Social stigma of mental illness essays example

Introduction

The society receives the magnitude of various types of illnesses with equal different perceptions (Fink et al., 2003). For instance, somebody suffering from certain chronic disease that the society considers it as ‘ severe’ with intolerable effects will be treated courteously. This is opposed to one suffers another type of chronic disease but tolerable in the eyes of the society. The case of Marty and Sally justifies this claim. It is evident that Marty’s mental illness is associated with certain violent behaviors that could emerge any time. This would mean that Marty could be violent to anybody around him anytime and cause unexpected harm to other people’s lives (Ruggiero, 2008). Unlike Marty, Sally’s illness is manageable even at a person level/attempt. This is because Sally is well informed and courteous about her illness, and she can manage it all by herself. Marty is courteous, as well. However, the mental illness he suffers is too risky to manage even by a collective effort.
The conditions experienced under Marty chronic disease scares the neighbors and everyone associated with him. For instance, Marty’s employer is worried about the extent into which Marty could turn violent, especially while at the place of work. And probably Marty may cause harm and heavy destruction of property. On the other hand, Marty’s mother is also worried of a situation that Marty could abandon his apartment and go to the streets as observed from most people suffering from mental illness. Marty’s doctor is also very concerned about the instances of the increase of Marty’s illness in a progressive manner. These conditions plus the way Marty sometimes is highly agitated and yelling some evil voices makes the society believe that his disease evil related. Therefore, this could be the reason that the society has a negative perception of Marty’s disease than what Sally is suffering from.
Comparing the society’s treatment and perception of Marty and Sally’s diseases, it is evident that there is more of a stigma about certain types of diseases compared to others. This situation is severe especially the treatment on mental illness to other types of diseases (Goldstein, 2007). This is because mental illness types of diseases such as schizophrenia among others expose individually to live in the other world in most of the times. That is people suffering from such diseases are mostly found in the streets and in conditions of evil nature. For example, it is common to find mental challenged individual naked or doing things of abnormality in the public. Even at times; such individuals do talk out about unknown things that nobody understands. It is only to themselves that they are in agreement with what they say and think about.
The general societal judgment to these situations and phenomena that mentally challenged individuals engage in are completely negative. The situation is indifferent even to the religious individuals. They all view the yelling, abnormality and violent behaviors as devilish or acts of the devil. In most of the time, the society associates mental illness and people suffering from such diseases to have done something bad to others. The bad things that such patients did in the past are come at a later date to haunt them. That is why they yell out; talking in languages other people do not understand and even mention the bad things they have done. Stead of assisting such people appropriately, the society keeps a distance from them. This is probably because they fear that such diseases may turn out to affect them in one way, or another. Therefore, this is the society’s stigma about mental diseases as compared other types of illnesses.

References

Fink, P. J., & Tasman, A. (2003). Stigma and mental illness. Washington, DC: American Psychiatric Press.
Goldstein, E. C., & Social Issues Resources Series, inc (2007). Mental health. Boca Raton, Fla: Social Issues Resources Series, Inc.
Ruggiero, A. (2008). Mental health. Detroit: Greenhaven Press.