Mental health in made in communities. The communities we live in. The communities we belong to. The communities we identify with.
It’s a cliché and can seem so obvious as to be not worth saying. But the implications of this simple truth, as we understand it, are profound and need to be spelled out so that its value is translated from theory to action.
This year’s Mental Health Awareness Week, facilitated by the Mental Health Foundation, centres on the theme of community, and its importance to our mental health. That’s a topic that is close to our hearts at Centre for Mental Health, too, and for equality and social justice in mental health more widely.
Research shows that the biggest influences on our mental health during our lives come from our environments and experiences. The things that protect our mental health and those that put it at risk are in constant conflict around us. And they’re not equal. Poverty, racism, misogyny, violence, marginalisation and discrimination put too many people’s mental health at risk unjustly.
Community can be a major protective factor for our mental health. Being part of a community in which we feel valued, heard and connected gives us a better chance of having good mental health or recovering from mental ill health. The communities that have meaning for us can be our families, our neighbourhoods, our schools, our workplaces, our online worlds, faith and social groups, and many more. Those communities can mitigate or challenge many of the wider risk factors for our mental health, offsetting some of the structural drivers of distress, fighting injustices, and healing wounds.
Of course, communities can also do the opposite. They can exclude and oppress, and in so doing they can cause severe and lasting harm to people’s mental health. Throughout history, people living with mental health difficulties have been shunned and shamed by communities that seek to exclude and blame them for their distress.
In recent decades, groups of people with mental health difficulties have fought back, creating survivor-led communities and networks that provide peer support, campaigning voices and mutual aid, challenging traditional power bases and imbalances.
This year’s Mental Health Awareness Week comes at a time when we need communities more than ever: with rising levels of mental distress, global conflict, and climate change. The recent rise in populism and authoritarianism around the world is also generating more reactionary responses to deepening economic, social and environmental threats to our collective wellbeing.
Recent attempts to shut down debates and discussions about mental health and illness here in the UK are a cause for notable concern, especially in the wake of the suppression of federal government agencies and research in the US. Mental health research, that can speak the truth to power without fear, and community advocacy have never been more important than in this challenging context.
Standing up for mental health equality is at the heart of our work. So we stand with the communities that bring hope, belonging, compassion, and friendship. We stand up for the rights of people living with mental ill health. And we stand alongside those who face exclusion, stigma and discrimination in their everyday lives. Mental Health Awareness Week is a great opportunity to celebrate those communities, and to renew and reaffirm the push for equality and justice more widely.
