Bell Let’s Talk is a highly successful corporate campaign to raise awareness and funding for mental health and respective charities.
The creation of a campaign such as Bell Let’s Talk appears to mark a time in our history when we, as a society, have become more open and supportive of talking about what was once a taboo subject.
In reality, the effect of the campaign is exactly as its name suggests: All talk, no change.
This isn’t to knock the funding power of the campaign, which raised a staggering $7.2 million dollars for mental health initiatives this year, according to Bell’s website.
It is to criticize the way in which Canadians have used Bell Let’s Talk as a Band-Aid for a deeply systemic issue.
On the day of each year’s campaign, our phones are flooded with texts, calls, and posts with the Bell Let’s Talk filter—each promising to donate five cents for each share. People also use the campaign to talk about their own mental health journeys or to promise to be a listening ear to any social media mutual in distress. But the next day, the filters are down, social media is quiet, and people have moved on.
This is not how we should be addressing a systemic issue, such as the one surrounding the way our society deals with mental health.
It should not take a private, capitalist company to raise funding for mental health initiatives—nor should our friends, family, and acquaintances feel compelled to share their own struggles with mental illness on social media in order for them to be recognized with humanity and compassion.
Even as our society becomes more open to certain kinds of digestible mental health issues, there is still an underlying stigma that stems from our lack of education. That lack of education leads to fear, disgust, and apathy rather than kindness and compassion to those suffering from mental illnesses which we don’t understand.
Our poor education creates several problems, from stereotypical depictions of mental illness in the media to cuts in governmental funding from programs that could genuinely help those suffering.
For an example of the ineffectiveness of the Bell Let’s Talk campaign, look no further than Ontario Premier Doug Ford, who tweeted in support of the campaign, months after slashing $335 million from a planned mental health funding budget.
We need to look at combating mental illness and promoting mental health awareness from the bottom up—not the other way around. That means we need to be educated on all the different factors of mental illness, including what can lead to its development, what factors worsen mental health, and what those with mental illnesses actually need as opposed to what neurotypical people say they need.
After we are educated, we need to act on this knowledge.
Combating homelessness, providing more government funding to programs which support mental health, and subsidizing mental health treatment in the same way we cover physical health treatment are all goals which we can start working towards.
Supporting mental health and helping people with mental illnesses is more than just talk—it is hard work that requires action, everyday.
Image by Lauren Hicks
