When I found out about the movie Split, I spent a huge part of my Saturday crying. It was two years ago. Now, Glass, the follow-up is about to be released, and it’s time to republish this article. I thought I would have to edit so many things, but in fact… no. I changed this introduction. And a few things here and there. But for the rest, it’s still the same anger, the same sadness, the same hopelessness. I just gave more thoughts to some parts. Before I begin, I will just remind you this: I’m not judging the aesthetic quality of the movie. Two years later, I still haven’t seen it. I decided long ago that it didn’t worth sacrificing my mental health to educate neurotypical people. It may be the best movie ever. The truth is I don’t care. The problem is what it says. The problem is the context. The problem can be sum up this way “one more”. And now, let’s begin…
Here it is: another movie with a multiple personality disordered killer.
Cynical sarcastic me: How great is that? Really, that was really all the world needed. So new and provocative.
Angry me: aren’t they never gonna get tired of this shit?
No they’re not, sorry angry me.
And there are so many reasons to be angry I don’t even know how to start the list… So maybe I should answer to what I’ve been told (most of the time by very well intentioned people who really wanted to make me feel better)(I write this because if you’re one of them I want you to know that I know you mean well, and I’m not mad at you, I’m mad at the world who let you think these are good arguments, or let movies like Split exist.).
This movie is not about schizophrenia.
Truth is, this not the problem. Really. I didn’t calm down when I learnt that for once cinema did tell apart schizophrenia and dissociative identity disorder (DID). Reason 1: there is nothing to be proud of here, that’s basic research work. Last week, I told my students I wouldn’t congratulate them for coming up at the right time, they are supposed to do so, that’s the basic rule of school. Same here. When you make a movie about a mental illness, it’s basic work to simply know a few facts about those mental illnesses. But as students don’t show up on time at class, cinema doesn’t often do its basic research work. Which leads us to reason 2: cinema never really cares about the differences between schizophrenia and dissociative identity disorder. So here we are, schizophrenic and DID people, stuck in the same boat thanks to the cinema even if our struggles can barely be compared, except for the struggles of being missunderstood all the damn time. As a schizophrenic friend brilliantly put it yesterday “We are in the same boat do to our shared frustration of being forced into the same boat”. Quite ironic isn’t it? So I will consider we are in the same boat. Because even if the movie does make the difference, it’s still fucking uncool with DID people, and it’s the same problem. Plus, the cinema has forgotten this difference so many times a lot of people barely know there is one. And I am not letting DID people fighting on their own.
People can tell the difference between reality and fiction!
No they can’t. And I should know, I’m schizophrenic, so I know quite a lot about the ability to know the difference between reality and non-reality. And believe me, one of the biggest problem of neurotypical persons is that they are unable to consider that there is more than one reality, or that their reality is biased, which means it’s their reality and not The Reality. So here is the problem: there are a fucking lot of stigmas around mental illnesses. And there are even more stigmas around schizophrenia and DID. Do you know why? Cinema, TV shows, medias… Can you name movies where the schizophrenic / DID person IS NOT a fucking psycho killer? I can name one… only one. When there are so many psycho killer… Where are the movies / books / stories where people like me gets to be teacher doctors physicians parents social workers lawyer singers or whatever? Where are they? We need those stories so bad…
It’s human, when you’re shown with the exact version of the reality over and over again, you tend to believe there is no other way. It’s such an old trick, and it works for everything. You’re waging war and you need your people to kill with no second-thought? Keep portraying the enemy as rapist/killer/monster and no problem! You want people to accept to lose their freedoms in the name of security? Keep telling them they’re in danger and that’s the solution! You want people to buy water/milk because of the taxes or just because you produced too much? Keep telling them science proved you need to drink 1.5 liters of water a day!
The difference is, no one really wants people to believe schizophrenic / DID people are psycho killers. (well I hope there is no one…)(I shouldn’t have written that, it’s giving ideas to my paranoia) But it’s the same principle: it’s the only thing you ever about schizophrenic / DID people. Maybe you don’t realise it, but your mind is already biased, even if you think it’s not.
