I Write Letters

Dear Jon Stewart:

"The Rally to Restore Sanity" is disablist shit.

That the politics in this country have become extreme, absurd, and increasingly dangerous is not a result of mental illness; it's the result of ignorance and bigotry—and opportunistic fuckheads willing to exploit the same, without a modicum of regard for any consequences aside from their personal gain.

The "crazy" thing (see what I did there?) about your framing what is a legitimate threat to this democracy as "insanity" is that, because of the stigma against mental illness, the issue is being taken less seriously than it ought to be. These people aren't nutty outliers; they are knowingly and deliberately and rationally complicit in a campaign to undermine both the credibility of the democratic process and the efficacy of the US government.

It's a comprehensive strategy crafted by intelligent people who fervently believe in ideas like government should be small enough that "we can drown it in the bathtub." (And constantly vulnerable to that possibility.)

Because we live in a culture where people with mental illness are to be dismissed out of hand as the hopeless lunatics they are, your disablist frame is actively counterproductive.

"Crazy" turns this steaming mess into a joke—a joke that doesn't have to be taken seriously. And more deeply entrenches the marginalizing narratives that created that dismissability in the first place.

Snake. Tail. Yummy yummy. Fail.

Contemptuously,
Liss