggest to many that you are someone who, at the first sign of stress, will drop to the floor, assume the fetal position, and stay there at least until the start of rush hour."
When we label and alienate those who suffer with psychological issues, we make the problems worse both for the individual and for society. The mentally ill are not foreign beings; they are us. There is another saying which one hears on psychiatric units, "The only difference between us and the people out there is that we are the ones who know that there is a problem." Sometimes the ones who get help, i.e., become "mental patients," are healthier than those who don't see that they have a problem. IMHO Donald Trump is exhibit 'A' on that one.
I too have had my experience with the mental health system. I used to carry a quote I found in a newspaper (from where I don't remember) "To admit to having been depressed is to suggest to many that you are someone who, at the first sign of stress, will drop to the floor, assume the fetal position, and stay there at least until the start of rush hour."
When we label and alienate those who suffer with psychological issues, we make the problems worse both for the individual and for society. The mentally ill are not foreign beings; they are us. There is another saying which one hears on psychiatric units, "The only difference between us and the people out there is that we are the ones who know that there is a problem." Sometimes the ones who get help, i.e., become "mental patients," are healthier than those who don't see that they have a problem. IMHO Donald Trump is exhibit 'A' on that one.
170
"The only difference between us and the people out there is that we are the ones who know that there is a problem." Sometimes the ones who get help, i.e., become “mental patients,” are healthier than those who don't see that they have a problem.
Anne-Marie, I think that as with ANY disability “normal people” are uneasy around anyone with a psychiatric diagnosis as “maybe that can happen to me”--so shut them out--if I don’t think about it..they don’t exist.
Or worse
They feel that I am strong so I could never succumb to schizophrenia etc as if these people have control over it! It would be like telling a person with Tourette’s or having auditory and visual hallucinations that YOU can control your own thoughts! STOP feeling sorry for yourself--snap out of it--QUIT THINKING THAT WAY!
It would be the same as if I were to tell my diabetic patient--it’s YOUR fault! Just instruct your pancreas to release more insulin into your blood stream--you can do it if you just try hard enough!
Mental illness is a horrendous REAL illness.
I cry when I think of how much pain and confusion Robin Williams had before completing suicide. Protein deposits, called Lewy bodies developed in his brain regions involved in thinking, memory and motor control.
Lewy body dementia causes a progressive decline in mental abilities. People with Lewy body dementia may experience visual hallucinations, and changes in alertness and attention.
Robin could NOT deal with a disease that took HIM away!
Anne-Marie, I think that as with ANY disability “normal people” are uneasy around anyone with a psychiatric diagnosis as “maybe that can happen to me”--so shut them out--if I don’t think about it..they don’t exist.
Or worse
They feel that I am strong so I could never succumb to schizophrenia etc as if these people have control over it! It would be like telling a person with Tourette’s or having auditory and visual hallucinations that YOU can control your own thoughts! STOP feeling sorry for yourself--snap out of it--QUIT THINKING THAT WAY!
It would be the same as if I were to tell my diabetic patient--it’s YOUR fault! Just instruct your pancreas to release more insulin into your blood stream--you can do it if you just try hard enough!
Mental illness is a horrendous REAL illness.
I cry when I think of how much pain and confusion Robin Williams had before completing suicide. Protein deposits, called Lewy bodies developed in his brain regions involved in thinking, memory and motor control.
Lewy body dementia causes a progressive decline in mental abilities. People with Lewy body dementia may experience visual hallucinations, and changes in alertness and attention.
Robin could NOT deal with a disease that took HIM away!
3