This morning, my pregnant Dandie Dinmont Terrier, Lucy, woke me up at 4:15 — she had to pee and was ravenous. After letting her out and feeding her, I started reading one of my favourite left-leaning zines, The AlterNet.
Today’s story? “The Bad Frame: Why Are The New Yorker, Salon and Other Liberal Media Doing the Right’s Dirty Work?”
There's a media brouhaha brewing over the latest issue of The New Yorker magazine and its cartoon cover that plunges over the edge of satire into rank offensiveness.
Barry Blitt's cartoon is clearly a caricature of Barack Obama, pictured wearing a turban, knuckle-knocking his wife Michelle, her hair in an Afro, decked out like a revolutionary with a machine gun slung over her shoulder. They're standing in the Oval Office near a portrait of Osama bin Laden hanging over the fireplace. An American flag smoulders in the hearth.
Obviously satirical, it's possible that even the prestigious New Yorker is capable of a lapse of sanity.
Anyone is!
This cover, on newsstands today, is perilously over-the-top and the sensational publicity it's igniting has the Obama campaign fuming. The right-wing media are poised for a political free-for-all that could backfire on the original intent of the cartoonist and the magazine — to mock right-wing opposition and its misguided, often flawed spin on Obama.
Don Hazen, who wrote the story, said the cartoon makes New Yorker editor David Remnick and Blitt appear "arrogant and indulgent, insensitive and out-of-touch with political and media dynamics."
I’m not going political on you, but language is political and powerful, and it’s what I learned about the linguistic, editorial “frame” in today’s AlterNet piece that I want to share with you.
In the past, I've referred to what might be considered a "frame" by its academic, practically unpronounceable name, the praeteritio.
Quite honestly, I didn't know "praeteritio" was, in essence, a "frame."
The term "praeteritio" is fine for PhD’s in linguistics, but there's a much simpler way to describe how a frame works editorially.
It’s relevant to Mad Pride, when you consider what Mad Pride is all about — namely counteracting "stigma" and "shame" by celebrating, educating and learning what “madness” has meant historically and how that history colours our perceptions of “madness” or “extreme mental states” or “mental distress” today.
Why? So we can feel good about who we are! Stand proud!
By now you know “stigma” and “shame” are two words I rarely use. I detest them.
Here’s why. Those two words are “bad frames.”
Hazen explains it this way: "Every word is a frame; evoking a frame reinforces and strengthens that frame; negating a frame, i.e. attacking it, reinforces that frame; and finally, words defined within a frame evoke that frame."
Hazen cites the example of Richard Nixon saying, “I’m not a crook.”
So think about it.
“Stigma,” by definition, is a mark of disgrace associated with a particular circumstance, quality or person. “Stigma” is most often, almost exclusively associated with mental illnesses.
Here’s how a frame works in this case.
Say, “Stigma” and you reinforce “stigma.”
Say, “Anti-stigma” and you still reinforce “stigma.”
Define, “Stigma” and you evoke “stigma.”
The medical and everyday public discourse about mental health includes this bad frame. All the time!
It evokes disgrace and “shame,” itself a bad frame, even though it’s trying to eradicate them.
This is Mad Pride Day. All kinds of people all over North America, Europe and Africa, people with “lived experience,” my fellow psychiatric travellers, are working so we can celebrate who we are. We deserve to celebrate.
Let’s start by using good frames today, all week, and on and on.
What’s a good frame?
I can think of a great one to try!
“Hope.”
Happy Mad Pride Day!
Depends on how people interpret the word "mad" some might say it means "anger" others equate it with words most typically used in society as "crazy". Add that into how "stigma" equates more "stigma" and I think calling it "Mad Pride" is just as stigmatizing.
Posted by: Stephany | July 15, 2008 at 11:29 AM
What the hell! MAD PRIDE! I personally take offence and believe this label is insulting and demeaning! So grab you brightly colored party hat and join the other ignorant MAD people in your stupid parade and gatherings. Maybe big Pharma can set you up some free trial sample booths while you’re at it. People who trivialize mental disorders are just a bunch of followers that refuse to think for themselves. Which would be pretty typical behavior coming from a journalist in general. Especially from a socialist leaning Canuck!
The New Yorker probably had it right even if it was meant as a satirical piece. Obama has taken more money from big Pharma than any other candidate. At least as a journalist you could check your facts before you start trying to shove your hog wash down everyone’s throat that will read your non-sense. The Drugging of America could easily be akin to a horrible terrorist plot, yet have far worse results and much more profit to be made.
