What does a mental patient look like?

This week two large corporations have been forced to remove Halloween costumes based on 'mental' or 'psycho' patients. Following a huge outcry on twitter and other social media, Asda and Tesco both removed these offensive costumes.

My initial reaction was one of complete disbelief. I couldn't fathom how such an idiotic and offensive decision could be taken today. But actually perhaps it isn't that surprising. On the face of it we are a accepting, politically correct society. We don't allow racism, we have laws against discrimination and we have certainly made significant progress on sexism. However, mental health still teeters on the line between offensive and acceptable humour.

Whilst outright discrimination may be taboo, there is an underlying sense that purveys humour and language that speaks of mental health issues in terms that are stereotypic.  'Crazy', 'psycho', 'going postal', amongst others, as well as a common assumption that extreme violence must mean an underlying mental health problem. The media often makes mention of the existence or not of mental health issues in an assailants history. Between the lines, although not said, we are supposed to assume that there must be a mental health problem to explain the atrocity. Recent cases in the US, for example the navy yard shooting, do exactly this.

I am not asserting that mental health conditions do not play a part in many violent crimes, but statistics show that people with serious mental health conditions are much more likely to be the victims of violence than the perpetrators. And yet films, books and TV continuously portray the bad guy with mental breakdown or condition. Some people with mental health conditions commit violent crime, but so do many men, many single people, many blonde haired people. To assume on these grounds would be seen as ludicrous.

There is a fear of mental health, but also an attitude of 'its only a joke'. It used to be acceptable to make jokes about the Irish, women, or the physically disabled. This attitude allowed discrimination and prejudice to pervade society and effect the treatment of these groups. These costumes passed through buyers and managers, they were deemed acceptable because of this humour rule. But this attitude causes serious damage to the view and treatment of people with mental health issues. Not on the surface, deeper; in throwaway comments, assumptions made about friends and employees. It makes people with mental health problems less likely to speak out in case they are seen as 'mad'.

The positive is the outrage, although I was deeply offended, I was also cheered with the outrage of others. It led to an opportunity to talk again about the stigma of mental health and photo campaign by Time to Change called "this is what a mental patient look like". And open conversations about mental health are always a good thing