How people with bipolar disorder are represented in the media

 Considering my last posting,  I only thought it would be appropriate to showcase my research on how people with bipolar disorder are represented in the media, or rather misrepresented in the media. I have done some research on this previously for a past assignment in this class, so it is fitting to include said research here.

Law and Order: SVU, episode 22 “Influence” season 7

This episode follows a teenage character named Jamie who is accused of murder after mowing down a group of people, one of which she killed, during a suicide attempt after being found for giving a false allegation of rape. In the episode, it is confirmed that Jamie has bipolar disorder and refuses to take her medication. This is a common trope that other crime shows/films and many other genres of tv and film follow, someone with mental illness (particularly bipolar disorder but other severe psychological disorders as well) refuses to take their medication and so is a loose canon and ends up committing a serious crime or crimes against others (the victims usually being neurotypical) as a result.

Silver Linings Playbook (2012)

This film follows the main character, Pat, as he returns home after an eight month court ordered stay at a psychiatric facility after he beat up the man his wife was having an affair with. While this film does many things right in its portrayal of mental illness within a family and other supporting characters,  particularly with the main character Pat who is diagnosed with bipolar disorder, they also resorted to using the stereotypical trope of violence and aggression that is often used in the portrayal of any mental illness, but particularly bipolar disorder, in the media.

The contents of this meme is a part of a long running “joke” that those with bipolar disorder don’t actually have anything inherently wrong and that they’re actually just assholes using a label as an “excuse” to be one. It insinuates that anyone with bipolar disorder is automatically an awful person, lumping them together under a collective identity of being violent and abusive people, which stigmatizes the disorder and puts a false idea in those without the disorder’s heads about what a person with the disorder should look and act like.

Once again, another long running “joke” about bipolar disorder that implies that people with the disorder can’t seem to stick to a feeling,emotion, decision, or opinion. That they are always flipping from one extreme to another, one second they hate something and the next they love it or vice versa. This oversimplifies the disorder completely by creating a stereotype of the main symptom in the disorder which is severe mood swings. Not only is this an incorrect depiction of how this particular symptom manifests, but it oversimplifies the disorder by overlooking the fact that this disorder has a spectrum and a wide variety of symptoms that everyone with the disorder experiences differently. Oversimplification of the disorder undermines the severity of it and can be seen by misusing the term in our everyday language which additionally creates a stigma. Some examples being “the weather is so bipolar lately”, or “sorry I can’t go out tonight, my mom said I could yesterday but she changed her mind she’s so bipolar.”

Common representation tropes of bipolar disorder in the media include:

• People with bipolar disorder are more likely to be criminals

• People with bipolar disorder frequently refuse treatment

• People with bipolar disorder are all hypersexual, unfaithful and have difficulty with long term relationships

• People with bipolar disorder (as well as other psychological disorders) are all violent

• People with bipolar disorder are all unable to maintain jobs and unable to experience successful careers