8 Responses

1. a says:

   May 6, 2008 at 12:58 pm

   Since when does “many”, a word used by the reporter, not the subject of the article, mean “most”, the word you chose to use in your headline, or the word “all” you chose to use when accusing him of peddling the “all comics are crazy” meme? Guys, your problem seems to be with the reporter, who is using these words, not Mr Granier, who has consistently used the word “many”. Is it probably that many people in any given industry suffer from mental illness? I would say so.

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2. Brian McKim & Traci Skene says:

   May 6, 2008 at 1:12 pm

   Since when is this kind of journalism acceptable? No matter your opinion of comedians? Did we use “most” instead of “many?” Yes.Did the reporter use “many?” Yes. And he did so while paraphrasing Granirer.Are you splitting hairs? Yes. Inexplicably so.Let’s zoom out: For the second time in about 150 days, a Canadian newspaper article has given its readers the impression that comedians are mentally ill. Do the readers make such fine distinctions as you or I? No, probably not.Is the impression a mistaken one? We say it is. In our experience (which covers a quarter of a century, compared to the reporter’s phone conversation probably lasting a half-hour) we would say that the comedians we’ve encountered might actually have a lower incidence of mental illness when compared to the general population.Your eagerness to defend Granirer and the reporter(s) is puzzling and your desire to identify us as the ones with the problem runs counter to logic.

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3. myq says:

   May 10, 2008 at 7:35 pm

   I don’t believe the first commenter is splitting hairs.I would say that your use of “most” instead of “many” does your case, which is a reasonable one to make, a disservice.Because you’re doing just what you often rightly accuse others in journalism of doing: taking words and concepts out of context to support a preconceived conclusion.(Even if that conclusion would be valid, using exaggeration and misquotes to arrive at it necessarily weakens and detracts from the case in general, does it not?)Very likely, “most” comedians aren’t mentally ill. (And this most recent article has not tried to make that case.)Additionally, very possibly, “many” comedians DO have some form of mental illness, depending on one’s definition of “many” and “mental illness.”Finally, “many” non-comedians likely have some form of mental illness as well.And that is the most relevant point to make here, I would say, if you wanted to…that the reporter irresponsibly presents the case that “many” comedians have some form of mental illness without also indicating that “many” members of the non-comedian population likely do as well.The implication of that minor section of the article does indeed seem to be that perhaps comedians have a higher incidence of mental illness than non-comedians (which may or may not be the case, because no case has been made, neither by the article’s potential implication NOR your anecdotal “evidence”).I think furthermore that you miss the greater point and do the mental health industry at least as big a disservice as you claim is being done by this article to standup comedy… namely by furthering the stigma that mental illness is deserving of shame.I could certainly go on even longer than I shouldn’t have already on this subject, but the point is this:1) no one has said here that “all comedians are crazy”2) to imply that Canadian newspaper readers can’t discern the difference between the meanings of different words DOES seem a little crazy3) even if someone said “more comedians are crazy than non-comedians” (which could be true, though it may indeed be irresponsible to suggest it without statistics on either side), that doesn’t mean that they’re calling YOU crazy (but responding as though they are seems a bit, well, crazy).crazy frequent commenter,Myq KaplanPS Why couldn’t this article be viewed as something positive about standup comedy?Which seems to be the main spirit in which it’s intended.The idea that standup comedy can help people who already HAVE mental illness seems great (and the point that perhaps a number of comedians may have an undiagnosed mental illness seems more of a throwaway that has been given more attention by you than anyone else would have given it otherwise, thought-wise).Why are these people the enemy?In fact, the idea that “you need to be a little nuts to do standup” seems more like, well, a joke.And if it’s based at all in truth, then at least it’s the GOOD kind of nuts.

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4. Brian McKim & Traci Skene says:

   May 10, 2008 at 8:03 pm

   Myq says:<>“I think furthermore that you miss the greater point and do the mental health industry at least as big a disservice as you claim is being done by this article to standup comedy… namely by furthering the stigma that mental illness is deserving of shame.”<>We call bullshit.It is Mr. Granirer who most often talks about the stigma that is attached to mental illness… indeed, he makes a great deal about it. Then, he does us the favor of thrusting the stigma onto us. And he generalizes in doing so. And he doesn’t back it up. And he doesn’t do so as “a joke.”And, for the record, we don’t buy even the idea that “many” comics are mentally ill. And by that we mean not a large raw number, and not a disproportionately large number either.Our “evidence” which you so quickly dismiss as “anecdotal” is taken from careful observation of hundreds (maybe thousands) of comedians over 27 years.And, while we lack the (alleged) expertise of Mr. Granirer, we are nonetheless astute observers of human behavior. And, we daresay we’ve had more contact (and higher-quality contact in terms of length, depth and breadth) with comedians than he has (or possibly ever will have). The case could be made that our anecdotal evidence could whup his anecdotal evidence any day.As for us giving the article “more attention … than anyone else would have given it otherwise,” the article and a similar, earlier one, appeared in major Canadian newspapers and were carried on wire services. We can guarantee that their circulation and readership dwarfs ours. The damage is done when an irresponsible newspaper includes such claptrap in its pages.Staying silent would compound the damage.