To sound a bit less judgy, I will also judge me. I realised that I was getting more suspicious or afraid or uncomfortable around people of colour. How ridiculous is that? A lot. Objectively, intellectually, I know that they are not more dangerous than white people. I KNOW that, I believe it, there is no way you can make me say that coloured people are more dangerous. But still, when I go home alone and there are groups of coloured people, I feel a bit more in danger than with white people. So there was a difference between what my brain knows and what my body knows. I had to dissect myself to solve this issue (that’s the good point of being schizophrenic: your mind is so broken there is always one part to dissect and judge the other one. Sometimes, it can be very useful!). The answer was obvious: most of the time, they are the bad guys of the movies, and even in the news. Even if I didn’t believe in those racist bullshits, I’ve heard and eaten so much of it without knowing it that my mind was biased. I’m working on it because I can’t let that happen. (and now I’m pretty happy to announce that my paranoia is quite the same around coloured AND white people)(what? I never said white people didn’t scare me)
You don’t realise it, but movies about schizophrenic / DID killer (or “crazy persons needing to be committed to the closest asylum” which is our second option) are doing the same to you. Even if a part of your brain knows that you’re watching fiction, another part of your brain is taking notes. The only way to get out of the bias in your mind, is to realise that they do exist. Which means that you must be ready to consider that bias may exist in your mind. Believe me, neurotypical persons simply aren’t the best at this… Not because they are bad people or stupid people or any bullshit like this, but because the simple question of reality has never been a problem to them. So please, do realise that there are bias in your mind. We all have some of our own. And maybe you already know and you’re already working on it (if so, you’re already working at making the world a better place and it’s great!).
But a lot of people don’t. And it’s hard for us. If you’re fighting bias like sexism homophobia racism and all their friends, you know what I’m talking about. It’s the same. Except that I can sometimes try to explain a guy why what he’s saying is sexist and why it’s a problem. But when it comes to psychophobia… Have you ever experienced being described as a psycho killer at your workplace? Because I did. Sure, my coworkers were joking “we should be careful, customers will drive us crazy and we’ll turn schizophrenic and kill them!” SO FUNNY isn’t it? I guess I have no sense of humour. At this exact same moment, my schizophrenia was killing me. The Madness, was turning my life into a gigantic big brother experiment. All day long I was followed by men covered with eyes, literally, they had eyes all over their faces their arms their chest. They were counting my steps my breathes my words. They were counting down. I had no way to know how much step breathe and word I have left, the only thing I know was that when the countdown would hit 0, I would disappear in pain. I had to work with this fear, doing panic attacks in my car, wanting to hurt myself at work to make it stop. But the eyes were always watching me. And I was alone dealing with this. No one I could tell. I was almost glad when some big shit happens at work because when it did, people would assume I was pissed because of it and wouldn’t ask anything, I wouldn’t have to lie to them or to hide what was really happening. And while I was dealing with all this alone, my coworkers were joking about schizophrenic psycho killers. Which proved me that I should shut up. Which makes everything worse. Hide yourself hide your scars keep saying the voices.
How many times have I chosen silence over talking my issues?
How many times have I almost died because of this choice?
I’m afraid to say anything to anyone because what if I didn’t prove them enough that I wasn’t a crazy psycho killer and they think I am and just abandon me ?
And here I am, day after day, trying to fight the silence, but ending up choosing silence on a regular basis because there are still so many movies like Split to prove me that silence is my best option. Those movies are feeding my isolation, our isolation. Those movies are making it worse. [edit of two years later: the schizophrenic friend who proofread this article explained me that when one of this friend saw Split, he thought that was just how my friend was and that my friend was lying to himself. I am not exagerating. This happens to us ALL THE TIME]
Because they maintain the terrible representation people have of us.
But also because they can trigger us.
