Blaming violent crimes on mental illness stigmatises others struggling with their mental health It’s this way of thinking and lazy stereotyping that kept people silent about their mental health problems for decades

Over the weekend, 29 people were killed in two separate mass shootings in the United States. After the shootings that took place in El Paso, Texas and Dayton, Ohio, two very powerful men both made broad, sweeping statements that suggested this was not a gun control issue, but rather a mental health issue.

“This is a mental illness problem,” Donald Trump said on Sunday in response to the shootings in Texas and Ohio. “These are people that are very seriously mentally ill.” So far, authorities have not made any statements that either of the gunmen had mental health problems.

Read more i's opinion newsletter: talking points from today Email address is invalid Email address is invalid Thank you for subscribing! Sorry, there was a problem with your subscription. US mass shootings: Donald Trump tries to link ‘desperately needed immigration reform’ with gun checks

On the same day, United States senator Bernie Sanders said shootings across the US are making people outside of the country wonder what is “the mental health situation in America where time after time after time, we’re seeing indescribable horrors”.

Alarming

Both statements are alarming, not just because they demonstrate a clear lack of knowledge around mental health, but because they come from people who wield an immense amount of influence and authority, who have so clumsily conflated mental illness with violence and crime.

On Monday, Trump added: “Mental illness and hatred pulls the trigger, not the gun.”

The overall message is that only someone who is mentally ill could undertake such a horrific act, obfuscating the much larger issues of gun access and rise of white supremacy terrorism.

By drawing such broad strokes between violence and mental illness, it immediately ramps up the stigma against people struggling with their mental health. It gives the wrong idea to those who don’t know much about mental health and ill-equips them to understand it when it happens to themselves or a loved one.

‘It wasn’t until I was married to someone who struggled with severe depression that I realised how we talked about and viewed mental illness was completely wrong’

I should know – I was one of those people. It wasn’t because I was wilfully ignorant, but because I was never taught about it in school, and because of how mental illness was framed in the media, I came to assume that mental illness was an unknown, dark and violent thing. It wasn’t until I was married to someone who struggled with severe depression that I realised how we talked about and viewed mental illness was completely wrong.

How we report about mental illness, and how people in power speak about it, matters. Time To Change, the UK mental health charity, found more than one third of the public think people with mental health problems are likely to be violent.

People with severe illness are more likely to be victims than perpetrators, according to the charity. “The majority of violent crimes and homicides are committed by people who do not have mental health problems”, they explain on their website.

The clearest example of this stigma is in how the most maligned of all mental illnesses – schizophrenia – is depicted. The mental health charity Mind, for example, said the media reports so much misinformation about schizophrenia, presenting people as dangerous, when most don’t commit violent crimes.

The good news is action does make a difference. An incredible amount of work has been undertaken by campaigners, people who work in TV and film, authors and journalists, to change perceptions in a relatively short space of time.

I couldn’t imagine people making jokes for instance, about the local psychiatric hospital in the same way I heard people doing while I was growing up. Or that a film like Me, Myself and Irene which features Jim Carrey dealing with split personality disorder – with the tagline “from gentle to mental” – would ever pass muster now.

Ignorance dies hard

I’d also like to think things have changed in terms of our sensitivity and understanding when someone is struggling mentally. When I was younger, relatives and family friends who were clearly mentally ill were written off as odd and were generally avoided. Now, people are much more clued up thanks to workplace initiatives and empathetic informed stories in the media about the reality of mental illness.

But we also have a long way to go because ignorance dies hard.

To people who struggle with their mental health and question their own sanity, President Trump’s words may seem like someone confirming their worst fears and existing stigmas they have about themselves. He has effectively taken a box, labelled it mental illness and has stuffed in people who have committed utter atrocities with people who are vulnerable and in need of understanding.

It’s this way of thinking and lazy stereotyping that kept people silent about their mental health problems for decades. If we are to evolve the conversation about mental illness, it should be done with all the facts at hand, and with education, empathy and consideration for those who face stigma about their mental health on a daily basis.