Tag: Minorities

The Depression & Anxiety of Racism

Last week, I wrote a bit about the Black Lives Matters movement and the incredible stress and strain that racism is causing people of color. This is a topic that I really think demands further exploration.

First, I mentioned it last week, but check this article out in more depth. Rates of anxiety and depression spiked, hard, for African & Asian Americans in the aftermath of George Floyd’s murder. Among African Americans, positive screenings for these disorders rose from 36% to 41%, while they increased from 28% to 34% among Asian Americans. Those are all significant increases.

Interestingly enough, it did not increase for members of the Hispanic population. I’d be curious to better understand why that is the case, but that’s for another day.

Tragically, the reason we have this data is because the federal government was attempting to track the impacts of COVID-19 on minority populations, which, as we know, has been hit particularly hard by this pandemic. One tragedy upon another.

If these findings are accurate and representative of the increasing rates of mental illness among the general public, it means that at least two million more people experienced mental illness as the result of the murder of George Floyd. These are horrifying numbers, but they really aren’t all that surprising.

We know, definitively, that external forces can increase rates of mental illness. Depression, anxiety, and suicide all rise in times of economic turmoil and it makes tragic sense that a group of people who are under perpetual attack at an individual and societal level would experience rising rates of mental illness when a horrific video showed a slow-motion murder.

What does this mean? Again, the good news…such as it is…is that we, as a society, are having a larger conversation about systemic racism. I worry that too much of the conversation has focused on police brutality and criminal justice reform. That is important, no question, and its the primary issue in front of us at the moment. However, we cannot lose sight of the impact that centuries of racism have had on countless other areas of life.

One of those must be mental health.

As a white man, I cannot personally understand the impact of racism on mental health. But the literature and personal experience of countless people of color are clear. Racism means lost opportunities. It means personal pain and lives destroyed. It also means the trauma of watching countless people who look and act like you being gunned down by the men and women who are supposed to protect you.

What’s my point of this entry? The article above proves it: Police brutality and systemic racism mean depression. They mean mental health. And as we have a conversation about what Black Lives Matters means, we cannot forget this vitally important component of addressing and ending systemic racism.

COVID-19, Mental Health and Black Lives Matter

Hey, everyone!

First, I apologize. My blog entries have obviously been spotty for the past few months. There is a reason for that: The real world. Simply put, my job as State Representative became too overwhelming. This, along with other responsibilities, made it really difficult for me to blog. I am sorry and I will try to get back into my twice a week habit now.

So, let’s get right to it. Every one of us has been following the murder of George Floyd and the subsequent explosion of the Black Lives Matters movement. If you read my blog, I’m guessing you are at least somewhat progressively orientated. That probably means you are shocked and horrified at the current state of the world, and want to do something to make it better.

As a white man, I can’t sit here and yammer on about what the Black Lives Matter movement means. I represent a district that is about 1/2 minorities and work with dozens of other elected officials who are people of color, and I’ve tried to learn from their experiences to figure out not only how to do my job better, but how to be a better person.

From my perspective, acknowledging those limitations, I’ve come to the conclusion that we scream Black Lives Matter because society has decided for centuries that they don’t. That we scream Black Lives Matter at the top of our lungs because the communities of color have been devastated, destroyed, and degraded for centuries in a way that white people cannot begin to fathom.

To the casual observer, I think it gets too easy to assume that the entire Black Lives Matter movement only revolves around police reform and criminal justice. As best I can tell, that isn’t only the case. Black Lives Matter, at least to me, means that we address all of the systemic inequities in our society. That means addressing countless areas of our public policy, including education, urban planning, economic development, health care access and more.

It also, unquestionably, means mental health. I’ve written on this topic before, but even the briefest of looks at Google shows the enormous disparity facing the minority communities when it comes to mental health. Furthermore, new studies show that that levels of anxiety and depression spiked among the African American population after the murder of George Floyd. As if their burden wasn’t already enough to shoulder.

All this brings me back to COVID. I wrote a line in Redemption that I barely even thought about until a reviewer flagged it: “When civilization collapses, it doesn’t collapse evenly.” COVID has taught us that, hasn’t it? Obviously, civilization isn’t collapsing, but boy has it taken some hits.

And those hits have not been evenly distributed.

Just take a look at how COVID has hit minority communities. The evidence is painfully clear: According to the CDC, minority communities in general – and the African American community specifically – are more likely to contract COVID, be hospitalized as a result of COVID, and die from COVID. This isn’t a result of any genetic challenges. Instead, its a result of systematic discrimination that has resulted in years of poor health care access in general, substandard living conditions and worse health.

When civilization collapses, it won’t collapse evenly.

What’s my point? Pretty obvious. I think most of us agree with the statement that Black Lvies Matter. That means we have to act like it. It means our policy has to reflect those values, and that must be carried out in the way that we discuss all aspects of public policy. Mental health must be part of that equation.