Stan
Posted by: Stan | July 15, 2008 at 10:06 PM
Do some research before censorship or "educating" readers:
http://writhesafely.wordpress.com/2008/05/12/about-sundays-ny-times-piece-on-mad-pride/
Posted by: Stephany | July 15, 2008 at 10:16 PM
We'll have to agree to disagree on this one.
I have no problem with the words "crazy," "mad," or "madness," but I do have problems with the phase "mental illness" because it's a social construction.
As for schizophrenia? It doesn't even exist. Any well-trained psychiatrist would have to agree. Ask around. They'll know their Emil Kraeplin and Manfred Bleuler!
Schizophrenia means nothing. It's a vicious, horrible, scary label. That's why I hate labels. And the drug companies need it! It makes them millions.
I can't remember who said it but it's true. Labels are for jars! Not people!
Posted by: Sandy Naiman | July 15, 2008 at 10:36 PM
I think it's a mistake to attempt to classify anybody, insane, genius, radical, whatever, because they're sure to do something sane, stupid, or conservative, and make a mess of one's pigeonholing system, sooner or later. One then has a choice of reorganizing, or else pretending they didn't do what they did to mess up one's preconceptions and assumptions.
Anyway, I don't doubt that some of the most intelligent and interesting people I've ever met might well have been diagnosed with some disorder, or other.
Matt
Posted by: Matthew Holford | July 16, 2008 at 05:09 AM
Wow this generated a lot of discussion and led me to some other useful resources, thanks!
I've been thinking about words a little bit lately too. Why do we say mental illness? I find when people tell me I have a mental illness or history of mental illness it takes on for me perhaps more severity than it should. I think to me this general term implies that all my mental functioning is or can be incapacitated.
I'm not sure if this makes sense. I guess I started thinking how people are always referring to mental illness/mental health but the same is not true for physical conditions. I don't hear people talking about physical illness or physical health in general terms. They just say 'my back is sore', ‘I have a headache,’ etc.
I can understand that people whose thinking has been affected in different ways can relate on many levels - therefore the generalization. However I wonder if by generalizing there is sometimes the danger of creating a 'mystery', something scary and not to be discussed, everything grouped together under the term 'mental health problems' rather than discussing specifics.
It would be nice to be simple and direct. To casually mention our health concerns the same way that people often do physical ones. And to just as casually discuss what we are doing to try to get better. Maybe one day I will have the courage. I remember once mentioning to a colleague that I couldn’t concentrate. That was a conversation killer. And I remember being surprised that some discussion didn’t naturally follow. Imagine if I talked about my thoughts when psychotic or paranoid! For example saying ‘I’m having some thoughts that I don’t think are true.’
So I think for me, even the phrase ‘mental health’ has some negative connotations. I don’t know if this is a ‘frame’ or not, but when I hear the term mental health it brings up the concept mental illness and I feel uncomfortable, although of course I know the health part is a positive thing.
I decided to do a search on ‘what is mental health?’ and got a little bit more confused, for example:
The World Health Organization states that there is no one "official" definition of mental health. Cultural differences, subjective assessments, and competing professional theories all affect how "mental health" is defined.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mental_health
And I know that mental health is more than the absence of mental illness, but I still find myself searching for words. Maybe there’s a DSM label for that!
Posted by: elaine | July 16, 2008 at 03:36 PM
My personal favourite diagnosis is "drapetomania." This was coined by a Southern doctor before the Civil War to describe "the desire of a slave to run away" - and yes, it was labeled a mental illness. It's still on the books today. Depending on the dictionary, it's defined as an excessive desire to run away (from home, from problems, from "responsibility", whatever the heck that is supposed to mean). Personally, I proclaim myself a proud drapetomaniac!!!
Posted by: Dominique Millette | July 18, 2008 at 11:29 AM
Welcome back, Dominique, now that we're iinteractive, and thanks for adding a touch of levity to our discussion. I laughed out loud reading about "drapetomania." (Today, it's considered pseudoscience and scientifically racist.)
Proclaiming yourself a "proud drapetomaniac" was quite profound. This phobia, as you describe it, is probably universal.
Who hasn't desperately wanted to run away from something? Home, school, a job, responsibility, parents, kids, a spouse, or their current life... to a completely different one. On a more serious note, could it not, in some instances, lead to suicide?
Back to your definition, I suspect we all have our "drapetomanic" moments. Or is it "abnormal?" Maybe there's a drug to numb those desires. If not, Big Pharma will probably develop one, and then, maybe, the APA will reinstate it and add it to the new DSM-V. Just give it contemporary name. Call it some sort of disorder. Everything can be turned into a disorder these days.
Posted by: Sandy Naiman | July 20, 2008 at 10:10 AM