Joe Pantoliano shared his thoughts and opinions on mental illness and mental healthcare on ABC Primetime. Pantoliano also showed his support for the Mad Pride movement.

The segment began with a cellist who suffers from manic depression and psychosis. Perhaps suffering isn’t the correct word in this case. She states that her talent is enhanced by her “madness”. She mentions Van Gogh and Da Vinci and ponders the idea that they would not have been brilliant if they had taken psychiatric meds. They also show a man with paranoid schizophrenia who murdered his mother during a severe episode after refusing medication. He is now taking medication and says that he wishes he had taken medication when it was offered years before. A 28 year old woman who was diagnosed with bipolar disorder in her teens stated that her medication was affecting her memory. She began tapering herself off of medication and ABC documented her withdrawals.

A spokesperson for the Mad Pride movement stated that their mission is to promote choices in mental healthcare. While I agree with this point, I must say that his message was confusing. He appeared to be promoting the idea that people with mental illnesses do not need medication in any situation. I feel this was a result of the way that the interview was edited. The interviewer looked shocked (somewhat mortified) when Pantoliano said that his illness had helped his career and she kept a less-than-sympathetic look throughout the entire segment. Regardless, the ideas promoted by the movement were unclear. I wanted to clarify the points of his intended message so I visited the website.

“Too often, traditional mental health services keep clients stuck in the system, keeping people from having choices about their lives. The emphasis on medical solutions, especially psychiatric drugs, has become problematic for many. We are seeking new ways of taking charge of our lives, new answers to finding our way out of the mental health system, new roads to our own recovery.”

http://www.mindfreedom.org/campaign/choice

I agree with this statement, but I still wish to clarify their stance on people who choose to take medication simply to clear up the confusing messages in the ABC interview. I will be contacting them and requesting a statement.

In all fairness, ABC did remind the public that some of the mentally ill that committed unspeakable acts were medicated at the time that they committed these crimes-such as the Columbine massacre. (I know this doesn’t sound good, but hear me out on this one.)They were not implying that everyone with a mental illness is violent. They were trying to demonstrate that medication does not always help, which seems to be supportive of the Mad Pride movement. I feel that they acknowledged the media’s portrayal of mentally ill persons as violent criminals, but coupled it with instances demonstrating that we can lead productive lives in spite of, and even because of, mental illness. I must say that this is much better than the way we have been represented by other media outlets, and I applaud that.

Joe Pantoliano stated that he wants to make the discussion of mental illness “sexy”. The interviewer asked him to clarify this statement later in the segment. He hopes to make it “cool” to talk about mental illness. If this is accomplished, it would effectively remove the stigma and improve the way we are perceived by what Joe refers to as “normal people”. He says that we probably outnumber “normal people”. Wouldn’t that make us the normal? Isn’t normal considered to be cohering to the majority? That is what I believe, but Merriam Webster disagrees.

normal

1 : perpendicular; especially : perpendicular to a tangent at a point of tangency
2 a : according with, constituting, or not deviating from a norm, rule, or principle b : conforming to a type, standard, or regular pattern
3 : occurring naturally <normal immunity>
4 a : of, relating to, or characterized by average intelligence or development b : free from mental disorder : sane
5 a of a solution : having a concentration of one gram equivalent of solute per liter b : containing neither basic hydroxyl nor acid hydrogen <normal silver phosphate> c : not associated <normal molecules> d : having a straight-chain structure <normal butyl alcohol>
6 of a subgroup : having the property that every coset produced by operating on the left by a given element is equal to the coset produced by operating on the right by the same element
7 : relating to, involving, or being a normal curve or normal distribution <normal approximation to the binomial distribution>
8 of a matrix : having the property of commutativity under multiplication by the transpose of the matrix each of whose elements is a conjugate complex number with respect to the corresponding element of the given matrix

Can you believe that? Normalcy is defined as being “free from mental disorder: sane”. So those of us who have a mental disorder are insane? According to the dictionary, we certainly aren’t “normal”. This is ridiculous. Alas, the perception of normalcy and normal people equates (to me) as boring. I find people with mental illness to be interesting. We lead interesting lives that differs from the run of the mill and we survive despite that. While some may trudge through life under ideal circumstances, we persevere and I feel that makes us stronger. Take that, Merriam-Webster.

Back to Joe Pantoliano. Joe is a true inspiration. He is outspoken and committed to his cause. Pantoliano founded No Kidding, Me Too. (http://www.nkm2.org) His mission is simple-Stomp the Stigma! He is actively involved in this campaign and works hard to garner support and accomplish this goal. The mentally ill community has said that we needed a celebrity to speak out. We have said that this would greatly help our efforts to reduce the stigma related to mental illness. I say to you, this is our man. Pantoliano is passionate about this cause and is bringing mental illness into the spotlight in a positive manner. This is a giant step in the right direction and I sincerely appreciate his work.

If you would like to join in the fight to reduce the stigma, please visit http://www.nkm2.org. If you would like to know more about the Mad Pride movement, visit http://www.mindfreedom.org.

Related posts:

1. No Kidding, Me Too! Celebrities talk about mental illness.

2. Increase awareness and reduce the stigma of mental illness–Now!
3. Washington educates the media on sensitivity for mental illness
4. All About Bipolar: CBS airs comments degrading mental illness
5. All About Bipolar: Medical ailments linked to mental illness