Since 2000, World Mental Health Day has been held as a way to encourage discussion and awareness in the face of diseases that often are ignored or silenced.
The 15th annual mayor’s initiative for world mental health was held at Guelph City Hall on Oct. 9 with the theme, “mental health and the media.”
Guest speakers included Dave Adsett, publisher of the Wellington Advertiser, Lynn Haddrall, editor-in-chief of the Guelph Mercury and Waterloo Region Record, and Kevin Kelly, program director and host with Magic 106.1 FM.
Each speaker provided a unique perspective on the treatment of mental illness in the media and its impact on their personal lives. They discussed how journalism has the ability to positively impact public knowledge, perceptions and access to mental health resources and break down stereotypes and stigmatization.
The role of the Internet and social media were also mentioned specifically as both a tool for education and instrument for harm. While social media can set the tone for mental health discussions, some also say it can condone bullying by providing a screen to hide behind.
Haddrall said Newspapers used to shy away from publishing stories that involved suicide or mental illness out of respect for the family or deceased, but she says by putting stories in the proper context and using appropriate terminology, it can convince others to seek help and make topics such as depression seem less taboo.
She said using the phrase “‘committed suicide’ romanticizes it and implies criminality or moralizing.” Instead, she says “it should be treated the same way as a physical illness – with compassion.”
However, she says the media has come a long way in the last decade – an example being the treatment of Robin Williams’ recent suicide, where coverage “delved into the issues and root causes, unlike the treatment of Kurt Cobain, Rob Ford and Charlie Sheen, which was treated more as entertainment.”
Haddrall says that while coverage of celebrity mental illness is improving, it is still personal stories and accounts that can have the most impact on readers.
“Thirty per cent of people will receive a mental illness diagnosis in their lifetime and will wait to seek treatment… those who come forward to break down myths and misconceptions are the real heroes,” she said.
Adsett described how the vague terminology previously used to address suicide in small communities left many questions unanswered in his youth.
“A neighbour’s son was noted in the obituaries as ‘died suddenly at home.’ I vividly remember asking my dad innocently, ‘what is suddenly?’ … he explained that phraseology was often code for when a person took their own life.”
Adsett said that although it is often uncomfortable to approach such topics, it is important they be brought to the forefront in small communities – if only to avoid such questions in the future.
“How do ordinary people (if there is such a thing) support people with troubles, without getting pulled into the vortex of crisis? Admittedly, I find myself shutting down at times, when I think too deeply on some of these issues,” he said.
The Advertiser’s Open Mind column is one way the community paper has decided to tackle the subject and generate awareness about a variety of topics, from bullying to suicide. He said the column’s title is a play on words to counteract “the ‘closed mind’ – the minds of those who would prefer mental health discussions be thrown back to the days when we just didn’t talk about any of it.”
Kelly spoke less to the role of the media and instead about his own battle with depression and an eating disorder. He said he doesn’t know when exactly the illness found him or the root cause – only that he suddenly found himself in the midst of it.
For a long time, he said he tried to hide it.
“I kept it to myself – I was afraid … but trying to keep it a secret only adds to the shame of the disease,” he said. “I finally decided that I wasn’t going to hide it anymore – if people were going to back away that says more about them than it does about me.”
Kelly said the best description he has seen for depression comes from the Harry Potter novels by J.K. Rowling. After her mother’s death, Rowling experienced a period of depression that led to the creation of one of the darkest creatures in the series: the Dementors, ominous beings who feed off human happiness.
“Dementors are among the foulest creatures that walk this earth. They infest the darkest, filthiest places, they glory in decay and despair, they drain peace, hope and happiness out of the air around them … Get too near a Dementor and every good feeling, every happy memory will be sucked out of you. If it can, the Dementor will feed on you long enough to reduce you to something like itself – soulless and evil. You’ll be left with nothing but the worst experiences of your life.”
Though he said he is doing better now, Kelly emphasized that depression is not something that will “just go away.”
“It’s like driving into a tunnel and you’re completely enveloped by blackness – all you want to do is find the light, and when you do – there’s always more tunnels,” he said.
