I’m sorry, but I do not see an issue with romanticising mental health issues on TV

The media at the moment is full of keyboard warriors quick to bash any kind of TV show for portraying something typically considered taboo, and I’m sure you’re already sat there, poised, ready to scream (well, all caps rage in Facebook comments) at me for my shortsightedness and my blah and I’m bored of the comments already. I’ve lost count of the number of articles condemning Netflix’s recent show “13 Reasons Why” for prompting teenagers and young adults into committing suicide, and for romanticising these issues. And now Netflix’s original show “To The Bone” is getting a lot of stick too, for many of the same reasons, namely because a lot of pro-anorexia chat groups online are using the show to encourage each other to relapse. And there are so many things wrong with that, but the show is not to blame.

I’ve read a few articles lately, mostly surrounding the likes of the horrendously written teen drama “13 Reasons Why“, and also the Netflix Original “To The Bone” – outraged by their depictions and romanticisation of mental health/eating disorders. I get the frustration, as someone who has dealt with mental health issues before I can understand why seeing something trivialised (or, conversely, put on a pedestal) can seem damaging. I also do think it CAN be damaging. As Serena Smith rightly asks of 13 Reasons Why’s portrayal of someone with depression: “Where’s the numbing lethargy? Where’s her losing interest in her appearance? Where’s the self-harm?”. And it’s a good question. Where is it?

My answer to that question, however, is that it’s in the same place as all the other parts of general life that we take of our consumable media because it’s simply more fun to watch. Imagine if we included all the non-sexy things that can happen during sex. I don’t mean to be vulgar but you don’t want to watch as James Bond and [insert Bond Girl here] clean up their mess afterwards, nor do we want to see Khal Drogo try some really awkward dirty talk when he was about to get busy with the Mother of Dragons. And you definitely don’t want to hear a little queef come out of Rose as Jack goes down on her like the Titanic itself. We don’t see it because it’s a romanticised version of sex.

Taking this mindset we have here and applying to mental health is perfectly fine. People who react to the fictional romanticised content in a way that makes them feel like they should act, or feel, a certain unhealthy way already have issues with their mental health. A TV show is not to blame for the actions of people who watch it, whether it’s accurately represented or not. If you’re watching Donnie Darko talk to a 6-foot rabbit that tells him to commit all sorts of crimes for 2 hours 14 minutes and come away thinking “I wanna be like my boy Donnie”, then unfortunately you can’t blame the film when you decide to burst your school’s water pipe with an axe.

Did they, Donnie?

There’s a reason we don’t see long winded conversations where both parties misunderstand each other for hours on end. There’s a reason we see a much higher number of people running to airports to stop flights of loved ones on TV than we do in real life. There’s a reason we don’t watch people go to the toilet. The list goes on and on, but people still seem to think that TV and Film have some sort of obligation to be accurate to life. I’m not going to deny that people have been caught in damaging mindsets after trying to replicate the characters on TV, but under the same logic we can’t have the vigilantism of Batman, the sadism of the Jigsaw Killer, nor the misogyny of James Bond (maybe nobody will miss that one, admittedly).

Creators can choose whether they want to mirror life or romanticise life, and we should stop blaming them for choosing the latter.