Repeat After Me: Mental Illness Can Strike Anyone

Okay, I'm not going to deny that there's some malicious humor in the story of the astronaut who drove 900 miles to try to scare or hurt or kill (depending on who you listen to) a rival for the affections of another astronaut.  The humor being that she wore adult diapers so that she wouldn't have to stop on the way to go to the bathroom.

Of course, that was just a professional trick that all astronauts use on take-off and landing of space vehicles, because you can't exactly go hook up your little bathroom device during that time.  It's not like she was half-naked in diapers sucking on a pacifier the whole way.

But the media coverage of all this is infused with this sense of "Astronauts are our best and brightest!  How could one of them be unstable like this!?!  I can't believe that smart and talented people have problems, too!"

Except that Lincoln exhibited signs of bipolar disorder.  Tchaikovsky exhibited signs of depression.  Cheney exhibits signs of paranoia (that's my actual opinion, not a dig at Cheney, although that opinion scares me).  A relatively recent graduate of my school acquired mental illness in college and recently took his own life.  All sorts of people exhibit signs of mental illness.  If anything, the pressures and responsibilities of a difficult job might make it more likely that a person could fall victim to mental illness.

There are probably thousands of cases a month nationwide of people losing control and doing something extreme to threaten some other person.

I'm not that mad that people are laughing at this clearly sick woman.  I mean, I see the humor, even though I'm not proud of finding it funny.

I'm mad that it's a story at all.  She's sick.  So are thousands of other people.  Deal with it.

Comments

[Cat lover]

Excellent post. Thank you for saying something that really needed to be said, and doing so in a mature, non-confrontational way. The blogosphere could use more of that.

[The Science Pundit]

I truly feel bad for the woman. I also feel bad for the astronaut she attacked; I feel bad for her husband and children; I even feel bad for the male astronaut who got caught up in the triangle. These things are painful enough when they happen to ordinary folks, I can't imagine what it must be like to be part of a national media circus. Now a new tragedy has bumped the astronaut saga off the front pages. I'm not sure how I feel about that.

[Jonathan]

It's all true. But at the same time, the news media covers crime, no matter the mental health of the accused. Probably a higher proportion of crimes are committed by people with mental illness than we usually care to think about.

And this society demands that cases involving prominent individuals get covered by the new media, and prominently at that. An astronaut? Definitely a minor celeb. The adult diapers have given it some extra mileage, and a love triangle gets more coverage than a liquor store hold-up, but I don't think she is being picked on for her illness.

(I'm not disagreeing with at least one major point: it's not nice, it's not necessary, and the coverage is not informative.)