For the lover of jokes poking fun at mental illness maybe
You mean my family, friends and circle in general ?
Whose humour about
-the disorders I have
and
-the way they fuck with me (and by extension fuck with them)
...meant my diagnosis and subsequent transition to a rather testing time (ongoing) of using strategies to reduce the impact on my life that the symptoms cause ....was more giggle-fest than gloom infested ?
Thank god they didn't turn around and stop taking the piss out of me (via my disorders) when I got diagnosed because I was no longer "normal" and had to suddenly be treated with kid gloves. Because that would have finished me off. Things were hard enough as it was without being suddenly relegated to the untouchables table, who can't be teased.
In the decades since offence/feelings have become entrenched as the primary argument for watching what you say about non-physical conditions, what has been achieved ?
Are fewer people dying needlessly thanks to a lack of support services and medical access ?
Are more people given a timely diagnosis and carefully monitored entry into medication so the side effects can be minimised and an effective dosage be achieved as quickly and painlessly as possible ?
Are fewer families being left to cope with a loved one whose symptoms in crisis are so severe that entire groups of people are held hostage by their condition. Without any of the training, tools, or time off required to manage without depression, exhaustion and loss of hope ?
Are fewer people with every chance of managing life reasonably successfully being left without adequate medical, emotional and practical support, resulting in a spiral whereby they become far less successful in life than they could have been ? With the double whammy of then being dismissed as a drain on society.
Are fewer children being left in educational settings without the support/funding they need to achieve to the full extent of their abilities ?
Is the proportion of the prison population with MHI decreasing ?
Nope. If anything things have moved even further and faster in the wrong direction.
But viral witch hunts of people who have put their foot in it on facebook are at an all time high, so ... result !
It's just a personal theory, but by giving so much oxygen to what are more minor issues in the grand scheme of things might actually be counter productive if people want notable changes where it can have the most real world, tangible benefit, for a significant number of people.
Offering potential supporters a sense of "doing something" and "being a good person" who is "helping to effect change to help those with non-.physical conditions" via clicktivism and online outrage gives them high pay off for relatively little effort.
But it doesn't function as an entry level drug. The online army doesn't then flock around a push for gov. to look again at MH provision. Or the massive fuck up that is happening whereby schools are required to provide support, but have neither the expertise, nor the funds to do so to the necessary degree They don't turn to their MPs in anything like the same numbers to kick up a stink and waggle their vote with "only if you do the right thing by MH" scrawled on it in with such consistency that the gov. of the day goes "err, hang on, rethink time". ( worth remembering that political parties of ALL FLAVOURS have grossly let down people with MHI for decades )
They just leap on the next twitter-flap.
Why wouldn't they ? They have been led to believe they are helping in a significant way. They think they are doing a very good thing even while gratifying their own enjoyment of a bit of online argy-bargy in the process. It allows them to perceive themself as sensitive, informed, caring etc etc.. But actually costs them very little. Which is not an insignificant motivational factor when you consider that many people have good intensions, but are time/money crunched.
When people feel they have done and are doing their bit and then some, they are much harder to motivate into giving time and energy in ways that are much more costly to them personally. Especially if the route to giving donating more energy feels like boring work, and distinctly unattractive after a knackering day. Especially when they've become convinced that sitting on a comfy sofa, sub consciously feeling superior to somebody else as they police their language , is just as valid and useful.
What has happened IMO is that genuine good will has been redirected and squandered by self appointed internet activists/activism. And I think they do it in good faith too. I honesty believe that the self appointed activists believe they are a force for good.
But humans will always be human. If you offer your supporters a Ferrero Rocher tent and plates of lentils tent to sit in while they do the supporting , far more people will pick the bite sized chocolate. Especially if they are under the impression they have similar "nutritional value". I.e. they are equally worthy and useful forms of support that will result in similar, tangible, real world gains.
Online outrage by/on about language/awareness of MH conditions is the Ferrero Rocher in the equation. And it has proven so moorish that the uptake of the lentil option (constant, off-line, sizeable badgering of successive governments to halt the decades of slash and burn in MH provision) has utterly failed to keep up with the needed pressure required. The lentil tent simply cannot compete in terms of recruiting warm bodies who are willing to move en mass for the sake of a principle.
I'd say the same phenomenon can be seen in issues as they relate to those with physical disabilities. There has never been more online outrage. Woe betide the person who in their non-wilful ignorance uses a term deemed by some to be offensive, cos they shalt be dog piled within an inch of their life.
At the same time into-the-bone cuts to support for those with disability have gone through with barely a whimper of real world protest from the general public. And this despite the general public being broadly supportive of the principle of a robust welfare state and medical provision for those with disabilities.
Personally I've given up. I feel utterly alienated by the tone, debate practices and priorities of the people who have wrestled the larger part of control over "our voice". I don't think we can roll this back, or rein it in. But I'll be damned if I'll join in. I can't see any lentilly solutions that have a realistic hope of success anymore. That ship has probably sailed. But I can avoid becoming part of one of the problems that IMO has helped nudge any hope of solutions off the table.
I, like most people, do not enjoy fuck faces deliberately belittling me for sport via my Unholy Trinity of Disorders. But despite being distinctly more challenged than your average human when it comes to regulating and managing my emotional responses to stimuli, I still think we should have focused on the bigger issues and the larger picture back when we still had a chance to at least slow down the erosion of services and support.
But we didn't. So good luck to my counterpart in 5/10/15 years time. I hope you at least manage to get an appointment and arrive at a diagnosis the way I was able to. Cos understanding that I had the Unholy Trinity and wasn't just "the rather crap person" I believed I was did an awful lot for my self esteem and sense of control over my destiny.
I don't think any increase in checking of able-brained privilege around you, or the improved degree of tongue biting (for fear of using the wrong word, or saying the wrong thing) will be much compensation for a lack of of access to medication, support and therapeutic approaches. But I appear to be in a minority with that opinion in this brave new world.