Everyday experience of racism plays a part in black men's mental stress







Social disadvantage, poor housing, poorly paid work, low educational achievement, and overt and covert discrimination may play role in the development of emotional distress tending to mental illness in black men.

A recent survey by the Commission for Healthcare and Audit Inspections (CHAI) (2005) found that the rates of admission into hospital for black men is at least three times higher than the national average in the UK, indicating that a significant number of black men are suffering from emotional distress that is never detected by mental health professionals until it becomes serious enough to warrant hospitalisation.

Black men are twice as likely to be referred to mental health care institutions via the Courts or the police as they are by the GP and up to 38 per cent more likely to be detained under the Mental Health Act (1983); though for black women the rate of detention is far higher (CHCAI, 2005).

These findings have been reported in increasing proportions since the 1960s and there is ample evidence from research in many of the leading psychiatry and mental health journals such as the British Journal of Psychiatry and the Sainsbury Foundation for Mental Health. This information is therefore not new, but the reasons underlying emotional distress in black men is, as yet, uncertain.

Dr McKenzie (Royal Free Hospital) has indicated that social disadvantage, poor housing, poorly paid work, low educational achievement, and overt and covert discrimination may play a role in the development of emotional distress tending to mental illness in black men.

And Prof. Roland Littlewood (UCL) has indicated that the different interpretations of lived experience found in different cultures may play a role in the overrepresentation of mental illness in black men in the UK. Whatever the underlying cause of the emotional distress, living with it has grave consequences for the health and well-being of family friends and society as whole.

My own research with black men conducted in two south London mental health care settings suggested that many of their emotional problems arise as a consequence of the guilt and shame experienced in not being able to provide and act in what they believed was an appropriate way for a man to behave.

Their everyday experience of discrimination and failure seemed to reinforce feelings of persecution and oppression and participants found it difficult to communicate to their families because they felt that they ought to be able to deal with this perceived oppression, themselves.














Some black men think it's unmanly not to cope







Black men who do not value counselling and psychotherapy may view any suggestions to seek this kind of help as a waste of time.

These black men did not feel that they were mentally ill, or in need of mental health care. They saw their problems as arising from the social context within which they lived, and that resolution would require the reorganisation of the power relations that persist in the society. In such circumstances, black men are not likely to seek help and support from anybody.

Refusal to seek help from mental health professionals may be due to the sigma associated with a mental illness; or from the possibility that black men see their difficulties as arising from their social situations. In such circumstances, black men who do not value counselling and psychotherapy may view any suggestions to seek this kind of help as a waste of time.

Personally I receive many requests from distraught partners of black men, but black men themselves rarely if ever contact me with the view to seeking counselling and psychotherapy for themselves. Most of my black clients are women concerned about their black male partners.

Some black men may feel that it is unmanly to be seen not to cope and may feel robbed of their manhood in relation to their partners who earn more than they do. They may feel powerless to effect change; that the pressures of life are too great, and have fallen into bad habits in an attempt to dull their senses and dilute the emotional pain they are experiencing.

Some black men may have heard of other black men who have had a negative experience after contacting mental health services, or believe that the mental health practitioners are, essentially, racist.

Ultimately, it is black men who must decide for themselves whether they wish to continue suffering in the way that they do, or opt to seek help and support from someone bearing in mind that family and friends may not have the time, knowledge, and skills necessary to help and support them. Sometimes it is necessary to seek professional help. There is no shame in seeking help, and surely that’s better than suffering in silence.


Vernon A. De Maynard. AKC., JP, MSc, MBACP (Accred.) Psychotherapist and Counsellor

Please feel free to express your opinion on this column by posting your comments to the forum or by emailing 'Uncle Vern,' who will soon be joining our lifestyle section as a regular counsellor to help you with your emotional dilemmas.



















FROM 'BLACK BRITAIN'

blackbritain@co.uk