Everyone has their crap TV show. I could write hundreds of articles about why no one should watch "America's Next Top Model" literally ever, and yet I'm pretty sure I've seen every season at least nine times. "Criminal Minds" used to be the same way for me. Sure, I knew it was crap, but come on, if you don't love Spencer Reid, you're lying. But after a while, it got harder and harder to watch.
Every single episode seemed to prey on my worst fears, poke and prod at my insecurities, confirm the voices in my head that assure me I am a bad person because I have a mental illness. I am accustomed to the popular media misunderstanding mental illness, and I do my best to give them the benefit of the doubt, lest I also be stigmatized for being "too sensitive" (we just can't win for losing). But "Criminal Minds" doesn't simply "misunderstand." Its entire premise is built on an inaccurate and hurtful view of mental illness.
Not only are mental illnesses incorrectly portrayed in the show (apparently OCD is when you have a mildly clean house, according to Hotch), but the entire idea of the show is dangerous. Criminal profiling is shady dealings at best, and it's more likely just straight up psuedoscience. But even if we decide to look past that blatant misrepresentation of the degree of certainty in psychology, it's still concerning. Because who are the "unsubs?" They're different. Their way of thinking must inherently differ from the general population's, otherwise the BAU wouldn't be able to generate a unique profile. So what's so dangerous about portraying criminals as objectively different?
It helps create an "us" vs. "them" barrier that isn't real.
"Criminal Minds" assumes that there are criminals, and then there are normal people. The suspects are so profoundly "other" that we can assure ourselves we could never be like them in any way. But all criminals are human. And we, the viewers, are human. So what separates us from the killers? The answer for most people, especially the BAU, is that they must be sick.
It's easy to think this. Empathetic, almost. Instead of believing that these unsubs are inherently evil people, we give them the benefit of the doubt. As a friend once put it, "You want to feel bad for them, because they're clearly so sick, but you can't excuse it either, because that's how they all are." And that right there is why I hate the show so much. Nearly every single suspect is mentally ill, and it is convincing kind, intelligent people that all criminals must be sick.
I could rattle off numbers to you about how people with mental illness are several times less likely to commit a violent crime than a neurotypical person, or about how people with mental illness actually represent a disproportionately large percentage of victims of violent crimes, but that stuff probably won't stop you from watching the show, right? Because it's good! You'll tell me all about the BAU characters, how you watch it mostly just because you love Garcia (who doesn't?) and how the show isn't really about the unsubs, but about the team.
To which I can only say this: pick something unusual about yourself, something the media picks on or misrepresents. Maybe you're bisexual, or in a sorority or a ginger. OK, now imagine there was an entire show dedicated to explaining why you are inherently different, deficient and dangerous. It sounds ridiculous, right? That's because it is. But people will tell you that the main characters (who are of course all straight, anti-Greek or natural blondes) are the real point of the show. It doesn't matter that there would be no show at all without the assumed depravity of bisexuals, sorority girls or gingers. It doesn't matter that there is absolutely no science to support anything that's said in the show. And worst of all, it doesn't matter that people actually believe the false information the show is spreading.
Well it matters to me. And I hope it matters to you. Because even if you don't have a mental illness, someone you know does, and odds are, you don't go around thinking they're a serial killer. They're your RA, your professor, your best friend, and they deserve better than "Criminal Minds."
