Media Representation Of Mental Illness Essay

Misrepresentation of Mental Illness Mental illness is often portrayed wrong in the media. Most movies and television shows exclude the details that truly go along with mental illnesses. We must clarify the actual effects of mental illness versus the misrepresentation we are shown on television and in movies. Mental illness is unfortunate, becoming a cliché. The media make mental illness a stereotype specifically making it seem like all people with a mental illness are violent or a criminal. 61% of Americans said they believe people with schizophrenia are violent individuals. These people believe this is because of the way the media reflects the view of the disorder by using violent characters who are involved in violent events. In real life, mentally ill people are more likely to be the victims of crimes rather than the one’s committing them. Jarune Uwujaren uses the example of The Dark Knight in her article “Mental Illness: How the Media Contributes to Its Stigma”. Uwujaren backs up this example by saying “The Joker’s motives for wreaking havoc on Gotham City are never fully explained. He seems to be bombing hospitals in nurse outfits not because he’s spreading any coherent message of villainy –he’s just a lunatic.” (Uwujaren) Although The Dark Knight is completely fictional, the news reporters are linking mental

An example of a movie that makes this particular stereotype is Me, Myself, and Irene, starring Jim Carrey as a patient with a dissociative identity order. This movie makes light of mental illnesses portraying these serious mental illnesses as a quirk causing people to find the person as funny, silly, and childlike. In reality, people with dissociative disorder strongly dislike themselves due to the lack of how they act. Rather than being happy, funny, and childlike, they are really depressed and embarrassed by