Mental Illness is Real – Just Look at Your Local Hobo

Usually I write things with a humorous motive in mind.  However, there are those times when I will make an exception to this rule.  And today is a good day to make an exception.  This post is going to be somewhat more serious in nature, and is centered around a subject that is very close to my heart – mental illness, and society’s attitudes towards it.  So, if you are looking for something that is consistently funny, or have problems with staying awake, you may want to look elsewhere.  Anyhow, let’s begin…

Mental illness is becoming more prevalent in this day and age for a number of reasons.  Drug and alcohol abuse, stress, and the current economic climate all contribute to breakdowns in psychological integrity, and of course, these manifest themselves in numerous ways – depression, suicide, personality disorders, and schizophrenia, to name a few.  And from a socio-economic perspective, its causes and effects are often reciprocal – unemployment, loss of productivity, absenteeism, disease and physical illness, et cetera, et cetera.

So why do some people choose to believe that mental illness is nothing but a myth, a fabrication, a conspiracy theory, or just plain Bolshevism?  Is it because they believe that, for something to be credible, it must be tangible?  Is it because they believe people with mental illnesses are using it to justify suckling at the welfare teat at their expense?  Is it because they think people are using it to disguise their alleged failures as human beings?

All the above reasons are nothing short of fallacious.  Firstly, many, if not most people with mental illnesses hold down jobs, even if they require support mechanisms in order to hold them down.  Secondly, mental illness is very tangible, and it is quite easy to prove its existence based on simple observations.  How does one go about doing this?  Simply walk through the central business district of your town or city, and pick out all the homeless people.  Mental illness is one of the primary reasons behind homelessness and vagrancy.  You cannot tell me that the bum who sits on park benches all day hurling blasphemies at pigeons and accusing them of conspiring to steal his orange peelings that he scrounged from a bin for his pudding has an attitude issue?

And thirdly, how does having a mental illness impede one’s ability to be successful in life?  It doesn’t.  Many famous people both today and from history have, at some point in their lives been afflicted with some form of mental disorder – Winston Churchill, Isaac Newton, Abe Lincoln, Robin Williams, just to name a few.  Some have even speculated that Albert Einstein had mental health issues.  And numerous others have also gone on to lead successful lives, with highly prestigious careers to show for it.

Contrary to that age old saying, ignorance isn’t bliss.  It is rather annoying, actually.  And so is an outright lack of empathy for others.  Having somebody try and tell you to harden up without having acquired the necessary knowledge to be able to make that statement is one of the most frustrating things somebody who has a mental illness, or knows people who suffer from one, has to contend with.  And it really is not fair.