Ok, so I started my studies and I wonder how I’m going to cope with academic writing if I don’t understand it. I’m just reading a report about perception of dementia; it’s from 2012 so hopefully things improved a bit, if not in perception, then at least in language.

Let’s take that couple of sentences about stigma:

They suggest stigma only exists if ‘labelling, stereotyping, separation, status loss, and discrimination co-occur in a power situation that allows the components of stigma to unfold.‘

What does that mean, for godness sake?!!!

So if labelling, stereotyping and so on won’t allow components of stigma to unfold, stigma will not exist? Which makes kind of sense because if parts of something are not allowed to exist then the entire thing will not exist, however I cannot see this making sense in a real life. My dad’s mental illness was severely stigmatised and I’d never say it was because of components. It was because his illness made our life very difficult.

The same with dementia; how anyone dares to even say they want to remove stigma without providing effective solution to deal with challenges the illness brings on both the patient and their family members.

I do think now, if everyone diagnosed with dementia or serious mental health problems receive a massive, beautiful, modern house from either government or a charity, there would be no stigma attached to those conditions.