This point may be more personal, but I’m sure it can work in a way or another for other people (even if it can be slightly different for them). One of the main point of the Madness is that I’m a monster, like the worst thing that ever happened on Earth, something terrible that should have never happened. To prove her wrong, and prove me I’m worthy, I try to do all the good I can. It might sound cheesy, and maybe it is. But anyway, I’m doing my best on every field: I try to be here for my friend, to listen to them, to help them in any way, to keep their secret, to bring them home when drunk, etc. I try to learn as many things as possible to be a better feminist and “activist” and understand as many different points of view as I can. I try to produce the best research I can in my PhD so it can help people in different ways. I try to write for other, to tell stories. Etc etc. On the one hand, I hope it can balance the rot in me. On the other hand, like the Madness says, as I’m doing all of those things to balance the rot, it only proves that I’m rotten, so it doesn’t really count, I’m still a fucking piece of rot. (I’m pretty sure I will die of exhaustion in trying to balance the rot side of me) Can you guess what happens when one more movie with a schizophrenic / DID killer is released? Yes, the Madness earns more points to show me how rotten I am. Why am I bothering with all these when the world has already decided I was nothing more than a crazy monster? Those movies are not harmless, they kill all my work to be a better person and to prove myself that I’m not a monster, that it’s only the madness in me talking. Thank you Split, I’ll have to start from scratch again this week… I feel so dispossessed of my own life and mine since yesterday…
You can’t judge the quality of a movie without seeing it.
Maybe I should have started here. The quality of the movie is not the point. I don’t care. I couldn’t care less. In fact, it could be The Best Movie Ever Made I wouldn’t care anyway. I’m not judging the quality of the movie. I’m judging the world allowing this kind of movies without offering other possibilities for schizophrenic / DID people. I’m judging a world where people can call me a murderer and I don’t even have the right to be angry because if I do I will be taken to be the next psycho killer and I will not be able to deal with this irony. I’m judging a world where people are allowed to judge schizophrenic / DID people without knowing them, but where schizophrenic / DID people are not allowed to judge movies without seeing them. Don’t you feel that there is some kind of fucked up priorities here? Why can my coworkers joke about people like me being a psycho killer without problem but I can’t say this movie is a piece of crap without people falling on my back?
I don’t mind if you liked this movie. It’s ok. It’s not my point. If you’ve paid to see this at the theatre I hope you had a good moment. But please remember, those movies are feeding misrepresentations about people like me. Thanks to those misrepresentations, I’ve lost friends, got dumped. Friends of mine have lost their job. This didn’t happen to me because I always find a way to keep it secret, but I’m pretty sure it’s better if the parents of my students never learn this. All I’m asking you if you’ve enjoyed the movie (or other of the same kind), is to consider the bias it’s making in your mind. And when you have spotted them, please, spread the word. People like me need people like you to be more aware so we can feel safe. We need people like you not to feed our madness.
I spent my Saturday crying and asking friends to tell me I was not a monster, that they still loved me and wouldn’t go away.
I belong to the lucky ones: I have friends who know my struggles and are ready to help when shit like this hits the fan. Some people don’t.
It’s not written on our faces. And maybe you worked with schizophrenic / DID people. Maybe some of your friends are. My coworkers never knew. Some of my close friends still don’t know. Be careful. We need to know we can trust you before telling you. We need to know you won’t abandon us, proving us we are the monsters they show.
Thank you for your reading, your concern, your loving and reassuring words.
PS: The American schizophrenic friend who proofread this article asked me “the only movie you saw where the schizophrenic is not a killer, it’s A beautiful mind right ? _yes. _So the only movie we both know where the schizophrenic is not a killer is based on a true story. How ironic ? _Damn ironic. _Are we laughing not to cry? _Yes. But I’m still gonna cry.” I’m leaving you with this bittersweet irony. (notice that he didn’t ask me WHAT was the movie, there are so little that he already knew)
