Why Ignore the Stigmas now has a Mental Illness section — and what belongs in it.
This site began as a music blog with an argument underneath it. The argument is that the music kept telling us something, and that America kept changing the subject.
That is why the songs are so full of it. Not because suffering is romantic, but because a record was often the only place an artist could say the true thing without losing their job, their family, or their place in the room.
Depression is the other half of this. It arrives like a thief: it takes the colour out of the world, and then it tells you that you are the only one who has noticed. It is extraordinarily good at making people quiet — and the quiet is what lets the rest of us look away.
That habit of looking away is the stigma. It is not usually cruelty. It is closer to fatigue: a long, inherited flinch at the subject. And it costs lives, because it delays the one thing that reliably helps, which is saying the thing out loud to another person.
What this section is for
This section will carry writing about conditions, treatment, and what the country does and does not fund. It will include our own experience where it is useful, and point to the fuller account on our About page where it is not.
Two commitments, plainly. We will not diagnose strangers. And we will not treat anyone’s pain as the price of their talent — that framing flatters the audience and does nothing for the person living it.
Every piece that touches suicide will carry the same two lines, because they are the point of the exercise rather than a disclaimer.
If you are struggling, help is available. In the United States you can call or text 988 at any time. You can also text HOME to 741741 to reach the Crisis Text Line.
Ignore the Stigmas 
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