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romymdxcssecondyear · 2 years

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Reading- Madness: A Brief History

Ive decided to read Madness: A Brief History by Roy Porter

I focused reading Chapter 7 “The Mad” (pp156-182) An interesting read, Porter stated that he simply just wanted to share the accounts of the treatment of people with mental ill-ness, not to form an opinion or start a movement, but more down-to-earth show the mistreatment that people suffer. Some of the accounts are from 1800s so of course some accounts are shocking, but it still holds value as it shows that mentally ill people all along and still do now, want to be heard and treated with human decency.

Reading chapter 7 was weird for me, as the title is “The Mad”, I wouldn’t consider mentally ill people “mad”, but this is the terminology that Porter used so throughout the text I will be using it but know it does not reflect my own views on the mentally ill.

“The rich may not understand the poor, nor the atheists the God-fearing, but the experience most profoundly closed, is surely being out of your mind.” (Mental patient signed “Warmark”) (pp. 156) this quote stuck out to me in the beginning of the chapter as I think mental illness does have a universal understanding for those who deal with it, an unspoken understanding that somehow brings us together. Porter goes on to talk about Richard Hunter and Ida Macalpine, both psychiatrists in 1974, who are quoted to say “Patients are victims of their brains, rather than their minds, this means reorientation of psychiatry, from listening to looking” (Hunter, 1974) (Macalpine, 1974) (pp. 156) meaning they believed that mental illness had a biological base and that you could not de-code mental illness by what the patience’s say. I bring this up as I believe it’s a great juxtaposition to the other readings I’ve brought up further down my blog, mainly as it goes against everything I’ve brought up and believe in so far, these psychiatrists thought that because a mentally ill person is only affected biologically that all the ‘nonsense’ they spout should be ignored and the patience should be made to shut up. Because obviously being mentally ill, you wouldn’t listen to the actual person but instead ‘look’ for what’s wrong, rather then just asking ‘How can I help?’ (Sarcasm heavily intended) I think this feeds directly into the Anti-psychiatry movement and the message I’m trying to convey into my own artwork.

Porter goes on to share several accounts from ex-mental patients, one being ‘Perceval’, one of the many children of assassinated Prime Minister Spencer Perceval, his son Perceval converted to an extreme protestant sect, who thought the holy ghost spoke through them, he was later thrown in an asylum for 18 months, which there he accounted that the medical staff “never listened to him or even acknowledged him as a human being” (pp. 159) (Porter, 2003) Perceval goes on to say he was treated “like a piece of furniture, an image of wood, incapable of decision or will as well as judgement”. Perceval said “There is reasonableness in lunacy” I think this is an excellent quote as people even now think that someone who is ‘mad’ just talks nonsense and we should ignore it, but there is truth in somethings, obviously depending on the severity of mental illness some things people say can be from paranoia and not true, but that doesn’t mean they don’t deserve to be heard.

Another account Porter brings up is from a former British Parliament member in 1957 in a mental institution. “The staff ignored me, I thought this technique must be a new method of study for mental illness, but I later learned that it was nothing but callous belief that ‘the mad’ do not suffer, any problems they express are bound to be imaginary”. (pp. 160) Again another account that is shocking yet believable, I think even thought this account was from quite a few years ago it can still be said that this treatment happens now, from accounts from friends who have been in mental institutions or even treatment off of doctors who ignore our direct verbally communicated issues and send us on our way as were “not mentally ill enough” for them to do anything about it.

Making Madness Visible, Porter says “The mad have expressed themselves not just verbally, but visually too, by drawing, painting and creating things”. (Porter, 2003) (pp. 177) It was not until the 1807s that psychiatric attention was paid to image-making for ‘the mad’, there was a weird moral implied that if ‘the mad’ could draw, paint, or create art like that, then those who painted like that were ‘mad’ too. Although this was encouraging to see more psychiatrists using art therapy, it could be said that the patients were unconsciously being coached to produce artworks according to the psychiatrist expectations. This is a double standard I believe and can be debated about for ages, my main point to bring up is that artwork and mental illness have been married for a long time, and in doing to artists are labelled troubled depending on the art they create, or always asked the pain behind their art, take Vincent Van Gogh for example, when he painted himself, who can say whether he was painting madness?- all that is clear he was painting misery. (Porter,2003) (pp. 182)

I feel like a lot of people (not trying to generalise) try to make the mentally ill fit into their own understanding, but in doing so they ‘mould’ them to make sense of their ‘madness’. But people don’t need you to understand them (within reason) they need to be heard, felt seen and even if you don’t understand them, you made the effort to try to understand them.

Bringing up the anti-psychiatry movement again, thinking back to my work and how I want to create my artwork (graphic media). I don’t want to take over people’s stories and ‘boast’ about how much I helped them, I want them to feel heard, seen and treated as an individual. I do not need to understand them per say, if I listen then they will feel understood, if there is something I don’t understand about a person then I don’t have the right to mould their struggle into something more understandable to me, I don’t want to take away form their personal experience, nor do I have the right to share their experiences as my own.

Bibliography:

Porter, R., 2003. Madness. Oxford University Press USA - OSO, pp.156-187.

Porter, R., 2003. Madness. Oxford University Press USA - OSO, p.156. “The rich may not understand the poor, nor the atheists the God-fearing, but the experience most profoundly closed, is surely being out of your mind.”

Porter, R., 2003. Madness. Oxford University Press USA - OSO, p.177. “The mad have expressed themselves not just verbally, but visually too, by drawing, painting and creating things”

Porter, R., n.d. Madness. Oxford University Press USA - OSO, p.156. “Patients are victims of their brains, rather than their minds, this means reorientation of psychiatry, from listening to looking”

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