No Better Than Bedlam

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Jasmine Wing calls out Channel 4’s Being Bipolar as hardly better than eighteenth century voyeurs gawking at the inmates of Bedlam.

Channel 4 recently aired the supposedly brave yet dangerous documentary, Being Bipolar. It was introduced by psychotherapist Philippa Perry, who set out to establish the reasons for the disorder formerly known as manic depression.

But she never got that far. Instead, the programme seemed to content to discover its presenter’s preconceived notions of what causes bipolar. Being Bipolar…Philippa’s Way might have been a better title.

Perry did well to observe that we tend to view the mentally ill inaccurately by asking, ‘what’s wrong with them?’; rather than asking ‘what happened?’. But then she invited us to join her on a hunt not only for mental scars but also for wounds that remain open.

Viewers were encouraged to gawp and gape at the worst moments experienced by three especially debilitated patients, in a manner not entirely different from the way in which eighteenth century gentry would go to observe the crazy antics of the inmates of East London’s Bethlehem Hospital, aka Bedlam.

In those days the madhouse served as public entertainment. Could it be that Channel 4 has come close to doing the same – using the depths of mental despair for perverse public pleasure, and going for the WOW! factor in order to increase ratings?

Surely not.

The programme opened with the skilful depiction of patient Paul in one of his most manic phases – we were left in no doubt as to how crazy, crazy can be.

Admittedly, the programme was not primarily concerned with the stigma surrounding mental health – it was intended to be a warts-and-all portrayal of day-to-day experience. But the programme makers should have been more conscious of the impact of their footage on public perceptions.

Furthermore, they seem to have made a conscious decision to show the most extreme moments in the lives of mentally ill people, thereby positioning ‘bipolar’ in a box even further away from everyday people’s everyday lives.

This is especially unhelpful, bearing in mind that as many as one in a hundred of us are likely to suffer from bipolar disorder; and almost a third of the general population will be affected by mental health issues at some time in their lives.

By contrast to the heavy duty depiction of disturbed patients (unbelieveable!), the solution proposed by Philippa Perry was ultra-lightweight – again straining the limits of credibility. As if it could all be resolved by a miraculously long chat with a therapist. Heck, why not give someone with diabetes an extended therapy session instead of their epi pen?

You can say I’m too serious, but it seems to me that this coverage was unworthy of the subject matter. Call me old fashioned, but it seemed to confirm and indulge in stereotypes rather than doing anything to challenge them. (The reaction from Twitter indicated as much – instead of alleviating the stigma surrounding mental illness, the show seemed to have the opposite effect. )

What’s more Channel 4 seems to make a habit of this. The treatment dished out to mentally ill individuals in Being Bipolar, was similar in tone to the depiction of gypsies in My Big Fat Gypsy Wedding and gays in Cucumber and Banana. To say nothing of those featured in The Undateables.

Thriving on readymade stereotypes, the common theme of such shows is to deny these people their existence as human beings and reinforce our preconceived notions of them.

But I guess to do anything else would not make good TV.

The problems with this show were evident from the very first item – the title. Ask yourself, what would you think of a programme entitled Being Cancer, or Being Heart Attack? It wouldn’t be acceptable because we would immediately recognise the cruelty of naming someone – defining their entire existence – by their illness.

So if we wouldn’t do this for a physical condition, why does Channel 4 think it is justified to do it with regard to mental illness.

As I say, Being Bipolar suggests we haven’t advanced so very far from putting the inmates of Bedlam on (the) show.

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Jasmine Wing is Rising East‘s Health and Wellbeing Editor.

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