Hashtag protest action for the mentally ill

Protest action against discrimination of the mentally ill

26/10/2013

For a few days people have been pointing out the discrimination of the mentally ill on Twitter at #isjairre. The protest action is especially important against the background of the increasing rejection of the mentally ill.

Discriminators are crazy
Since Wednesday several users share on Twitter under the hashtag „isjairre“ their bad experiences in dealing with emotional suffering. The initiators want to show that it is not the mentally ill people who are crazy, but those who discriminate against them because of their illness. Concerned them discuss their everyday life with depression, burnout, trauma and other mental disorders. How explosive the topic is in this country is shown, among other things, by the fact that „isjairre“ after just a few hours, it came second on the German Trending Topics on Twitter.

Similar debates on sexism and racism
The current debate recalls similar predecessors as „yelp“ and „look at“, among them tweets for months about sexism and racism in everyday life. The action was initiated by the 21-year-old Hengameh Yaghoobifarah, who herself is affected by a mental illness. The student of media and cultural studies had raised the question under her username @Sassyheng whether there is a need for a hashtag on the subject of discrimination of mentally ill patients. „The response was very high, so we searched for the right term. The idea was to choose a word that is actually negatively occupied, but is used colloquially in everyday life. We came up „crazy“, so Yaghoobifarah.

Handling in Sweden more open
Although the 21-year-old, who is studying in Freiburg, is currently in Sweden for a semester abroad, the tweets should still be German-speaking. She says: „In every country, people deal differently with mental disorders. In Sweden, for example, I experience that the topic is less taboo and people are more open.“ She did not expect the great response of those affected and points to the positive effect of the campaign on Twitter: „The advantage of a uniform hashtag on the topic is that you can search for the topic in a targeted way and make the problems visible in a collected form.“

Mental illness no marginal phenomenon
Even though the media and the affected nowadays deal with emotional suffering much more widely than a few years ago, many people do not know what it means to be mentally ill. Not only the patients themselves, but often enough their relatives must defend themselves again and again against stigmatization. And although it is by no means a marginal phenomenon in such diseases. Thus, according to the health insurance DAK now every eighth sick leave on mental disorders. This is an increase of 74 percent since 2006. In addition, reports from the German Pension Fund would show that more than four out of ten people in early retirement would list psychological distress as reasons. The costs are also rising continuously. In Germany, spending on mental illness and behavioral problems amounts to more than € 28 billion a year - about ten percent of annual health care costs.

Inacceptance and discrimination
Yaghoobifarah wants to join „isjairre“ help to raise awareness about the issue of discrimination of those affected, such as language: „Many are unaware that their language is pejorative when they say it „That is completely crazy!“ or „That is totally sick!“ Users share in their tweets what experiences they had to make with disapproval and discrimination, or report unpleasant scenes when buying medicine. It is also pointed out that there are problems in the care of the mentally ill, for example because of scarce treatment places.

Rejection has gotten worse
Shortly after the hashtag was launched, the first users abused it and made fun of mental disorders. Even malicious accusations are not missing. So also the initiator meant: „And indeed, there are also Twitterers, those affected - once again - to scold hunger for attention.“ Also the author of the book Stigma mental illness and founding member of the German society for social psychiatry, Asmus Finzen, refers to the importance of the topic: „The stigmatization of those affected is a very central problem.“ He even sees a deterioration in dealing with the patients: „Despite major campaigns, the rejection is worse than it was twenty years ago.“

Friendship with sufferers unimaginable
In 1990, a German research team carried out a representative study on the attitude of people to mentally ill patients and repeated them in 2011. As Finzen writes in the latest issue of Psychosocial Review, the result was that „In 1990, just under a fifth of the interviewees did not want to tolerate patients with schizophrenia as neighbors. In 2011, this was almost a third. It was no different at the workplace. While in 1990, two-fifths could not imagine being friends with a mental health patient, in 2011 it was more than half.“ He said that campaigns like #isjairre are all the more important.

Protest out of society
The doctor also said: „It remains to be seen how this exciting action develops.“ The action was definitely promising because it was initiated from below. „Major campaigns have fallen for the fundamental misconception that they can change society“, so finches. But since the protest comes from the society itself, it would have more substance. Yaghoobifarah stated „isjairre“: „It's about visualizing and addressing oppression - on the part of those affected.“ (Ad)