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5. myq says:

   May 10, 2008 at 8:31 pm

   First of all, you’ve misunderstood and/or misconstrued all of my main points.Second of all, let me explain (again).The first (and main) point you missed, regarding the stigma:The stigma associated with mental illness is that mental illness is deserving of shame.You perpetuate that stigma. The article does not, nor does anyone in it.Mental illness is just as real and valid as physical illness.What if someone said “comics are more likely to get physically ill because of long hours traveling devoid of regular human contact plus the malnourishment often associated with being on the road”?It might be true, it might not be true.But there’s no stigma attached to physical ailments in that way, like there is with mental (but there shouldn’t be, and the article doesn’t treat mental illness as such, but you do, perpetuating societ’s unhealthy view on it… you call “bullshit”? an eloquent rebuttal… I call bullshit on your “bullshit”).The second point you missed:The fact that the article is by and large pro-standup comedy, and its therapeutic value.The third missed point:When I said you were drawing more attention, I was not speaking of the entire article, but rather the throwaway point at the end that was not in any way the main point of the article, that might easily (and rightfully) gone unnoticed in the face of the rest of the article’s substance.Finally, I would like to re-direct attention to my first point, as it is the strongest and most relevant, and I probably should have closed with it.I’m crazy,Myq

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6. Brian McKim & Traci Skene says:

   May 10, 2008 at 9:30 pm

   Myq:A stigma is a stigma. It’s not a good thing, it’s not a bad thing. It is a thing. (Although some folks may argue that some stigmas serve a good purpose and that the disappearance of some other stigmas has been, on balance a bad thing. But that is a topic for another day.)The author and the subject of the article may not have done anything to further the stigma. But they did nothing to lessen it.That’s the thing about stigmas. No matter how much well-meaning people talk about them, they pretty much don’t go away. All the talk succeeds in doing is make folks feel bad for feeling the way they do. And that is neither a good thing nor a bad thing, but is merely a thing.A stigma is not a death sentence. It is not a call to arms. It is a way of thinking about something or someone or some condition. If we say that we don’t want comics to be thought of as mentally ill, we are in no way, large or small, perpetuating a stigma. We are, however acknowledging that one exists.If Mr. Granirer thinks that spreading the stigma around to other groups is a holy thing to do, he is mistaken.It’s not our job here to humanize the mentally ill. It is our job to clarify the general public’s idea of who standup comics are (and what they aren’t).They aren’t any nuttier than the general population. And they might even be less nutty. (And, if by using the term “nutty,” we have reinforced a stigma, we plead guilty.)

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7. myq says:

   May 11, 2008 at 5:53 am

   First, I don’t believe that a stigma is neither good nor bad. The Oxford English Dictionary defines it as “a mark of disgrace or infamy; a sign of severe censure or condemnation.” That sounds “bad” to me. Disgrace, infamy, censure, condemnation. Bad.Second, I don’t believe that stigmas can’t go away, and that talking about them isn’t the thing to make that happen.In fact, I believe that over the past century, and especially into recent decades, a lot of headway HAS been made in making mental illness less of a stigma, in the minds of a lot more people than in the past, as people have learned more (by TALKING about the issue).So many more people are on medications these days, lots of people understand that depression and anxiety can be physiological problems as real as a disease, etc…So I don’t see at all how you can suggest that talking does nothing productive.Third, the article isn’t “spreading the stigma” to other groups. It’s saying that there are likely comedians who have some form of mental illness. And that’s the truth. The literal word-for-word interpretation of the words typed in the article is provably true.There ARE certainly comedians who have some form of mental illness.Your reaction to the article positing this in the way they did (with the words “many” and “probably” there even) is understandable, but one of my main points in my initial comment (which I believe went unanswered) was this:misquoting “many” as “most” (or purposely using one instead of the other) does your cause a disservice, if your cause is to clarify ideas for the public.Because it IS a different word with a different meaning that makes for a different interpretation of the facts, and people know the meanings of those words.The article DEFINITELY didn’t say or imply that MOST comedians are mentally ill.You’ve mistakenly implied that the article did so.And my main point was initially not to defend the article’s potential implications, but to say that if you wanted to correct or clarify them, you shouldn’t do so with fallacies yourself.Do you disagree?

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8. myq says:

   May 12, 2008 at 5:03 am

   Sorry if this is posted twice…First, I don’t believe that a stigma is neither good nor bad. The Oxford English Dictionary defines it as “a mark of disgrace or infamy; a sign of severe censure or condemnation.” That sounds “bad” to me. Disgrace, infamy, censure, condemnation. Bad.Second, I don’t believe that stigmas can’t go away, and that talking about them isn’t the thing to make that happen.In fact, I believe that over the past century, and especially into recent decades, a lot of headway HAS been made in making mental illness less of a stigma, in the minds of a lot more people than in the past, as people have learned more (by TALKING about the issue).So many more people are on medications these days, lots of people understand that depression and anxiety can be physiological problems as real as a disease, etc…So I don’t see at all how you can suggest that talking does nothing productive.Third, the article isn’t “spreading the stigma” to other groups. It’s saying that there are likely comedians who have some form of mental illness. And that’s the truth. The literal word-for-word interpretation of the words typed in the article is provably true.There ARE certainly comedians who have some form of mental illness.Your reaction to the article positing this in the way they did (with the words “many” and “probably” there even) is understandable, but one of my main points in my initial comment (which I believe went unanswered) was this:misquoting “many” as “most” (or purposely using one instead of the other) does your cause a disservice, if your cause is to clarify ideas for the public.Because it IS a different word with a different meaning that makes for a different interpretation of the facts, and people know the meanings of those words.The article DEFINITELY didn’t say or imply that MOST comedians are mentally ill.You’ve mistakenly implied that the article did so.And my main point was initially not to defend the article’s potential implications, but to say that if you wanted to correct or clarify them, you shouldn’t do so with fallacies yourself.Do you disagree?

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